She gripped the knife. “Don’t touch me, and the thing between us won’t happen.” He stiffened as if she’d raised the weapon against him.
The other fighters weren’t waiting for them anyway. Instead, they ripped through like superheated scythes, steaming away malice in wide swathes.
The talyan pressed forward. Sera heard a whoop of satisfaction at the easy progress. Before the malice had been entirely dispersed, a tide of ferales swept forward.
But they were small and halfhearted in their attack, almost clumsy. One stumbled past the talya ahead of her, and she put Archer’s knife through it. It collapsed without even a groan and only a thin trickle of ichor.
The fighters mowed through the ferales as easily as the malice, some pressing toward the center of the building and the basement access, some hanging back to guard the territory they’d taken.
“Birnenston has weakened these demons,” Archer said. “This must’ve been a nest for years and we never knew.”
She realized he’d been sticking close, but not close enough to touch, even as he contributed his share of the decimation. Making sure she didn’t screw up, she guessed.
She frowned. “Why would the djinn-man stay here if it poisons his demon?”
“Maybe we can ask him this time.”
She glanced at him, caught by the note of reservation in his voice.
By then, they were making their way down the stairs, a few scattered malice fleeing ahead of them.
She heard one of the warriors give a single cry, then fall silent. Her blood froze.
Archer shouldered her aside. “Wait here.”
For once, she didn’t argue. The rest of the talyan cleared the stairs around her, leaving her in the dim, dank space. A lone malice skittered aimlessly in the dark corner at the bottom landing, like an autumn leaf caught up in a swirl of wind.
A sob echoed through the basement door. All else was silent. She couldn’t stop herself.
She crept down the last few stairs and stared in.
Framed in the open doorway, head bowed, Zane was tied naked to a chair.
If all the malice and all the ferales they’d battled on their way down had bled like humans, still the flood would have been a drop compared to the pool of crimson surrounding the chair.
With a choked cry, Sera broke through the ring of waiting talyan, though Liam tried to catch her. “Someone untie him. Oh God, Zane.”
He raised his head to meet her gaze—except his eyes were gone.
Archer wrenched her back. “We can’t untie him. The bindings are acting as tourniquets. Until the teshuva gets its act together and starts healing the worst of the wounds, we don’t dare loosen them.” He lowered his voice. “It’s all that’s holding him together.”
Sera swallowed hard, until she had herself under control. “Let me go.”
With each step sliding or sticking in the insane spill of blood, she went to Zane’s side and crouched beside him.
“You guys found me.” Blood trickled from his mouth. Behind the broken and missing teeth, his tongue was split, whether from blows, his own teeth, or from the heavy shears on the floor just in her line of vision, she didn’t want to know. “Not a second too soon.”
“We were gonna stop for coffee, but . . .” She tried to keep her tone light, but she heard the quaver in her voice.
A few talyan in the circle, including Liam, turned away.
“I’ve got a theory,” Zane said. “When the teshuva came to me, I was so afraid to die, I would’ve agreed to anything. I’m not afraid anymore.”
“Hmm. Where’s the theory part?”
His breath rattled wetly in his lungs. “I think the demon is finally gone.”
“The djinn-man? Yes, he’s gone.”
“I meant my demon.”
Stillness rippled out from her to the listening talyan.
“It’s not death that frees you from the demon,” Zane said. “It’s the end of the fear of death. That’s peace. I knew you’d understand.” His voice trailed off.
Archer pulled her back. “Leave him be. Let the teshuva work.”
She bit her lip. “What if his demon is gone?”
Archer crossed his arms. “You think he wouldn’t be dead already with those wounds?”
She didn’t doubt Archer knew death intimately, but he didn’t know the knife-edge between life and death like she did. Years of hospice work had shown her both the precious fragility and the monstrous tenacity of life. “Demon or no, we can’t stay here. It reeks of evil.”
Archer nodded. “The birnenston. Probably why Zane’s teshuva hasn’t been much help.”
Unwilling to question him again about the demon’s continued presence, she let it pass. “I know you don’t think much of first aid, and we’re way past that now, but somebody should look at Zane.”
His lip curled. “Your faith healer?”
“I was thinking a little more practical.”
When the slow leakage from Zane’s body congealed, they gingerly cut his bonds. Only his rasping breaths told them he was still alive.
The transport back to the safe house might have been a funeral procession. Liam arrived a few minutes after them, the task Sera had set him complete.
Sera met Betsy outside Zane’s room. “This is awful,” she warned. “But I didn’t know whom else to call.”
The nurse clutched her small duffel, still blinking the early-morning sleep from her eyes. “I’ve done three mercy tours following two civil wars and a genocide. You can’t shock me.”
Sera gestured her in.
After one small gasp at the sight of the battered, raw meat that had been the talyan warrior, Betsy upended the duffel on the table beside the bed. Zane flinched at the clatter of glass vials.
“You’re awake?” Betsy slanted a glance at Sera, eyes wide with disbelief. “I’m a nurse. If I hurt you, tell me.”
Zane chuckled, little more than a gurgle. “I sort of doubt I’ll notice.”
“Ah, a funny guy,” Betsy said. “Those kind pinch my ass.”
The bare twist of a smile on his cut lips faded. “No pinching, I promise.”
“Just to be safe, I’m putting you out again. You won’t feel a thing.”
“Good,” he whispered.
Sera set her hand on his shoulder while Betsy emptied a syringe in his arm. He went slack, and she reassured herself that his chest still rose.
Betsy started cleaning and suturing. “I could lose my license for this.”
“We know all about risk.” Archer laid a hefty stack of bills beside Betsy’s duffel. “For your next civil war.”
Betsy glanced at Sera. “Is he for real?”
Sera shook her head, no.
“It helps to think of it all as a bad dream,” Archer agreed.
Betsy grunted. “You say this guy can’t go to the hospital, but we don’t know what internal damage he’s suffering. And you can be sure he’s suffering.”
“Yeah, we’re sure,” Archer said. “We just needed you to stabilize him.”
“He’s still capsized,” Betsy said. “We’re just keeping him from sinking any more. Barely.”
“That’s enough.”
“Probably not.” Betsy unrolled an arm’s length of gauze. “Whoever did this was a monster.”
Sera bowed her head.
“We’ll catch him.” Archer hovered just behind her. The warmth of his big body took a bit of the chill off hers.
Betsy eyed them. “You vigilantes? That why you won’t go to the police?”
Sera sighed. “Remember that self-defense course you wanted me to take? Consider it taken.”
“You’re gonna save the whole city from bad guys now?”
Sera looked at her hard. “How many gunshot wounds, rapes, and finger-shaped bruises on kids have you seen? If you could stop it, wouldn’t you?”
Betsy stared back. “No one can stop it.”
Sera let her intensity bleed away. “Slow it, then, even if you’re not sure what you’re doing matters in the end, even if nobody else thinks you’re right.”