“So I heard. I’ve got nothing but soul-snorters—wait a minute. Some idiot just came out of the building east of the canal. Dressed like a man. He’s moving toward the rubble.
Can you see him?”
“Not from here. Which is a bad spot anyway, considering. I’m changing positions.”
I couldn’t slip around behind the man. There just wasn’t enough room between the rampart wal and the vat for the shadows to hide me. So I moved past him on the north side, crouching low enough for a long line of hide-covered tanks to disguise my scuttling outline. I ended up in front of the building he’d just left. I stil couldn’t see him. But I caught sight of the kloricht and Kyphas, moving quickly from vat to vat, closing in on Cole and Vayl like a fatal disease. And the worst part? We’d been right. They’d had two extra guards, maybe standing with the ship they’d sailed in on.
But now, with so much at stake, they’d put al their forces into one concentrated attack. Sun Tzu would not approve.
My quarry had to have heard the demons, but he didn’t seem to care. He was bent over the lid’s remains, avoiding random droplets from its fountaining fire, ignoring the howling faces and scrabbling claws of the demon host straining to be free as he searched through the debris. The depth of the alcove partial y blocked my view, and I didn’t dare twitch now that the kloricht were close enough to sense my movements. So I tracked Kyphas’s summoner as long as I could, and when he strayed out of view I watched the demons he’d invited into our world.
Though they’d taken basic human forms, they stil managed to look comfortable walking on al fours. Probably because it al owed them to jut their chin barbs out as far as physical y possible. Their silver mohawks shone in the moonlight as they turned to talk to one another, their whispers sounding like the hiss of steam escaping an overpressured valve.
I opened my mouth to tel Vayl he had company, but Sterling was on the bal . “Okay, you two, visitors entering the ground floor. I count five plus the demoness. You’re standing right in the center of the Hand now. As long as you’re there, you won’t be outnumbered. So stay cool. And I’l see if I’ve got something up my sleeve that can zap them without frying you guys at the same time.”
“Thank you, Sterling,” said Vayl, his tone nearly as calm as our warlock’s. “We appreciate it.”
I wanted to rush the dude stil rifling through the broken lid pieces and bits of building rubble, but I knew I had to wait until the demons were committed. Three minutes later I heard the clash of steel and Cole yel ing. My whole upper body twitched against the wal .
“Jaz, don’t move,” said Sterling. “Somebody else just walked into the ruins.”
“What are you doing here?” asked Kamal. In English.
“What do you think?” answered Yousef. Also in English.
What the fu—
“I think you’re never going to keep it without a fight,” said Kamal.
“Come on, then.” I imagined Yousef flicking his fingers toward himself, probably hoping Kamal would beat him badly enough that he’d at least get some fun out of it.
Then I heard the hol ow slap of knuckles on flesh.
I spun around the corner, hoping a better view would help me figure out what the hel was going on.
Yousef had Kamal by the shirt col ar. He was pounding him so hard that sweat droplets flew off the boy’s face. But Kamal had grown up in the streets, and he’d learned a few tricks of his own. Including the flailing leg move that eventual y connects somewhere tender.
Yousef went to one knee. But he didn’t let go. In fact, he buried his fingers in Kamal’s neck. “You little perversion,” he gasped. “The world is going to be a better place without you.”
I snuck in closer, trading my sword for a weapon more appropriate to the moment. But I kept Grief pointed toward the ground, because I was listening to the debate raging in my head.
Yousef is the bad guy! Granny May screeched. He’s clearly bent, or he wouldn’t get such a thrill when you slap him around!
Maybe not! argued Teen Me. Kamal might not be as innocent as he seems. I’m going to date plenty of guys who’ll be perfect gentlemen until they “run out of gas” in the middle of nowhere. And then it’ll be like they’ve gone deaf and grown four extra pairs of hands!
Kamal swung wildly and managed to slam his fist into Yousef’s eye. Suddenly their positions were reversed.
Yousef lay on the cracked cobblestones while Kamal straddled him, delivering punishing blows that would’ve knocked out anyone with less resistance. Yousef smiled through the blood and his missing front tooth.
“You hit like my great-grandmother!” he taunted, not even trying to block the blows. One hand crawled up Kamal’s chest, reaching for a choke hold, while the other felt beneath his back. “Ha!” he shouted in triumph as his hand came free, and in his grip he held… the Rocenz.
“Stop!” I yel ed as he started to swing. The hammer made it to Kamal’s ear before Yousef managed to halt it.
Good thing too, because I was that close to blowing his brains out.
“Get up, Kamal,” I said.
He grabbed the Rocenz and got to his feet, backing away from Yousef, who slowly dragged himself upright, coughing and spitting pink phlegm as he rose.
Kamal murmured something. “What’d you say?” I asked.
“Thanks for saving me.”
I nodded, turned back to Yousef. “You can speak English. What’s that about?”
“Kamal taught me,” he said. “What else is there to do to pass time here every day?”
“But you never told us your secret,” I said.
“No. I like knowing what the ladies say when they think I’m ignorant. It’s like peeking into their diaries.”
“You are such a freak.”
“Yes,” he agreed, holding up a finger to keep me from continuing my train of thought. “But not evil.”
“Are you trying to tel me you didn’t summon the demons that are fighting Cole and Vayl on the roof right now?”
He glanced at the flames ful of enraged demonic faces, gnashing their teeth at Sterling’s net, and the expression on his face sent a chil through me. He pointed at Kamal. “He did it.”
I glanced at Yousef’s young translator. Who seemed sort of… smug.
I watched him flip the Rocenz in his hand, throwing it up high enough so that it did a ful 360 before he caught the handle. “What are you doing, Kamal?” I asked careful y.
“Deciding not to spend the rest of my life wading in shit,” he said. “For the longest time I thought I didn’t have any other choice. And then I met the most beautiful woman in the world.” He pointed to the hole the explosion had blown in Cole and Vayl’s building just as Kyphas stepped through it.
“Good boy,” she crooned, giving him such a lusty wink I knew where he thought he was going to be spending the rest of the night. She held her arms out to him.
I swept Grief from Yousef to Kamal and fired. The boy crumpled, screaming as his kneecap shattered. But I was already too late. He’d thrown the Rocenz to Kyphas.
“Your contract,” I reminded her.
“You found the tool,” she told me. “It’s not my fault that you lost it again.” She laughed. “If you ever retrieve it, I’l be sure to meet you at the gates of hel to help you with Brude’s name-carving party. Until then…” She shrugged.