must lead it back. Her foot nudged the cooper’s ax on the flagstones. The bloody shoe lay nearby. The beast hissed and crept closer.
On instinct she backed inside the witch’s circle, hoping it held some protective energy against the thing. But the moment she stepped across the line, tendrils of murky energy crept up her legs, seething with dark magic. A current of energy ran over her skin, sleek as snakes. The demon held back, studying her, watching for what she would do with the magic.
She took the gamble. Elena drew the bierhexe’s magic into her hands as a thread of saliva slipped out of the demon’s mouth. Miraculously, the magic held together like a ball of static that bit at her skin. The beast crouched, legs ready to lunge. With fingers quivering, she unleashed the sphere of crackling energy. The blast hit the creature full in the muzzle, but instead of setting it afire as she hoped, the energy enveloped the demon’s body in glowing green light.
The thing’s hair thickened, its snout elongated, its teeth and claws curved and sharpened, and then it stood on its hind legs, displaying the full height of a grown man. The fiend roared at her, its breath reeking of spoiled meat.
Her mouth convulsed as if to scream. It merely grinned back. And though the demon didn’t speak aloud, she understood every word directed at her as it inched closer. “That old hexe’s instincts were right about you,” it said, unfurling a pair of leather wings. “Your cursed blood only enhances the dark energy.” It licked its lips, tasting her magic in the air. “Pity you won’t be joining us in everlasting life, but you’re going to taste deliciously wicked when I tear your throat out.”
Jean-Paul let out an agonizing yell as he scraped his chest against the press to free himself of its grip. She heard a rib snap. The demon heard it, too, and just for a second seemed to consider which was the better of two meals.
Her eyes darted from Jean-Paul to the beast. It growled low and hungry. She pulled the cochoir from the small of her back and waved the curved blade in front of her as she inched backward. There were no more magic spells. “Get out,” she shouted to Jean-Paul, not daring to take her eyes off the demon a second time. “Take Yvette with you.”
“Elena!”
The beast pounced, fangs bared. It pinned her against a row of barrels, its teeth sinking into the triangle of flesh above her collarbone. She’d thought she’d known pain when Old Fox took her toe, but it was nothing compared to the electric stars that flashed in her eyes. Jean-Paul’s voice shouted at her to hold on. Fight, Elena, fight! She swiped the curved edge of the knife against the thick hide of the demon, and it answered by sinking its teeth deeper. A strangled animallike shriek crawled out of her throat. She tried to push the thing off, to wriggle loose, to flee, anything to be free of its bite. But its grip was too strong, its teeth too practiced at their purpose. Her blood was being drawn into its mouth.
She would be drained like a cat to feed the desecrated body of a demon.
But as sudden and vicious as it had struck, the hairy devil abruptly let go. Its tongue thrust in and out of its mouth, as if trying to rid itself of the taste of her. White froth foamed on grotesque lips. It clawed at its face, gagging for breath, spitting her blood on the floor. Elena shoved the beast away, thinking it possessed, when a putrid stream of yellow bile oozed out of its mouth. The demon dropped to its knees in a spasm that racked its body in marionette-like contortions. The golden eyes dilated in disbelief.
“What have you done to me?” it begged. And then the monster slumped into stillness, leaving her bewildered and without answer.
Jean-Paul, finally free, limped madly toward her from the winepress, one hand clutching his ribs. “Christ, is it dead?” he asked.
The demon was definitely dead. But how?
Rivulets of blood trickled from the puncture wounds near her neck. She wiped a smear of it on her hand and rubbed it between her fingers. Could it be? For seven years she’d ingested toxic toad skin to break the curse. Was it possible the bufotoxin still swam in her blood after all this time? It must have, though the realization gave her no comfort.