Demon Inside

Chapter 22

She started to sweat as she buttoned her jacket. True to form, Spud had selected a skirt she normally wore in the evening—it was shorter than work generally called for—and a summery camisole. Whatever. Given how pale she looked, maybe it was better if no one focused on her face too much. Not that her cleavage was anything to write home about.

“What do I do about it?” she asked, pulling up her stocking.

“Hmm?” His eyes tracked the movements of her hands. “Oh. Just relax. If you don’t panic about it, it won’t be so bad. It’s not like this is some crazy force that’s going to overtake you at any moment and force you to do things, especially once you get matters sorted out with your demons. It scared you, right, more than actually bothering you physically?”

Funny. She hadn’t thought about it that way before, but he was right. It was the creepy awfulness of wanting to drink blood, more than the actual desire to do so, that had bothered her. She nodded.

“It’s just a desire, not a demand. You’re not a slave to it. It—you—have specific triggers. You can avoid those or you can learn to accept them and try to find another way to deal with them. It’s only a problem because you made it one. Oh, and sex is always a good way to get your mind off it, you know.”

She rolled her eyes, but couldn’t help smiling. “You’re so helpful.”

“I try.”

She dug her compact out of her purse and smeared a little powder on. Ugh. Blotchy skin, bags under her eyes…and so many unanswered questions, still, that she thought her head might explode, although—she hoped—not literally. Of course, if Ktana Leyak got hold of her, it was entirely possible.

Unless Orion Maldon had told the truth and knew how to defeat her.

“We’ll talk more later,” he said. “Unless you’ve decided to go home after Winston leaves.”

“Talking sounds good.” She still hadn’t even asked him about whether his demons were picking on hers…not that one explosion meant much. Not that the connection was even confirmed. Coincidences did happen, even when it seemed like they shouldn’t.

“We’ll see if—What the hell?”

Screams of pain tore through the door, mingled with shouts from Malleus and Maleficarum. Greyson started running, Megan right behind him, her heels clicking on the spotless floor.

They burst through the door of the study, where Greyson stopped so abruptly that Megan ran right into him. He hardly noticed. Neither did she.

Orion Maldon glowed like an LED light, sitting in his chair with sweat pouring down his face. Megan could practically see the air above him shimmer as his blood heated, as he got redder and redder until she expected to see his tears boil and sizzle down his tight cheeks. Heat rose from his skin and canceled out the chill of Winston’s rage.

Winston leaned against Greyson’s desk, his arms folded and his brows drawn. At their abrupt entrance, he glanced up.

“Nice to see you again, Megan,” he said, surely the most incongruous greeting Megan had ever received.

“Um…you too.”

“Winston,” Greyson said. “Far be it from me to interfere, but what are you doing?”

“Orion deserves to be punished. You guys do it your way. This is ours.”

“Of course. But we still have a lot of questions to ask him. If you wouldn’t mind—”

“What questions? He betrayed me. He made a deal with Templeton Black and allowed Templeton to almost bring the Accuser into your House. To defeat our own! I had no idea he was involved in that. The disloyalty…” He shook his head. “I know we were going to discuss his punishment, but I hope you’ll forgive me if I say I’ve already made the decision.”

Megan glanced at Orion. His eyes weren’t bulging anymore. Instead his lids were closing, his head slumping to the side. He was dying, right there beside her, and she couldn’t do or say anything to stop it.

“I gave him retchia, Win. You can’t kill him under my roof, not if I’m aware of it.”

“I’ll take him outside.”

“Vergadering is outside.”

“Oh, yes.” Winston looked thoughtful. “I did notice them. They’re going to want him first thing in the morning, aren’t they?”

“I promised them, yes.”

“Asterope Green?”

Greyson nodded.

Winston sighed. “Why you let that witch get so close to you I’ll never understand. We’re not meant to mix with them, you know.” His gaze settled on Megan, who had the uncomfortable feeling that both men were in complete agreement but only one was brave enough to say it. Or rather, only one of them was keeping his mouth shut because he wanted to stay in her bed.

“Orion says he knows how to beat the leyak,” Greyson said.

“He’s a liar. What would he know about leyaks?”

“If we figured out the connection between the Yezer who exploded and mine,” Megan cut in, “maybe he did too.”

Greyson shot her a glance. Oops. Well, not exactly oops. She hadn’t really had a chance to talk to him about it, what with the vomiting and the cannibalism taking up so much of their time.

Winston sighed. “I’d say you were overestimating Orion’s capabilities, but after what he did—what he tried to do—with the Accuser, I don’t know I’d believe it myself.”

“He was a buddy of Temp’s from way back,” Greyson said. “Who knows what they talked about?”

They were silent for a moment, then Winston nodded. “I guess it’s worth a—What the hell?”

Megan had already started to jump away when Greyson’s arm caught her and pushed her back, trying to put more distance between her and Orion Maldon as he began seizing.

Pinkish foam oozed from between his tight lips and ran down his chin. He flopped out of the chair, onto the floor, a high-pitched sound, a keening, coming from his throat. Megan’s demon heart twisted and wiggled; her fingers dug into Greyson’s hand.

“It’s her,” she whispered. “Greyson it’s her, you have to do something, you have to stop her—”

He didn’t argue, or say it was impossible, even though she knew it should have been. He didn’t ask how she knew. He just crossed the room to the fireplace and picked up the poker, holding it in front of him like a baseball bat.

Megan clasped her hands over her face, but couldn’t resist peeking out through her fingers. She didn’t want to watch this, but it was like a gory accident—no. Not like a gory accident. It was a gory accident, about to happen in the middle of the antique oriental rug on the floor of Greyson’s lovely study, and in her panicked state she didn’t even care. She just wanted the threat gone. She couldn’t face Ktana Leyak again, not in her current state. Her demon heart might be pumping merrily away in her chest, but the human one had had just about all it could take.

Orion started to swell, the thin navy fabric of his shirt ripping down his spine to reveal flesh mottling blue and purple. Greyson raised the poker and started to swing it down, but Winston caught it. The sound of the metal hitting his flesh made Megan wince. How had he not just broken every bone in his hand?

“My rubenda,” Winston said.

“Sorry.” Greyson dipped his head and handed over the poker, while sweat trickled down Megan’s temple and she clenched her fists to keep from grabbing the fucking poker herself. What was the matter with these two? Didn’t they realize how close they were? That they didn’t even know if this would work?

Winston brought the poker down in a savage arc. Blood and tissue spattered everywhere as Orion’s head exploded like a cockroach under a brick.

Someone shrieked, long and loud, raising the hairs on the back of Megan’s neck. For a moment she thought it was her, but it wasn’t. This came from elsewhere, circling the room, brushing past all of them before disappearing with a tiny pop.

“Eshti raika,” Winston gasped. His casual dove gray trousers and white shirt were spotted with gore. Megan looked down; she and Greyson both resembled extras from the set of a slasher film. “How did that happen?”

“She must have been in there the whole time,” Greyson said. Megan thought he looked a bit pale. She was certain she was. Her skin was numb. “She must have called and turned him in to Vergadering, Meg, just like she got you arrested last week.”

“She—” Megan stopped. Of course Ktana Leyak had tipped off the police. They’d said it was a female voice.

“And she heard our conversations.” Greyson raised a hand to his head, pinching the bridge of his nose for a second. “Now she knows the story of your father and Orion—if she didn’t already. She knows something about the layout of this house. She knows you two figured out why some demons are exploding.”

“We’re not sure of that,” Megan said. “It’s just a theory. There’s no proof, since every house has lost at least one demon and…they can’t all have attacked my Yezer. Can they?”

He met her gaze. “Anything’s possible. Mine are ordered to leave yours alone, but personal squabbles happen all the time.”

A weight she didn’t know was still on her shoulders lifted. Not much of a relief, but a relief just the same. She nodded, her lips curving into a slight smile.

Winston cleared his throat. “I haven’t ordered any of my rubendas to go after your family either, Megan.”

“I know. Thanks.”

“That doesn’t mean the other Gretnegs haven’t,” Greyson said. “Unless…unless she’s been possessing them, in order to attack yours, and not the other way around. Who’s been attacked, Meg?”

Her evening bag sat on the desk, behind Winston. He followed her pointing finger and handed it to her, with that particular uncomfortable air most men had when touching a woman’s purse. Like it was going to explode and spray them with tampons and cooties.

She pulled the lists out and handed them over.

“Okay.” His dark eyes scanned the sheets as he shuffled them. “So all of the victims, for lack of a better word, are still with you?”

“You think she was trying to convince them to leave?”

Greyson nodded.

“But I’ve lost some too.”

“Perhaps they agreed to join her, but something went wrong,” Winston said. “Perhaps it’s their connection to you that drives her out.”

“Then how are they managing to leave me?”

“They’re doing it themselves.” Greyson shrugged. “You’re connected to them as a whole, the individual bonds are pretty weak. So she might not be able to undo it, but they can.”

“You’re probably right,” Winston said, “but it doesn’t explain how she managed to possess Orion. That shouldn’t have happened. He should be too powerful.”

“Unless he invited her.”

Both men looked at her.

“Well, I don’t know,” she said, a little defensively. “Orion obviously liked to play with the big boys, right? If he tried to do some sort of deal with the Accuser sixteen years ago, why wouldn’t he try something else now?”

“To get her in here,” Winston said. His blue eyes—so like Orion’s and yet so different—lit up. “To get to you, my dear. Your little Meegra is her goal after all.”

“Yes, we already knew that,” Megan said, with a businesslike impatience she didn’t feel. “But—”

“Your demon is unspecified,” Greyson said. “It could become anything, since you haven’t done the Haikken Kra. She might not have known that before.”

“She had to know it.”

“She might not have known what it meant.”

Winston snorted. “That’s a bit of a stretch, isn’t it? The Ancient Ones aren’t stupid, Grey.”

“But we’ve never had anyone quite like Megan either. She hasn’t tried to possess her, right?” He glanced at Megan. “She hasn’t, has she?”

Megan shook her head.

“So she’s afraid of you.”

“She hasn’t tried to possess you either.”

Greyson shrugged. “She wouldn’t. She’s not capable of possessing other demons unless she’s somehow connected to them—like the Yezer—or unless she’s invited. Orion must not have known what she would do to him when she came out.”

“Or maybe she said she wouldn’t.” Winston glanced around, then picked up his glass from the desk behind him and took a swallow. “If she told him she just wanted to eavesdrop and Orion thought he’d be killed in the morning anyway, why wouldn’t he let her in?”

“That would explain why she didn’t manage to materialize, too.” Greyson sat and pulled Megan down to sit beside him. Her legs ached. She hadn’t realized how stiffly she was holding them, her knees locked in an attempt to stop them shaking. “She doesn’t get power from other demons. Remember what I told you at Mitchell’s, Meg? Leyaks are generally dangerous to humans, not other demons. They kill people—sometimes they possess them, but usually they just steal their energy. That’s why she hasn’t been able to stick around for very long when we’ve seen her. She’s trying to do something she’s not meant to do.”

“But she did possess a human, at the café.”

“An old man,” he said. “Elderly and in poor health. He didn’t have the energy to power a flashlight, much less a demon.”

“So Orion found her,” Megan said, understanding. “And he knew my demon was…adaptable, because what I felt at his house, that I could use his power if I wanted to, he felt too? He knew it?”

“It’s the best explanation I can think of.”

“Orion always wanted more,” Winston said with a heavy sigh. Megan realized with a start that she’d forgotten all about Orion’s body, still and silent on the floor while they talked over him as though he were a needy pet they were ignoring. “That’s why he never went further. He was smart enough. But when I made him a lakri…that’s when I realized his ambition wasn’t tempered with anything. He wasn’t patient. He wasn’t willing to put in his time. So he never got closer. He just wasn’t…good enough to be closer to me.”

It was one of the saddest epitaphs Megan had ever heard.

“Feeling better?”

She tied the belt of his bathrobe around her waist and started rolling up the sleeves. “Actually, yes. Does that even make sense?”

The shower and snack helped clear her head, but there was still so much to discuss, so many facts and worries and feelings to slog through. The kind of things she would have advised her patients it was unhealthy to hide from.

But she didn’t have any patients anymore. Was she even really a counselor anymore? Her show probably didn’t count.

Which meant that as an almost-official-not-counselor, she could engage in whatever unhealthy avoidance she wanted to.

Greyson glanced up from pouring their drinks. By unspoken agreement they’d decided champagne was inappropriate under the circumstances, so he fixed them both Jack and Cokes. “Everybody feels better after eating and taking a shower. It’s a scientific fact.”

“See? All those years of college wasted, when I could have just charged people for sandwiches and some hot water. I knew it.”

He smiled. “Tera said they’d probably want—”

“Can we not talk about it? Right now, I mean. I think I’ve had enough for one day.”

“Of course. We can talk about anything you want. It’ll wait until morning.”

She sipped her drink, looked around the room. “I can’t think of anything to say.”

“We don’t have to talk at all,” he suggested, stroking her back with his left hand and leaning down to kiss her neck. “We could just go to sleep, of course, but…I think this might be more fun.”

Part of Megan was horrified by the thought. When she closed her eyes, even after the shower and snack, she kept seeing the pool of red spreading from Orion’s head and ruining the intricate pattern of the carpet. Or the dungeon, again, the flames almost licking the ceiling, almost finding her hiding place…

Too bad other parts of her were intensely interested. What better way to drive the memories of chilling horror away? To replace those images with considerably more pleasant ones?

“Are you going to sleep with Justine?”

He stopped moving but stayed where he was, his face buried in the curve between her shoulder and her neck, and his arm around her waist. “No, bryaela, I’m not going to sleep with Justine.”

“But if she—”

“She’ll accept a substitute. She always did with Temp.” His lips resumed their lazy journey.

“But you were the substitute, weren’t you?”

“It was part of my job.” Strong fingers tilted her chin up, so their eyes met. His were deep, unfathomable; but she realized as she looked into them how shaken he’d been earlier by the presence of Ktana Leyak, saw his need to put it behind him was no less intense than hers. “It’s not anymore.”

Megan forced her relief not to show. “So what is part of your job now?”

“Ah, that’s a secret. If I told you, I’d have to hypnotize you to make you forget.”

“I think the line is ‘I’d have to kill you.’”

“No. If I killed you I wouldn’t be able to do this anymore.” He caught her earlobe between his teeth and sucked it softly. She shivered. “And then you wouldn’t do that anymore and I do so enjoy it when you do that…”

She swallowed. Uncomfortable images and thoughts still played in her mind, but it was hard to concentrate on them while his silver-smooth voice whispered some of John Donne’s finer lines in her tingling ear and his hands illustrated them on her heating skin.

What the hell. A little forgetfulness was just what the counselor ordered.