can kill me in a few minutes. I want to talk first. You like to talk, don’t you?”
I eyed Quen, then faced Trent. Zack wouldn’t dare move. He never had before. “Yes,” I said, satisfied I was the strongest one here. “Hearing you lie is amusing.”
That pixy, though, wouldn’t stop moving. “Wake her up,” Jenks said, sword held high as if ready to cut me. “It’s going to eat her to a shell.”
“I can’t believe I sleep with you,” I said, and Trent took a quick breath, the pain in the back of his eyes mirroring his aura flashing red and settling.
“Maybe I can give you something Landon can’t,” he said, and I laughed, having had this conversation with him before when we first met.
“A Brimstone plantation in the South Seas? You foolish, stupid man. I want a body. Can you give me a body?” Which was really weird, because I had a body. I was in it.
Trent didn’t seem to have a problem with the incongruity, though, shaking his head and inching closer, that damn pixy with him. “You can’t have hers,” he said.
“Why would I want to be a stinking whore of a second-class demon when I have a powerful elf for the taking?” I said, my words confusing me even as I felt a surge of confidence. “Maybe you can tell me why Landon wants me alive and you dead. Demons spared when elves are slain. Still, killing you gives Landon all the power, dewar and enclave alike. Maybe Landon is right. I’m tired of you hurting me.”
Again I pulled on the line, my knees going watery as the power of the line flowed in with an unexpected force, singing through my mind as if it was angels exalting me home. So much power, I thought, looking at my hands and wondering why they weren’t burning. Perhaps Landon was a mistake. Perhaps this was the body I wanted to keep. It wouldn’t take much now. My eyes rose to Trent. Either way, he was going to die.
“Corrumpo!” I demanded, marshaling the whining mystics streaming through me into motion. It was a mundane curse, but the force behind it would shatter stone.
“Septiens!” Quen shouted, and Trent ducked as my force hit the circle he’d invoked around them, sealing me out. Zack yelped as my magic ricocheted, screaming past me to explode in the cavern of the fireplace. Rock chips flew like daggers, and the scent of dust and burnt amber rose.
I turned from the cracked wall as the adolescent elf skittered to put a chair between us. From across the room, a dog barked to warn me off as I pushed myself into motion.
“You will not hurt him, baku,” Quen said, and I jerked. He had said these words to me before. A long time ago. He might not have remembered, but I did.
Wavering, I felt something open in my thoughts, a memory I’d never created swimming up from the sliding sound of salt spilling from one lobe of my mind to the other. “I know you,” I said, letting the memory slip to the front of my mind, and I gasped as I recalled what he and that elf Trisk had done to me.
Hatred boiled up, and I took a step closer, the line screaming through me as I pulled on it until my hair floated. “You were why I was imprisoned in a worthless body,” I said, hitting my chest as if I was in it still. “Decades I waited, until magic failed and I was freed.” My lip curled, and my hand fisted into death. “You die first. It’s personal.”
“Quen!” Trent shouted, hunched in indecision.
But I was already in motion. Quen was too fast with his circles. I remembered from before, and a part of me spun in confusion as two pasts tried to make one present.
“Septiens!” Quen shouted again, and I slid to a halt, magic dripping from me, hatred rising from my pores. He’d hidden behind a second circle. Son of a bastard, I thought, relying on my memory, and then I jerked as a new thought, one of my newest, rose like a pearly wave of sun. I was a demon. Quen’s new circle was undrawn. Without salt or chalk to give it structure, it was weak and wouldn’t stand before me. Not now that I was a demon.
“Nice try,” I said, and then I hauled off and slammed my glowing fist right into his barrier.
“Rachel!” someone shouted, and I ground my