The Trouble with Demons (10 page)

I couldn’t stop that power.

“Raine!” It was Mychael’s voice sounding like it was coming down a well. I was at the bottom of that well, trapped, with no way out.

“You’ve got to discharge!”

I was going to implode or explode or something fatal and final if I didn’t get rid of the power charge that had built up inside of me. I couldn’t force it back where it came from. There was too much of it, a wall of power bearing down on me. It was coming, and I couldn’t stop it. The Saghred and I were one. Mychael said the containments were failing.

Clearly, no containments held the Saghred now.

Or would ever hold it again.

“His magic grew him; your magic can destroy him,” Sora was calling down that same well.

I had no idea what she meant, but I knew what I could do, what I
had
to do before the power that surged through my veins killed me—and everyone else.

Then on some level, I understood what Sora meant. It was so simple.

I extended my hand, fingers spread. The yellow demon was massive, but it was across the room, and my hand covered it completely, at least that’s what it looked like. It was a distance illusion, but illusion was magic, too.

I began slowly curling my fingers closed. The demon began compacting like I was crushing a wet sponge in my hand. It roared, then those roars turned to screams, and finally a thin shriek as I closed my hand until it was the tightest fist I could make. I tasted blood in my mouth, and black blooms danced on the edge of my vision. I opened my hand and released what was left and heard a wet, sickening plop from across the room. Then came the retching noises from a few of the watchers.

That and awed—and horrified—silence.

The last thing I heard before silence and blessed unconsciousness took me was Carnades’s calm, cold voice.

“Lock her up.”

 

 

I woke up in a dark, warm room. Not a cell. And I was tucked into
a soft bed, not a prison cot with a threadbare blanket. Nice. And deeply wrong. When I passed out, I must have hit my head. Hard.

I was in my bedroom back home in Mermeia.

“Aside from bruises that most certainly will hurt when you wake up, you’re surprisingly unharmed, all things considered.”

My father sat in a chair half hidden in shadow near my window. That was one reason why I hadn’t seen him. The other reason was even more unnerving than waking up in a place where I couldn’t possibly be. Unnerving, but not unexpected. We’d spoken directly one other time.

I’d been able to see through him that time, too.

Eamaliel Anguis’s elegantly pointed ears marked him as an elf, a beautiful pure-blooded high elf. His hair was silver, and his eyes were the gray of gathering storm clouds. Eyes identical to my own. I could see why my elven sorceress mother hadn’t cared that he was nearly nine hundred years old.

Yes, nine hundred years old, and he didn’t look a day over thirty. Elves had the same life span as every other race, so having a father who looked four years younger than me took weird to a whole new level. He’d spent the last year or so inside the Saghred, the other eight hundred and something years the result of an extended life span from too much contact with the Saghred. A fate I really wanted to avoid.

I knew I wasn’t really at home in my bedroom. One, it was impossible. Two, this bedroom was way too neat to belong to me.

I felt my temple for the lump that had to be there. “No concussion?” I muttered to myself.

“Just unconscious from what you did.”

I remembered and groaned. I’d just done the worst thing possible at the worst possible time in front of the last person I wanted to see me do it.

I was screwed. Royally, completely, and utterly.

“Yes, you did put on quite a show,” my father agreed.

I sat up in bed, and surprisingly it didn’t hurt. “How are we—?”

“You’re dreaming. You picked the setting.”

“Why are you—?”

“Because we need to talk.”

“Stop finishing my sentences!” I didn’t mean to snap, but apparently I needed to.

“I know your thoughts as you think them, daughter. Isn’t communicating this way more—”

“Annoying,” I finished for him. Two could play at that game.

The corner of Eamaliel’s mouth quirked upward. “Since it’s your dream we’ll do it your way.”

I threw back the blanket and got out of bed. I went to the window and yanked back the curtain. Instead of Mintha Row with its shops and cobblestone street, there was a gray void.

My chest tightened. “You’re sure we’re not inside the Saghred?”

“Positive. For some reason, your dream only includes this room.”

“And you.”

“Apparently you wanted to see me.”

I could certainly understand why I’d want that. Get in trouble, go home to Dad.

I let the curtain fall back over the window. “I’m sorry I yelled.”

“No offense taken, Raine. I, of all people, understand your frustration.”

And fear. Let’s not forget gut-clenching fear. I looked down at my wrists. Just because there weren’t manacles on my asleep self didn’t mean my real self wasn’t sporting a pair right now courtesy of Carnades Silvanus.

“Thank you,” I said, sounding as exhausted as I remembered my real body felt. “I’ve had more than enough magic today.”

“I hate being the bearer of bad news, but magic is what we need to talk about. And we need to do it quickly because you’re going to be waking up soon.”

The tightness in my chest dropped into a knot in my stomach. “Waking up where?”

Eamaliel knew I didn’t mean in bed in my dreams. “That I don’t know. I only see what you see. And at the moment, you’re unconscious and not seeing anything.”

“Carnades could be taking you to prison,” purred a cultured and silky voice I knew only too well.

Sarad Nukpana was reclining on my bed in the exact spot where I had been.

“And it’s still warm,” he murmured, running a long-fingered hand over the sheets. His voice dropped, low and intimate. “Eamaliel isn’t the only one who knows exactly what you’re thinking.”

Sarad Nukpana had been the chief counselor to the goblin king Sathrik Mal’Salin, and grand shaman of the Khrynsani, an ancient goblin secret society and military order. At least Sarad Nukpana had held those titles before a little quick thinking by yours truly had gotten him sucked into the Saghred. Nukpana and his boss wanted to get their hands on the rock and bring back the good old days of conquering kingdoms and enslaving thousands. Sarad Nukpana didn’t want me dead, just tormented for eternity.

Here he was on my bed, in my dream. It wasn’t exactly torment, but it was close enough.

I just looked at him. “So, what am I thinking now?”

Nukpana smiled slowly, fangs peeking into view. “Such violence, little seeker. I don’t think what you propose is physically possible.”

I showed him a few of my own teeth. “I won’t know until I try.”

His black eyes glittered. “As always, I welcome your efforts.”

Being trapped inside the Saghred hadn’t diminished the goblin shaman’s dark, exotic beauty one bit. His long black hair was shot through with silver and fell loosely around his strongly sculpted face; the tips of his upswept ears were barely visible through the midnight mass of his hair. Nukpana’s pearl gray skin set off what was any goblin’s most distinguishing feature—a pair of fangs that weren’t for decorative use only.

“Since this is my dream, I say who stays and who goes,” I shot back smoothly. “Guess who doesn’t get to stay.”

Nukpana’s smile spread. “As I said, I welcome your efforts.”

I tried to not only ignore Sarad Nukpana on my bed, but to cease any thoughts of him, forget my memories of him, and blot out his very existence. I knew the last one wasn’t possible, but it never hurts to try.

The goblin was still there.

He laughed, a dark, rich sound. “Getting rid of me is easier said than done, little seeker. Perhaps dispatching those demons took more effort than you could spare.” He paused suggestively. “Or perhaps, you want me to stay. You just can’t say so in front of your father. I quite understand.”

“You’re a parasite, Nukpana,” Eamaliel noted coolly. “You’ll merely take more effort to detach. Though such extreme measures are usually fatal—to the parasite.”

The goblin’s dark eyes narrowed briefly, then he ignored Eamaliel, focusing all of his attention on me. Lucky me.

“You may find this difficult to believe, but I hope Carnades hasn’t taken you into custody,” Nukpana said. “His Majesty’s lawyers and my Khrynsani would be disappointed if you were snatched from their grasp.”

Sathrik Mal’Salin had sent lawyers to Mid to try to retrieve the Saghred and extradite me. When legal means didn’t work, he’d sent Khrynsani shamans and temple guards. So far the goblin king hadn’t gotten his hands on either me or the Saghred. The lawyers and Khrynsani were still on the island and still trying. I almost admired their tenacity.

“What can I say? I’m the most popular spellslinger in town.”

I felt rather than saw my father stand up. I didn’t blame him; I felt the same way. When a first-rate psychopath like Sarad Nukpana appeared in your bedroom, you didn’t want to be caught anywhere but on your feet. I was glad I hadn’t still been in bed when the goblin had slithered in. That would have gone way beyond creepy.

“You said you would stay away from her,” Eamaliel said with quiet menace.

Sarad Nukpana swung his long legs over the side of my bed. “I lied. Surely you didn’t expect me to actually keep my word.

You’re the man of honor, not me. Honor and morals are an inefficient, unproductive waste of my time. By the way, the board is still as you left it, should you want to resume our game.” He turned to me. “Your father stormed off in the middle of a match; it was his move, and I wasn’t even cheating. He may be a man of honor, but he can be rude.” His fangs flashed in a quick grin. “Perhaps there’s hope for him yet.”

I blinked at my father. “Game? You’re actually playing games with him?”

“What an appropriate choice of words,” Nukpana said.

“Your noble father plays games on many levels, little seeker. His powers of manipulation are admirable—and that says much coming from me.”

“Chess, Raine,” Eamaliel clarified. “And yes, it is a way to pass the time and to keep an eye on this one. At least I know that while he’s sitting across from me, he’s not plotting with his allies.”

Sarad Nukpana sighed dramatically. “He still doesn’t believe that my allies have all but evaporated. Literally.”

I could believe that. Almost. The last time I’d been in the Saghred, I’d seen filmy figures, some more solid than others, most wasted away to wraiths. I’d also seen some who appeared to be as solid as Sarad Nukpana.

“Unfortunately, their mental capacity evaporates with them,” the goblin was saying. “It’s difficult to scheme with yourself. I’m all alone.”

I was sure he wasn’t. “I’m sure you’re managing,” was what I said.

“Even the worst enemies when imprisoned together form a kind of camaraderie,” Nukpana said. “Your father and I have found some things in common. You, for one.”

“You’re wasting Raine’s time, Sarad,” Eamaliel warned.

“There’s all the time in the world inside the Saghred.”

“She’s not inside the Saghred.”

Nukpana smiled suggestively. “A goblin can dream, can’t he?”

“What happened at the watcher station wasn’t your fault,” my father assured me. “If you hadn’t acted as decisively as you did, innocent people would have died, and many more would have met the same fate if those demons had escaped.”

“Decisive. So that’s you call shoving one demon into a wine bottle and squashing another into a bloody pulp.”

“I call it beautiful,” Sarad Nukpana said.

Eamaliel shot him a dark look. “It was necessary.”

“But I used the Saghred for the big, yellow one,” I said. For the purple demon, I’d used Tam. Or Tam had used me.

“Because you had to,” my father was saying.

I snorted. “Yeah, I could use it, or I could get ripped apart from the inside by the rock or from the outside by a demon. Some choice.”

“That’s not what I meant. There was a need, and you acted.

You did the right thing, the
only
thing. Yes, the Saghred is a force of death and destruction. But those things aren’t inherently evil. War is death and destruction; war is not inherently evil. People who misuse power are evil.” He shot an accusing look at Sarad Nukpana. “You used your power for the greater good.”

And I had felt good using it. There, I’d admitted it. The Saghred’s full power had been terrifying, overwhelming, but it had also been intoxicating. And deep down, some dark part of me wanted to do it again.

“And she took a couple of giant steps closer to insanity,” Nukpana was saying. “Either that or being locked up for the rest of her life, or getting a dagger in the back, whichever comes first.”

“If I punched him, would my fist go through?” I asked Eamaliel.

“It would. I’ve tried.”

“Too bad.”

“There were mages like Carnades in my time,” my father said. “Men who were absolutely convinced that their beliefs were right and just. Going through a self-righteous life wearing blinders will do that. They can’t accept that the world isn’t only black and white—there are many shades of gray.”

I thought of Tam and what we’d done. “Tam,” I murmured. Sarad Nukpana pulled his legs up to sit cross-legged on my bed, a grin of eager anticipation on his face. “Ah yes, Tamnais Nathrach.” He rubbed his hands together. “Finally things are going to get interesting. What the two of you did was very naughty. It must have felt delicious. Tell me, just how good was it?”

My father looked like he wanted to knock Nukpana off the other side of my bed and through the wall. It wouldn’t work, but that didn’t stop him from entertaining the idea. I was thinking along the same lines myself.