Demon Master (Demonsense series Book 2) (45 page)

She pictured making that argument to Kevin, and could easily imagine his objections. He was doing amazingly well here tonight, as he’d done when they worked together at Alki. But it wasn’t truly in his nature to take many risks. He was protective and cautious to a fault, and she knew he’d throw her promise not to call Gelsenim ruthlessly into her face if she tried to make her case. Yet again, she wished Daniel were here. She thought he’d back her up on it if he thought she could get away with it.
 

She and Kevin made it all the way out and turned to face the action. She scanned for Franchesca. It was clearly going to be difficult to try to keep track of her while avoiding being seen in all this mess. She could see more police in riot gear moving into place around the pockets of violence, trying to move in and break it up, and Bree had a brief hope that they would be able to contain the worst of it.
 

As her eyes moved over the crowd, her attention was caught by a flash of red light. She realized as she searched for the source that she was seeing the reflection of the light in the huge glass expanse that was the front of the Westlake Center mall.
 

The flickering of the light increased in tempo and then, to her great shock, she saw the form of a disembodied demon rise above the crowd. It looked like a dragon, long reptilian snout opened in a roar of anger, red lined black wings rising over it’s long body, orange eyes whirling.
 

Bree was drenched in involuntary terror. A demon in a form like this had killed her husband Seth. It might even be the same one. That it was visible here, now, was a violation of the deepest tenant of the magical community, both light and dark, that of secrecy. Even a demon burned Demon Master would be highly unlikely to allow a disembodied demon to be seen in public if they had any control over it whatsoever. Which may well mean that this particular demon had escaped control of the Master who had called it. And that was a seriously bad thing.

There were shrieks of surprise and fear as the people in the crowd nearby saw the apparition, followed by screams of pain as the demon’s energy began to burn the people around it. The demon wouldn’t be able to hurt people for long. It couldn’t maintain enough physical energy on this plane to do so for more than a minute or two. But a minute or two was all it would take to get a lot of people seriously hurt or killed in a crowd this dense. She turned frantic eyes on Kevin, who was looking as freaked out as she felt. “Kevin, I have to do something!”

“No. It’ll burn out in a minute.” His face had turned grim as he looked at her. He gestured to his right, and she saw Keeper Chen and her partner moving toward the demon. Chen clutched some kind of amulet around her neck, probably a religious focus of some kind, and her lips were moving in what Bree assumed was the beginnings of an exorcism spell. Bree knew the likelihood of the exorcism spells being raised in time to protect those nearby from the demon was nil, though she didn’t blame Chen for trying. What else was there to do?
 

She watched in trepidation as Chen and her companion broke into the area around the demon. The crowd was trying to move away from it, so there appeared to be some space around it. Chen was tall enough to be seen over most of the crowd. Her partner wasn’t visible at all. Chen’s arms rose as she prepared to throw the exorcism spell she’d prepared at the demon.
 

Just as she cast the spell forward, the demon spun to face Chen, jaws outthrust. The spell did nothing to stop the demon as its spectral form bit into Chen, and she watched in horror as Chen started to burn. She caught fire and blackened like a marshmallow being roasted in a campfire. Bree had to clamp a hand over her mouth and turn away to keep from throwing up. Panic competed with nausea as her eyes lit on another demonic form coming into being, a devil form this time, much further away, but visible over the mass of people in a swirl of red, orange and black. Bree forced her gorge down and grabbed Kevin by the arm, turning him to face her. “I have to call Gelsenim!” she shrieked.

Kevin’s hands went to the sides of his head and he was saying, “Fuck, fuck, fuck!” Bree shook him by the arm, hard, and said, “I need you to ward me. And I need you to keep an eye out for Keepers. Jesus, Kevin, I have to, you know I have to!”
 

He closed his eyes and grimaced, then he dropped his hands and said, “Shit, yes, I know!”
 

She turned full circle to scan for Keepers, Reader sense questing at full range for powered. When she came back around to Kevin, she said, “Clear for the moment.” She rubbed at the demon repelling wards on her hands, forcing them to break, then gathered her will quickly, and called mentally, desperately, "Gelsenim, come to me now! Come directly into me!" She stood, braced, as another, then another demon took shape, both civilians and police scattering away from the nightmare forms. A familiar rush of heat flowed into Bree, and she heard Gelsenim’s voice in her head,
My host, yet again you place yourself in danger. Is this truly necessary?

Just shut up and get busy. Are you muting your energy signature?

Yes, my host, I know that is what you prefer.

Fine, now help me banish these fucking demons!
She stalked forward into the crowd, Kevin at her side. She went straight for the dragon. It was probably about out of steam, but it was closest.
Can we do this silently? I don’t want to broadcast to the world what I’m doing.

It is only slightly more difficult that way.
She got about twenty feet away from the demon and focused both her base and will energy in that configuration she had come to think of as Demon Master energy.
 
She shouted the words in her mind,
Demon, I command you, be gone!
 

 
Gelsenim’s power combine with hers and struck the demon. It howled in protest, but almost immediately broke form and vanished. A wild triumph rose up in Bree at the sight. She turned to face the next demon, and instead came face to face with Franchesca.
 

“You know, I put a lot of effort calling that one, and I don’t appreciate you messing with my work,” Franchesca said conversationally. They were in a relatively open area near where the vanished demon had been, and while there was a lot of crowd noise nearby, Bree could easily hear Franchesca speak. Before she could think up a reply, she felt Kevin’s ward spring into place. She was immensely grateful for Kevin’s quick action.
 
They had at least a couple of minutes to get away from Franchesca while staying protected from both magic and physical force.

“Yeah, well I don’t appreciate you messing with my city,” Bree replied angrily.
 
“Get out of my fucking way.”

“Or you’ll do what?” Franchesca asked, eyes narrowing.
 

Gelsenim, can we take her?

I can help you cast several offensive spells, but your friend would have to drop his ward.
The structure of the spells he intended bloomed in her head.
 

She can probably counter those,
Bree replied anxiously. She realized that the longer she failed to answer Franchesca, the more strain she was putting on Kevin. He couldn’t hold the ward forever.
 

“Look, you can probably sense I have a demon on board,” Bree temporized. “It’s an Erekim. So you might want to think twice about screwing with me.”

Franchesca threw back her head and laughed. “And you think I can’t call one of my own?” she taunted.
 

“I think you’re probably overextended from calling as many demons as you have already tonight,” Kevin put in. “I think your control is slipping already and you don’t dare let yourself be possessed right now.”

Franchesca’s expression darkened to anger, and Bree immediately read that Kevin had hit the nail on the head. Damn, the man was brilliant. Franchesca didn’t want to be possessed right now, so Bree had at least that advantage.

Won’t you let me kill this one for you?
Gelsenim wheedled.
She is truly a danger to you. We have encountered her before, and she is a very high power Caster. You are right, she may be able to counter even our combined power.
 

Bree was mightily tempted, but she thrust that temptation away. She had to come up with some other way. And the longer it took, the more people were going to die. “How can you do it?” she blurted out. “How can you just ruthlessly kill all these people?”

“For a higher goal, of course,” Franchesca responded with an ironic sneer.

“Oh, I think you enjoy it,” Bree shot back. “I think you are that completely sick and twisted. How do you suppose Daniel will react when I tell him what you’ve done here?”

Franchesca’s face dissolved instantly into rage, and Bree knew a moment’s intense fear, fear that she’d gone too far, fear that Kevin’s ward would fail if Franchesca hit them with her full power, as she was like to do in anger.
 

But then Kevin did something completely unexpected. He dropped the ward, stepped forward, and punched Franchesca in the face. He had to reach up a little to do it, but he didn’t hold back, and Franchesca’s head whipped hard to the side. He hit her again before she could respond, and she staggered, clutching at her cheek. One more jab, and she was down. Kevin bent over her and punched her a couple more times for good measure. "And that's for kidnapping my son!" he snarled.

Bree’s mouth was open in stupid surprise. She hadn’t known Kevin had it in him to physically attack anyone, let alone a woman. Of course, this was Franchesca they were talking about. “C’mon, let’s move out before she recovers,” he said, wiping his forehead with the back of his wrist. Bree lost no time in following him away from where Franchesca was lying dazed and bleeding on the ground.
 

They’d only gone a few steps towards the next demon when Bree saw Javier Ortiz. Heart rate spiking, she ducked behind Kevin, and anxiously maneuvered him in another direction.
Mute, Gelsenim, mute! Hide as best you can,
she commanded. She didn’t dare risk a glance back at Javier, just moved as fast as possible away from where she’d last seen him.
 

As they approached one of the devil formed demons, she threw a quick read around for him, but he wasn’t in range. She focused back inside on Gelsenim, bid him to help her, focused her power and banished the demon. There was only one of the visible ones left now, as far as she could see, the others likely having possessed someone to avoid retreating back to the void. In spite of the dangers of the milling, panicked, battling crowd, Bree was starting to feel like they were making a little progress.
 

How close do I really have to be to banish these demons? And can’t you do more than one at a time?
she finally thought to ask Gelsenim. She wished she'd thought to ask before, but she supposed she could be forgiven for not thinking straight in the middle of such a dangerous mess. She realized it would have been better to have planned these things out in advance rather than tell herself she wouldn’t call Gelsenim.

I can do more if I do not have to suppress my energy signature. But we are much more likely to be perceived by Keepers if I do so.

Bree took a few precious moments to read the crowd again.
Okay, I think we’re safe. Let’s see how many we can do at once.
She focused on her Demonsense, registering not only the disembodied demon, but also nine more inside hosts that were within about fifty feet of her.
 

Her concentration was broken by the sound of gunfire. She was getting too damned familiar with that sound. She glanced around, didn’t see anyone with a gun nearby, and proceeded to try to banish ten demons at once. She wondered if even Daniel could do such a thing, wondered if she was insane for even trying.
 

Desperation lent her strength, and as Gelsenim allowed his full power to fill her, she felt swollen with energy. She realized she had to say the words out loud and risk being heard if she was going to have any hope of directing such a huge wad of energy.
 
“Demons, we command you, all of you! Be gone!” With a painful sucking sensation, she felt the power roar out of her and strike each of the demons she’d targeted. She staggered, head ringing and spinning at the same time, and she had to clutch at Kevin to avoid going down. To her stunned but immense satisfaction, every single one of the demons vanished back into the void. Bree took a shaky breath, and looked at Kevin. “We did it!” she told him. “We got a big bunch of them to leave.”
 

“I guess that makes me an idiot for telling you not to do it before,” Kevin replied ruefully, then staggered as someone clipped him trying to get by. As Bree looked up at him to reply, she saw his eyes widen. “Javier!” he hissed.

Oh shit, Gelsenim, leave now!
she squawked internally. She felt dizzy as the demon obeyed her, and had to clutch at Kevin’s arm.
 

Javier was bleeding from his nose and was limping as he approached them. Bree read his face intently for signs that he’d perceived her as possessed, and she didn’t see any hint of it. He wasn’t really focusing on her at all, she realized. He looked like he was spending all his effort at holding himself together. “Glad to see you both unhurt,” he said briskly. “I think you’d better retreat back to the edge of the crowd. Some of the demons have left, but the whole situation is fucked.”
 

Bree was shocked to hear him swear. It just wasn’t something Javier did. As if to underscore what he’d said, more gunshots rang out, much closer this time. “Whitman, put up a ward,” Javier barked, and pushed past them, deeper into the chaos.
 

Bree felt shaky, and had to hold tight to Kevin to walk. She wanted to call Gelsenim again, try to banish more demons, but Javier was right, they needed to get closer to the edge. They had to maneuver past several fights, but as no one’s life appeared in danger and no powered or possessed were involved, they went on by.