Revealed in Fire (Demon Days & Vampire Nights #9)(3)

“Help them,” I pleaded. “Don’t let them die.”

He crashed into my air shield as I readied another elephant calf behind him. His eyes darted, and he jerked away from the one nearly at his side. It made him bump into the apparition behind him, but his back pushed through the image. They weren’t solid, and I didn’t know how to infuse enough air into them to make it so. Not yet. It was a work in progress.

I backed it away.

“They’re dying,” I hollered, putting as much drama into it as I could. Blood gushed, the little babies faltering, and his body tightened.

And then I crashed a second wall forward, smashing him in between them.

He flattened against the wall in front of me. His sword sliced into his forearm, and his cheek smeared against the hard air. Red-tinged spit dribbled out of his smooshed lips and leaked around his chin.

“Say uncle,” I yelled, using all my power to keep him put, shaking with the effort as he tried to buck and create some room for himself to escape. “Say uncle!”

He tried to buck again, and I dumped all I had into my magic, no longer focusing on keeping the world intact around us. The fluffy sky started to dissolve like cotton candy in the rain. A leg fell off an elephant, and it hobbled before bending to breaking knees.

“Yield!” he mumbled through still-smooshed lips.

“I said say uncle, not yield. You have to say uncle or I won’t let you out.”

Another elephant crashed to the ground, and the illusion of blood spread across the ground. My faltering magic couldn’t hold the original design. This was so much more gruesome than what I’d created.

Cahal jolted, his eyes wide as he caught sight of it. He bucked wildly, the wall pushing back.

“No you don’t.” I gritted my teeth and balled my fists, needing to visualize the air pressing against him. “Not this time. I will not lose at the final moment and get beaten up for my efforts. I will win this time. Say uncle!”

Another elephant crashed to the ground. I gave a fourth a little push to do the same, since Cahal was obviously reacting to the sight of them hitting the dirt, lifelike or not.

“Uncle,” he finally said, going limp. “Uncle.”

I tore the air away, panting. Working quickly, I tore the rest of the scene down, letting my magic dissolve back into the world, raining down through the moon-soaked night like acid across a painting. Darkened grass took the place of the gumdrops. Just over a berm, the liquid-black ocean shimmered as it lapped against the flat sands. The twisted wood cleared to a landscaped and carefully tended front yard, little potholes dug into it from my boots or my scuffle with Darius. A large mansion wavered into view behind us, the pool in front of it lit from within with eerie blue light. When Darius had organized a retreat to hide me away from the world, he’d done it like he did everything else—in style.

Cahal wiped his lip with the back of his hand, his eyes burning into mine.

“The rules of uncle are clear and finite.” I held up my hands and took a step back. “Once you say it, you are declaring yourself the loser of the fight, and you cannot resume the attack after you’re freed. That would be cheating.”

“You always cheat.”

“Only when you’re not looking.”

He paused for a moment. “How’d you know about the elephants?”

“Yeah, bud. What’s the deal with that? You really don’t like to see elephants suffering, huh?”

His stare raised my small hairs, something very few people could do.

I jerked my head toward the house, seeing Darius hadn’t just recovered but was already dressed and pristine and waiting for us behind the bar. Emery sat in a chair with his ankle resting on his knee, watching as Penny lazily swam through the water. They’d laid the power-siphoning spell for me and then gone about their leisure time. How nice for them.

“You mentioned that elephants were your favorite animal,” I said, “and you tensed for a fraction of a second, so I thought I might play off that. I had no idea you’d go full-scale soupy about it.”

“Soupy?”

“Yeah, you know…” I sagged my shoulders, slumped forward, and pouted.

“No. It is not clear.”

“It affected you, basically.”

“Would’ve been easier just to say that at the get-go.”

“And miss out on a colorful explanation?” I grinned at him as we climbed the steps leading up to the pool area. I stopped there and turned toward the ocean, breathing in the warm, salty air and taking in the lovely view, knowing it looked even better in the day, the clear turquoise waters sitting beneath the royal-blue sky. “I literally want for nothing right now. Through Darius, I have all the money I could ever possibly need. I have a life of luxury. I have love and support. Most people would find this a dream come true.”

“The struggle of life defines you. You are not a pampered pet; you are a savage hunter. You were born to it. You were bred for it. You yearn to throw off the robes of secrecy and reach for your destiny.”

Here he went again, with his visions of grandeur. I didn’t bother arguing. He never seemed to hear me when I said that my sole desire was to go home to my comfortable house in New Orleans, take up my old job of bounty hunting, and chase some shifters around for sport. I missed taking pleasure in the little things, like trying to force the overly loud were-yeti to call me ma’am, just for funsies, and checking in with my neighbors, a surly crew who would kill for me. Not that my friends wouldn’t kill for me—they had—but it didn’t mean as much in the magical world. Humans digging an unmarked grave meant bros for life. Or…bras, in this case, since I was a chick.