Demon Inside

Don’t think about it!

But he looked just as he had before he’d left for the ceremony, save his damp hair and clean, ordinary clothes. Black pants, a black V-neck. Greyson casual. A sweating bottle of champagne dangled from his left hand.

Some of the choking fear abated. He hadn’t turned savage in the last hour. This could have been any night, one of many when he’d greeted her with a cold drink and a warm kiss. If her heart hadn’t been pounding in her throat she could almost have imagined it was.

She found her voice. “His life?”

“He knows we’re meeting with Winston tomorrow, so yes.”

“But his life isn’t in danger.”

“Isn’t it?” The bottle clanked solidly onto the table by the door.

“No. I mean…oh.”

“He tried to kill you. He tried to kill us both.”

“I can’t…I can’t just order someone killed, Greyson. I can’t do that.”

I can.

“What if I ask you not to?”

He stepped back and put his hands in his pockets. “If you ask me not to…we’ll discuss it.”

“Now?”

“No. Now he’s standing outside on the street, getting ready to make a scene. I don’t want him out there any longer than necessary.” His glance took in her shoes and purse still clutched in her hands. “Mal, get Miss Chase’s coat, please. Better put those shoes on, Meg.”

“We’re going outside?”

“We should get a look at him before we let him in, don’t you think?”

Oh. Ktana Leyak. “He’s not a Yezer, though, isn’t he safe?”

“I would think so, but I can’t guarantee it. Especially not in his—shall we say highly emotional?—state. He’s vulnerable, and that’s not a safe way to be.”

She nodded as Malleus slipped her coat over her shoulders. Her cold, stiff shoes refused to admit her feet. She stooped to shove them on and almost fell over.

Greyson didn’t tease her about her clumsiness. Normally he would have. She glanced at him once she’d righted herself and found him watching her. He’d seen her at the door, obviously preparing to flee; was he going to say anything? Did she want him to?

The trouble with keeping secrets was that it became harder and harder to stop as time went on. Tiny discussions, simple questions, grew out of control the more she tried to put them off, until they were no longer simple, but complex and full of mines.

“Open the door,” he said.

Cold air blasted into the room, scented with wood smoke and snow. The pale sky hung low and heavy above them. Megan had forgotten it was only a few days until Christmas.

They stepped outside, their shoes scuffing the white stone steps and the sidewalk beyond, until they stood almost at the gate with the boys behind them.

“Greyson, Megan,” Orion said. It seemed clichéd somehow for a blood demon to have bloodshot eyes, but the pinkish tinge, like Pepto-Bismol in his eye sockets, was definitely not anger or passion, and the tremulous rasp of his voice made her skin crawl. Greyson was right. Orion had come begging.

“What do you want, Orion?”

“To talk to you. I have information. You came to me for it. I’ll give it to you now. Free. A favor you don’t have to return.”

“No.”

She glanced at Greyson, opening her mouth, but his warning look shut it again.

“Megan? Don’t you want to know how it happened? What your father did, what he said? Why he left that hospital to you?”

“I’m tired, Orion. And bored with you,” she lied, but his words echoed in her head. She did want to know why her father had left it to her, more than almost anything. Was it one last reprimand from beyond the grave?

Or was it an apology he felt he couldn’t make in life?

“I can tell you,” he continued. “I was there, I know it all. All you have to do is let me live. I’ll leave you alone. It wasn’t my idea, anyway, at my place. You know that.” His horrible pink gaze turned to Greyson. “You know I wasn’t behind that, you know it!”

“Just like I know you jumped at the chance to help,” Greyson said.

“You fucked my wife! What was—” Orion subsided. His thin fingers curled over the top of the gate. “We’ve never been friends. But that wasn’t personal.”

Greyson shrugged. “And neither is this. Come on, Meg, it’s cold out here.”

He took her hand and started to turn away, but Orion’s next shout stopped them both. “I’ll tell you how to stop the leyak! I know what she wants!”

For a second Megan thought he’d somehow managed to break the gate and it had exploded with a sound like thunder. Then she heard him scream. She was already throwing herself to the ground when Greyson’s hand caught her neck and shoved.

Not an explosion. A ball of something black and shiny, like obsidian or jet, with trails of red sparks in its wake. And not aimed at her, but at Orion, who was now shrieking, “Let me in! D’sham tergan, chresh! Chresh!”

The brittle, frozen grass sliced at her palms like razor blades as she clambered out of the way. Greyson caught her around the waist, trying to roll her to the right across the icy lawn, but she didn’t want to go. The front of the house was naked, i

Another bang. Orion screamed again, and now other voices joined his, harsh muffled voices in English. “He’s down! Get him!”

“Greyson, we have to help him,” Megan gasped. “We can’t just leave him!”

“The fuck we can’t. He’s going to die tomorrow anyway—”

Maleficarum slammed into them, knocking them into the trees. The scent of pine filled her nose, and for one absurd moment it actually felt like Christmas.

Until a dried pine needle, sharp as a dental instrument, jammed itself into her cheek when she hit the ground. “Ouch, shit!”

“Are you okay?”

Muffled footsteps sounded on the street, some distance away but gaining fast.

“Help me! Chresh!” The hysterical quality of Orion’s pleas made her jaw clench. She glanced around and saw another ball hit the fence and erupt into a shower of black sparks like the sequins on Justine’s dress.

“We have to help him!”

“This doesn’t concern us, those are—”

“Greyson! Ak vend retchia! Ak vend retchia!”

Maleficarum said something Megan was fairly certain he wouldn’t have said in her presence at any other moment, but the exact phrase was covered by Greyson’s much more concise one.

“Ak vend retchia—aaaaa!”

“Damn it!” Greyson paused for a moment, then shouted, “Retchia a capt.” Megan heard the footsteps outside getting closer, heard the front gate squeak then slam shut.

Greyson snatched her hand and yanked her toward a small side door she hadn’t seen until then. “Fuck.”

“What about—”

His face was hidden by shadows. “Mal and Spud have him. I gave the bastard sanctuary.”

“Call Tera.”

She actually stumbled. Words she never thought she’d hear Greyson say. “What?”

“Call her, now. Tell her we have Orion and he’s been injured, but convince her we’re not going to help him escape or anything stupid like that.” He paused and glanced at her shoes and purse again, his arms crossed over his chest. “Please, Meg.”

The blaze in the fireplace warmed her skin, but the phone was still winter-night cold in her hand. Tera picked up on the first ring.

“Megan, is Orion Maldon in that house? You need to send him out now, out front, unarmed—”

“Wait, wait, Tera, hold on. Yes, he’s in here. He’s injured. We’re not going to help him escape or anything, but we can’t—”

“Look, this has nothing to do with you or Greyson. This isn’t even me, I didn’t order this. This is Vergadering business, and they’ll storm that fucking gate if they—”

“Tera, please. Just listen for a minute, okay?”