to stay upright. “I think you’ll find yourself unable to act quite so much like a petulant god now, running around destroying anything that makes you mad. Maybe you’ll have to fight fair. I wonder how long it’s been since you’ve actually had to do that?”
He reached for her, so fast it took her breath away. Too fast. His fist shot through the barrier and clamped in her hair. Damn he’s strong, Donna thought, feeling a vague shock. His arm sticking out of the wall of light had been terrifying enough, but now Demian began dragging her toward him. All his smooth seduction had disappeared. He looked truly awful, like the King of Terror he was.
Donna yelped as some of her hair was pulled out at the root. She felt herself being dragged toward him—it was either that or lose a chunk of hair. The searing pain all along her scalp made her eyes water. How had he broken through the ward? Despite his power, Donna had believed the circle would hold him. It should have worked! Even if it hadn’t contained him for very long, it should have held for more than a few seconds.
“Do you think your little prison can hold me?” Demian growled.
Donna struggled, in too much to pain to respond with anything coherent, but at least the Demon King wasn’t actually free. Not yet. Maybe he’d had enough strength to thrust that one hand through the wall to grab her, but it didn’t look like he could step all the way out. Strain showed on his face, as though breaching the barrier at all was almost too much for him.
Yet he kept hold of her. She was almost standing on the line of salt. If her foot touched it, even for a moment, the circle would collapse and the demon really would be free. Not to mention majorly pissed at her.
“I could tear you into pieces,” he said. Their faces were almost touching, on either side of the wall of light. “I don’t need to be able to destroy cities or worlds to be able to destroy you.”
“You say the sweetest things,” Donna said, the toes of her sneakers inching toward the barrier. She panted with pain, trying desperately to focus on the agony in her scalp so that she would stay conscious and be able to act. She pushed the thought of Maker’s broken body from her mind—at least, for a few more moments.
“There will be no mercy in me if I have to take the Stone from you, Donna Underwood,” the Demon King said. “Only pain. And perhaps death, eventually.”
“And to think,” she gasped, “you wanted me to be your queen at one time.”
“You are unworthy,” he spat. “Once I have the Philosopher’s Stone, I will wipe the memory of every pathetic human from this world.”
“You would have done that anyway.”
“I look forward to crushing you beneath my heel, al-chemist.”
“I think you’ll find it’s too late for that, Majesty,” Donna said, hope suddenly surging through her. “Look!”
Demian raised his head, keeping his brutal grip on her. One of his hands was firmly around her throat—maybe even preparing to snap her neck. Then the demon’s eyes widened.
A shimmering door had opened on the horizon, and the glittering army of Faerie was riding out of the light. The alchemists’ “war council” had clearly been a success; leave it to Quentin and her mother to convince the races to work together. Donna smiled through her pain.
Fey horses spilled out, looking almost as if they were riding the waves; their riders crouched low over their backs, inhuman eyes fixed straight ahead. White, black, chestnut—no matter their color, the steeds were tall and strong and impossibly swift, with shining armor around their fine heads. One of them even had wings, and Donna thought her heart actually skipped a beat as she watched its indigo wings curve up and down in majestic arcs. The faeries who rode the horses all brandished flashing swords and were clothed in the polished silver chainmail she was already growing familiar with. Donna saw that women rode alongside the men, and they were so fierce and beautiful that it hurt her eyes.
And then a new disturbance, on the other side of the clearing, drew Demian’s gaze away from the approaching army. The Wood Queen was coming toward him as well, striding tall and straight and dressed in armor made of polished bark. Her helmet was wreathed with ivy, and, attached to her shoulders, there was