“And you called the council?”
“Yes. I wanted them to send a necromancer. Hah. Worthington told me I was imagining things.”
Silas turned and cast a seeking spell toward the elm tree. Find and show and demon-trace wound in a ball of power. The spell slid over the snow and dirt, then moments before reaching the tree it sparked green and bright. Silas felt a pull, almost as if a gate to the Veil was waiting to open. He tossed a few more runes for shape and gate, and they outlined an arched space, then collapsed in on themselves and went dark. No gate there now, but still a lingering thinning and potential in that space.
“Yes,” Hutchins said. “It was right there.”
Grim ambled over to where Silas had delineated the gate and paced around the area, staring intently. “No trace of a circle. No taste of human magic I can pick up.”
“That’s my yard and there was no circle,” Hutchins insisted.
“There had to be something,” Silas protested. “Demons don’t just… pop between worlds out of thin air, without magic to transport them.”
“Maybe there was a circle on the demon’s side,” she suggested.
“We’d better pray not.” The very idea slid ice down Silas’s spine. “If the demons have gained the power to gate at will, instead of waiting to be summoned, we’ll all be in enormous trouble.”
“Have you done any summonings lately, Miss Hutchins?” Jasper asked. “Built any circles at all in the last few days?”
“Well, not out there.” But her cheeks showed a red flush.
“Inside the house? Something?”
“I did try to summon a familiar, two days ago. Without success.” She shrugged casually, though the twist of her mouth looked disappointed.
“I should take a look at that circle,” Silas said. Maybe she’d done something wrong, something that somehow formed a hells gate. In her yard, and a day later? That was a heck of a longshot.
“I erased it afterward, of course. I wouldn’t leave a failed spell running in the middle of my workroom for a whole day. Or even an hour. Every trace was long gone before that demon appeared.”
Silas pinched the bridge of his nose. “I need you to show me how you constructed that summons—” Silas cut himself off as Kii swooped down out of the sky and landed on a branch of the dead tree.
“I think I spotted it.” Kii swiveled her head to peer over her shoulder, gesturing with a jerk of her beak. “A power hot-spot with a nasty red tinge to it. Half a mile that way.”
Silas turned to Hutchins. “Who lives out that way? Anyone with power you know of?”
“Granny Abels. But she’s more herbwife than sorcerer. She uses charms to beef up her potions a bit, but they have more power of suggestion than real magic in them.”
Grim said, “A demon would prefer a host with more power. But in a pinch, they’ll take whoever’s handy.”
Darien flinched hard enough for Silas to see it.
“Can you show us where she lives?” he asked Hutchins.
“I’ll give you her address. I’m not leaving these wards till the demon’s taken care of. It was hunting, hungry. It… wanted me.” A shiver shook her body.
“The address will do,” Silas agreed. They didn’t need another low-powered innocent in the middle of their hunt anyway.
Chapter 2
Darien tried not to let his nerves show in his driving. He wasn’t sure what he’d expected when they set out.
He hadn’t forgotten that demons could take over vulnerable human sorcerers. God, I have not forgotten. The demon poured into Lucinda— He swallowed hard. Maybe the old lady wasn’t even there. Maybe the demon was just nosing around somewhere in cloud form and Silas could snare it and send it back where it belonged with no casualties. And maybe Grim will pat rats on the head and serve them tea.
“Here.” Silas pointed left. “Pull in at this drive. It’s the next house along.”
The driveway Darien obediently turned into curved back toward a farmhouse and outbuildings, but he pulled over just off the road and put the Studebaker in park. “Now what?”
Silas cranked down his window and sketched a couple of runes toward the cedar hedge that screened the next property. The runes drifted across space, then sparked and glowed as they rose over the bushes and into the next yard. Silas gestured and the runes winked out. “It’s there.”
Jasper asked, “Can you tell how strong it is?”
“Not from here.” Silas drummed his fingers on his knee.
“What do we do?” Darien slid his hands around the wheel, tense and restless. He didn’t want to think about this, he wanted to do something, move, fight, whatever.
“Might be smartest to leave the car here and walk over.” Silas glanced into the back. “Kii, want to go aerial? Scope out next door, give us the layout?”
“Of course.” The hawk opened her wings and shook them, climbing past Silas’s shoulder and out his open window. She took off, circling high in the blue, then swooped back down and landed on a fencepost a few feet away. “Single house. A small one, old car in the drive, no garage. What power there is feels modest but demon-tinged and doesn’t spill outside the walls. There are wards up. Weak ones.”
“I can work with that.” Silas flexed his knuckles. “Grim, take Pip and stay out of sight, pick your vantage point.”
Grim stretched a claw-tipped paw. “We’ll find a hidden way to get close. Let us out, Jasper.” When Jasper swung the car door wide, Grim jumped to the ground. Pip gave Darien a quick look, then followed the big cat.
Darien took heart at seeing the little dog’s white body was fairly camouflaged against the patchy snow, as Pip trailed behind Grim toward the hedge. Stay safe, Pip. “What about us?”
“Sometimes approaching head-on is the best way,” Silas said. “The demon’s only been on this plane for a few hours. We don’t know what its relationship to the sorcerer is. Maybe she’s held out against it, still thinks she can control it. Maybe it hasn’t even shown her what it is yet.”
“Head-on sounds risky,” Jasper said.
Darien licked his dry lips. Yes, yes, it does, thank you Jasper for telling him so.
“Ah, but the part that makes it safer?” Silas reached down by his feet and dragged up his work bag. “Before I go knock on the demon’s door, we get to draw a circle.”
“Circle?” Jasper cocked his head like a curious bird.
“Around the whole damned house.” Silas grinned. “Inexperienced demon, gone to ground in a freestanding location? We definitely can take advantage of that. It’ll take a bit of time, but there’s three of us.”
“I don’t know your circle structure,” Jasper pointed out.
“I’ll do the front, and the lock. You two, just do a plain arc, with a contain rune every couple of feet. I can make that work.”
Darien felt a grin pull at his lips. “You mean we could lock that thing down before it even knows we’re here?”
“That’s the plan.” Silas pulled out several of the powdered chalk bags he used for scribing on rough ground and handed two to each of them. “Widdershins, for this circle, against the clock, to freeze the space.”