Legacy of the Demon

by Diana Rowland

  His expression flickered in an instant of puzzlement.

  And like looking at an optical illusion and seeing that the duck could also be a rabbit, I suddenly saw everything that was wrong. The wrongness of the ward. The unfamiliar touch. The wrong smile. Wrong because I was expecting Zack’s energy signature and Zack’s smile. I didn’t recognize the signature, but I recognized that smile. Carl. No. Xharbek.

  Even as the realization hit home, I leaped toward him, slammed him against the wall and jammed the muzzle of my gun up under his chin. That I could do so without him deflecting me told me everything I needed to know. He couldn’t read me. Couldn’t anticipate my moves. The real Zack Garner and Kadir’s estranged demahnk ptarl, Helori, must have implanted mental protections in my head when they shielded other sensitive information.

  “What happens to a non-corporeal being if I blow its corporeal head off?” I growled, finger on the trigger.

  He didn’t move—an eerie, unearthly stillness impossible for a human. “You hold the means to find out, Kara Gillian.”

  “FUCK, you’re annoying. I’m two pounds of pressure away from scattering sparkly demahnk brains all over the ceiling, and you’re still playing the evil-Gandhi act and spouting vague bullshit.” I held the means, all right. Maybe I couldn’t actually kill him, but either way I wasn’t going to come away from this empty-handed.

  I drank in his signature, allowed its resonance to suffuse me. At least once a day, I searched Earth’s arcane flows for any hint of my four AWOL people. Now I’d have a fifth signature in my arsenal. This bastard didn’t know where they were, but not through lack of seeking. If he left even the slightest fart of a trail, I was going to sniff it out and use it to locate the others.

  “You are not a murderer, Kara Gillian,” he said and teleported away a microsecond before my bullet buried itself in the ceiling.

  “Pussy!” I yelled into the emptiness.

  Chapter 6

  The morning after the Beaulac PD valve explosion two months ago, I woke up to the world in shock and the FBI at my door. Well, at the end of my driveway, since very powerful arcane protections kept them out. They needed to get my input, they’d said, since I was a consultant for the task force.

  I, very stupidly, believed them.

  On the sixth day of my detention as a suspected terrorist, Gallagher and two other agents barged into my cell and announced that my house and property had been seized by the U.S. government, and if I wished to spare myself the certainty of life in federal prison, I would cooperate and allow them to take possession. They assured me that it was only a matter of time before they broke through the arcane protections, and therefore I was merely delaying the inevitable and making my predicament much worse.

  When they finished their little speech, I laughed and said, “Good luck with that.”

  At that point, they attempted to convince me that everyone who was currently holed up behind my fence would go to jail forever and then some if I didn’t cooperate, but I could spare them that fate if I simply accompanied the agents to—

  I stopped them and said, “Let’s cut to the chase. You guys want to poke around my house and property because you have satellite imagery and probably drone video that shows something very interesting in my back yard. Only problem is that you can’t get past the fence. Not one bloody inch. And anything aerial you send can’t get within three hundred feet vertically. So how about we skip all the bullshit. I’ll take you three agents—and only you three—onto my property and give you the grand tour. You can even keep me cuffed and shackled and duct taped if it makes you feel safer.”

  Which they did. They had no doubt there was a catch of some sort, but they also knew they weren’t getting past the fence without my cooperation. Within an hour we were in my driveway, which was when I discovered that my super cool and smart demonic lord boyfriend Mzatal had included a nifty feature on the new and improved back yard nexus—allowing me to tap it from anywhere on my property. It was a mere fraction of the power I could pull when standing on its surface, but it was all I needed.

  Long story short, I gave the nice FBI agents an up close and personal demonstration of the power of the nexus, which included their very own aerial—though upside down—view of my house, and made it very clear that I could have easily squashed them flat if I’d wanted to. I then told them to stop fucking wasting my time and maybe now we could work together and do something about the rifts that had started opening up. Oh, and it looks like a rift is about to open up on the south end of Lake Pearl, so you jackholes might want to make sure that area is evacuated. I didn’t tell them that I’d sensed the rift via the nexus, and they didn’t push the issue of how I knew. It helped that I was right about the rift.

  Needless to say, that was the end of my detention. It was also the beginning of DIRT, and how I became the Arcane Commander.

  The protections that kept the agents and other official busybodies out were kickass, but Bryce Taggart—former hitman and my current security expert—informed me that, with the increased activity, we needed to add a few measures. He proceeded to hand me a breakdown of the expected costs, which included actual human security guards and improved surveillance and communication systems. I added the other costs of living that I expected to incur, as well as healthy salaries for all of us since why-the-hell-not and yes I was still mega-pissed about being detained for six days, then gave my funding request to the powers-that-be, told them it was what I needed in order to best do what needed to be done, and was utterly shocked when I got it.

  The very next day, Bryce brought in portable buildings and handpicked security guards: people who he knew had excellent skills, experience, and reliability, but also wouldn’t freak about any weird shit that might happen. We had Jordan Kellum, a former world-class powerlifter who was barely 5'4" but strong as an ox; Chet Watson, gunsmith and firearms expert; David Nguyen, an expert tree man—which was a seriously useful skill with the zillion pines I had on my property; Dennis Roper, a whiz at logistics and planning; Lilith Cantrell, our resident tech guru; Ronda Greitz, mechanic and engineer-type; Bubba Suarez, construction and all around handyman; Nils Engen, medic; Sharini Tandon, who had umpteen black belts and considerable military experience; and several others who didn’t necessarily possess a definable specialty but were sharp and intuitive and darn good picks.

  The guard shack at the end of my driveway was one of the many new additions. I stopped in front of the gate and rolled my window down. The guard on duty was Tandon—tall and lean, with ink-black hair pulled back into a tight coil at the nape of her neck. She gave me a smile but kept a hand on her sidearm and maintained a distance of no less than ten feet from my vehicle.

  “Afternoon, Miss Kara,” she said. “Any word on when football season might start up again?”

  “Afternoon, Sharini. I figure the Saints will come marching in when the moon turns red with blood.” A coded question and response that changed daily and would hopefully trip up a shapechanged demon attempting to infiltrate. It wouldn’t stop Xharbek since he could simply read the answer from the guard’s mind, but the protections that Zack laid around the perimeter would hopefully be more up to the challenge.

  She nodded at my correct reply then hit the button to open the gate. I continued up the long winding driveway and to my lovely hundred-year-old Acadian style house—still in need of a paint job, a task that kept slipping lower and lower on my list of priorities. Fifty yards to the east of the house was a double-wide mobile home, current residence of my best friend, Jill Faciane. To the west, five short and squat trailers sat in a line at the edge of the woods—housing and office space for the security team. It truly was a compound now.

  Cory’s Bertha was parked near the front of my house. I pulled in beside it, and as I climbed out of the Humvee a flash of red hair drew my gaze to the woods beyond the house. Jill, running the obstacle course. Probably not the first time she’d gone throug
h it today, either. Hardcore exercise was only one of the ways she’d been burning through her grief and anger over the kidnapping of Ashava.

  Jill had been understandably devastated, but she wasn’t the sort to wallow in misery. By the time the Feds sprang me from detention she was already working her ass off to get strong and tough. “I need to be ready to do whatever needs to be done to protect my daughter,” she’d told me.

  I had zero doubt she’d be ready for anything. A mama grizzly was a fluffy bunny compared to Killer Jill.

  And yet . . . I knew Jill, and she wasn’t fooling me. She was like a Prince Rupert’s Drop, able to withstand hammer blows to its body but exploding into bits at the slightest flick to its tail. The more time that passed without word of her daughter, the longer that vulnerable tail grew. High on my mental to-do list was “Talk to Jill about Xharbek being Fake-Zack,” but I was going to have to approach the issue carefully. I had no intention of keeping her in the dark, but the last thing I wanted was to get her hopes up about finding Ashava when nothing might result from it. I’d track her down after I finished assessing Cory. That would give me time to plan my approach.

  She vaulted over a wall with an ease that showed her gymnastics background, did a diving roll under a log, then sprinted to the finish, face set in a snarl of determination. As she slowed, her expression shifted to a smile, and I realized Bryce was there, holding a stopwatch. I was too far away to hear what he said, but it made her laugh and smack his arm. A measure of my worry slipped away. Yep, Bryce was damn good for her.

  Maybe one of these days he’d let Jill know how much he loved her.

  No, he does that every day, I thought with a smile. But at the same time he never crossed the line. Though Zack was nowhere to be found, he was still a part of Jill’s life, and out of respect for their relationship, Bryce remained an absolute rock of support for her without ever doing anything to make her feel uncomfortable or pressured. And, in turn, she’d been there for him when he needed it. Bryce shared an essence bond with demonic lord Seretis—a union of minds that went deeper than the closest friendship. After the valve explosion, not only had the ways closed between Earth and the demon realm, but his bond with Seretis had gone silent as well. Yet that silence was more than just a closed door. For Bryce, it was as if the room beyond it had been a favorite space, a treasured and safe retreat that was now an empty void.

  Yep, Jill and Bryce were a good team, helping each other through loss and worry.

  I grabbed my bag and headed toward the porch, reaching it as Pellini’s chocolate Labrador trotted up the steps carrying a kitten by the scruff of its neck. Granger, by the look of it. One of the six kittens Fuzzykins had splorted out onto my bed around three months ago. They were more “catlets” than kittens now. Certainly a lot more rambunctious. To everyone’s amusement, Sammy had become fiercely protective of the litter, even enduring swats and growls from Fuzzykins to be near them.

  But two weeks ago, Sammy had saved Bumper from a red-tailed hawk, earning him belly rubs for life from every human in the compound. Even Fuzzykins stopped harassing him. Mostly. After that, Pellini and I fashioned an arcane perimeter around the house that had so far proved successful in containing the catlets, and kept hawks, owls, and other possible kitten snatchers out.

  “You’re fighting a losing battle, Sammy,” I told him even as he set Granger safely on the porch. No sooner did Sammy release her than the fluffball raced to the stairs. Without slowing, she launched herself off the edge and into the grass where two of her brothers were busy attacking a vicious and dangerous leaf. Bewildered, but determined, Sammy bounded down the steps and after them.

  Fuzzykins lay sprawled in front of the door, apparently content to let Sammy run himself ragged chasing after her wild brood. I stooped to give her a head scratch which she accepted with a soft brrrmp—a far cry from the hiss-growl-scratch she’d have granted me before Angus McDunn reversed his skill-enhancing talent and stripped my arcane abilities. For reasons unknown, cats—especially Fuzzykins—hated summoners. It remained to be seen whether she’d resume hating me as I grew stronger in the arcane.

  I stepped over her and let myself in then closed the door gently behind me. Cory was laid out on the opened sofa bed. Pellini sat in the armchair near him, working on his computer.

  “Any change?” I asked.

  Pellini closed his laptop. “He’s sleeping. I think. Otherwise, everything’s the same. No respiration, but his heart is beating.”

  “We’ll find an answer,” I said with as much conviction as I could muster.

  “You’re goddamn right we will.” Worry darkened Pellini’s expression as he looked at Cory. “He’s been through too much to end up as a fucking bug.”

  “Might end up as something else entirely,” I said quickly. “The mutations seem to run the gamut of—” I grimaced and shook my head. “Sorry. That’s not exactly reassuring.”

  “It’s cool.” He gave a soft snort. “I’ll hold out hope that he turns into something kickass like a unicorn centaur.”

  “You want him to have a horn growing out of his forehead?”

  Pellini let out a breathy chuckle. “That’d be funny as shit. But still better than being a bug.”

  I couldn’t argue with that. “I’m going to grab a quick shower then get the nexus ready. Ten minutes, tops.”

  “I’ll let security know.”

  • • •

  I desperately wanted to let a blistering spray pound me for twenty minutes or so and maybe boil away some of my tension. Instead I settled for a mostly warm two-minute scrubdown that got the worst of the grime off. I hated to waste even that much time before starting my assessment of Cory, but physical impurities such as grime, sweat, and stench tended to interfere with tricky arcane processes, and I didn’t know what I was up against.

  As I toweled off, I scowled at my reflection out of habit. Eleven intricate scars covered nearly every inch of my torso—a sigil for each of the demonic lords, and souvenirs of Rhyzkahl’s torture ritual. A twelfth sigil rested at the base of my spine, transformed by Szerain and his command of rakkuhr from an unfinished unifier scar into an enigmatic glyph, visible only to othersight. I still didn’t know his purpose for creating it other than that it was connected to Ashava.

  I yanked on clothing to cover the sigils and myself, then detoured through the kitchen, grabbed a protein shake and glugged it down. Movement caught my eye through the window, and I steadied my gaze on a shirtless Rhyzkahl tracing the sigils of the shikvihr. Crap. I didn’t want him to know what was going on with Cory. I’d have to make sure the captive lord was in no position to watch us.

  My back yard had changed significantly in the past two months. Mzatal had transformed the nexus slab from ordinary concrete into an obsidian-black, diamond-hard surface that shimmered with intricate patterns of silvery threads. A five-foot-wide swath of grass ringed the nexus, and beyond it was another five-foot-wide ring, where little grass remained. That outer ring was Rhyzkahl’s prison, where wards and protections—brilliantly crafted by Mzatal—kept him in place, like a planet that could neither approach nor retreat from the sun.

  Though Mzatal was judge, jury, and jailer, I was the warden—not that I’d been given a choice in the matter. Still, I did my best to be fair and considerate. I’d even arranged to have a narrow house built for Rhyzkahl, one that fit perfectly along the curve of the circle, with doors at both ends to allow him to pass right through. While the center of his orbit was packed dirt, small gardens dotted the circumference, coiling vines of pumpkins and runner beans alongside neat clusters of beets and chard and tomatoes, with interspersed pockets of marigolds and cosmos, zinnias and celosia—all grown from seeds and soil that Rhyzkahl had requested. His activity fit with what I knew of the lords. They weren’t averse to hard work nor did they feel themselves too good to pitch in as needed. They had demons to help with household tasks but didn’t treat
them like servants. Plus, the lords worked their asses off to keep their planet’s potency from going out of whack. Rhyzkahl would probably go stir crazy if he couldn’t keep busy.

  Gardening. Occupational therapy for a caged demon.

  Purple irises flourished on both sides of his house, encouraged to bloom out of season by what little potency he could muster within the prison. On the roof lay yet another granted request: a coil of leather straps and a pile of sandbags that he used to work out.

  I didn’t grant all his requests. I was proud of myself that I no longer laughed in his face when he demanded to be released.

  Rhyzkahl paused between one sigil and the next, flexed his right hand several times before continuing. A deep scar crossed his palm, a remnant of the searing hilt of his essence blade, Xhan, when Mzatal struck through it in order to free me from Rhyzkahl’s torture ritual. It was a vicious wound that never fully healed, but I couldn’t muster up much sympathy—not when that ritual had left me covered in scars.

  I chucked the empty shake bottle into the trash then stepped out the back door. Rhyzkahl immediately stopped the shikvihr and turned to face me, proud and aloof. Sweat glistened on his skin, but his white-blond hair flowed in glowing perfection past his shoulders, seemingly untouched by Louisiana humidity. Mzatal had left him a thread of potency—enough that he could heal himself and even regrow his hair. Now Rhyzkahl once again looked every inch the demonic lord, a far cry from the pale and stumbling figure who’d been cast out of the demon realm.

  Only the incessant twitch in his scarred right hand betrayed the profound damage that wasn’t so easily healed. Each of the demonic lords had a ptarl, a demahnk advisor with whom they shared a deep bond that was both arcane and emotional. And unknown to the lords, their ptarl was also their parent. The lords relied on their ptarls for counsel, support, and focus. Yet during the battle at the Farouche Plantation, Zack/Zakaar—Rhyzkahl’s ptarl—made a radical, terrible, and necessary decision to sever the three thousand-year-old bond, an act that left them both shattered.