Fury of the Demon

Chapter 23

I stroked his chest while I pillowed my head on his shoulder. “Do you do that lightning thing often?”

“Perhaps thrice a year,” he replied. “Though I called it only two days past after returning home because of the severe depletion.”

“You don’t feel at all depleted now,” I said, pressing close. “We should work on that some more.”

His hand slid to my ass, and he chuckled low. “Ah, you will indeed deplete me, again and again.”

I laughed. “Before any more depletion, I need to get something to eat,” I told him. “Plus, my friend Jill is here. Y’all should meet.”

“Yes, it is time to know Jill Faciane,” he agreed.

We found our scattered clothing, quickly dressed, and returned to the house. Jill and Jekki sat at the kitchen table, heads bent together and apparently deep in conversation. She looked up as we entered, sly smile on her face in an I-know-what-you’ve-been-up-to expression, but then her eyes widened in obvious Wow, Holy Shit! appreciation as she took in the sight of Mzatal up close.

Yeah, my boyfriend was pretty impressive. Especially as radiantly vibrant and super-charged as he was right now.

“Hey, Jill,” I said with a smile. “This is Mzatal. Mzatal, this is Jill.”

She managed to scrounge together some composure, stood and offered Mzatal a hand, though she was clearly trying hard not to stare. “It’s nice to meet you.”

Mzatal took her hand in both of his. “Jill Faciane,” he said with a small smile. “It is a pleasure to finally meet.”

Jill’s mouth dropped open, and I knew she felt the tingling vibration from super-charged Mzatal along with a good dose of his natural mojo.

She abruptly jerked and let out a small Oof! “Sorry,” she said with a shaky laugh as she put her other hand on her belly. “She’s a bit wiggly right now.”

Mzatal’s eyes dropped to Jill’s belly, and an odd expression came over his face, fascinated and perplexed at the same time. He tilted his head slightly, kept hold of her hand, and placed his other hand on her belly. His expression grew even odder, as if struggling to remember a phrase or saying that was on the tip of his tongue.

Silent, I watched the curious exchange. Surely Mzatal had encountered a pregnant woman before? Jill remained motionless and didn’t say a word about the somewhat rude business of touching her belly without permission, though I saw it in the slightly wary-but-baffled look in her eyes. Beneath their hands the baby kicked some more, to judge by Jill’s occasional winces. I sensed him extend, mentally touch the baby.

Rare, naked curiosity lit Mzatal’s face. His lips parted as he leaned closer, feeling the movement of the baby, and connecting on the non-physical level. He abruptly sucked in a gasping breath and straightened, face contorted in pain as he jerked his hands to his head and took a staggering step backward. I seized his arm to steady him.

“Mzatal!? What’s wrong?” I demanded, worry flaring as I sensed his excruciating pain. He let out a low groan and took another step back. I shot a look at Jill as she backed away in confusion. “You okay?” I asked. She blinked and nodded, and I immediately shifted my full worry and attention to Mzatal.

I snaked an arm around his waist. “Outside,” I said as I worked to maneuver him in that direction. “You do better outside. C’mon, Boss.”

He didn’t resist, but it took all of my effort to keep him steady. He nearly stumbled down the back steps, but grabbed onto the post in time to shift the fall into a heavy sit onto the steps.

Jekki ran up beside me, chittering in distress. Keeping a hand on Mzatal’s arm, I shifted to crouch before him. “Mzatal? Boss? How can I help you? What do you need?”

Mzatal kept his eyes squeezed closed in a rictus of agony. “Ilana,” he managed to choke out.

Shit. Couldn’t ask for something simple, like Percocet. “She’s not here,” I said. “I can try to summon her.” Could one of the demahnk even be summoned? I turned to the faas. “Jekki, is Zack here?”

“Dahn dahn dahn.” His tail twisted in worry.

Yeah, that would have been too easy. “Can you get tunjen for Mzatal, please?”

The faas darted off, and I returned my attention to the lord. “Boss, talk to me,” I urged. “What’s going on?”

His breath hissed between his teeth, and a sheen of sweat covered his face. He gave a sudden cry that sounded more like frustration than pain. A shudder wracked his body, and a heartbeat later the rictus of agony faded from his expression. He opened his eyes, wiped an unsteady hand over his face.

“I do not know,” he said, voice thready. Jekki ran up with the glass of tunjen and gently pressed it into his hand. Mzatal murmured a low thanks and sipped, color slowly returning to his face.

“It started when you connected with the baby. Was something wrong with her?”

He started to say No—I felt it—but then the pain spiked through him again, as if caused by the mere thought of extending to touch the baby. He drew a breath and remained quiet, and the tension in his face diminished.

My worry for his immediate well-being began to ease a bit now that he didn’t look as if his head was going to explode, though I had plenty of concern beyond that. “Has this ever happened before?”

He drank more tunjen, then set the glass aside and reached for my hand. “Yes, many times,” he said, fingers tightening on mine. “Not for almost a year though.”

I moved to sit beside him on the step. “What triggered these other times?”

He took a long breath and released it. “No single trigger that I have found,” he said. “It has happened when working deep in the plexus. Once when simply talking with Helori. Many times with . . . nightmares.”

I brought his hand up to kiss his fingers. “I’ll try to summon Ilana,” I told him. “Maybe she can help.”

But he shook his head. “The demahnk rarely answer a summons,” he said. “I am unsettled, but the pain has receded. Do not worry, beloved.”

“Yeah, like that’s going to happen,” I said with a roll of my eyes, then kissed him gently. Rarely answer. Did that mean they could resist at will? “You should go lie down.”

“Yes, it would be wise,” he agreed. “Yaghir tahn.”

“No need for apology, love.” I gave him a warm smile.

He finished the glass of tunjen, then stood, swaying slightly. “I will be by the pond.”

I rose with him and slipped an arm around his waist. “How about I walk you there.”

His arm encircled me as we started for the path. “I much prefer it that way.”

We made it to his pavilion without incident. I got him onto the bed and made sure Jekki would monitor him. It was clear that Mzatal remained very unsettled, even if the pain had gone.

He rested a hand on the faas’s head, his eyes on me. “Thank you, zharkat.”

“I’ll be back to check on you,” I told him. I leaned over to kiss him. “I love you.”

Mzatal laid his other hand against my cheek, the simple gesture like a caress of my essence. “I love you,” he replied, then took a deep breath and closed his eyes.

I stayed a few more minutes to watch over him, then gave Jekki’s head a scratch and returned to the house.

Jill sat at the kitchen table distractedly flipping through an old Forensic Times magazine. She snapped her gaze to me as I came in. “What the hell was that all about?”

“I don’t know,” I said. “And I don’t think Mzatal does either.” I slumped into a chair. “I felt him connect with the baby and then felt him wracked with blinding pain. No clue why though,” I saw the worry in her eyes, and I hurried to reassure her, “but I honestly don’t believe it was because something might be wrong with you or the bean.”

“Okay. Good.” She let out a breath and relaxed. “I want you to know, your boyfriend is seriously hot and seriously freaky.”

“Yeah,” I said, then grinned. “I think I like the freaky.”

She snorted, laughed. “You have pine needles in your hair from whatever freaky things you two were doing in the woods.” I opened my mouth to respond, and she jerked a hand up. “Do not tell me what they were.” She paused, appeared to consider. “Not right now, at least.”

“I’ll save the sordid details for the next girls’ night out.”

“Make notes so you don’t forget anything.”

I laughed and headed off to my room.

A quick shower and a change of clothing did a lot to restore my overall equilibrium. As I came into the living room, Bryce glanced up and paused the game he played, leaving a purple and green alien frozen in mid-splatter on the screen.

I flopped onto an empty space on the couch. “Is this day over yet?”

“Still a few hours until midnight,” Bryce said as he set the controller aside. “A little lightning wear you out?”

“What, that?” I gave an exaggerated snort. “Pshaw. I have lightning strike through me all the time. Old hat!” I twisted my face into a comically freaked out expression.

“I’m not going to lie,” Bryce said with a shake of his head. “That was unbelievable.”

“Mzatal says it will help him remain here longer.” I mentally crossed fingers for that. Even three or four days at a stretch would be nice. With Idris on Earth, there wasn’t much Mzatal could do from the demon realm.

Bryce nodded. “He said as much back at his place.” He let out a low whistle. “He worked with the lightning there, too—while standing on the balcony rail about a billion feet above the rocks. I’ve never seen anything like it.”

I eyed him. “He was standing on the railing of the balcony?”

“Yep, barefooted and shirtless and calling in a storm,” he said. “On the railing.”

“I’ll kill him,” I said with a sweet smile.

Bryce’s face abruptly twisted into the expression of a man who suddenly realized he’d told his buddy’s girlfriend that said buddy had been at the strip club all night. “Uh, he didn’t fall or anything,” Bryce fumbled out as he struggled to retract his earlier statement. “I mean, he seemed to be in complete control of what he was doing.”

I snorted. “I’m sure he knew what he was doing.” Then again, it wasn’t as if I could call Mzatal on it. He’d simply give me an implacable look and tell me he was always in control. Dating a demigod sure carried its own set of unique issues. “I’m glad I wasn’t there to see it, though.”

“I’m glad I was,” Bryce said. “I’d only talked to him once, briefly, before witnessing the lightning-on-the-railing thing. I’m not likely to forget it.” He shrugged. “And today’s was impressive too, but something about there being nothing but sky beyond him, and the whole different world thing, it was beyond surreal.”

Jill came into the room with a large bowl of something weird and gloppy half-resting on her belly. “Jekki made pickle peanut butter pretzels for me,” she announced. “Anyone want some?”

“Oh, wow, gee, Jill.” I made an exaggerated wince. “Y’know, I just had that for lunch, so I guess I’ll have to pass.” I shuddered.

“I’m not even going to pretend I want any,” Bryce said, giving Jill the warmest smile I’d ever seen on the man. He nodded toward the bowl in her grasp. “That looks and sounds disgusting.”

Jill returned the smile, chuckling softly as she lowered herself into the chair and rested the bowl atop the swell of her belly. “Says the man who likes spicy pickled cabbage.”

I looked at the two of them. They’d sure gotten to know each other quickly. The alarm panel in the kitchen buzzed, indicating that someone authorized was coming through the gate. Either Zack or Ryan, since all the other chicks were at home to roost. I stood and moved to the window. “Zack’s home,” I remarked to nobody in particular. Nobody who was paying any attention to me, at least. I watched as Zack pulled into his usual spot and got out of the car, face grim. He closed the car door, then leaned back against it and looked up at the sky, expression somber and with an odd longing I couldn’t quite parse.

“Yes, but there are other people who like and eat kimchee,” Bryce was saying with a laugh. “I doubt anyone else eats that concoction.”

Jill merely gave a serene smile. “Pregnant chicks all over the world would eat the hell out of this if they knew it existed.”

Zack pushed off the car and headed up the steps, expression all surfer-dude Zack and not somber at all by the time he reached the porch. I stepped away from the window as he opened the door and entered.

He gave Bryce a broad smile, everything in his posture indicating customary good mood and joviality. I almost doubted that I’d seen the earlier gloom. “Welcome back to the land of the living, Mr. Thatcher,” he said with a congenial air as Bryce hurried to stand.

“Bryce, this is Special Agent Zack Garner,” I said to help him out.

“It’s nice to meet you, sir,” Bryce said to Zack, extending a hand. “Can’t thank you enough for everything you’ve done for Paul and me.”

Zack took his hand and shook it, and I noticed the faint flicker in Zack’s eyes as he did. Assessing Bryce, I knew. Apparently he passed the quick assessment since Zack continued by saying, “Sure you can. You can lose to me—badly—in a game of Alien Bloodbath later.”

Bryce chuckled. “I’ll be sure to go out in an impressive blaze of glory.”

“Of course you will,” Zack said with a laugh. “I’m that good.”

Jill snorted and rolled her eyes, but when Zack moved to her and leaned down to give her a kiss, she melted into it, then lifted a hand to his face and gave him a lovely, warm smile. “Hey, babe,” she said. “How was your day?”

“Long. And not over yet.” He sighed and dropped to sit beside her. “Waiting for Ryan to get home at this point.”

I watched as her smile flickered, saw the thought plain upon her face: He’s bailing on me again. And since she had no understanding of why, how could it feel like anything but rejection? Yet on the heels of her disappointment, I saw a shimmer of relief. If Zack bailed on her, then that was one more night where she wouldn’t have to face the giant winged elephant in the room and ask him about his demon side.

“You’re off again as soon as he gets here?” she asked gamely.

“We’ll be working in the basement,” Zack told her. He took her hand and kissed her knuckles. “It will probably only be an hour or two, sweetie. You’ll still be here?”

Her shoulders lifted in a too casual shrug. “I don’t know. It’s getting late, and I have some stuff I need to do at my house.”

I rolled my eyes so hard it hurt. “For fuck’s sake.” I glanced at Bryce. “You’ll have to excuse me, but there’s something I need to take care of.” I strode over to where Zack and Jill sat on the couch, removed the bowl of pretzel things from Jill’s lap and set them aside, reached down and grabbed her hand, then Zack’s. “You two are coming with me right now,” I said with my expression and manner fiercely conveying, Do Not Even Think of Resisting Because OMG, You Two!

Jill looked suddenly terrified. “I have some things I need to do.” Zack didn’t resist, but he didn’t stand either.

“No you don’t.” My fierce look grew fiercer. “We’re doing this now.”

Zack sighed, stood. “I think she might be serious, sweetie.”

“Damn straight,” I said. I tugged Jill to her feet, waited for Zack to steady her, then hauled both of them into the guest room and kicked the door shut behind me.

I released their hands and pointed at the bed. “Sit.”

Jill scowled at me, but obeyed. Zack simply shifted from foot to foot. I leveled a glare at him.

“You too, demon boy.”

His eyes narrowed, but he went ahead and sat beside Jill. “Man. Demon man,” he muttered.

“Then you need to start acting like one.” I narrowed my eyes right back at him. “Zack, you’ve been keeping secrets from your beloved.” I swung my attention to Jill. “And you’ve been too much of a weenie to ask Zack about his demon-ness.”

“She doesn’t want to know,” he said, expression serious.

“Yeah?” I planted my hands on my hips. “And you’ve never even tried to push the issue a teensy bit? Never tried to gently introduce aspects of your not-human-ness to her, to gradually get her more interested and maybe not so scared to death of this really big deal that she found out only after you knocked her up?” I returned my glare to Jill. “And you! Get over it already! You’re about to have a kid together.”

Her scowl deepened, but I saw the chagrin in her eyes. She knew I was right. “I don’t even know where to start,” she said, with an almost apologetic look to Zack. “I don’t know what to ask.”

I took a deep breath. “Okay, then I’ll start. First thing then,” I stepped back, “Zack, I think it’s time for you to show the mother of your child, your best beloved, your demon form.”

He winced. “I’m not certain that’s the best starting place.”

“Possibly not,” I said with a shrug, “but at this point I think we need to dive right on into this. So, have at it.”

Jill made a low noise and set a hand on her belly. “The bean just started kicking like crazy,” she said, then glanced at Zack, worry tinged with panic in her eyes. I had a good idea I knew what she was thinking, what she was afraid of. The only demons she’d ever met were Kehlirik and Jekki. Would Zack be big and scary? Or small and furry?

Zack gave Jill a long look before glancing my way. “Under protest,” he stated with the faintest of glowers. But he stood and removed his suit jacket, dropped it on the bed. His tie followed, then the shirt. His movements remained very deliberate, and for the first time I saw the lines of strain on his face.

Shit. Now I felt guilty. The grim face by the car had reflected his true state. He’d put on the smiles and congeniality for our benefit. Zack was already under a ton of stress, and my pushing the issue wasn’t helping. But it was too late to turn back now. And hell, who knew how much longer Jill could have handled not knowing? The baby was only a month away, and these two were so stubborn the kid would be graduating from high school before they finally got around to talking this shit out.

Still, it behooved me to try and make it easier, if possible. “If there’s anything I can do to support you,” I told Zack quietly, “let me know.”

He paused his movements. “A jinig and reverse natulik,” he replied. “Trace and simply feed for a moment.”

Hot damn, those were two I actually knew. Like wards, these didn’t require the use of chalk, simply a surface on which to set them and weave the potency strands. I crouched and began to trace them on the floor, then realized he’d no doubt intentionally picked sigils I’d already learned.

Jill sucked in a breath and covered her belly with both hands. Her brow furrowed as she looked at Zack. “I think maybe she’s excited?”

Zack toed his shoes off, unzipped his pants and dropped trou. He smiled. “Yes, she is.”

Jill met his eyes, the fear in them beginning to fade. She even managed a small smile as she stroked her belly. Meanwhile, I did my best to be totally blasé about naked Zack’s human-form junk right at my eye level.

Zack pulled off his socks, stood with his eyes closed and began to draw through the sigils I’d traced. I remained crouched and carefully fed power to the sigils as needed.

For almost a minute nothing happened. I remained perfectly still as I felt him draw power. Jill watched him with wide eyes. Even the bean went still, or at least I assumed so, since Jill had stopped making little noises of discomfort.

And then his form abruptly broke into a billion pieces that dissolved into amorphous sparkly multicolored light, so beautiful as to be nearly incomprehensible.

He remained thus for what felt like millennia though it was probably more like half a minute, then I felt the draw on my support sigils. In the span of a single heartbeat, the billion pieces coalesced into the form of a demahnk, half a head taller than any other I’d seen. I blinked, as if waking up from a dream, only now realizing how very different this had been from the transformation I witnessed with Eilahn or the smooth shift of Helori.

Jill’s eyes filled with tears, and she gave Zack a weepy smile. “You’re gorgeous.”

Chiming softly, he stretched his delicate, iridescent white wings wide, then settled them close to his body. “Demahnk, sweetie.”

Jill wiped at her eyes. “Okay, wow.” She let out a weak laugh. “Wow.”

I sat on the floor, relieved as all hell, while Jill stood and moved to him. Almost a foot taller in this form, he towered over her. She hesitated, then touched his chest—tentatively at first, then with her whole hand upon his pec. He caressed her cheek with two fingers of a three fingered hand, then lowered his head and touched his forehead to hers.

“You’re still you,” she breathed. She closed her eyes and slid her arms around him, belly bumping into him as he enfolded her in his wings.

“Yes, only a different form,” he said, voice still very much Zack’s but infinitely richer, and imbued with the chimey birdsong qualities of the demahnk. “All else is the same.”

I climbed to my feet, insanely pleased that my intervention was working. So far, at least. “Perhaps you should go back to human for the rest of this,” I suggested to Zack. “There’s still some more explainin’ that needs to happen.”

He shook his head, chiming low. “I am yet unable.”

“Sorry.” I winced. “I don’t know how all that works.” I gestured to the wings and all of him to indicate the shape-change. “But I do think it’s time you told her why you’re here. With Ryan.” I met his violet eyes. “She’ll understand and accept that you need to spend so much time with him if she knows why.”

Zack dipped his head slightly. “I cannot.”

“Crap, that’s right.” Zack was still oathbound to not speak of Szerain’s crime or his fate to any who didn’t already know. “Will you be forced to intervene if I tell her?”

His lips parted in a small demahnk-smile. “No.”

A frown began to tighten Jill’s mouth. “Someone had better spill whatever this big secret is.”

I debated telling her she should sit down, but then I realized that would only piss her off again. “Ryan is actually the exiled demonic lord, Szerain. Zack is his guardian, and he’s pretty much been busting ass for the last fifteen or so years to make sure that Szerain remains sane in what’s a truly brutal imprisonment. All those long periods of needing to do shit with Ryan? Most of those are spent helping Szerain.”

To my private amusement, she sank to sit on the bed and stared at me in astonishment. Zack lowered himself into a sit-kneel.

“And your sweetie’s demon name is Zakaar,” I said, unable to resist adding one more level of weird to the whole thing.

She blinked, shook her head like a dog shedding water. “Wait. Ryan . . . Ryan is a demonic lord? Ryan?!”

“Weeelll, it’s complicated.” I grimaced and rubbed the back of my neck. “Ryan Kristoff is . . .” I had to swallow back a sudden wave of sadness. “He doesn’t actually exist. There was a real Ryan Kristoff and, as far as I can tell, he died and his, um, life was taken over as a cover for the exile of Szerain.” The grief clogged my throat briefly, and it was a few seconds before I could speak properly. “He’s an overlay, basically. An identity with a real person’s background, but he’s an aspect of Szerain. He’s not real.”

“Ryan Kristoff died in my arms,” Zack said.

I stared at him, unable to form any possible reply to that statement. I’d thought about it, rationally accepted the truth that the Ryan I knew and, yes, loved wasn’t a real person. But hearing it like that—from someone who knew—seemed to wrench my whole world off its axis. “What happened?” My voice cracked. Since I already knew the basics, I hoped that Zack had enough freedom around his oaths to fill in the details I so desperately needed.

“I sought a candidate for Szerain, for his exile. Similar in body and face.” He tipped his head back, inhaled deeply. “I was carefully watching many possible choices. Ryan Kristoff was the one to succumb in a circumstance that proved suitable. He and a friend went hiking in the Adirondack mountains. Ryan lost his footing and tumbled a hundred feet down a steep rocky slope.” Zack lifted one long-fingered hand, tilted it to indicate a precipitous grade. “His friend went for help. I went to Ryan.”

Grief swallowed me as I listened. I pygahed in an effort to maintain any sort of control. I’d wanted to know this. As hideous and painful as it was, I wanted to know the truth.

“He was close to death,” Zack continued after a moment, voice a bit less rich. The memory affected him as well. “I eased him, removed the pain, held him, and spoke to him, in the moments he had remaining.”

Tears slid down my cheeks, but I didn’t wipe them away. I felt frozen in shock and sorrow, dimly aware that Jill also quietly wept, eyes on Zack as he spoke.

“What did you do with his body?” I finally asked.

“I incinerated him. Collected the ashes.” Zack lowered his head.

“And then you created the overlay?” A part of me marveled that I was able to continue to question him so calmly.

“The Demahnk Council sent Szerain through to me,” Zack said. “He had been submerged for some time already, but yes, I then formed the overlay, shifted his features, and—” He paused for a long moment, iridescence of his skin dulling. “And created injuries appropriate to such a fall, including head trauma to account for memory loss.” He shifted, settled his wings and lifted his head. “When Ryan’s friend returned, he found his hiking buddy injured but alive. The ultimate identity theft.”

I stood in numb shock, pulse ringing in my ears as the strange and horrific savagery of the entire thing rolled over me. And what must it have been like for Zack to brutalize Szerain for the sake of a stable prison? “What happened to the ashes?”

“I still have them,” he replied, words barely a ripple in the air.

Jill found her voice. “What happens now?”

Zack went still and pulled his wings in close. I felt a tug from the sigils and realized he’d recovered enough to make the shift back to human form. Carefully, I fed power into the sigils and observed his transformation. First the dissolution to sparkly-transparent, a pause, then finally to solid limbs and torso. The change from demahnk to human seemed easier for him, perhaps because he was so used to being in human form after all these years.

He drew a deep breath, then lifted his head and gave me a nod. “It is enough,” he said in reference to the sigils. “Thank you.” He gave Jill a weary smile. “Sorry, babe. I know it’s weird.”

I dispelled the sigils and sat on the floor. “You might want to tell her how old you are too.”

Zack shot me a disgruntled look before he spoke to Jill. “Millennia,” he told her.

I didn’t miss that he kept it nice and vague.

Jill gave a breathless laugh. “Wow.” She stroked a hand over her belly. Then she gulped, fear darkening her eyes again. “Will our baby look like, um, your winged form?” She’d seen a normal-looking ultrasound, but after witnessing Zack’s transformation into Zakaar, I didn’t blame her one bit for wanting more reassurance.

Zack laid a hand on the bed, used it to help him rise from the floor. “No,” he said as he sat beside her. “She will be beautiful like you.”

“God, you’re a slick talker,” Jill murmured as she leaned in for a kiss.

Zack returned the kiss. “You know it, sweetie.”

And that’s my cue to leave. They could handle it from here. I quietly departed and closed the door behind me.

A lovely heady scent filled the hallway, chocolate but more, and a bit of sniffing told me it originated in the kitchen. Paul and Bryce were there, chatting and relaxed, while Bryce stirred the contents of a saucepan.

“What am I smelling?” I asked as I moved forward, nose twitching like a bloodhound’s.

“Bryce makes the best hot chocolate ever,” Paul announced, grinning. “He’s doing up a big batch.”

I nosed my way in to peer at—and inhale the scent of—the contents of the saucepan, then shifted my gaze to his face. “I’ve always liked you, Bryce. You know that, right?”

Smiling, he snagged a mug from the cabinet. “As much as you’ve done for me, I think you’re pretty much guaranteed a full serving.” He ladled the thick, creamy liquid into the mug and passed it to me. I wrapped my hands around it, sipped.

“Marry me,” I moaned.

Bryce laughed. “I’m flattered, but I don’t think that would go over very well with the lord.”

“Details!” I sat and spent some lovely minutes savoring the creamy drink. “If chocolate was a weapon, the Mraztur wouldn’t stand a chance.”

“Weaponized chocolate.” Paul grinned. “Turn any bad guy good.”

I grinned and sipped. “We have you two as allies. That’s pretty hard core.” It was nothing to sneeze at either, I knew. Paul could supposedly work miracles with computer and infrastructure, and I’d already had the chance to see Bryce in action. My posse was getting bigger and better.

I finished the hot chocolate and resisted the urge to shove my face into the mug to lick out as much as possible. My ring clinked softly against the ceramic as I set it down, and I dropped my gaze to the thin crack in the blue gem. Unique and beautiful—which gave me an idea. The summoner who’d received Idris on Earth had worn an unusual ring, red and black stones set in a gold filigree. “Paul, if you had a picture of a fairly unique ring, would you be able to track it down?”

Paul screwed up his face. “That all depends on how unique it is, photos, sales records, stuff like that. Sure, it can be done in some cases, but I can’t make any promises until I get into it. What do you have for me to go on?”

“I’ll, uh, get a sketch to you later,” I said, tentatively. Crap. Good idea, shaky execution. My drawing skills sucked.

“Do that, and I’ll do what I can,” he said cheerily, then grabbed another mug of hot chocolate and returned to the office. Bryce poured more for me, gave me a wink and then retreated to the living room.

A few minutes later I heard the guest room door open and close quietly. I looked down the hallway to see Zack.

“She’s napping,” he told me softly, then moved on to the basement door. Time for him to tend Ryan/Szerain.

I found paper and a pencil, then settled at the table to drink awesome hot chocolate and sketch the ring as best I could. The house wasn’t exactly quiet—the sound of whatever game Bryce was playing mixed with the hum of the washing machine and the whirr of the air conditioner—but it all wound together into a comforting white noise of home and family. An odd family, to be sure.

After about half an hour I decided there wasn’t much more I could do with my raggedy sketch of the ring. I quietly entered the office and slid it onto Paul’s desk. He didn’t even twitch in acknowledgment of my presence, eyes totally locked on the screen. I bit back a low laugh as I returned to the kitchen, then pulled my phone out and sent him a text to tell him the sketch was in front of him. A minute later I heard, “Got it!” from the office. Now to see what he could come up with.

Jill came out of the guest room and gave me a smile. “I hate to admit it, but you were right. I needed to know about Zack’s demon-ness.”

“Yes, you did,” I agreed. “For the bean’s sake as well.” I gave her a smile. “Anyway, I’m glad that’s over with. You staying for the night?”

She shook her head. “I don’t have a change of clothes here, and I’d rather sleep in my own bed than wake up early to go home and get ready for work.” She slung her purse over her shoulder and gave me an exaggerated mock scowl. “Also, Zack and I talked about the whole moving in thing again, and,” she rolled her eyes and sighed, “I told him I’d think about it.”

“Cool,” I said. “I’ll add you to the chore rotation list.”

She snorted. “I knew you had an ulterior motive.”

“Always. Give me a call tomorrow, okay?”

“If you’re lucky,” she said with a laugh, then departed..

Pleased, I returned to my seat at the kitchen table and busied myself with arcane homework—boring-but-necessary stuff that wasn’t anywhere near as cool as tracing glowing sigils, but was essential in order to understand the fundamentals and theory and why certain strands linked only in certain ways, etc.

Sometime around midnight, Zack finally came up from the basement and closed the door quietly behind him. I looked up as he approached, but I didn’t say anything. I still wasn’t sure how he felt about what I’d done.

“A warning would have been preferable,” he said, but gave me a smile as he dropped into the chair across from me.

Relieved, I returned his smile with a wry one of my own. “I was afraid that a warning would give either of you a chance to escape.” I shrugged. “And I figured it was time.”

“Time for Jill, perhaps,” he said. “It was not ideal for me.”

I angled my head, regarded him. “When would it have been ideal?”

He sighed, passed a hand over his face. “With warning, in a day or two. Still not ideal, but not detrimental. And yes,” he said with a faint nod as if reading my thoughts, “I could have refused today, but then where would that have left Jill?” Regret flickered in his eyes. “Hurting more.”

Spreading my hands on the table, I carefully mulled over his words. “I honestly didn’t know how you’d react to my pushing the issue,” I admitted. “You haven’t allowed me into your thought processes and plans lately. And, at that point, I was more concerned about Jill.” I took a deeper breath. “That said, I apologize for putting undue stress on you.”

He regarded me in silence, for long enough that I began to conclude he wasn’t going to respond at all. But then he laid a hand on top of mine. “You are right,” he said quietly.

Until that moment, I hadn’t realized how scared I was that he might reject me. I sucked in a ragged breath that was perilously close to a sob and turned my hand over to clasp his. “When you talked about Ryan, the real Ryan, something broke inside me,” I said. “I see Szerain coming out more and more, and I tell myself I know Ryan’s not real, that he’s only an overlay, but I couldn’t make myself believe that he’d be going away.” My throat tightened. “But now I know he will. Someday, probably not too far off, Ryan will be gone. He’ll really be dead.” I felt tears slide down my face. “And I’m sitting here watching my best friend die, and he doesn’t even know it.” I was crying in earnest now as I looked up at Zack. “Promise me,” I said almost desperately. “Promise me you’ll let me say goodbye to him before . . . he’s gone forever. Please.” My voice cracked on the last word, and I fell silent.

“Yes, I promise.” His fingers closed around mine. “I am deeply sorry,” he said, sounding as if he was apologizing for more than the current topic.

I gripped his hand while I cried, feeling the full grief of the loss of Ryan for the first time. It wouldn’t be the same with Szerain. It could never be the same. I struggled to get a hold of myself before Bryce heard me bawling and came to investigate, but it was a lost cause.

Keeping a firm hold on my hand, Zack stood, tugged me to my feet and led me out to the back porch. As soon as the door closed behind us, he wrapped his arms around me and pulled me close.

And then I couldn’t hold it back anymore. I clung to him as I sobbed into his chest and let it all out. He held me, somehow giving me the comfort of being enfolded in wings even though he was most certainly in human form.

Gradually, I quieted to sniffles, though I kept my head leaned against him.

“It is unfair and unjust,” he said gently. “And, from my perspective, the opposite.”

“The opposite?” I tipped my head back to look into his face. “I don’t understand.”

“Ryan masks the one I know,” he said. “The one I . . .” He exhaled, troubled sadness in his eyes. “The one I know.”

“Oh, I see.” It was, indeed, the opposite viewpoint of mine. “I don’t understand why you can’t be his ptarl.”

He went eerily still, barely seemed to even breathe.

“Zack?” I said, worried. “Did I say something wrong?”

His eyes met mine. “No, Kara Gillian, you said something very right.”

“You mean about becoming Szerain’s ptarl? I mean, his ptarl is gone, and it seems like he could sure as hell use one.”

“Yes, he could,” he agreed, tension whispering across his face before he shook his head. “Though we both are bound elsewhere with bonds that serve none.”

I fell silent for a moment, turning all of that over in my head before speaking. “A bond—any bond—should be a benefit to both parties,” I stated. “If it isn’t, then one of the parties is a parasite.”

He closed his eyes and lowered his head. I felt a tremor pass through his body. He was already stressed to the nines, and I wasn’t exactly helping matters right now. Maybe time for me to ease up on the dude for a while.

I sniffled. “Sheesh, I’m all puffy-faced and red-nosed now.” I gave him a squeeze, then pulled away. “Jill said she was considering moving in. You got through to her.”

He smiled softly. “Like you said, there were some past issues she needed to face. I can’t say they aren’t a factor anymore, but I don’t think they’ll keep her from making the right decision. And she almost smiled at the idea of a double-wide mobile home rather than an RV.”

“You know just how to charm her.” I yawned and considered going out to the pond to snuggle with Mzatal, but when I extended I felt him sleeping. I didn’t want to risk waking him when he needed the rest so badly. “I’m going to sneak to my bedroom and do my best to sleep the sleep of the righteous.”

“Righteous,” he echoed, faint smile on his mouth. “I suppose there are times when the word suits you.”

“As long as it suits me with about eight hours of sleep.” I gave him a quick kiss on the cheek, then returned inside to see how much righteous or unrighteous sleep I could manage.