Legacy of the Demon (Kara Gillian 8)

All right. Time to let go of my preconceptions of what the chant should be and freestyle this thing. Starting anew, I allowed sound to flow—unfamiliar though melodic, but oh-so-right. In confirmation, the sigils flared, and a frigid arcane wind swirled around me.

I am lordy.

The guided potency of the ritual slammed against the dimensional fabric, but the portal itself was stubborn, like trying to open a door against a gale. I’d successfully opened hundreds of portals, but never with so much power at my disposal. It should have been easier, not harder. I was trying my best to be the damn summoning. What the hell was wrong?

I sought the calm center in the midst of frustration. Szerain had told me to be lordy and be the summoning. That instruction had brought me this far, but clearly, I was missing something.

Kadir’s advice to Pellini whispered through my mind. Believe it has already happened.

Understanding crystallized. This was different, not harder. It wasn’t all about control and rules like in a regular summoning. It was about creating. It was the difference between painting by numbers and translating an artistic vision to a canvas. Using a boxed mix to make a cake versus creating a breathtaking dessert from scratch.

Here and now, I was the artist. I breathed in the arcane wind, mingled it with my own potency then exhaled it, all while envisioning a pinprick of dimension-piercing light within the perimeter of the binding sigils. The vision became reality as the light expanded into a portal vortex. With it came a roaring rumble like boulders crashing down a mountainside.

I gathered the prepared potency strands, made the call in a voice that was mine but so much more. “Dekkak!”

The wind picked up the name, howled it through the roar and ensnared the demon on the far side of the portal. I braced against the tension on the strands and pulllllled.

For several tension-wracked heartbeats, nothing budged, then all hell broke loose as the demon fought the call. I thought I’d performed tough summonings before, but this was like trying to pull a pissed-off grizzly bear through a porthole using a bungee cord in the middle of a hurricane.

It took every bit of standard training and lordy experience to keep my wits and my hold, but I had the sucker, and I wasn’t about to let go. Dekkak’s shadow choked the portal, and with one final yank he was through and on my nexus.

He stood taller and broader than the Piggly Wiggly reyza—and wore ten times more gold—but to my surprise was nowhere near the size of Big Turd. Rakkuhr flames crawled over his blood-red hide and rose, smoking, from wicked double-curved horns. A thick, barbed tail twitched like an angry snake, and the stench of sulfur rolled from him in a noxious wave.

Fire and brimstone. A living hellish nightmare.

Not my nightmare, damn it. I fed potency into the bindings, imbuing them with his name—Dekkak.

His head swiveled toward Pellini, even as a lightning-fast whip of his barbed tail caved in half of Rhyzkahl’s house. Pellini raised the staff, but the demon was already in motion, lunging toward him. I tightened the bindings, but to my horror they slipped from the demon like greased spaghetti. Out of the corner of my eye, I caught the recoil of the net launcher, its sound drowned out by the fading roar of the of the closing portal.

Dekkak ripped the staff away with one clawed hand and sent it skittering across the nexus then seized Pellini in a demonic bear-hug and launched into flight.

Heart in my throat, I gathered and checked the bindings, watching with one eye as the net sailed through the air toward the target area. All the demon needed was another solid beat of his wings, and he’d be clear.

The net won—barely—fouling Dekkak’s wings. Shrieking with fury, he crashed down, lower body and tail hitting the nexus, and upper torso slamming into the grass. Pellini let out a wheezed curse and scrabbled against the demon’s hold.

Bryce and Suarez ran toward the netted demon and Pellini while I anchored the useless bindings and dove for the staff. Dekkak thrashed on his back, bellowing a deep scream full of rage and the promise of death. In a few more seconds he’d be free of the net.

With a fierce pull of nexus power, I focused a blast of potency at one of Dekkak’s massive arms, burning through the rakkuhr shielding and biting into flesh. He jerked, loosening his grip. Without hesitation, Pellini shoved a flare of Kadir-chartreuse potency against Dekkak’s chest.

The demon howled and pulled one hand free of Pellini to scrabble at the weirdly clinging glow. Leaping forward, I drove the wizard staff hard against the demon’s side, thumb already mashing the button. His body spasmed as electricity found its mark, but I could already tell it wasn’t enough to incapacitate him for long. “Get Pellini out,” I hollered to Bryce and Suarez then sucked in a breath of shock as rakkuhr flames wreathed the staff and crawled toward my hands. “Hurry!” Part of me was impressed and fascinated by this utterly cool and badass use of rakkuhr as both defense and offense, but the rest of me did not want a personal introduction.

The guys moved fast to drag Pellini free then raced to secure the net. They got as far as pulling it around Dekkak’s upper torso before I shouted for them to get clear and had to backpedal to avoid the rakkuhr.

The demon snarled and clawed at the net. The graphene-enhanced strands held firm, but it was clear we had minutes at most before he struggled out of it.

Rhyzkahl’s voice cut through the final rumbles of the summoning and my own pounding heartbeat. “Kara! Bind with yulz. Yulz.”

What the hell was yulz? I wracked my brain futilely for a sigil or protection called yulz before his meaning hit me. Not what. Who.

“Keep him occupied.” I shoved the staff into Bryce’s hands then dashed back to the Dekkak-attuned binding strands. No wonder they’d failed. I’d sure enough lassoed a Jontari warlord, maybe even an imperator, but it wasn’t Dekkak. Baffling, but no time to figure out how and why that happened. I recharged the bindings with the name and energy signature of Yulz then sent them to snake around the downed demon. With a triumphant jerk of my fist, I tightened the hold.

Yulz hissed, unable to do more than wriggle within the confines of the physical net and arcane bindings. The rakkuhr flames slithered from him and dissipated.

I bent forward and rested my hands on my thighs while I caught my breath. Yulz wasn’t the demon I’d intended to summon, but he was still one seriously potent motherfucker. We’d have been dead meat without the net—or Rhyzkahl’s well-timed help.

Straightening, I gave Rhyzkahl a grateful nod and a mouthed Thanks. “Status!” I called out then began to meticulously anchor the bindings. No way did I want to risk releasing the demon prematurely.

“Five by five,” said Bryce and Suarez in unison, standing tense and wary beside the demon. Suarez had a bloody nose, but seemed okay otherwise. Bryce held the staff at the ready.