“Ready?” Ian’s casual tone belied the new flare in his aura as he held out a pouch containing several magic-infused stones.
I gave him a level look as I took it. “More than ready.”
Ereshki had said if I knew where she was, I’d murder her and lie in wait for Dagon next to her bones. To give her credit, it was a good idea. I was just changing up the order of events.
We waited until it was so dark that only another vampire or demon could see. This section of road lacked streetlights and the lodge’s exterior illumination had long gone out, allowing blackness to swallow the area. Only the occasional headlight bit through the darkness. Thus concealed, Ian and I began placing the stones around the perimeter of the former ski lodge. Ian set his at the five tips of the pentagram’s star. I placed mine at the five vertices of the inner pentagram. I didn’t have the stealth advantage of teleporting, so in case I was spotted, I wore my usual glamour. Ereshki had only ever seen me in my true form, so she wouldn’t recognize me while I was wearing my slim, blonde Law Guardian appearance.
When we finished placing our stones, we drew a magic circle around the entire pentagram, then went back to our hiding spot. There, I began to fill the double-enclosed space with more magic, taking my time so the spell would be undetectable to all but the most attuned sorcerer.
“Done,” I said over an hour later.
Ian’s aura flared again. “Now, we wait for Dagon to use his tie in Ereshki’s brand to find her.”
Ereshki had said that Dagon checked in personally with her for updates when he wanted one. After everything that had happened, he’d want an update, all right. I only hoped he hadn’t already gotten one in the eighteen hours since Ereshki had escaped.
“If we’re lucky, it won’t be long until you get to kill her,” I said, trying to stay optimistic.
“Impossible.” Fast as a bolt of lightning, Ian’s tone changed to the deadly slice of a knife. “She laughed at what she did to you. Every second she lives after that is too long.”
I’ve had poetry written for me that didn’t make me feel the same warmth.
“You get her, and I get Dagon,” I said softly. “We’re ending this even if we have to sit here all week.”
He grinned, his expression changing from intense avenger back to his normal, cheerful arrogance. “Hope it’s not that long. My bollocks are already freezing into ice cubes.”
It always circled back to genitals with men. “They’ll thaw,” I said dryly, and began unpacking the rest of our bags.
Half an hour later, we were redressed in the tactical gear Ian had brought, with bone knives sheathed at our belts and other weapons strapped to our arms and legs. Then we crouched behind the remains of the fallen tree and waited.
I gave the setting sun a hopeful look despite it being the third one I’d seen from my cramped perch behind the tree. Darkness meant another chance that Dagon would arrive—maybe. This would be a hell of a time for the demon to get modern and contact Ereshki by text instead of a personal visit.
We were running low on blood bags since we were both eating more to keep our energy at peak levels. We were also getting texts from Ian’s people saying that Silver was acting “morose.” I hadn’t liked leaving him behind, but an outdoor stakeout was no place for a pet. I also couldn’t risk Silver getting hurt when Dagon—hopefully—arrived and the fighting began.
“You’re sure Ereshki’s still in there?” I couldn’t help but ask. This whole time, she hadn’t once left to get food or water.
Ian gave me a baleful look. “For the third time since we started this stakeout, yes.”
He made no effort to hide his annoyance, but I was starting to wonder if Ereshki had tricked us. We’d never gotten close enough to the ski lodge to verify that Ereshki was inside since we hadn’t wanted to risk being spotted. Could she have soaked an object in Dagon’s power and left it there to throw us off her trail? She knew that Ian had the Dagon-power-sensing spell in him, so despite my vow not to kill her, she might have taken precautions to avoid being detected.
Several hours later, I was so convinced of this theory, I was about to summon my friend Leah. The ghost could enter the lodge to check if Ereshki was in there without being spotted. In fact, why hadn’t I thought of this days ago? If Ereshki had tricked us, she could be continents away by now—
Ian suddenly tensed and his aura crackled with enough energy to make me feel as if I’d been stung by a swarm of bees. I gripped his arm, anticipation rocketing through me.
“Is it Dagon? Is he here?” I whispered.
“Yes,” Ian replied with quiet savageness.
I threw the blanket off us. Then, with barely any noise, we both got to our feet. I palmed one of my demon-bone knives before I met Ian’s eyes. The last time we’d ambushed Dagon, Ian had died. I wouldn’t let that happen this time, no matter what.
He gave me a look I couldn’t read as he handed me the sparkling blue diamond. Magic crawled up my arm, painful in its potency, but we needed every bit of it. I closed my fist over the diamond, and Ian took my clenched hand in his.
“This time, we win,” he said as if reading my thoughts.
“This time, we win,” I echoed. No matter what.
His hand tightened; then our surroundings blurred.
That blur stopped moments later, revealing an interior room on the first floor of the lodge. It was stripped except for a few benches, lockers, and counters where skiers must have once checked in. Now, graffiti covered the walls and trash covered most of the age-bowed wooden floors. The stench of old urine, feces, and garbage was almost overwhelming.
But beyond that, I smelled a hint of lilacs and lavender. Ereshki’s scent. Ian was right, she was here, possibly on the second floor. Another sniff revealed the harsher scent of sulfur. She wasn’t alone. Ian was right again. Dagon was here.
I went to the far side of the room, then looked at Ian. He checked the coordinates programmed into his smart watch and nodded, confirming that I was at the center of our pentagram.
I bent down, cleared the garbage away, and slammed the blue diamond onto the floor hard enough to puncture the wooden floorboards. Magic exploded with such a tangible rush that the garbage blasted out in all directions.
I felt that magic find the stones at the five tips of the pentagram’s star and activate them. Then it found the five stones in the circle surrounding the pentagram and filled those, too. But the circle allowed the magic to go no further, so it boomeranged back toward the blue diamond with the force of a thousand speeding trains. Feeling it coming, I ducked and braced.
The boards covering the windows exploded inward. Wood shards and the window’s remaining glass fragments pelted me before the magic caught me in a full-body blow that slammed me up and into the ceiling. Ian was thrown backward hard enough to tear a line of ski lockers off the wall. My head rang, my body ached, and I could barely see through the haze of garbage that swirled around like the world’s ugliest confetti, but despite all that, I let out a hoarse cry.
“Got you!”
The magic that had blown us off our feet now prevented anyone from entering the pentagram that surrounded the entire lodge and some of its grounds—critical to keeping Dagon from bringing in demon reinforcements. But the circle around the pentagram was the real trap. It kept everyone inside its limits until the sun shone through the blue diamond that now lay like a discarded toy on the garbage-strewn floor. No way in, no way out. One way or the other, our war with Dagon ended tonight.
Ian untangled himself from the lockers, then threw the mangled mess aside to check on me. “I’m fine,” I assured him, even though my arm felt like it was paralyzed from holding the diamond while all that magic funneled through it.
“Then let’s get the sod.” Blood practically dripped from Ian’s tone. “The spell your father put on Dagon should have him on his knees from being this close to me—”
“I am not on my knees,” a familiar voice hissed.
Both of us turne
d.
Dagon was at the top of the staircase connecting the second floor to this room. His blue eyes gleamed with malice and his pale blond hair swirled from the residual waves of magic, but as described, he wasn’t on his knees. He did lean heavily on Ereshki, though, and she looked like she wasn’t enjoying being his version of a pair of crutches. That could be because she looked exhausted. Whatever she’d been doing the past three days had taken a toll on her.
“What do you think you accomplished with that spell?” Dagon continued in the same snakelike tone.
“Consider the doors on this place locked,” I replied with deep satisfaction.
Ian gave the demon a brilliant smile. “Used the blue diamond I stole from you to anchor the spell.”
Dagon didn’t look afraid at hearing he was locked in with us. I hoped that was overconfidence and not something more ominous.
Ereshki appeared rattled, though, which was cold comfort. “You broke your vow,” she said. “Dagon told me you would.”
“He was wrong,” I replied. “I’m not going to kill you, Ereshki. Ian, however, has other intentions.”
Ian’s smile made ice roll over my skin despite it being aimed at Ereshki, not me. If death indulged in foreplay before getting to the final act, it would start with that smile.
“Shall we, poppet?” he purred at her.
Ereshki shuddered. Dagon spat. “We’re all trapped in here for however long your spell lasts, so if you want me, here I am!”
He was taunting me to charge him. Doing anything that Dagon wanted me to do would backfire, so I stayed where I was. Ian must have thought it was a trap, too. He put a hand on my arm.
“Don’t move,” he said through newly gritted teeth. “I feel something building . . .”
I pulled the pin on my other nature, trusting that more than whatever the demon was about to do. Power flooded me, blacking out my vision while sending my other senses into overdrive. I sent that power toward Dagon, seeking every drop of liquid in his body. Then I tightened my power around them and yanked. He couldn’t hurt us if he was too dehydrated to move.
Dagon’s fluids hit the floor in a wide swath of red I felt rather than saw. The crash I heard was Dagon crumpling to the ground, Ereshki unable to bear the full brunt of his weight any longer. Then the multiple satisfying thumps must have been his body hitting the steps as Dagon fell down the stairs.
I had an instant to savor the sound before Dagon’s magic slammed into me with such force, all of my senses blinked out.
Chapter 40
I opened my eyes, revealing that I was now crumpled in the same spot where my vampire half had stood. I rose to my feet, noting with detached surprise that everything hurt. I couldn’t see a wound, so there was no obvious source for the pain.
Ian was across the room, his outstretched arm almost touching Dagon, who was in a heap at the foot of the stairs. I grasped my bone knife and started toward the demon—only to have an invisible wall stop me. Agony shot through me as a wide circle around me flared into view. Then it vanished, showing only the warped wood floors and carpet of trash.
“’ull me . . .’way . . . from him,” Dagon rasped.
Ereshki hurried down the stairs, giving Ian wary looks as she stepped around him. He still looked unconscious, but she was careful not to touch him as she grabbed Dagon’s arms and hauled him away from Ian. She kept away from me, too, making a wide berth as she dragged the demon to the entrance of the ski lodge.
“Far enough?” she asked with a grunt of exertion.
“’or . . . now.”
I tried to yank any remaining fluid out of Dagon, but felt my power smack against the walls of the circle that imprisoned me. The circle didn’t merely trap me inside its invisible circumference; it also succeeded in trapping my abilities, too.
“Clever,” I said. My vampire nature howled; her form of agreement, I supposed.
Dagon’s smile split his severely cracked lips, but he didn’t have enough blood left in his body for them to bleed. Then he said something too garbled for me to translate.
“Don’t bother talking until you heal enough to speak intelligibly. It appears I have the time to wait.”
Dagon held up his middle finger. No translation required there. Then light burst from his chest, briefly blinding me. A few blinks later, the flashes were gone and I could see again.
The demon’s skin was now as hydrated and vibrant as a youth in full vigor. He tapped his lips as if admiring their plump smoothness, then smiled at me with boyish charm, as if that detracted from the new, ugly spark in his eyes.
“How do I sound now?”
In reply, I hurled my power at him. It hit the walls, lighting them up. In the same instant, another full-body ache made me wish I could rip my bones out because they felt as if they’d caught fire. My vampire half howled in pain, too. And rage.
This isn’t helping! I felt/heard her snap.
Did she think she could do better? Very well, then! I wasn’t the one who’d fallen victim to the demon’s clever trap. Let her deal with its repercussions. At least she’d earned them.
This situation is all yours, I thought, and fell back into the cage she’d long ago forged for me.
I slammed back into the mental driver’s seat with a gasp that made Dagon’s grin widen. Hatred flooded me along with the pain that had made my celestial nature decide to take a vacation day. I bit back my next gasp, gritting out a curse instead.
“How the fuck did you heal so quickly?”
Dagon tilted his head in a friendly way. “Burned through my last extra soul, of course. I used the others to give Ereshki the raw magical material to formulate these traps. What do you think she’s been doing for the past three days? The circles are linked to each other, and they were both set to activate as soon as my blood touched them. I knew you couldn’t resist using your blood-ripping powers on me, and I wasn’t wrong.”
I wanted to scream with frustration, but that would only delight him. I had to think up a way out of this. Quickly, before Dagon tired of gloating and got down to murdering us.
“Your extra souls?” I clucked my tongue in a disapproving way. “Have you been collecting on your demon deals before their expiration date to get so many, so fast?”
“No, you stupid whore,” he replied in that same cheery tone. “While you were busy scouring the globe looking for the other resurrected people, I was slicing open their new bodies and taking back the power they stole from me. Acquiring their souls again was equally easy. People will agree to anything to make very creative torture stop.”
I closed my eyes. Those poor people. “You used a spell to trace your power in them from the very start.”
His snort opened my eyes. “I didn’t have to. They rose from their graves, and I already knew where those graves were because I’m the one who killed them. I only left you the ghoul in Mycenae as a trap. Who do you think uploaded that video of him screeching in ancient Greek?”
Dammit, dammit, dammit! Why had my father tasked me with tracking down the other resurrected people when all along, Dagon had had a virtual map to their locations? Hadn’t my father known that? Or, in his usual, apathetic way, had he not cared that Dagon had a huge advantage while I’d had nothing except an endless supply of false Internet leads to comb through?
“Now, he’s the only one left,” Dagon said, with a glance at Ian that made me hurl the strongest spell I knew at the walls confining me. They glowed amber from top to bottom, the circle flaring into fire before I dropped to my knees from the agony that shot through me.
Third time wasn’t the charm.
“Keep it up,” Dagon said in an approving tone. “Every time you touch or use magic on those walls, you trigger their defense mechanism. I am older than the creation of the human race and I’ve had over a month to plan my revenge, so I assure you, I thought of everything. Don’t feel like a failure,” he added mockingly. “You came closer to killing me than anyone ever has. I actually felt afraid back at that the
me park several weeks ago.” Then his voice turned caressing. “Then, you and Ian lured me into a trap by leaving just enough traces of my tracking spell in the Simargl for me to follow. Now, I trapped you by using that delicious spell inside Ian to lure you both to Ereshki after she contacted you. Fitting, don’t you think?”
I did not, but I did glance at Ereshki long enough to catch her taunting smile. “At last, you die, girl.”
She’d called me Ariel in her last communication. Now, I was “girl”—the only name Dagon and my other captors had given me.
“Oh, she doesn’t die yet,” Dagon said with obvious relish. “A quick death is too easy. No, she took what I loved from me—my power—so I’m going to take what she loves from her, and all she’ll be able to do is watch and scream.”
Ereshki’s clear brown eyes gleamed with malevolent glee as she glanced at Ian. “How will you kill him?”
Dagon leaned closer as if sharing a secret, but his gaze was all for me as he said, “You’ll see.”
Ian groaned, yanking my attention back to him. He rolled over, shielding his eyes as if seeing something too bright to look at. Then, he bolted to his feet, bone knife at the ready in one hand while his other flung a tactile spell at the circle entrapping him. It glowed, illuminating a circumference far wider than mine, before pain slammed into me and my own circle glowed in response. The sudden, merciless slice of pain once again dropped me to my knees, then my gasp became a choking sound as blood poured from my mouth.
Dagon’s laugh rang in my ears, covering whatever Ian said. I only caught the tail end of “. . . rip your entrails out and give them away as party favors!” before another bellyful of blood spraying from my mouth claimed all my attention. It felt like Dagon had teleported a chainsaw inside of me.