back from the table. Panic took me when it slithered past my mental barriers as if they didn’t exist.
Will you fall to me today? snaked through my mind, and I freaked. It wasn’t my thought. It was the baku, and I wasn’t asleep! On the table, Landon’s imagined candles flickered, a few of the flames regaining a healthy color as the baku tried to move from him to me.
Get out! I demanded, ramrod straight in my chair as I fumbled to control my thoughts. But it wasn’t like fighting the Goddess, who absorbed memories. It was trying to eat my soul!
Too fatigued to expel me, too alone to hold me, the baku thought, and I stiffened, feeling assaulted when it sank a long thought deep into my core. Panic swirled. I was awake. It couldn’t take me. Unless . . . it had eaten deep enough and I couldn’t stop it.
Not today, I thought savagely, and in a desperate effort to get it out, I touched my thoughts to a ley line and let it pour in, pushing the energy from my well-used channels and into the baku.
A laughing sensation rose as the baku rode the incoming tide of energy. But then its satisfaction faltered, and I felt a long finger of it pull free, and then another, and finally I took a breath as the first shimmer of nothing stood between it and my psyche. Not today, but soon, it agreed, and then I jumped, everyone crying out in surprise when Bis crashed heavily onto the table. With a burning pop through my thoughts, the baku was gone, and the line hung in me alone.
Immediately I dropped the ley line. My circle fell with an audible snap. Landon’s security rushed forward, pulling him to his feet and dragging him away until the man shoved them off. Trent stood tall over me, his expression grim as his hand rested on my shoulder. I didn’t think he knew what had happened, and shaking, I reached up and touched his fingers, grateful for him.
He was there, and the baku was gone. My soul was still strong enough to fight it off. That was four times now, each attack more effective. Sleeping under guard or charmed silver would only let it pare another layer from me. Maybe the demons were right.
“Thanks,” I whispered to Bis, and the kid sidestepped the scattered curse to hop to my other shoulder. That no-doze amulet was around his neck, and even as I watched, the sun rose and a rosy haze touched the tallest buildings.
“I didn’t do anything. You kicked it out on your own,” Bis said, his eyes squinting at the new light, and I gave his toes a squeeze as he slumped, clearly tired.
“Kicked it out?” Trent said, and I looked up at him, wanting to tell him but afraid.
But my cold face gave me away. His grip on me tightened as he turned to Landon and the delicious scent of angry elf flowed from him like a balm. Zack was ashen, and Jenks stood on the table with his sword in hand, ready to give someone a lobotomy. Failed attempt or not, it was obvious that the baku had come from Landon. But the proof was his word against ours. Worthless.
“You’ve been a bad religious leader, Landon,” I said. My voice was low to keep it from trembling and I didn’t dare try to stand. Not yet. “The baku has eaten you to a shell.”
“I have this under control,” Landon said, but he looked as shaken as I felt, and I frowned. Weast had said the same thing.
“Then you don’t understand what’s going on,” Trent said.
Landon pushed his security away. “You have to sleep sometime, Morgan,” he said, and a real fear zinged through me. “You. Stop being stupid and come with me,” Landon directed to Zack, and the kid twitched. “You aren’t equipped to function in the real world. What are you going to do? Get a job? You don’t know how to do anything.”
My lips parted at the insult and Jenks rose. But Zack was twisting that ring off his finger, gasping in pain when it pulled free. Chin high, he threw it at Landon.
Landon caught it with one hand, almost as if the ring had been magnetized. Expression sour, he put it on his finger next to its twin. “Your entire life will be a waste,” he said, and then he took the candle and strode away, his security hustling to