She's No Faerie Princess (33 page)

She clenched her teeth and made a muscle jump in the

side of her jaw. Walker just stood quietly while her eyes scanned the smears of blood against stone and then looked at the marks on the tree trunks. He heard her

breath hiss through her teeth.

"More sigils." Her voice shook, this time not with grief but with rage. "Damn the fiend and all of its kind for the rest of eternity! It used his blood to draw the sigils."

Walker squinted at the dark, ugly lines and frowned. Hecouldn't read them, but they did look similar to the oneshe'd seen carved into the bodies of the demons' earliervictims. "It's still trying to break away from the amulet. Ihope to God it hasn't figured out how."

"Squick, we need to find out exactly what those glyphs mean," Fiona said. "Every single line of them. I want a direct translation. I don't care if you have to ask every single demon Below to find out, but I want the answer."

The imp looked alarmed. "But Miss Fiona, the demonsdoesn't like us. They only didn't eat us last time because Ihides real good. If I talks to them, I ends up dinner forsure."

"Fine. Then I'll go myself. Just point me to the gate."

Walker grabbed her and spun her around. "Hold on aminute," he soothed. "I know you're upset, but there's noway I'm letting you go to hell to ask directions."

"It's not hell," she snapped, her eyes flashing up at him, a mixture of anger, pain, and determination. "Don't bring mortal religion into this. It's just Below. It's no different from going to Faerie."

"Sure, except Faerie is populated by pixies and sprites

and sidhe, as opposed to big, hungry demons who happen to still be holding a grudge about the way your ancestors kicked their asses."

"I don't care if they're holding a grudge over the last mortal presidential election. We need this information, and if the only way to get it is to go Below, then I'm going!"

Walker drew a deep breath and wrestled back the urge tojust throw her over his shoulder and be done with it. These protective instincts were becoming almostimpossible to tamp down. The idea of seeing his mate putherself in danger drove him crazy. He couldn't imaginewhat would happen to him if anything happened to her.

"I don't think that's a very good idea, Princess," he began,

clenching his teeth to keep from shouting.

"I don't care what you think!"

He could feel his eyes flashing with temper and used allhis willpower to keep it from boiling over. "And I don'tcare if you're queen of the whole goddamned universe," Walker said, his voice dangerously low. "There's nofucking way I'm letting you walk into some dimension fullof demons. You are not putting yourself in that kind ofdanger."

"You don't get to tell me what to do, wolf!"

Something tugged hard at the leg of his jeans and cut off

Walker's sharp retort.

"Um, excuses me, furry mortal guy, but you gonna have

to stops with the screamings and shoutings."

"In case you hadn't noticed, Squick," Walker bit out, not taking his eyes from his mate, "I'm not the one doing the shouting."

"That's nice, furry mortal guy," the imp said, tugging again, "but the princess be yelling so loud that nobodies need to go nowheres to find demons. They coming right here."

Walker heard the low, menacing growl a split secondbefore Squick screamed. Instinct took over, and Walkerthrew himself at Fiona, shoving her to the ground andcovering her with his body. He felt the searing pain of aclaw ripping into his flesh, and he howled. He braced hishands on the ground at Fiona's side and the glow of hiseyes illuminated her startled face.

"Stay down," he hissed, and threw himself into his

change.

CHAPTER 24

Stay down?

Fiona lay on a bed of leaves and twigs for half a secondand blinked. Was he out of his bloody mind?

As soon as his weight left her, she sprang to her feet. Walker had been right. The same demon that hadattacked her when she first appeared in Manhattan theweek before crouched in the center of the clearing, eyes

glittering red-orange with menace. It had its gaze locked on her, staring past Walker's huge half-wolfen form with malevolent intent. Slowly, never blinking, it raised one misshapen hand and licked a drop of Walker's blood from its long, curving claw.

The rage bubbled inside her like lava, thick and searingand destructive. She'd never experienced anything like it,never known she was capable of hating so violently andso completely. Her people were poets and lovers, a racethat had fought one war in its entire existence—the warthat had banished creatures like this one to the depths of Below and bound them there forever. For the first time Fiona understood what it meant to have a racial enemy,something that could be despised not for who it was, butfor what it was. Evil.

She stepped forward, but Walker cut her off, keeping hisbody between hers and the demon's. It wasn't thatdifficult. In his were form, one that combined the featuresof man and wolf, he stood over seven feet tall on his hindlegs, and his body rippled with cords of heavy muscle. She knew she couldn't get around him without cheating,damn him.

The demon, though, didn't pay Walker any attention. Notuntil it tried to push past him. With an echoing howl, Walker lunged for its throat, lips drawn back overgleaming white fangs, hands heavy with sharp blackclaws of his own.

Astonishingly fast for something so huge, the demonthrust its arm out and caught Walker with a backhandedblow just before his teeth made contact with its thick skin. Fiona cried out as her mate went down to the ground with

a grunt. He turned even as he landed and slashed at the demon's leg, slicing through armored skin into flesh and tendon. The demon bellowed in pain and turned away from Fiona to stare down at Walker, hate and murder gleaming in its eyes.

Fiona heard Walker snarl something she couldn'tunderstand, but the message was clear. He arched hisback and flipped himself onto his feet, ducking beneathanother heavy blow. Keeping his head down, helaunched himself at the demon like a linebacker, comingin hard and low. The demon staggered backward acouple of steps but didn't fall. Its goatlike legs absorbedthe shock and pushed back, shoving Walker away withbrute strength.

Remembering the early struggle between demon andwolf, Fiona felt her stomach churning. They had bothbeen injured last time, and that had been before thedemon had a chance to feed. By now, its strength wouldhave multiplied, increased by every heart it hadconsumed. She didn't know if Walker could defeat it.

She looked down and saw Squick watching the battlefrom between her feet, eyes wide, hands moving inpantomime punches in time with the contestants.

"Squick, I need you to do me a favor."

The imp looked up at her. "Now, Miss Fiona?"

"Yes, now. I'm going to try to do a spell, but it's a tricky one, and I'm going to need to concentrate. I need you to watch out for Walker. If he gets into trouble, you need to do whatever you can to distract the demon until I'm ready. Do you understand?"

"I understands, miss, but why you wants to help the furry mortal guy I doesn't know. Mortals break too easy, you know?"

"Just do it, Squick. Make sure he doesn't get himself

killed. And make sure you don't, either."

Face grim, Fiona moved quickly to the gate, pressing herback up against the stone. She might not be able to getthrough the damned thing, but she might be able to get alittle boost of energy from it, if she was lucky. And if not,at least this way she knew nothing was going to come upbehind her.

She knew the fabric of the spell she was about to cast. She'd read about it many times during her education, butshe'd never cast it herself. She wasn't sure if anyone had,not since the end of the Wars. After all, when the demonshad been banished, there hadn't been much reason foranyone to cast a spell designed to destroy them.

Closing her eyes, she took a deep breath and struggledto block out the sounds of the battle. She hated it, hatednot being able to see what was happening to her mate,as if her watching him somehow protected him fromharm. But she knew that unless the cavalry camecharging over the hill in the next couple of minutes, thiswas the best chance she had at ensuring they allsurvived this attack.

The lack of sleep from the previous night actually servedher well in this instance. She might be tired, but her bodythrummed with the energy of their long, intense night ofloving. She could feel it, welling up inside her, spreadingfrom the depths of her heart and her womb and coursingthrough her veins until she could have glowed with the

intensity of it.

This spell bore a resemblance to the one she'd usedagainst this same demon a few days ago, but only apassing one. She needed a lot more energy for this oneand a lot more concentration. She let the power buildfurther and further, gathering it up in waves andcompacting it into a tight, dense ball of magic. She couldfeel the ball like a weight inside her chest, feel it gettingbigger and bigger until she had fed it all the power shehad. She could only hope it would be enough.

When she opened her eyes, the clearing looked different,glowing with a bright haze that haloed the trees andshrubs and the limping form of her mate.

Her breath hitched and her body tensed. Instinctscreamed for her to run!
 
Go to him! He's hurt! Keep himsafe
 
!

Her heart leaped into her throat, and she had to fight tokeep her feet in place. She could help him better fromhere, by casting this spell rather than distracting him andgiving the demon any greater advantage.

She saw how the demon was the only thing in theclearing that looked dark to her new vision. It movedthrough her line of sight like an oil slick, black andcancerous, constantly shifting.

Drawing a deep breath, Fiona lifted her hands, sent afervent prayer to the Lady, and gathered up every scrapof magic she could muster, aiming it carefully at themassive demon.

That's when her heart stopped.

At the edge of the clearing, she saw a new form emergefrom the woods. This one looked almost human, like atall, hard, menacing man with eyes as black as pitch. Itdidn't have hooves or horns or scales or claws, Fionasaw, but it was enormous, thick enough with muscle thata professional wrestler would have run from it. It had darkgolden hair that waved about its head, but even thatcouldn't make it look angelic. It carried a sword almost aslong as she was tall, and its aura wasn't glowing to herbright, hazy vision. She might not have known if themagic hadn't told her.

It was a demon.

A shout tore from her throat, half warning, half curse, andshe saw the first demon's bovine head shoot up at thesound. Its flaming eyes locked on her and blazed as ifsuddenly reminded of her presence.

Fiona felt her concentration begin to unravel and the ballof magic went soft around the edges, the powerbeginning to sink back inside her. She swore and foughtto hold it together, but she couldn't look away from thenew threat that was moving unhurriedly across the forestfloor, its eyes locked on the violent straggle. It held thehuge sword easily in one thick-wristed hand, the tippointed to the ground as it stalked closer to Walker.

"No!"

Desperate now, seeing no alternative, Fiona drew theremnants of her spell quickly together and with as muchprayer as magic sent the ball of magical sunlight hurtlingtoward the newest threat.

The second demon had its eyes on her mate, but

somehow it sensed the spell. Quick as a cat, it shifted,

one huge brawny arm lifting the sword high into the air as

if to deflect the magical blow. The blade sparked to life,

but instead of dodging the magic, it seemed to absorb it.

The demon glowed a bright, silvery violet-blue, ringed in

a halo of magic she had given it.

That was impossible. It should have been impossible. Fiona had crafted a sun spell, a larger, more powerfulcousin of the light spell she had cast last week, the onethat had injured the demon and stopped it long enoughfor Walker to carry her to safety. Demons couldn'ttolerate light, especially sunlight. It burned them like acid,more toxic to them even than it was to vampires. Fiona'sspell should at least have stunned it, if not seriouslyinjured it. Even having lost a good part of its intensitybecause of her distraction, the spell was still a powerfulweapon against demon kind.

Her heart sank, and she felt the first wave of terror washover her. If this new monster had some sort of protectionfrom or immunity to sunlight, they were lost. It would killher and her mate, and there was nothing she could do tostop it.

Well, she sure as hell wasn't going to go down withoutfighting.

"Squick!" she screamed, her voice carrying over the din

of the fighting. "Help him!"

Hoping the imp could at least trip the thing or maybeclimb up and plant a hoof in its eye, Fiona sprang at thehuman-looking demon.

What she intended to do she wasn't sure. She had

thrown every scrap of her power into that sun spell.

Frantic, she searched for something more, some smallthread left over that could distract or disarm the demon. The power she cobbled together had more to do withprayer than with magic, but it was the best she could do. If she could have, she would have pulled the energy outof her soul. Her heart froze in her chest as she stretchedout a hand and threw her last, desperate weapon at thearmed demon.