"Good idea," Bree said aloud. She feinted to her right as the boy approached, tried to dodge left, felt her foot slip on the sand, and at the last minute, before the boy could reach her, threw herself as hard as she could right again. She slipped again, but the boy just missed her, and she managed to get a hand on his arm as she went down into the sand. She threw the spell into him as hard as she could. There was a palpable sense of power in it, and it felt good.
The boy stiffened and went down. He nearly got his face stepped on as a fight careened past, and Bree winced. Just as she managed to crawl over to him, Kevin appeared. His jacket was pulled half off one shoulder, and his nose was bleeding, but otherwise, he looked all right.
"My G.o.d, it"s a full out riot," he panted.
"I know," Bree replied, voice coming out in something of a croak due to her abused throat. "Help me pull this kid out of here."
Kevin got hold of the boy"s shoulders and Bree picked up his feet. The demon inside the boy glared out of the boy"s eyes at her, but it was staying put inside the boy, which was the best case scenario at this point.
They managed to get him to a clear s.p.a.ce past the edge of the crowd. As Bree straightened up, she could see the riot had spilled over from the beach onto the street. She heard the sound of gla.s.s shattering, but couldn"t see if it was one of the storefronts or a car that was being vandalized. The kids on the beach were in a whirl of motion, and the sounds of screams were frequent.
It was overwhelming. She quickly considered her options, and decided the most help she could be right now was to work on exorcising the demon in the boy, given she was unlikely to be much help in breaking up fights, even with Gelsenim"s help.
Gelsenim said in her mind, voice wry, Must we banish the poor demon? The food here tonight is rich. If you will but allow him to stay awhile longer, he will not feel hunger for many days.
"Too d.a.m.ned bad," Bree snarled, and earned a confused look from Kevin. He didn"t have Demonsense, and had no idea that she was possessed. In case you hadn"t noticed, Bree continued mentally, things have gone to h.e.l.l in a hand basket here. People are going to get killed, if they haven"t already. She slung her daypack off her back and began getting out her supplies. "Get a ward going around us," she told Kevin as she pulled out a bottle of holy water and a vial of salt. She started to pull out her bible, but shoved it back into the pack. It would be faster to just use some simpler prayers for the exorcism, and anyway, the bible would look weird in this setting.
Why do you object so strongly to the death of these? Gelsenim went on as she worked. The existence of you humans is temporary. Their lives will end soon anyway.
I object because every life has value, no matter how short, Bree replied. Now, would you save the d.a.m.ned philosophical questions and let me work here?
Bree found it easy to engage the demon possessing the young man lying on the ground in front of her. It was already close to the surface, and it already knew she had recognized it.
Getting it to admit its existence wasn"t hard. Getting its name was. After about the fourth try, including the failure of contact with holy water to spur the demon toward cooperation, Gelsenim offered, My host, if you will allow, I can order this one to leave.
Bree was tired enough and worried enough to seriously consider it. She glanced around, looking to see if any other powered were nearby. She didn"t see anyone she knew, but she decided not to risk it. All she needed to make her life really wonderful was to be labeled a Demon Master. No, she told the demon, let me do this the old fashioned way.
It took another ten minutes, but she was finally successful in exorcising the demon. The boy was unconscious but breathing, and he looked much younger and much smaller than he had when he"d been strangling her. She and Kevin dragged him further down the beach and arranged him under a park bench in hopes of keeping him from being trampled if the crowed surged in that direction.
"Now what?" Bree said anxiously, looking back the way they"d come. There were flashing lights from police cruisers illuminating the scene and she could see some police officers in the crowd, and heard the muted sound in the distance of someone talking through a bullhorn.
"They have to be sending for tear gas or something," Kevin said, pushing his gla.s.ses up his nose.
"Who knows how long that will take? I think our best bet is to keep locating the possessed and taking them out. But I"m worried about Daniel. I"d like to find him."
"In all this?" Kevin gestured at the crowd ahead of them. He shook his head. "I doubt we could find him at this point if we wanted to. I suspect you"re right, and we"d be more use focusing on possessed. The conflict is likely to be most violent around them. Which raises the problem of how to do it without getting killed."
"Are you up to another ward that will repel physical contact?" Bree asked.
"For short periods of time. I"ve been saving some energy back in case I have to do more of that."
"Well, get ready, that might be what it takes to get us into position safely."
As they set off back toward the milling crowd, Bree realized she was limping. She felt like she"d bruised her hip on a rock one of the times she"d been pushed to the ground, or maybe someone had kicked her, she couldn"t remember. Her throat was killing her, and she brushed a careful hand along it, feeling for the extent of the damage, but she couldn"t tell anything by feel.
My host, if I may make a suggestion, Gelsenim said diffidently.
Go ahead.
In the past, when I have possessed high power Readers, I"ve seen that some are able to read patterns in battle in such a way that they can avoid harm. Might you have that ability?
Bree only had to consider a moment before she remembered experiencing something like that in the only full scale battle she"d been involved with. "Kevin, wait," she said as she stopped in her tracks and tried to do as Gelsenim had suggested. She opened her Reader sense wide, and at first, all she got was chaos. The night was awhirl with energies of all kinds, confusing her senses.
But gradually, a pattern emerged. And once it occurred to her to think of it more in terms of tells, tells of the crowd, it all started to make sense to her. She could see a nexus of trouble, energetically and based on the flow of movement of the crowd, and she could see a relatively safe path to get there. "Okay, follow me, and be ready to ward us both," Bree told Kevin.
It took some careful dodging, and some shoving on Kevin"s part, but they quickly got to the area she was shooting for, an island in all the physical conflict where a group of kids were standing around in a circle. There was a tall, gawky girl at the center of it, maybe college aged, with chin length dark hair curled up on the ends, in a short pink and green plaid jacket and low rider jeans. A boy was kneeling in the sand in front of her, shirtless, and the girl had a gun pressed into the boy"s forehead.
A jolt of terror went through Bree. Somehow, she hadn"t been expecting a gun. The girl was possessed, and this demon was a big one. And she hadn"t the slightest idea what to do to intervene. If she startled the girl, she might shoot. Of course, she might shoot anyway.
Kevin took a step forward, and said firmly, "Okay, that"s not funny. Put the gun down, you don"t want anyone to get hurt."
"Oh, but I think I do!" the girl replied, eyes widening disturbingly.
Ideas, Gelsenim? Bree asked desperately.
A telekinetic spell, well aimed, could knock the gun out of the girl"s hand, the demon replied.
Even if you boosted my casting power, I don"t have the fine control. If I do it wrong, I could make the gun go off.
Almost before the thought was complete, the gun jerked right out of the girl"s hand, high into the air and over the heads of the circle of young people. For a moment, Bree thought Gelsenim had done it somehow, through her, but then she saw Daniel walk into the circle, holding the gun.
"Did you lose something?" he asked the girl. Strangely, the boy kneeling in front of the girl hadn"t moved. He looked dazed and gla.s.sy eyed, and she wondered if he was on something or had been hit in the head at some point.
"Give me that!" the girl demanded, hand outstretched, with that irritating, nails-on-chalkboard tone that indicated the demon was in full control.
"If you want it, come and get it," Daniel said with a taunting smile.
Well played, Gelsenim commented. He draws the girl away from the crowd.
It seemed Gelsenim was right. The demon possessed girl followed Daniel as he walked backwards. The kids in the crowd made way for him at the sight of him holding a gun.
Kevin took the opportunity to wade into the group of kids. "All right, you guys, look around you. People are getting hurt, things are out of control. If you have half a brain in your heads, you"ll get out of here as fast as you can." He literally grabbed a couple of them, and began shoving them toward the more lightly populated end of the beach. He seemed to be having some effect, so Bree grabbed a few kids herself. The first three gave her a startled look, then obeyed, but the last one pulled away so hard he clipped Bree on the chin with an elbow. Her head jerked back, and she heard Gelsenim hiss inside her, Allow me to punish him, my host!
No, no, what are you talking about?
He harmed you! the demon protested.
It was an accident. Jeez, bloodthirsty much?
I will try not to be if it disturbs you, he replied with a sudden meekness Bree didn"t trust. She studied the crowd around her. Things were breaking up a bit on this end, but glancing behind, she saw the riot was still in full swing. Looking up towards the street, she could see the gla.s.s fronts of some of the stores had been broken, and looting was in progress. She heard sirens off in the distance. She"d lost sight of Kevin, but as she looked around, she saw Daniel. He had retreated close to the water, the girl following him. If the demon possessing the girl hadn"t felt so powerful to her, she would have left him to it. But if he was going to try to exorcise that thing without using his Demon Master abilities, she wanted to be there for back up, because she couldn"t help but remember what had happened to him during the last exorcism. So much for her idea that she wouldn"t let him take primary. She was desperate enough that she had to trust Daniel to stay in control.
The water was calm and black, lapping the sh.o.r.eline in gentle waves. Daniel was standing with his back to it, having lured the girl well away from the crowd. "I see you, demon," Daniel was saying as Bree approached. He was totally focused on the girl and Bree didn"t know if he"d seen her approach. She wondered if Daniel might take the risk of just ordering the demon out when she heard Dion"s voice raised somewhere behind her, shouting, "I said you ought to be ashamed of yourself, beating on a girl like that!" Bree saw Daniel"s eyes flicker as he registered the familiar voice. Well, there went that easy option.
How about another one of those nifty paralyzing spells? she suggested to Gelsenim.
I am happy to a.s.sist, he replied smoothly.
Bree approached the girl slowly from behind. The girl was saying, "It"s mine, give it back to me! I want..."
Bree froze when the girl stopped talking, but it was too late. The girl jerked around and saw Bree just before she got close enough to touch the girl. "Keep away from me!" the girl screeched, tripping back a few steps towards Daniel, then turned to face him again. "Don"t you touch me either, I"ll call the cops!"
"Nice try, demon, but I know just how unlikely that is," Daniel replied as he shoved the gun into the waistband of his jeans at the small of his back. Then he raised his hands sharply, palms forward to either side of him, and Bree felt a ward go up around all three of them. The girl"s head jerked back and forth as she tried to keep both Bree and Daniel in her sights. Bree decided against trying to touch the girl, opting instead for raising the ritual energy for an exorcism. "Mother Mary, hear my prayer," she intoned aloud, and started pacing a circle around the girl. She felt Gelsenim stir uneasily inside her.
Are you going to be able to help me with this or not? she asked him.
It does not harm me to hear these words when we are merged, but I don"t like them. They bring bad memories.
Sorry, buster, it"s got to be done. So yes or no, can you help me raise the energy, or should I do it on my own?
I will help.
Bree put her intention, her power into the prayer. "Holy Mary, help this young woman fight evil, help her to resist the power of the Adversary." She felt her power flow into the words, forming a shape in the air around her, a cloud of energy waiting to be directed.
"Sky Father, I call you, Thor, I call you," Daniel was chanting on the opposite side.
"What are you people talking about?" the girl said, starting to sound more frightened than angry. It felt like the demon was receding inside her, and that was not what they wanted at this stage. Daniel must have thought the same thing, because he said, "You can"t hide, demon, I feel you. And I know you, we"ve battled before. I know your name. You are Habakku."
The girl emitted a shockingly loud scream in response. Bree glanced around in concern. She didn"t want someone trying to come to the girl"s rescue. Fortunately, although she could see a large group milling around fairly nearby, no one seemed to be moving towards them. She continued walking a circle around the girl, praying aloud, helping to raise the energy. As she paced, she worked her daypack off her back, unzipped it, and got out her bottle of holy water and vial of salt once again. She continued to work at completing the ritual circle for Daniel.
He was engaging with the demon now, who was hurling the usual threats of death and dismemberment, so she was unprepared when the girl turned and lunged towards her, crashing into her. She knocked Bree down, then ran past her, only to slam into the ward Bree had raised. Bree felt the impact in the air as the girl hit the ward. Even the strongest wards couldn"t stand up long to physical resistance. The girl hurled herself against it several more times before Daniel reached her and hauled her physically away from them.
Bree"s breath caught in her throat. Please don"t let the demon get into him, she prayed. But something even worse happened. The girl"s hand darted around behind Daniel and she came up holding the gun. She thumbed off the safety, and before Bree could even blink, the sound of the gun firing split the night.
Daniel spun and hit the ground, and the girl turned quickly to face Bree, gun held out. Bree instinctively dodged to her left as the gun went off again.
Cast quickly! Gelsenim roared in her mind.
Faster than she thought possible, Bree formed and cast the muscle weakening spell. The girl"s arm dropped, and she visibly wavered, but recovered her balance. Bree wanted to run, all her instincts were screaming at her to get away, but if she did, the girl might kill Daniel, if she hadn"t already. Her whole body was electric with the fear that he was dead.
This one is strong, you must put more power into the spell, Gelsenim prodded. The girl was raising the gun again, and Bree tried to do as Gelsenim said. She cast a dizziness spell this time, picturing it as a tiny tornado whirling into the girl, and she shoved power into it. The spell shot out of her hands and the possessed girl spun around and fell to the ground.
Daniel lunged at the girl from a half p.r.o.ne position, hand shooting out to grab for the gun. Another gunshot rang out, but Daniel got the gun away from the girl so quickly that Bree thought he might not have been shot after all.
With demon enhanced reflexes, the girl scrambled to her feet and came at Bree again. Bree tried to dodge, but she couldn"t get a good purchase in the sand. The girl slammed into her hard enough to send her flying backwards into the water, which could only mean that the wards were down. The shock of cold was intense. By the time she"d shaken the water out of her eyes, the girl was standing in front of her with the gun trained on her. Bree had no idea how she"d managed to get the gun back from Daniel.
"I do not like Exorcists," the girl said in the demon"s voice.
Bree had just enough time to think, I"m going to die, for the second time that night when Daniel"s voice rang out, "Demon, I command you! Depart!"
Bree felt a whiplash of force, and the girl crumpled to the sand.
Daniel strode toward her and held a hand, hauling her out of the water, getting his own feet wet in the process. He let go of her quickly, and looking down at her said, breathing hard, "Is it Gelsenim?"
"Yes," Bree told him. He went ahead and put an arm around her. She was shivering like crazy, partly from the cold and wet, partly in after reaction to all the stress. As they both turned and waded out of the water, Bree saw a sight that made her feel, if possible, colder. Dion was standing at the edge of the crowd, looking at them. And next to him was Javier Ortiz.
CHAPTER SEVEN.
Gelsenim, please, please leave. If Javier senses you in me I"m in big trouble.
Promise me you will call me again, the demon said stubbornly.
I promise, I promise! Bree replied desperately, and to her huge relief, she felt the demon leave her.
Unfortunately, he took what little warmth was left in her body with him. Daniel had let go of her to check on the girl and retrieve the gun. Dion and Javier approached, looking grim. If they"d seen what had just happened, or worse, if they had actually felt Daniel use Demon Master energy, the jig was up.
Dion came up to her and said, "You"re all wet. We"ve got to get you warm, p.r.o.nto. Any injuries for either of you?"
Bree"s hand went involuntarily to her throat, and Dion put a careful finger on her chin, lifting it and peering closely at her. "It"s hard to see in this light, but it looks like some bruising is starting. Did someone choke you?"
"Yes, one of the possessed kids got hold of me, but I managed to exorcise the demon on that one."
Daniel arrived at her side as she spoke and said, "We just finished with the girl. She"s conscious, but groggy. She said she did have some friends here, but who knows if any are nearby enough to help her." He sounded smooth and calm to Bree"s ears, but Javier was a Reader, and by the look on his face, he was reading Daniel.
"Yes, we saw the end of the exorcism. If you want to call it that," he said harshly.
"Yeah, I know, it was pretty quick and dirty, but fortunately, Bree had already raised most of the energy. I was able to take it over and get it finished," Daniel replied, deliberately misunderstanding Javier. He held out the gun to Javier and added, "Maybe you want to hand this over to a police officer." There was a tension in the tableaux of the two men facing each other, Daniel with the gun, Javier across from him unmoving, with a severe, suspicious look on his face.
"I"m serious about getting you warm, Bree," Dion interrupted firmly, although he was looking at Daniel searchingly as he spoke. "Things are starting to die down. As long as nothing"s broken and you can walk, I think you should get into a car with the heater full up, and preferably with a blanket around you as soon as possible."
"I"ll take care of her," Daniel promised. He put his arm around her and started them moving.
Javier grabbed Daniel by the shoulder as he tried to move past and said, "This isn"t finished, Thorvaldson."
"It is for now," Daniel replied tersely with a sharp look at Javier. Javier dropped his hand, and she and Daniel walked on. Bree expected Javier to object, but he let them go. Her teeth were chattering so hard now it was hard to talk. "Where"s Kevin?" she managed to get out.
"I don"t know, but we should head back to the car right away. Dion"s right, we"ve got to get you warm. I"d say it"s gotten down into the low forties out here. We can call him when we get to the car."
He led them around the edges of the crowd, which was clearly starting to disperse. Daniel kept the pace brisk, but it didn"t seem to warm Bree.
Fortunately, Kevin was waiting for them at the car. Daniel dug into his pants pocket and threw the keys at him. "Can you drive? My feet are blocks of ice. They got wet when I got Bree out of the water."
"Are you both okay?" Kevin asked as he unlocked the car door.
"Bree"s going to get hypothermic if we can"t warm her up soon. That water was icy cold. I"ll get in back with her, try to help her get warm." Daniel opened the door for Bree, then told her, "Here, let"s start with getting this coat off, it"s soaked." He pulled it off her, helped her get her wet sweater off over her head, then tossed both on top of the car. He shimmied out of his black leather jacket and put it around her shoulders, then motioned her into the car. He put her wet things in the trunk, then climbed in next to her. Kevin started the car and got it moving.
Daniel pulled his own sweater off over his head. "Here," he said, "get out of your wet shirt and put this on. "I"ll close my eyes," he prompted as she hesitated.
"Okay." Her whole body was shuddering. It was awkward to get the wet things off in the limited confines of the car, but she finally managed it. Once she"d gotten the sweater on, she said, "You can open your eyes."
"There you go," Daniel said soothingly. "Now, tell you what, I"m just going to lean back here, like this, and you just lean up against me and I"ll put the coat on over you." With quite a bit of squirming, they managed to arrange themselves as he suggested. Bree had her shoulder tucked up under his arm, head on his shoulder, with most of her front pressed against his. He shuffled the coat on over her, and put an arm around her back and held her in close. Her wet legs were entwined with his dry ones. "I"m getting you wet," she protested weakly.
"Not much," he rea.s.sured her. He started rubbing her shoulder, arm and back briskly. Bree tried to relax into it, tried to tell her body to stop shivering.