Vengeance of the Demon (Kara Gillian 7)

Idris flicked his eyes to the demon-dragon-baby on my shoulder then back to the ugly eggs. He pulled a trembling hand over his mouth, hesitating as doubt flared, in himself, in the plan. It was up to him, one way or another. Up to him to save everyone.

He took the last strand from Pellini and brought it to the last egg, but before he could attach it another tremor shook the valve. The strand slipped from his grasp, flailed like a time-lapse of ivy seeking purchase and slapped against the egg.

Cracks fissured over the egg’s surface, and black light spewed forth while the other ten egg things radiated soft green.

The impending explosion of the one egg built as pressure in my chest until I was certain my heart would stop beating. “Stay close,” I called out to anyone within earshot. “Everyone. Get close. And stay that way.”

Idris sat back on his heels. Shock and disbelief radiated from him. I failed everyone. His thoughts flowed through me like water. I’m not supposed to die this way! It’s too soon.

The pressure in my chest squeezed my breath away. Blue-green snakes of potency whipped outward from beneath my feet like wriggling spokes from a hub.

Pellini put his hands to his head. Fuck. Bryce’ll take care of Sammy, right? God, I hope so. Shit. At least Boudreaux’s clear. More thoughts that I couldn’t shut out.

The twelfth sigil cooled. The blue-green spokes of potency continued to lengthen. Twenty feet. Icy. Fifty feet. Burning cold. Another foot. No more.

Silent words and impressions tumbled over me from people farther away. It’s probably that damn fracking. The prisoners. Gotta do something. Jesus, I’m sweating my ass off. Ugh, I left my cigarettes in my desk. How could the lords stand the constant barrage?

The bean shrieked by my ear, a terrible sound of frustration. The spokes melted into a blue-green carpet and a sensation like being submerged in water closed in.

A protective cocoon. It was all the bean could do.

I’m so sorry, Amber. I couldn’t avenge you.

Will I go to hell?

And then silence. A flash of ruddy light beneath me. Tame, then not. Beyond the perimeter of the blue-green sanctuary, everything blurred, vibrated. The cocoon dissolved, and with it my arcane sense. Surroundings snapped into sharp focus. Sound crashed in. Screams. The crack of concrete. The shriek of twisting steel. The crash of glass. Horror clawed within me as a portion of the station collapsed in upon itself. The entire front half of City Hall disintegrated into rubble. And then buildings beyond it. Trembling, crumbling. And more beyond those. Like a five minute earthquake compressed into the span of a heartbeat. Nightmare. Impossible. And real.

Chapter 38

Smoke and gas and blood. Shouts and orders and screams. Panic and fear and determination.

Dust choked the air, and water fountained from a broken hydrant. Concrete and rebar groaned and creaked as it settled into ungainly piles. The entire front of the three-story City Hall lay in the street. More than two thirds of the PD had collapsed, and tears sprang to my eyes as I took in the sight. Surely everyone had made it out? They were still my people even if I didn’t work there anymore. The station would always be special to me—a place I’d called home.

I tore my eyes away from the ruin. “How is it?” I asked Idris.

“Don’t know yet,” he said, hands shaking as he worked them over the valve.

I didn’t want to think about the number of casualties in the blast radius—couldn’t think about it if I wanted to keep going. But without the bean’s intervention it would have been much worse.

She scuttled around to cling to my chest, her back claws hooked on the waistband of my jeans. She spread her wings and brought her scaly snout to within an inch of my nose, her eyes fixed on mine. I steeled myself for a baby dragon-demon surprise of who-knew-what instructions, but instead she stretched her fanged jaws wide in an almighty yawn. Aww, she was a tired baby.

I cradled her close in an awkward wingy sort of way. “You did damn good, kiddo,” I murmured, then sighed. Crap. Not half an hour old, and she’d heard me curse. Oh, well, best for her to get used to it. “Y’think you can give your poor mama a break and look human when she first sees you?” I said with a soft smile. “She’s been through a lot for you.”

She let out an adorable little burble and made an unsettling shift that left me feeling as if I held a bag full of wiggly kittens. White scales transformed to soft skin, and her tail shrank to a stub. She waved her wings once before they quivered and morphed into smooth skin on her back. The dragon face shifted into something humanish—except it swiveled on the end of a disturbingly long neck. I stooped and picked up the red silk that had wrapped Katashi’s arm and tucked it around her.

“C’mon, sweetie, all the way human,” I urged. “Do it for your mommy.” I glanced at said mommy. Bedraggled and dazed, Jill slid down from the backseat, staggered a few steps then collapsed to sit against the rear wheel of the truck with one hand on her belly. “She deserves a break,” I went on, “and she needs your help right now.”

The bean tick-growled, but she adjusted her neck to a reasonable human baby length and shrank the stub of her tail away. She was still a lot bigger than a typical newborn, but at least she looked like a baby now—mostly. She yawned, a bit too wide, revealing several rows of pointy teeth. And the blink of her inner eyelids was way weirder on a baby than a dragon. I tried to wrap her in a Kara version of a swaddle but, when claws emerged from her fingertips, I got the message and left the cloth loose around her. “Put the claws away,” I murmured as I held her close and hurried over to Jill.

“Hey, chick,” I said with a smile. “Got someone who wants to say Hi.”

Jill lifted her head as I crouched. The distress vanished from her face at the sight of the bundle in my arms, and she took the bean from me with a choked gasp.

“She’s pretty kickass,” I said with a warm smile as Jill made cooing noises at her baby. “Just like her mom.”

Jill brushed her lips over the bean’s head, made more mommy-to-baby noises then finally looked up at me. “What happened? I was ready to whack you for doing that counting thing . . . and the rest is hazy.” She bit her lip. “Something really bad happened, but I don’t remember.” Worry swept over her face, and she held the bean closer, mama instinct in full force. Already I saw her fretting over how to get her daughter to safety.

“Would’ve been a lot worse if not for your kid.” I stroked the back of my fingers over the bean’s cheek. Jill spared me a questioning look. “Seems she has a few tricks up her sleeve,” I said. “She’s special—the best of you and her daddy.” That didn’t explain a damn thing, but thankfully she was distracted by her baby and still dazed enough that she didn’t feel her usual urge to press for more answers. I knew I needed to get up and make sure the valve was safe and start helping with re