A burning dose of betrayal joined the icy dread in my gut. I frantically ran through all our strategizing, but we hadn’t covered this scenario. All I knew was Justin and I weren’t supposed to attack anyone—that was Aaron and Kai’s job.
“Whatever he reported, this pair clearly hasn’t left town.” Daniel listened for a moment. “All right. I’ll deal with these two, then look around for the others.”
Ending the call, he pocketed the device, then gripped the door handle behind him. With a flex of his arm, he snapped it off the door.
My jaw dropped. That was … not possible, was it? Was the handle faulty? Had it been sabotaged?
“Backup,” I muttered frantically. “We need backup.”
“Aaron, get in there,” Kai barked.
“The door is jammed!”
Daniel stepped away from the door, rolling his shoulders to loosen the muscles. “Okay, lady and gent, you have two options. You can jump off this roof and hope you survive the seven-story drop, or you can play with me.”
I shoved my hand into my purse and whipped out my paintball gun. Justin’s hand appeared from beneath the back of his jacket at the same time, holding his much scarier real gun, and we both leveled our weapons on the mythic.
“Don’t move!” I ordered.
He blinked, then threw his head back in a long, humorless laugh. His head came back down and his eyes fixed on me.
A crimson sheen blurred his brown irises.
His arm snapped up. Glowing red lines surged up his arm in twisting veins, and power ballooned in front of his palm.
Before I could fire a shot, the demon mage unleashed an explosion of magic.
The blast of hot power flung me backward. I slammed into a lawn chair and tumbled down, my leather jacket scraping over the concrete. My paintball gun skidded across the terrace.
“Tori!” Kai shouted in my ear. “What’s happening?”
“Demon mage,” I gasped, eyes watering from pain.
A hand closed over my hair and yanked my head up. Daniel’s crimson-tinted eyes scoured my face, then he ripped the Bluetooth phone from my ear. Across the terrace, the steel door rattled as Aaron tried to break through.
“So, your friends are here too, hmm?” Daniel yanked me hard against his chest as though embracing me, his arm crushing my lungs, and spoke over my head. “Gonna shoot your teammate?”
“Do you think I can’t make a headshot at this range?” my brother growled.
I couldn’t see Justin with my face mashed against Daniel’s shoulder, but he sounded close enough to make the shot. I mentally yelled at him to do it, because I was two seconds from death.
The gun didn’t fire.
A distant thud shook the terrace door, but it didn’t open—and there was no other way onto the rooftop.
My purse clung to my elbow, and I awkwardly dug into it one-handed, my head spinning as I sucked in shallow breaths of icy air. The temperature around the demon mage was ten degrees colder than the surrounding atmosphere.
His arm tightened, his demonic strength compressing my chest until my ribs creaked. I couldn’t breathe at all.
He slashed his other arm. Red power flared and Justin’s gasp was followed by a thump. The cold deepened as Daniel prepared a second strike—a lethal one, if I was going to bet.
My fingers closed around a smooth glass ball. I flung my arm out and whipped the sphere into the ground. It shattered and thick smoke billowed out, engulfing us and stinging my nose with its peppery scent.
“What the—” Daniel snarled. His arm unlocked and he shoved me backward. As I fell, he caught the front of my jacket. He lifted me off the ground, my feet swinging helplessly.
His hand, glowing with power, swung to point at my face.
If I’d had my Queen of Spades, I could’ve reflected his strike back into him. If I’d had my amplifying brass knuckles, I could’ve knocked him on his ass, demon strength or no demon strength. If I’d had my fall spell, I could’ve dropped him to the ground.
But I had no magic at all.
Raw demonic power burst off the demon mage’s hand—and Hoshi appeared in a swirl of silver.
Her tail looped around me, paws clutching my shoulders, and the world turned to white mist. The blast of crimson magic shot straight through me, and my feet dropped to the ground as his hand slid through my insubstantial jacket.
With the fae holding me in the misty reality between her realm and mine, I bolted away—but between the ethereal haze and the smoke bomb I’d set off, I couldn’t see a thing.
“Justin?” I yelled, shoving my purse back up onto my shoulder.
My voice echoed as though I were standing in an empty stadium. I whirled around in a panic—and saw a dark, human-shaped smear crouched nearby. As I leaped toward him, Hoshi’s grip loosened. The world rushed back in, and the exhausted sylph sent a swirl of fearful color through my head as she faded from sight.
I grabbed Justin’s arm and hauled him toward the faint outline of the terrace door. Blood ran down his face. I couldn’t tell how bad the injury was.
Red magic blazed. The demon mage charged out of the smoke, cutting us off. Power snaked over his arms and built up in his palms. His face was twisted with anger, the crimson glow in his eyes even brighter.
Almost bright enough to resemble the eyes of the demon inside him.
“Demon!” I yelled desperately, half stepping in front of my brother. “I know a way to save you!”
“Save me?” Daniel snarled, raising both hands toward me and Justin. The ground around his feet turned white with frost. “Worry about yourself.”
“Not you. Your demon.” I locked my stare on those crimson eyes while digging into my purse. “You don’t like your host, do you? You haven’t taught him any real spells. He’s throwing magic around like a kid chucking mud.”
Daniel hesitated, confusion twisting his full lips. A dozen paces behind him, the part of the door next to the latch glowed with heat.
“I can free you from that flesh prison,” I said, frantically combing my memory for things Eterran had said. My searching fingers found a cool chain. “Do you know what this is, demon?”
I whipped the demon amulet out of my purse, the medallion swinging.
Daniel’s brow furrowed—then his eyes blazed bright red. He snapped straight, back rigid and limbs spasming. With a hoarse cry, he grabbed at his face.
“No!” he yelled. “You can’t! Stop it!”
Not waiting to see if the demon or the human would win that battle of wills, I hauled Justin past the convulsing mage and toward the door.
“Aaron!” I shrieked desperately.
“Tori!” The door jolted as Aaron slammed into it from the other side. “I’m not through yet!”
Shit!
“You bitch!” Daniel staggered into view, his teeth bared and one hand pressed to his forehead. “You’re dead!”
I recoiled, almost bumping the searingly hot door. Power blazed up the demon mage’s arms and sizzling orbs of crimson formed in his palms. He drew both arms back to hurl explosive death at me and Justin, and all I could do was clutch the useless demonic amulet.
The wind gusted, blasting the smoke screen to nothing. A violent swirl of dust shot upward like a tornado—spiraling from the street below, surging past the rooftop, and reaching for the clouds above.