“R-AB1,” I whispered into the night. “Will you grant me the force of your fire?”
There was a strange moment as I found that the phoenix spoke not in images like the dragon, nor words like the demon, but in emotion. A pure giddy feeling swept over me that could only be agreement.
“Look what I can do for you,” said Estahoth. “You couldn’t do this without me.”
“I know,” I said. “Believe me, I know.”
And then the phoenix burst into flame.
Estahoth reached out through me and like a current we transmuted the force of the explosion. Unlike Sarmine, we didn’t use it to power a spell. We used it for another elemental. We translated that fire into an energy that we fed to the call of the approaching dragon.
Like a radio transmitter we sent Moonfire’s plaintive call for her sisters out to the world.
We stayed there, holding the current in place till the force of the explosion dimmed. It seemed to last forever; forever, I stood looking around at the world lit with a soft golden glow. Forever I kept the fire back, kept it from engulfing the town. I wondered if the town could see any of this, or if it was as difficult to see as a mostly invisible dragon.
The new phoenix, the baby arisen from the ashes, flitted out of that flame, as tiny as the mouse had been. It ringed my ghostly head for another indefinite span of time as the golden glow blackened to night. Until at last I felt the sadness of parting, and a swelling of thanks.
And then it was gone.
The demon slowly collapsed us back from the sky, back from power, back from strength. Jenah and Moonfire came to a landing down on the runway of the track. I stood on the hillside in the dark, knees and elbows shivering from the prolonged stretch. For the first time in my life I felt short.
The last bits of the phoenix’ explosion hung in the sky, like the aftermath of fireworks. There was fury on both the witch’s and Hikari’s faces, but that didn’t stop them from running around and picking up bits of phoenix feathers, and occasionally kicking each other.
It was kind of nice to know that Sparkle’s attention was going to be occupied for a while. I didn’t think she wanted to be Kari any more than I had wanted to be like Sarmine. I remembered a girl who’d stood up for me and my stolen Bomb Pop and sighed. You never really knew anyone, not even your closest friends. Maybe not even yourself.
But self-examination would have to wait—the night wasn’t over yet. Until the last bits of phoenix fire faded, the demon remained on earth.
And where he remained was in me.
Now that my adrenaline was relinquishing its hold on me, the demon’s presence inside me was the most horrible thing ever. It was no longer like a goldfish swimming in my mouth. It was more like a cockroach running around behind my teeth. “If you let me stay,” he said, and the words seemed to coil through the veins in my body, “then you could have this kind of power forever.” With invisible fingers, he stretched us to the dragon on the field. Reached inside—and pulled a salamander off its Velcro hold on the dragon’s lungs. We disintegrated the salamander. The dragon coughed, then purred.
“Am I all bad?” he said. “Look at the good we could do.”
“The good you were bound to do,” I said. “That was in your contract.”
“With my help you could be greater and more powerful than all the witches in the world,” he said. “Be better than Sarmine Scarabouche.”
Despite the nasty slithery clattery feeling, I laughed. The gentle thanks of the phoenix still feathered my soul and I laughed—at Estahoth, the millennia-old elemental.
“Estahoth,” I said. “I already am better than Sarmine Scarabouche.”
And inside the cockroaches dissolved. Faded out and away. I felt Estahoth wailing, felt him clutching at his last hope of Earth.
And then he was gone.
I stared at the night sky.
Below me Jenah and Moonfire stood on the track field, watching for any sign of another dragon left in the world.
Devon stood with an arm draped on the T-Bird, looking into the night sky like he’d never seen it before. I could see why the fire elementals wanted to be on land. Earth was a beautiful place.
I parked my butt on the cement block of the T-Bird and patted its grasping claw with fingers that hardly shook. I was glad the T-Bird hadn’t turned out to be the phoenix after all. No one would miss tripping over the mouse. They probably wouldn’t even notice its absence.
Devon’s arm was very near mine. I looked at him staring into the sky and suddenly I knew that my worries about only liking the demon-altered Devon were ridiculous. The demon might have improved his confidence, but that was only a veneer on top of the boy I liked. Like a perfect pair of jeans, or a new shade of dark-brown hair.