Which I thought was funny, because Trent hadn’t done it. Finished, I tossed the rag into the waste barrel and scooted up atop the table to sit cross-legged. “So . . . how do we get the baku out?”
Jenks dropped down from the rafters to stand before Landon. “Let’s knock it out of him,” the pixy said, and Landon sneezed on his dust. “There’s lots of two-by-fours.”
“It won’t leave voluntarily.” Hodin looked sage in his black jeans and T, a wise-biker-dude-demon vibe on him. “You have to convince Landon to kick it out.”
“That’s not happening.” I stared as the frustrated man choked and trembled, smearing his dewar robes with sawdust as he tried to break the curse holding him.
Hodin’s lips pressed. “I think we’re very close to where he won’t be able to anymore.”
“I control it.” Landon’s hate-filled eyes found mine. “I can kick it out anytime I want.”
“Prove it,” I said, channeling my inner sixth-grader, and Zack gave up on the pool table scribbles and went to stand beside Trent.
“You’d like that, wouldn’t you?” Landon struggled. “You are finished, Kalamack. I will hound you and your children’s children. I will live through the ages as a plague upon your house.”
“Tink’s tampons. He’s monologing,” Jenks muttered from Trent’s shoulder.
“But for you, we’ll start with abducting a high priest,” Landon continued. “Transferring without consent through the lines. The damage to the undercroft alone will bankrupt you.”
Bis dropped down to land on the sawhorse. “It’s just a hole under the church.”
“For the last time,” Trent said, brow furrowed, “I’m not destitute. I have money.”
I slid off the pool table and sashayed over to Landon. “How can we catch it if he won’t kick it out?” I asked.
“Pull out his soul,” Zack whispered, and Jenks’s wings rasped in surprise as I turned to Zack. The kid’s eyes looked haunted, and his face was pale. “With a soul spiral,” he added, looking at Trent. “Take out his soul, and the baku will be forced to follow.”
My lips parted. True, but without a soul, Landon would be dead in five minutes. You could get around that by putting his soul in a bottle and keeping his body alive on life support as Trent had done with me. It would work on paper. The only reason the demons didn’t do it was because it required elven magic, and they would rather die than ask the Goddess for help. Me? I wasn’t so picky.
“Whoa, whoa, whoa!” Jenks said from Trent’s shoulder. “Won’t Landon die without a soul? Not that I care, but the I.S. or the dewar might.”
“Not right away,” Hodin said, and Zack nodded, solemn and scared.
“You wouldn’t,” Landon whispered, his fear obvious on his sweat-tracked, sawdust-caked face. “That curse isn’t supposed to be used until I’m dead. I’m not dead!” He wiggled, random bits of glass catching the faint light, and I nudged him back into place before turning to Trent, my eyebrows high.
“How does Zack know about the soul spiral?” I accused, and both Trent and Zack flushed. “We agreed that the dewar’s curse to move souls was going to die with us.”
Trent grimaced. “I didn’t tell him how to do the curse. I told him how I used it to save your life. A lesson on how something inherently bad can be used for a good reason and outcome.”
I shook my head, agreeing with Jenks. “No. Killing Landon is bad,” I said. “Even to catch the baku. And that’s what we’re going to get if we pull his soul out.”
“Not if he’s at the center of the spiral,” Zack said, and Hodin nodded.
“I’m alive!” Landon said, his voice echoing in the empty space. “I’m still alive!”
Yeah? And so is that baby you want to drop your soul into. “Then kick it out,” I said, and he gaped at me, his eyes round with fear.
“I can’t,” he whispered, and Trent gestured as if that said it all and why were we waiting?
“It would work, wouldn’t it?” Zack inched closer, his eyes on Landon. “If you pull his soul out, the baku will come with it. You can catch the baku, and Landon’s soul will be snared by the soul spiral and land back in his body before he can die.”
Breath shaking, I turned to Trent. He was clearly ready to try it, eyes alight and eager.
“That might actually work,” Hodin said from the pool table, and Zack bobbed his head.
“I’ll take the responsibility if it goes wrong,” Zack said,