Fury of the Demon

Chapter 14

Prickles of arcane energy flickered over my skin as they departed. I stood for a moment, watched the grass slowly struggle back upright where seconds earlier it had been crushed beneath them. My own life felt that way at times, pushed and changed by forces beyond my control.

But there are plenty of forces that are within my control, I sternly reminded myself. My life—and what I knew to be possible—had certainly shifted dramatically in the past couple of years, but I was still tough enough to roll with the punches. So far at least. It helped that I had an awesome posse of friends to back me up.

Smiling wryly, I returned inside. Voices carried from the hallway—Zack’s and Ryan’s—and cut off as the basement door closed with a dull thud. The two would likely be occupied for the evening while Zack tended Szerain.

The place felt crushingly empty with Mzatal gone and everyone else busy. I’d lived so many years alone, it seemed this should be the norm. But it wasn’t the norm. Not anymore. It was time for me to admit the truth: I liked living with others, both human and demon.

The bag with all of Bryce’s stuff sat in a lump in the hallway. After tugging on latex gloves, I hauled it to the laundry room, tossed bloody clothing straight into the washer and set his shoes aside, since they didn’t appear to have any blood on them. Also in the bag were his gear and weapons, all of it top quality. The nylon ankle holster and knife sheaths were unbloodied, but the leather shoulder holster that held his gun—a Glock 27, I noted with approval—had quite a bit on it. I carefully cleaned all traces of blood or other gunk from leather, gun, and knives, then tucked everything away in a cabinet and returned to the kitchen.

I scrounged in the fridge for a snack and laughed out loud when I found a plastic snap top container brimming with an Earth version of what I fondly called “cat turds”—Jekki’s demon realm delicacy that tasted anything but turd-like. I put half a dozen on a plate and headed for the living room. I figured I’d peruse Tracy’s journals for a bit then take a nice long hot bath, which I intended to follow with going the hell to bed.

It was tedious work, not at all helped by the fact that I didn’t really know what I was looking for, and could only hope I’d know it if/when I saw it. After half an hour of munching cat turds and poring through notebooks, folders, and binders, I decided the best analogy was a shopping trip to an utterly disorganized thrift shop. You had to search through mountains of useless shit in the thin hopes of stumbling upon a treasure. Except that in this case, Idris’s life depended on my finding that treasure.

I fought my way through a notebook with Farrah Fawcett on the cover that contained some excruciatingly bad poetry, and another plain yellow one with what looked like calculus homework interspersed with pages of basic summoning sigils. Tossing those aside in annoyance, I moved on to a journal with a faded blue leather cover.

My skin prickled as I paged through it. No lines of poetry or homework here. This one contained at least half a dozen date and time lists like the one I’d found for the warehouse node, except that these lists all began in handwriting far different from Tracy’s. Two different styles—one an elegant cursive, and the other a cramped print. His grandparents, I realized. Both had been summoners, killed by Rhyzkahl over thirty years ago during a failed attempt to summon Szerain.

Slowly and carefully, I deciphered the handwriting. At the top of every list was a series of numbers—most likely a coded way to ID the list, I decided. However, my tired brain refused to derive any meaning or pattern in the various series, so I mentally tabled that aspect for now. Each list also contained dates, written in the lovely cursive, from when both summoners were alive. Tracy had added more recent and upcoming dates, as well as at least a dozen of the seemingly random alliterative phrases. “Boss-boy breaks boss’s balls” and “Cowboy creek crevice creates confusion” and “Twin twilights twinkle,” but not a damn thing I could easily decipher to give me a location.

Groaning in defeat, I set aside the notebook and its stupid “Mountains mean multiple mergers” list. Figuring that shit out could go on my to-do list for after we found Idris. Right now the going-the-hell-to-bed part of my personal to-do list looked awfully appealing.

My phone rang in the kitchen where it was charging, and I groaned. “Shit.” It was so far to the kitchen. Twenty feet at least. Surely I didn’t have to get up and answer it, did I? But I should at least check the number, my far more mature conscience pointed out.

Crap. My far more mature conscience was right. Too much shit going on to ignore calls. I heaved myself up and shuffled to the kitchen, then scowled as the phone stopped ringing the instant I picked it up. I peered at the caller ID and scowled some more. Blocked. Probably stupid telemarketers. I unplugged the phone, about to stuff it in my pocket when it rang again. Blocked.

I started to hit the ignore button, then hesitated. Telemarketers didn’t usually call back. Could be a cop or something work-related.

I answered. “Kara Gillian.”

“Hey, Kara,” said a familiar voice.

It took a second for it to register. “Idris! Where are you? Are you all right?”

“I’m fine. And I intend to stay that way,” he said, voice calm but carrying a tinge of stress.

“Where are you?” I demanded as I ran to the basement door. “We’ve been crazy worried.”

“You know I can’t tell you that, and anyway, I’m calling to tell you to lay off. Don’t try to find me. It’s better for everyone that way.”

I yanked the basement door open, started down the stairs. “Idris. What’s going on? Why shouldn’t we try to find you?” I had zero doubt this call was being monitored by Katashi’s people, but I clung to the hope that Idris could give me a clue I’d be able to decipher but wouldn’t be significant to his captors.

“I don’t want you to find me, and I know you. I know you’ll try,” he said, a hint of desperation in his voice. “Don’t. Just don’t.”

Zack and Ryan stood and looked at me as I descended to the basement. I gesticulated wildly with my free hand and mouthed “Idris.” Ryan gave a nod, pulled out his phone and started a call, likely to get the trace. Zack dug for something in his pocket as he moved toward me.

“Idris, how can you expect me to stop looking for you?” I asked as I switched the phone to speaker. “I can’t believe you don’t want to be back with us, with Mzatal.”

“Yeah. I thought that too at first, thought I needed to get back. But my perspective has changed. I’ve had new training, seen more of the truth. Kara, you need to trust me. I’m dealing with things you can’t even imagine.”

My gut twisted with the horrible fear that Idris had been manipulated. “You might be surprised.” I kept my voice steady. “I have a damn good imagination.”

Zack put a digital recorder in my free hand, and I held it close to the phone.

Idris sighed. “I care about you, and I don’t want to see you or Lord Mzatal hurt. But if you find me, the shit’s going to hit the fan and people will get hurt.”

“Idris, you know Mzatal won’t give up on you and leave you to the Mraztur. He loves you. You know that, right?”

He went quiet for a second. “I know he won’t give up. That’s why it’s up to you to convince him. We know he’s here, and we’ll be prepared for him next time. Tito died because Tsuneo hadn’t anticipated Mzatal being at the warehouse. We won’t be making that mistake again.”

Nausea churned my stomach. Manipulated? Doubtful since manipulation decreased a summoner’s ability. Or simply playing along with his captors? And obviously Katashi’s people didn’t know everything. They didn’t know Mzatal wasn’t here anymore. “We,” I echoed. “You mean you and Katashi’s flunkies? You and Rhyzkahl? How can you include yourself as part of that ‘we’ after all you and I have seen?”

“I’ve seen a lot more in the past month. At first I thought they were trying to plant a seed of doubt, wanting me to shun my old associations. But there’s far more shit going on than I ever dreamed of. You think you have everything figured out, then whoosh! the game changes.”

I paced. “Idris, we’re spinning our wheels here. Why did they risk letting you call? Just to warn us off with some nebulous threat of dire consequences? I find that hard to believe.”

“I’m calling because I told them I wanted to call. And yeah, part of it is to say please, please leave off searching for me. It’s better for everyone that way.” He said it all with utter conviction, as though he actually believed it. “But mainly, I called because I wanted to hear your voice, to talk to you.” And now his voice carried an unmistakable echo of longing. And grief.

I had no way to unravel truth from bullshit, but that didn’t stop the wrenching ache in my heart. “All right. Let’s talk about something besides us not coming after you.” I gave Ryan a desperate Anything yet? look, but he pressed his lips together and shook his head. “I locked down the seventh ring of the shikvihr a few days ago,” I told Idris.

“Yeah? You’re kicking ass,” he said with a lightness that wasn’t there before. “I bet you got hung up on the next to last sigil though. You never could balance inverse coils worth a damn.”

I let out a weak laugh. “You’re right about that, but I think I have the hang of it now. I’m a prodigy, remember?” I said with a snort of amusement. “I even shaved eight minutes off the stair climb. You still staying in shape? Running any?”

Ryan finally gave me a thumbs up which I hoped meant he had the trace, but he followed it with a keep going hand signal.

“I was until last week,” he said. “Got the ninth right before I . . . came to Earth, but I haven’t done any training in the past few days, even with Master Katashi here. There hasn’t been time.”

Fuck. The Mraztur had found a way to send the old bastard to Earth. “You’ve been busy with your new associates?”

I heard a shuffling on his end and muffled voices as though he’d lowered the phone and covered it. A second later he returned. “I have to go now,” he said the tension of the earlier part of the call back in his voice. “Tell Mzatal I still have his ring, and I haven’t forgotten gheztak ru eehn. So leave me be. You don’t want to start a fire you can’t put out.”

My throat tightened. “I’ll tell him. No promises on the fire though.” I paused. “Tah agahl lahn.”

“Me too,” he said, the words catching. “I’m sorry.”

I was about to ask what for when a man’s voice I didn’t recognize spoke a single word.

“Rowan.”

The line went dead. My heart thudded as I recoiled from the unexpected assault, yet other than the adrenaline response, I didn’t feel any different. Was the asshole simply fucking with me? I wouldn’t put it past an ally of the Mraztur, but my instinct told me they had a deeper purpose. Why else allow the phone call?

Zack took the recorder from me, switched it off and eyed me critically. “You okay?”

I lowered the phone, stared at it. “Shit.” I drew a shaky breath, then looked up at Zack. “I think so. Fucking bastards.” Anger threaded with fear coiled through me. “I’m pretty sure Kastashi’s people attempted to Rowanize me with a command word.” I frowned and fell silent while I did a quick personal assessment. Name? Kara Gillian. Age? Thirty. Love life? Pretty damn awesome. “I still feel like me,” I told Zack. “I don’t know if the attempt failed, or if it has a delayed effect, but either way, I intend to be hyper-vigilant until I summon Mzatal.”

“You might not notice any difference in yourself,” Zack warned. “We’ll keep an eye on you as well, and I’ll make sure Eilahn understands fully too. You all right for now?”

I did my best to push down the worry. “So far I feel peachy. Thanks for having my back.”

“You got it, babe,” he said with a reassuring smile. “However, my guess is they expected at least part of their trap on the murder victim to touch you. They didn’t count on Ryan being such a badass and tackling you away from it in time.”

Grinning, I looked over at Ryan who was still on his phone. “I’m a seriously lucky bitch.” I returned my attention to Zack, caught his sleeve, and pulled him in close. “What does ‘gheztak ru eehn’ mean?” I murmured.

He answered softly, “Roughly, ‘the devastating failure.’”

I frowned. What the hell was that supposed to mean?

Ryan hung up and came over to us. “Got something. Idris was on a cell phone registered to Russell Dobry of Austin, Texas. Best guess based on changing cell towers is that he’s thirty to forty miles north of Austin on US 183 in a northwest-bound vehicle. I wanted you to talk as long as possible to see if the tower switched again. The phone is off now.”

“Northwest of Austin.” I tugged a hand through my hair. “Heading where? New Mexico? Utah? The local fucking diner?” I let out an unintelligible word in frustration.

Ryan grimaced in sympathy. “There are a lot of possible destinations. What did you get from the call?”

“He’s either rolled over, been manipulated, or is playing a tight game with his captors,” I said. “I can’t see him going over willingly to them. However, he also said he’s ‘seen some stuff’ in the past month and implied that it changed his perspective, so I’m putting turncoating on the back burner but not eliminating it. He also let slip that Katashi’s on Earth now, but I don’t know if he meant to do so.”

“You got a recording?” Ryan asked.

“Most of the call,” I said. “I’ll go over it to see what I can pick up.” I pressed my hands to my eyes, forced myself to think through it logically. “If his heart is still on our side, he’d have tried to get some info into the call that could help us. There were others there with him, so it’d be cryptic.” I dropped my hands, inhaled a ragged breath. “Here’s what I know. He’s around Katashi’s people for sure because he knew Katashi was here on Earth and knew about Tsuneo and Tito being at the warehouse. He said he cares about Mzatal and me and doesn’t want to see us hurt, said we will be if we go after him. Claims that bad stuff will happen if we find him, but didn’t elaborate.”

Ryan frowned. “Why let Idris talk to you at all? Why not just call and say . . . that name?”

“I don’t know. There has to be more to it.” I started pacing again. “Whatever Katashi and his peeps are, stupid ain’t one of them. Maybe a combination of small components.” I shrugged. “Like, I’m pretty sure Idris really did want to talk to me. The captors placating their captive. And maybe they needed some time with me on the phone to build up to the whammy.” I gave a helpless shrug. “I’m grasping at straws, but they had to know there was a chance we’d trace the call. So why weren’t they concerned about that?”

“Either they want us to know where they are,” Ryan said, “or it doesn’t matter because they don’t think we can find them, even with a trace.”

I nodded, way too tired to get my brain to digest it properly. “That phone was most likely stolen. Can you find out when and where the last call was made on it? That might give us another clue.”

“Sure thing,” he said, then laid his hand on my arm. “There’s not much we can do tonight. Why don’t you go grab some sleep and get a fresh start in the morning.”

I started to protest, to tell him Idris was out there somewhere right now in Texas and we had to do something. Ryan’s hand tightened slightly on my arm as though anticipating my response, and it was enough to stop the resistance. I let out a long exhale, slumped a little. “Yeah, you’re right. I’ll be a lot more useful once I’ve slept.” I rubbed my eyes. “I’m going to go curl up in bed, but I’ll listen to the recording a few times before I go to sleep. I can do that much.”

“Sounds reasonable.”

Zack handed the recorder to me. “I made a copy and erased the command word part. You don’t need to hear that again.”

I gave him a grateful smile. “Thanks. Y’all try not to blow the house up or anything while I sleep.”

Ryan gave a laugh. “Not making any promises on that one.”

I gave him a smile, then headed upstairs. I stopped by the living room, picked up the empty turd plate along with my note pad from atop the stack of Tracy’s journals, then stuck the plate in the dishwasher and trudged to the bedroom.

Fatigue held me firmly in its grip by the time I crawled into bed with the notepad and recorder. I wasn’t sure I’d make it through one listen, but I had to at least try. I owed Idris that much. I settled back in the pillows and started the recording.

“I care about you,” Idris said, “and I don’t want to see you or Lord Mzatal hurt.”

I squeezed my eyes shut against the fierce ache at the sound of his voice, familiar and dear.

“But if you find me, the shit’s going to hit the fan and people will get hurt.”

An image of him crystallized in my mind as I listened. Eager smile and keen blue-grey eyes beneath an unruly mop of blond curls. His words ran together like the distant rush of a river.

“You think you have everything figured out, then whoosh! the game changes.”

His voice cleared as though right by my ear. “You don’t want to start a fire you can’t put out.”

You don’t want to start a fire you can’t put out.

The room was cold. Achingly so. I needed a fire to counter the chill that knifed straight to my core. Shouldn’t be so cold this time of year. I could go turn up the heat, I thought dimly, but when I got out of bed to do so the room was pitch dark and the floor ice cold glass.

I wandered barefoot through darkness on an endless plain of smooth glass. Cold and black. Nothing. Forever. Step after frigid step.

“Dear one.” A voice. His voice. “Do not fret. It does not become you.”

“Lord Rhyzkahl?” I whispered, felt the darkness swallow the words. “Where are you?”

“I am here. I am always here.”

I looked down as a pale amber glow pierced the darkness. A beautiful filigree design of intricate fine lines glimmered on my upper chest with soft, breathtaking radiance. My throat tightened. “My lord? I do not understand.”

“Do you not, precious one?”

The glassy plain began to tilt. A voice like the hiss of sand flowing over stones whispered in my ear.

Rowan.

I cried out in shock as I lost my footing. “My lord!” Heart pounding, I flattened myself on the glass, braced with hands and feet to keep from sliding.

“Elinor. Elinor!” A different voice. Distant and desperate.

“Giovanni!” I called into the darkness. “I am lost! Help me!”

“Count, Elinor. Uno. Due. Tre. Quattro. Count.”

Rowan.

“Uno,” I said, then shrieked as the glass tilted more. Terror gripped me as I began to slide toward oblivion.

“Elinor!” he called. “Kara!”

Giovanni’s face swam in the darkness. Square jaw set with worry. Teasing smile gone. “Kara. Count.” His image distorted. Twisted. “Kara.”

“Due. Tre,” I said through gritted teeth. The glass leveled enough to stop my descent. “I’m here. Kara. Quattro. Cinque.”

Giovanni slipped away but other faces rose from the darkness to take his place.

Tessa. Jill. Zack. Mzatal. Ryan. Jekki. Eilahn.

People. My people.

My family.

I woke with a start, pulse stuttering as the fragments of the dream scattered. “People,” I gasped. “Family.” I scrabbled for the recorder, scanned through it, seeking the sentence. Found it, listened, then listened again.

“I care about you, and I don’t want to see you or Lord Mzatal hurt. But you find me, and the shit’s going to hit the fan and people will get hurt.”

“Fucking shit.” I played it one more time to hear the slight emphasis on “people.” I threw the covers off and ran down the hall, yanked the basement door open and flew halfway down the stairs before realizing I couldn’t see a goddamn thing. “Ryan!” I shouted as I ran back up the steps, flicked the switch at the top of the stairs then scrambled back down as fluorescent light filled the basement. “Ryan! Wake up!”

He jerked upright. “What? Shit!” He threw an arm over his eyes to shield them from the glare. “What’s wrong?”

“I need you to look something up.” I snatched his laptop from the end table and thrust it at him. “Idris said he didn’t want to see me or Mzatal hurt. Then he said if we looked for him, the shit would hit the fan and people would get hurt. People. Not just Mzatal and me. The first people who come to mind are his family.” I continued to hold the laptop out for him while I shifted impatiently from foot to foot like a pee-pee dance. “I need you to find out what you can about his family. Close members first. Then you need to do your FBI shit and get them into a safe house until this blows over.” I made a frustrated noise. “Damn it! Why didn’t I think of this earlier?”

“Whoa. Slow down.” He rubbed a hand across his eyes, tucked the sheet around his waist then took the computer from me and settled it on his lap. “Gimme a sec to catch up.”

I paced back and forth on the rug in front of the futon. “I know he has two older sisters. Both his parents are alive, and at least one grandmother. No idea about extended family.” This was the family who’d adopted him when he was fourteen, after the parents who’d adopted him when he was a baby had been killed in a car accident. Even though Idris had been with the Palatinos for less than a decade, I knew he’d fully embraced them as family, as real as any he might’ve been born to.

“I’m working on it, hotshot.” He flicked a glance up as he typed, then raked a more thorough gaze over me. “I like the new look.” A smile twitched at the corners of his mouth.

I stopped my pacing, looked down, then rolled my eyes. I still had on what I’d worn to bed: pink tank top and blue panties. No bra. “Oh great. Nearly naked,” I groaned, though I couldn’t fully hide my own amusement.

“Yes, you are.” The smile lingered on his mouth, then he dropped his eyes to his screen.

“It’s not fair.” I plopped onto the futon to watch him type. “I’ve never seen you nearly naked.”

“I’m naked right now,” he told me, eyes still on the screen, though the skin around them crinkled in amusement, “but I have the sense to keep the sheet over me. It might be too much for you.”

“I can take anything you dish out,” I shot back, grinning. If the view from the waist up was any indication, I had no doubt he’d look good naked.

“I do love a challenge,” he murmured with a low chuckle, working the touch pad and clicking on stuff. “Here we go. Sister, Amber Palatino Gavin. Sister, Rose Palatino. Parents, Angela and Jerome Palatino. All in the Seattle area. Maternal grandmother, paternal grandfather living. Definitely extended family. Aunts, uncles, cousins.”

I nodded. “Let’s focus on the immediate family. Can you get them to a safe spot?”

He gave me a reassuring nod, then glanced at the clock on the end table. “Five-fifteen a.m. I need to connect with Zack. Is he up?”

“No clue,” I lied. I had every confidence he was awake since the demahnk slept about as infrequently as the lords did, but Ryan only knew Zack as human. “He’s usually up before me anyway. I’ll go make coffee and see if I can find him.”

Ryan gave an absent nod, already doing stuff on his laptop again.

I returned upstairs, looked out the back window and was unsurprised to see Zack nimbly climbing over the high wall of the new obstacle course, neck and neck with Eilahn in the predawn light. I turned back to the kitchen and got a pot of coffee going, and a few minutes later I heard a thump on the roof as Eilahn found her favorite spot, and the simultaneous creak of the back door as Zack entered.

“Hey, Zack.” I held out a towel and gave him the rundown of my morning revelations and suspicions while he wiped off a sheen of sweat and mud. “And now Ryan needs your help to arrange a safe house.”

“Good work,” he said with an approving nod. “I’ll go check with him.”

“Thanks.” I grimaced. “I want to be sure they’re safe.”

He gave me a reassuring smile. “We’ll do everything we can. I promise.” He tossed the towel neatly through the laundry room door and into the hamper, then headed down into the basement.

I set to work cleaning the kitchen in an effort to channel my angst and worry. Unfortunately, Zack and Ryan kept the kitchen fairly spotless, and the three minutes it took to empty the dishwasher and wipe down the counters didn’t do much to ease my mood.

I pulled an egg carton from the fridge then fumbled it, barely hearing the squish-crunch of eggs meeting the floor as a truly horrible thought occurred to me. “Zack! Ryan!” Ignoring the mess, I ran for the steps and bounded down. “Check to see if any of his family are missing. One of his sisters? A cousin?”

Both Ryan and Zack turned to look at me, faces grim.

“Oh shit,” I breathed. “Who?”

“His sister Amber and his mom,” Ryan said. “They both went missing a few weeks ago.”

It fit all too well. I sank to sit on the futon as dread clenched at my gut. “Pull a pic of Amber,” I said dully. “I bet she’s our vic from the trailer.”