Demon Inside

Chapter 23

“He bashed his own head in? I’m supposed to believe that?”

“No. Your witches did that.” Greyson shrugged. “We tried to heal him so you could take him in, but…he was beyond saving.”

“Our weapons did not do this, Grey. Look at that!” Tera gestured toward her feet, where Orion Maldon’s body lay, mostly covered by a white sheet, on a rickety gurney. The damage was obvious. His entire face had sunk when his skull fractured, like a deflating balloon.

“I’ve seen it, thank you.”

“We sent smoke after him, that was all.”

“Now hold on, that was not all. Have you seen my fence? The gate is practically destroyed.”

Megan spoke up for the first time. It was hard to follow the conversation for some reason. Three cups of coffee had failed to perk her up, and she was about to start on a fourth. The week was finally catching up with her. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d slept an untroubled night. “They were shooting something else at him, Tera. Something…they looked like black rocks, and they exploded.”

Tera’s brow furrowed as she glanced from Megan to Greyson and back. “Really?”

Megan nodded. “I was there, I saw it.” Please believe me. I’m already having to lie to you, and you’re my friend and I hate that.

“That’s…well. I don’t see that there are any particles of that in his hair. It looks to me like somebody hit him with something.”

“The blast knocked free one of the finials,” Greyson said. “It flew into the back of his head.”

“Shit. This is just what I need,” Tera said. “If you’d given him to us last night we could have saved him.”

“I couldn’t, Tera. You know that. I couldn’t ignore his request, especially when I had no idea why you guys were after him.”

“Are…are you going to get in trouble for this?” Megan bit her lip. If this would cost Tera her job…and it was almost Christmas too. Never mind that Tera didn’t celebrate. Nobody should lose their job four days before Christmas, it was a crime against humanity—and witches were close enough to human, right?

Tiredness always made her sentimental. Or grumpy. Today it looked like sentimental.

“No. He’s right. It doesn’t sound like protocol was followed, so the ones in trouble will be the soldiers, not me. This wasn’t my affair anyway, I just stepped in because of you. No harm done. Except, of course, that now we can’t find out why he killed those witches.”

“Killed witches?” Greyson leaned against his desk and crossed his ankles in front of him, clearly ready to enjoy himself.

Tera colored. “Yes. Um, those witches who died, the ones I mentioned at the funeral? It looks like he was the one who did it, so…sorry about that. About suspecting you, I mean.”

“No problem.”

“But you have to admit you were a pretty likely suspect. It wasn’t exactly stupid of me to think you were behind it.”

“Of course.” Not a hint of sarcasm colored his voice.

“Well,” Megan said, clapping her hands together, trying to get her blood to circulate. The sleeves of Greyson’s shirt flopped from her arms. Her own clothes were being cleaned. “Tera, do you want some coffee or something?”

“I guess I’ll have water. Is Winston Lawden coming? He was here last night, right?”

“He’ll be here any minute,” Greyson said. “He said he was on his way.”

And he was. Winston arrived just after they’d settled Tera in a chair with a glass of water.

“Miss Green. What a lovely surprise.”

Tera raised her eyebrows. “Mr. Lawden. I have a few questions for you.”

He shook his head. “I don’t see what sorts of answers I might have. Greyson called me last night to inform me your witches had gravely injured Orion. He was dead by the time I got here.”

“Are you sure?”

“Are you implying something, Miss Green?”

“Only that if one of your people killed my witches, you might know something about it.”

Megan choked on her drink, but Winston only smiled indulgently. “Miss Green, I can assure you I did not. I’ve recently discovered Orion was…acting outside his authority, shall we say? This had nothing to do with me.”

Greyson must have called him while she was in the shower or when he got up in the morning. Or maybe demons simply had plenty of practice at this sort of thing, which was likely. She knew how quickly Greyson’s mind moved. Usually she wasn’t too bad herself, but she just couldn’t seem to get it together this morning. The coffee actually seemed to be working against her rather than helping; she was starting to feel sick.

Two witches came to collect Orion’s body, their faces fixed in disapproving sneers as they pulled the sheet over his ruined head and lifted the gurney with a clang of metal against metal.

“This will still be investigated,” Tera said. “Just because we can no longer question Orion Maldon doesn’t mean we’re done looking into his actions.”

“I’m an open book,” Winston said. A whisper of cold wafted over Megan’s skin. His voice echoed strangely in her head. Was he dragging out his words, or was it just her? He sounded like a record played on too slow a speed. “Feel free to make an appointment to speak with me, if you must.”

“How about now?”

“Am I suspected? Are you declaring me so? Because if not, you can make an appointment, and if so, I’m permitted my own witnesses. Uninvolved witnesses.”

Megan’s cup fell from her hand. The couch was so soft…she could just lie down and go to sleep…

“Megan? Megan!”

Greyson’s hands on her shoulders, shaking her. Maybe a little more roughly than he needed to. She was just tired, is all. Didn’t it make sense that she would be, after everything that had happened? And they hadn’t ended up going to sleep until almost three. So much to do, so much to discuss…

“Le’me ’lone.” She brushed feebly at his arm, while Tera’s and Winston’s voices joined the chorus of concern and she heard pounding in the distance. Someone knocking somewhere…why couldn’t she open her eyes?

More voices. One sounded like Roc, which didn’t make any sense because Roc wouldn’t be here. He was with the other Yezer, in his little room that looked like Currier & Ives threw up in it.

“All of them…she took…destroyed…everywhere…” The voices sounded like faraway whispers, like television filtered up stairs and under a closet door. She used to like to play in the closet, when she was little…it felt so secret and safe in there. Just like now.

“Fuck! Meg, wake up, sit up, come on…”

“God, she’s so pale.” Gentle hands patted her cheeks.

“Is she breathing?”

“Shit, get…”

Hands on her shoulders, lifting her from the couch, then sliding up to cup her face. She mumbled feebly and tried to push him away. Just like a man, couldn’t he see she was tired?

His lips pressed against hers, forcing her to accept the kiss. “Go ’way,” she started to say, but when she opened her mouth his tongue slipped inside, along with a deep, low rush of burning power. It flew through her body, heating her from the inside, speeding her sluggish blood and making her gasp.

Her eyes opened, then closed again as she leaned forward, raising her hands to his shoulders, trying to pull him closer. Somewhere deep in her mind she remembered there were other people in the room, but it didn’t matter. She was waking up, unfurling like a butterfly, going from exhausted to normal to overheated with desire in the space of a few seconds.

Abruptly he pulled away. She reached for him, her eyes widening at the sight of his tense, pale face, but as she did, she caught movement out of the corner of her eye.

Tera’s and Winston’s backs were politely turned, but she was dimly aware that she’d moaned, or something, and her face grew hot. Or would have, if it wasn’t already. Her cheeks stung. How hard had they actually hit her?

Worse than that was the little body next to Tera. It was Roc. And if Roc was here, something was very wrong.

Wreckage.

That’s all it was.

Megan blinked back tears as she took in the little doors hanging on their hinges, the broken furniture scattered across the shining floor. At least, it had shone once. Now blood, sticky and dark, slicked the surface and spattered the walls. It formed a clotted sludge in the crevices joining the floors and walls and in the cracks between the floorboards.

Roc righted a chair and slumped into it. “She took everyone,” he said for the tenth time, repeating the words over and over as if he could make sense of the event by describing it. “I managed to get away…I don’t know how.”

“She probably let you go,” Greyson said. He stood beside Megan, holding her hand, just staring around the room. Megan knew he was imagining his own Iureanlier, thinking of the destruction that could have been visited there the night before if they hadn’t acted quickly enough.

Ktana Leyak had arrived shortly before dawn, somehow managing to remain inside one of Megan’s demons long enough to get back here, the one place they should have been safe. Their home.

When the alarm sounded, those Yezer out with their humans had come back, only to face their own destruction. Those who’d remained stalwart to Megan were torn apart. The others acquiesced quickly.

She’d spirited them away, Roc didn’t know where. And nobody was alive who did.

Megan reached inside herself, looking for the door, looking for the connection between herself and her demons. Her demon heart lay like lead in her chest, cold and unmoving. Dead. The doorknob turned and she braced herself for the truth. No flames hid behind it, no cold breath of power. The demon was gone. She was alone.

Greyson’s energy still buzzed through her body, keeping her awake and alert, but for how long?

Roc nodded. “She wanted Megan to know what she’d done. She wants her revenge.”

Megan’s knees buckled. Greyson held her by the waist and slid a chair beneath her before they gave out, but it was little comfort, especially not since through the handkerchief he’d laid down the cushion was spattered with tacky blood. She’d never thought this much about blood in her entire life and she’d certainly never had to see so much of it.

If the demon inside her was still alive, it would be leaping right now, wouldn’t it? Raging at her, clawing at her chest, desperate to feed?

If it was dead, what would happen to her? Sure, Greyson could still shove power into her. Her psychic abilities were still there, her ability to hold his energy intact. But how long could that last? How long would it be before she became an anchor dragging around his neck, something pitiful, a duty?

All that coffee she’d drunk earlier had left a horrible, sour taste in her mouth.

“Isn’t this revenge enough?” She didn’t bother to hide the bitterness in her voice. “What more is there?”

Her ears rang in the silence. High-pitched, like the whine of Brownian motion only children hear. Must be the shock. Or she was having problems with her ears. Just what she needed on top of everything else. Ear infections.

Maybe she could get diagnosed with Epstein-Barr or something, get some sort of medical help that way…

The whine grew louder and broke, then started again.

“What is that?” Greyson asked.

“What? You hear it too?”

“Of course I hear it.” He squeezed her hand and let go, picking his way through the panorama of destruction to an overturned sofa and flipping it up.

Another demon huddled beneath it, little eyes impossibly wide. Blood trickled down its forehead and formed a trail down its snoutlike nose. Its mouth opened and closed, trying to form words that would not come.

“Ashtenor!” Roc leaped for it, holding it—him—tight. “Ashtenor, how did you manage to survive?”

“Hid. Pretended…” Ashtenor shuddered.

“Do you know where she took them?” Greyson said. Roc glared at him, but he only shrugged. “We don’t have a lot of time and there are one or two things we need to figure out.”

“Tul azar,” Ashtenor whispered. “Tul azar Akuzi.”

Greyson and Roc exchanged glances.

“Tul azar Akuzi?” Roc asked. “Tresh tena?”

Ashtenor nodded. Megan watched a tear trickle down his rough, wrinkled cheek. She’d failed him, God, she’d failed all of them, she hadn’t protected them and now…now she didn’t know if she had enough energy left to protect herself, much less a thousand little demons. Now that her demon heart was dead, she didn’t have any way to—

If her demon heart was dead, or at least dormant, could it still stop her from practicing what Tera had taught her?

She couldn’t try it here. With her Yezer gone—and she strongly suspected Ktana Leyak was using their connection to Megan to suck her energy away, now that she thought about it—there simply wasn’t anywhere to draw power from. Except Greyson himself, and the thought of treating him like her personal battery made her squirm.

But Ashtenor huddled on the floor, staring at her with those damned Keane-painting eyes of his, and the words were out of her mouth before she had a chance to second-guess them.

“Greyson, I need some help.”

Bless him—or whatever one would do with demons—he didn’t ask why, or even look surprised. He just gave her what she wanted and brought Ashtenor over to her so she could hold him in her lap.

The connection was there, faint but still viable. Megan closed her eyes and reached for it. Greyson’s energy had become hers and now she gave it to Ashtenor, sending it sliding along the line connecting them.

His little eyes widened, then closed, as he snuggled into her. She’d never thought of them as her babies before. Well, they weren’t babies. Babies were good and innocent. Babies were hope. The Yezer Ha-Ra existed to cause pain.

But they were her pain causers. More now than before, when she’d forced herself to watch as Halarvus was punished, she felt the great expanse of what she owed them.

They weren’t inherently evil. They were part of life. Isn’t that what she’d always counseled her clients? Without the bad feelings, we wouldn’t appreciate the good ones?

Being in charge of the Yezer Ha-Ra, even just her small Meegra, was a responsibility not just to them, but to mankind. It was their job to tempt. It was the job of humanity to resist. Without that battle, what was the point of life?

So Megan held Ashtenor close, and breathed her borrowed power into him until his tears stopped and his color—a particularly unpleasant glaring orange—returned. She took care of him.

The way his Gretneg should.