With a silent fury, Piscary leaped at him, a long hand snagging a floor lamp even as he was in the air. It swung in a fast arc, smacking into Algaliarept’s raised palm when the demon put his entire hand over Piscary’s face. Still laughing, he shoved the vampire across the room.
Cormel was half a second behind, the cord from the lamp in his hand. As Algaliarept watched Piscary skid across the floor and slam into the wall, Cormel spun the cord around the demon’s thick neck, wedging it above the elaborate collar of gold and stones.
Snarling, Piscary launched himself at the jackal-headed god, bowling him over with his sheer will. They hit the floor, crashing into the coffee table and shattering it. Standing above them, Cormel tightened the cord, trying to strangle the demon.
Trisk stood. Ulbrine’s circle hummed over her head. Choking the demon wouldn’t work. Algaliarept need only vaporize and reappear.
“What were you thinking?” Ulbrine said. “You killed them, all of them. God knows why. Help me hold my circle until the sun rises.”
She stared at him, lips parted. “Why do you think I summoned him?”
Ulbrine froze, fear widening his eyes. “You summoned him to make a trade? With me?” he said, and she recoiled, amazed he could think her so foul. Her intention had been to create a distraction to get his hands off her neck. Surely a member of the enclave, a professor at the university, and an undead master could together dispatch a demon. But seeing the horror and sudden fear on Ulbrine’s face, she knew she’d made a mistake.
“A trade?” Algaliarept said, and Cormel called out a warning as the demon was suddenly not under him anymore, having dissolved into a gray fog that solidified behind the vampire.
“We can work something out!” Ulbrine shouted in fear, still believing her intent had been to give him to the demon. But his attention jerked behind her, and he ducked when Rynn Cormel crashed into the bar beside them.
Now you want to work something out? she thought bitterly. Coward.
“Stay in your circle!” Professor Thole exclaimed as Cormel put a hand to his head and fell down, unconscious. Beyond them, Piscary wrestled with the Egyptian god, Algaliarept’s jaws snapping inches from the incensed vampire’s face as they rolled into tables and artwork.
“Fight!” Orchid shrilled, darting in and out, her tiny sword scoring on the jackal-headed god and making Algaliarept snap at her like a dog. “All of you! Alone you will be picked off. Attack together, or we all die! Has peace made you so tame that you’ve forgotten how to battle?”
Grunting, Algaliarept shoved Piscary from him and swatted at Orchid. The vampire howled as he flew across the room. Arms splayed, he hit a chandelier before falling to the floor. Piscary levered himself up, dazed as he slipped back down to one knee, struggling to focus.
“You summoned me for a trade?” Algaliarept said. “Mar-r-r-rvelous!” The demon dissolved into a mist that re-formed as his usual crushed green velvet frock and blue-tinted glasses. He eagerly paced forward, peering at Ulbrine cowering behind Trisk. “A member of the enclave?” he rumbled, tugging his white gloves tighter. “I amend my earlier words. I misjudged the depth of your determination, Felecia Eloytrisk Cambri.”
Trisk’s own fear swelled. She wanted to survive, yes, but she didn’t want to be known as a demon practitioner to have done it. She’d be a pariah among her people. There was a beating at the door as Piscary’s children tried to get in, and then more screams when that black goo slipped through the cracks and began to burn whoever it touched.
“Well?” Algaliarept asked Trisk, and she blanched. “I must hear the words, little bird.”
“I didn’t summon you to take him. I . . .”
Algaliarept’s thin lips curved into a smile as he looked at the imprint of Ulbrine’s fingers on her neck. “Are you sure?”
Why isn’t the sun up yet? Behind him, Orchid darted to Professor Thole and Daniel for a whispered conversation, her dust pooling on the surface of Thole’s circle.
“Shove him into his circle and give the worthless sod to me,” Algaliarept said, not looking as he flicked a sparkly ribbon of black at Piscary. It wound around the vampire, tripping him to the floor, where he writhed and cursed in what sounded like Hebrew. “I promise you’ll be . . . safe.” Algaliarept grinned, tapping on the circle between them to make dimples of stress ripple out. Ulbrine’s hand tightened on her arm. “Or don’t you trust me?” The demon’s eyebrows were high as he looked at them over his glasses, a curious quirk to his expression. Checking his watch, Algaliarept tugged the lace at his sleeves out. “I’ll even make sure your name gets on your research.”
“In return for Ulbrine?” she said, and Ulbrine’s grip on her arm tingled from the force of the ley line he was channeling. “It hardly sounds fair. You wanted my soul before.”