Hollywood Demon (The Collegium Book 6) (9 page)

Although, studying the demon, it didn’t seem as if Faust was much interested in rampaging anywhere.

“It’s a pleasure to have this chance to chat with you,” Faust addressed Mark. It was as if Rivera and Clancy weren’t in the room.

Is there any way I can use that?
Clancy eyed the cupboard filled with demonology paraphernalia. In an emergency, what might work against a demon? Holy water? That depended on faith. Silver? Silver would accept Clancy’s magic if she pushed it, then she could amplify silver’s natural antipathy to evil to protect herself and Mark, and Rivera—who was chanting hysterically up against the ceiling, while gently bouncing against it like a helium-filled balloon. But Clancy wouldn’t be able to contain Faust if he broke the circle.

So, she needed to banish the demon.

Rivera was evidently trying.

Clancy sidled sideways two steps.

Faust shifted around so he could see Clancy as well as Mark.

She froze.

The demon was beautiful. Masculine arrogance and full kiss-able lips were a potent lure, even if the red flickering in his brown eyes was an unmistakable indication of his true nature.

I should have thought to wear something silver
, Clancy chastised herself. Even a simple ring might have helped.

“What do you want to talk about?” Mark brought the demon’s focus back to him.

Clancy inhaled raggedly as the weight of Faust’s attention lifted. Rivera had been totally wrong, but so had Mark. Faust wasn’t some minor demon.

“Old memories,” Faust said softly. “Do you remember Phoebe?”

“You took her soul.”

“I did.” A chair appeared inside the circle with the demon, and Faust sat on it, big and male, legs sprawling. Sprawling but staying within the circle. Was he contained or wasn’t he? “But her soul was so much less than I wanted from Phoebe. If only she hadn’t driven so recklessly. I had such plans.”

“As I’m sure you still do.” Mark matched Faust’s suave tone with his own sardonic one.

“And my plan fascinates you, doesn’t it?” The demon smiled at him. “Such earnest endeavors to chronicle my manifestations, to plot and predict. You’ve come so close, and then, you wouldn’t believe your own deductions.”

Clancy glanced at Mark.

“It’s a ridiculous idea,” he said.

Faust laughed. “Which is why the Collegium would never believe you. They’re not alone. My colleagues didn’t think I could pull it off either. But, here I am, on the verge of becoming the premier tourist operator to Earth.”

Clancy ceased inching toward the cupboard in search of silver. “The what?”

Mark signaled by a quick shake of his head, that she shut up.

But Faust smiled. “I shall open a gate for other demons. Demon lords, such as my humble self, are generally the only demons summoned to Earth or powerful enough to remain and move around it freely after we’ve consumed the soul of our summoner.”

Rivera’s low-voiced chanting rose shrilly.

Clancy wished she’d shut up. The noise was distracting, and from the lack of effect on Faust, she might as well save her voice. Rivera’s chants and magic weren’t doing anything.

Faust stood and the chair vanished. “However, many lesser demons want to visit Earth to drink despair and riot in violence. And why shouldn’t they?”

“Because they don’t belong here,” Mark said.

“If we’re invited, we belong.” Faust’s teeth lengthened till his incisors resembled a vampire’s—and vampires were meant to be mythical. Perhaps demons were the source of those legends? “And humans will invite us. I have written the lure into the code. Not into the image-capture software. So dull. But where humans are more vulnerable.”

Clancy’s mind spun over a thousand possibilities.

“Our vanity,” Mark said flatly.

“And that is why I adore you.” Faust praised him. “You think like a demon.”

“God forbid.”

Faust ignored the heart-felt repudiation. “As humans are manipulating their images, updating their photos to lie about themselves and their lives, they’ll be offered a linked contract. Don’t simply doctor one image. Instead, enhance your entire life. Appear more beautiful. Have your life seem more enviable—”

“And all you have to do is sign over your soul,” Mark finished.

“No, no, no. Souls are delightful, but it is bodies I am after. Just a short possession.”

Clancy’s stomach roiled and she fought not to retch. The demon was diabolically clever. Human flesh could hide a demon’s presence from the Collegium. From Faust’s own boasting, such possession was only achieved by demon lords, but he intended to open the gate to ordinary demons. Humans possessed by demons on holiday…the world would become hell.

“A simple contract. Three scratches on their left palm.” Faust held up his hand. “Deep enough to scar, and press to the screen.”

A blood oath.

Mark shook his head. “It won’t work.”

“You’re thinking of your great-grandfather’s spell.” Faust flicked a hand and Rivera landed on the floor, almost gently. But then she seemed stuck to it. “Such an annoying man. You’re much more charming, Mark. It’s your lack of magic I appreciate.”

It was a wicked insult. Clancy flinched, but Mark showed no response.

Perhaps it was his lack of response that prompted Faust to continue.

The more worrying question was why Faust was sharing so much information. This boasting could undo his plans. He had to know they’d share what he said with the Collegium—and Clancy vowed she’d
make
the Collegium listen. So, did Faust intend to kill them? Were they to never leave this room?

She lunged for the demonology supplies cupboard.

Mark shouted.

Magic cracked.

As much as she wanted to see what was happening, she had to reach the silver crucifix she saw on a shelf.

An inch from grasping the silver crucifix, a massive power seized and flung her. Taekwondo had taught her how to fall. She rolled up into a crouch, but couldn’t initially see what was happening. Rivera, still stuck to the floor, hands and feet glued, her whole body straining, was between Clancy and the circle where Mark struggled with Faust.

Mark was
in
the circle with the demon!

Clancy was too stunned to even swear. When she’d run for the cupboard, Mark must have attacked Faust in an attempt to win her the time she needed. To protect her. She thought it was her mage sight flickering, but it was the thin green light of Mark’s magic that was faltering. Faust’s glowing red magic pulsed.

“Run…to the car.” Mark’s shout was strangled.

The demon was killing him. Faust had enough physical reality to wrap his hands around Mark’s neck, thumbs pressing into the pulse at its hollow. However, no matter how Mark fought and kicked, nothing seemed to hurt the demon.

Because Mark can’t back up his physical attack with magic
, Clancy realized with horror. It had taken all of Mark’s magic to break into the circle of summoning, and now, he couldn’t break back out. He was trapped with the demon.

“As amusing as this is.” And the damned demon smiled at Clancy over Rivera’s contortions and grunts of effort. “It’s time I left.”

Mark’s struggles were weakening. Either he was dying or—

Could Faust intend to take Mark with him to Hell? Circles of summoning were portals between the two realms of Earth and Hell. Did that mean Faust didn’t need Mark’s consent to drag him to Hell? If so, Mark faced the two awful fates of death or living death in Hell.

Faust raised his arms. Mark hung from them.

Power erupted beneath Clancy’s feet, surging up from the Earth, rocketing through her and blasting open the circle of summoning. She was running even as the circle broke. So be it. If the destruction of the circle released Faust into this world, she’d fight him.

Faust’s eyes widened and lost something of their human shape. His face stretched. He vanished.

Mark fell to the floor at Clancy’s feet, breath rasping in his throat as he struggled to stand.

She helped him up, looking around for the demon. Earth magic thundered through her, violent and relentless. “Where is Faust?”

“Gone,” Rivera said from behind her. The demonologist staggered to the cupboard, ignoring the silver crucifix and grabbing for a bag of something on the shelf below it. She returned to the blasted circle and dumped salt across it. “Get out.” She didn’t look at either Clancy or Mark, but the order was obviously for them. She threw the empty salt packet away.

Mark stood straighter, taking his own weight. He stared at Rivera who was no longer graceful and confident, but sweating, scared and destroyed.

Clancy thought he might apologize, taking the blame for bringing the demon to Rivera’s studio. He surprised her.

He said nothing. He put an arm around Clancy’s shoulders and they walked out. They laced their boots in grim silence, with equal silence in the devastated room behind them. “Thank you,” Mark said to her as they walked out of the yoga studio.

In the courtyard, the café’s customers were as relaxed and loud as before, unaware of the struggle that had happened so close by. Either Rivera’s wards or the demon’s intent had kept their activities silent.

Clancy hesitated at the SUV. “Are you fit to drive?”

Mark stared at her. His eyes were a clear blue, his face tired. He threw the keys to her and climbed into the passenger’s seat.

The powerful ward of the SUV closing around them was blissful. A tremor of relief shivered through Clancy and she finally released the geo-power that had surged in response to her fear. It slipped back into its usual flow beneath California and off into the seabed of the Pacific Ocean.

Jeremy would rant at her for the disturbance.

She started the SUV’s engine and drove home. Her phone rang within thirty seconds. She fished it out of a pocket, then swore and dropped it as an idiot in a red sports car pulled out in front of her. “Insane LA drivers.” She picked up the phone and passed it to Mark. “Can you check if it’s Grandma?”

Mark checked the display. “Yes.” He felt a bit like he was walking underwater; breathing water, too. His lungs hurt.

“Can you answer it, please?”

He did even as Clancy kept talking.

“She probably felt the earth magic I used.”

Doris probably had. She certainly sounded worried. “Clancy, are you okay?”

“I’m fine, Grandma,” Clancy raised her voice.

“Why are you shouting?”

Mark stirred himself to answer. “Because I’m holding the phone. Clancy’s driving.”

“Mark.” Silence for a moment. “What’s happened?”

He glanced at Clancy, who kept her gaze on the road. She’d fought a demon for him. Well, for her own survival, too, but she could have run. Instead, she’d blasted open a circle of summoning and the demon had fled from her.

“Mark?” Doris demanded.

How long had he been silent, thinking. “We’re okay. We’re on our way home.”

“Come straight to the cottage.” Doris hung up.

He wasn’t sure if she meant Clancy or both of them. It didn’t matter. At a minimum he owed Clancy the courtesy of standing with her when she told Doris about their encounter with Faust.
Damn
. He closed his eyes. He’d brought Clancy into danger. He had believed Rivera when she’d said she could handle Faust.

Had the demon been lying or was Faust a demon lord?

Clancy drove through the ward around the Yarren Estate and felt even safer than on entering the warded SUV. Her foot lightened on the accelerator, and she no longer had to wonder if other drivers on the public roads were possessed by Faust.

She just had to worry about Mark. He looked terrible. Then again, how else would you expect someone who’d been drained by a demon lord and almost taken to Hell to look? She drove to Doris’s cottage and parked behind her own little white car.

The power in the chamber beneath the cottage crested in a huge wave and gathered her in.

She was safe. She was home. But now, she had to calm the geo-forces she’d stirred up.

Jeremy was probably trying to do the same thing. If he hadn’t been, he’d have already phoned her to yell about her reckless use of geo-power in his territory.

What else could I have done?
She couldn’t have stood by and let Mark die; or stood by and let the demon consume her and Rivera, next.

Doris met them on the front porch. She wore slippers with her good “going shopping” clothes: a green corduroy jacket with a yellow turtleneck sweater over a denim skirt. She reached for Clancy. “Mark will explain. You go on down to the chamber.”

“I didn’t mean to disturb things,” Clancy said.

“I’m not blaming you for anything, honey. I think you need the chamber as much as it needs you.”

Clancy thought of entering into the silence that would cradle her like a baby. “Maybe I do.” She turned to Mark. “Will you be okay?”

“Absolutely.” Lines of exhaustion bracketed his mouth. He appeared ten years older.

Clancy glanced at Doris, who gave a small nod. She’d look after him. Clancy walked in, straight through to the laundry room, and opened the trapdoor to the chamber. She didn’t bother crouching to do so, but shifted it with magic and a thought. Then she climbed down the ladder and the trapdoor closed by itself.

Once upon a time the ladder down to the chamber had been wood. Before then, it had probably been rope. Now, she climbed down a sturdy steel ladder until the dirt of the chamber met her boots. At Rivera’s studio she’d taken off her boots and fought a demon in her socks. Here, where her family had stood for generations, she took off boots and socks and curled her toes into the soft dirt that covered solid rock.

The chamber glowed with its own light. It came from the gentle friction of quartz particles. She was hardly aware of requesting it with her magic. Jeremy called it a parlor trick, but it never felt that way for Clancy. For her, it was her magic meshing with the power in the chamber so that it welcomed her.

She’d never wanted to learn the geological science of how the chamber had been created. For her, as it had been for her ancestors, it was enough that it existed. She walked across to a rock that was a comfortable height for a human to sit on, and was worn smooth from generations of people doing just that.

The geo-power in the chamber lapped around her like a warm sea. This was a well of such power. A spring. If the power had been pure magic and not solely geo-forces, then the place would be known as a strong nexus. As it was, her family knew it as a site of stabilization.

The geo-power she’d tapped beneath Rivera’s yoga studio had disturbed the raw energy of California. Immense, unfathomable forces ground against one another as the tectonic plates that created the San Andreas Fault rumbled. Yet in the chamber, she didn’t feel panic at what she’d unleashed. She felt centered.

Jeremy had mocked her for imagining that the chamber “talked” to her. He hadn’t needed to. She’d always known that the forces in the chamber weren’t sentient. They were natural forces, like the wind in the world above. But just because they were natural forces didn’t mean she couldn’t think of them in ways that helped her relate to them.

So as the tumbling geo-forces poured into the chamber and into her, she greeted them as wild puppies and gathered them closer. In this chamber, familiar since childhood, she let go of her Collegium training and simply soothed the “puppies”. A small analytical part of her mind knew that she was channeling and lowering the geo-temperature of the forces with her own magic, but that was only a small part of her trained mind. Most of her was simply in the moment, which was how the chamber wanted to be used—and yes, she still remembered that the chamber wasn’t sentient! She laughed, no longer afraid of Faust as the geo-forces tickled her feet and drew patterns in the walls’ quartz lighting.

She’d forgotten the rightness of being in the chamber. Forgotten, or perhaps, memory had dulled the experience. Or—her breath caught as power swirled in the center of the chamber and erupted into a dazzling display of quartz on the ceiling—had it not been so strong before? Had her ability to interact with the chamber increased?

Dimly, she was aware of Jeremy arriving in the cottage above. The power in the chamber stalked his progress playfully. She ought to leave the calming of his territory to him, but she couldn’t. Everything was quieting and her spirit was soothed with it. She didn’t want to wrench herself out of this meditative state. Later, when Jeremy protested, she’d tell him that since she’d caused the out of control geo-crash, she’d naturally attempted to fix it herself.

It hadn’t quite been a geo-crash, but it had been cascading. The geo-forces beneath California had stormed to her when she’d prepared to fight Faust. Now, she was thanking them—
very unscientific of me
—and letting them go.