But she had not yet gotten cooperation from him. Nor did she have complete control of her own demon. Fire continued to blaze from her skin as it fought her for the freedom to reach Blade. She could not hold the section of boundary for long.
“Help him!” Raven said to her father.
Her father grinned. “As you command.”
He caught one wolven by the neck as it sprang for Blade. The claws on his hand tightened, and Raven heard a pop as it crushed the wolven’s throat, then tossed its limp body aside.
When Blade registered the demon’s presence, he lunged for Raven, throwing himself on top of her and covering her with his body. He swore through clenched teeth at the heat from the flames. As soon as he touched her, however, the fire emanating from her skin receded.
The last wolven loped off, disappearing into the mortal night with its tail between its legs.
“Explain this to me,” Blade said to her, his voice grim and low in her ear. He clutched his sword, bloodied with gore from the wolven he’d killed, and held it ready to defend them against her father.
She could not yet speak. Intense emotions coursed unchecked through her body and mind, from both her and her demon, as well as the knowledge that there would be repercussions for summoning her father and commanding him in this manner.
The beat of Blade’s heart was steady and reassuring where he pressed against her back, and the ground cold and solid against her hands and her cheek. She pushed upward, but was still weakened from three days of hallucinations and he was too heavy for her to dislodge easily.
“Let me up,” she said. “I need to speak with him.”
Blade got slowly to his feet and extended a hand to help her rise. When he had time to think about this night, to understand what she had done, she wondered how he would feel about it all. About her.
The demon’s head turned. A subtle shift in the pressure of Blade’s hand on hers was the only sign that it affected him.
Her father shifted from demon to mortal form. Blade would surely see the resemblance between them. While she looked most like her mother, there were enough similarities between her and her father, most notably in their hair and eyes, to make the relationship obvious.
“You asked for my help, and I gave it to you,” her father said. “There’s a price to be paid.”
She had known there would be. Dread slithered through her. “What do you I owe you?”
His attention fixed, cold and predatory, on Blade, then shifted to their linked hands. “First, send the mortal away, or I’ll kill him.”
Blade’s expression grew harder. He shook off her hand so both of his would be free. “You can try, demon.”
She did not dare try to force Blade to leave. “He stays,” Raven said. “Tell me what you want from me.”
Her father looked at her. “I want Justice.”
At first, she was relieved. The price was not as high as she had expected. And then, after the first heady wave of euphoria passed, cold reality settled in and she knew it was impossible. For her to give her father someone she already hated would increase her obligation to him, not pay off any debt, because her demon warned that it was more than Justice he wanted. She did not dare trust him, even to pay him what he claimed he was owed.
And while she wanted Justice dead too, it would not be at the hands of any demon. She could not allow this other side of her nature to touch her mortal existence. She did not like the thought of what she would become if she did. When she killed him it had to be by mortal means. And at a price she could afford.
Blade watched her without comment. Not a single word of protest. He, too, wondered what her response would be, and how deep her hatred for Justice ran.
“I won’t give him to you,” she said.
Her father’s beautiful face twisted to reveal the ugliness it disguised. “You don’t get to set the price for my help.”
“I think I do,” she said slowly. “Demons and mortal men hate each other too much to ever work together. A son would never summon a demon father, but I’ve just proved that a daughter will. You need me. So I do get to name the price, and I will, but not yet.”
She sensed his fascination at her refusal and worked hard to fight back a shudder. At some point, she would not be able to refuse him. He was prepared to wait for that moment. This was a game she did not know all the rules to, and he enjoyed playing it with her.
“We’ll see who needs whom, little demon.” His eyes flickered to her amulet, then to Blade, before returning to her face. “Remember me in your prayers.”
He did not wait for her to release him, but withdrew on his own from this temporary, in-between boundary to return to the other.
Raven remained where she was, conscious of Blade and his simmering anger as he stood beside her, but needing a few moments in which to reclaim her own emotions. Demons pursued her, as did Justice. And soon the Godseeker assassins would as well. On top of that, she was now indebted to her demon father.
She couldn’t bear to be afraid of Blade too, on top of everything else.
She took a deep breath and turned to face him.
…
She had summoned a demon.
Blade had known a demon fathered her, but to be presented with irrefutable proof had come as a greater shock than he had expected. Worse, now she owed it a favor because of him.
He took a deep breath, trying to think reasonably. He was not angry with her for wanting to save him. It was his inability to stand between her and a demon—and the sensation of helplessness he’d experienced—that infuriated him with such intensity that it left him shaking.
For ten long years, he’d had no choice but to accept helplessness. He did not have to accept it now. He was not as inexperienced at fighting demons as he had been back then.
He only wished it were not her father.
By the time she turned to him, with the last of those faint, blue-green shimmers of fire flaring through her skin slowly fading, he had calmed himself.
“Do not, ever again, summon a demon to help me,” he said. “I won’t be indebted to one.” His hands still shook as he spoke. He had not calmed as much as he’d thought, after all.
Total darkness settled around them as the last of the demon fire vanished beneath her fresh-scrubbed skin. The scent of soap root still clung to her, despite the acrid smoke that hit his nostrils.
She rested her palm lightly against his chest, as if she was carefully examining his emotions. Warmth inundated him at her touch—but it was not caused by any remnants of demon flame.
Awareness of her as a woman struck him sharply.
“I didn’t have a choice,” she said. “I couldn’t stand back and let anything happen to you. I’d never be able to live with myself if I did.”
All remnants of the anger he had been nurturing filtered from his lungs. She did not know him. If she did, she would have known not to worry. He had cheated death too many times already. When it finally caught up with him, it would be no more than he deserved.
Covering her hand with his own, he clasped it against him so that she could not pull away. Their circumstances demanded he think beyond the visceral to the practical. He knew demons hated Godseekers—and men—as a whole. But this demon had asked for Justice by name.
Blade would not let her pay such a price. Not even Justice deserved to be turned over to demons. No mortal did.
“Why would the demon want you to give him your stepfather?” Blade asked.
“Because of my mother. He believes she belonged to him and that Justice destroyed her.”
Blade knew of the bond created between an immortal and the one that it claimed. His friend Hunter, the Demon Slayer, had been more than content to have Airie—his half demon, half goddess wife—claim him.