Claimed by the Demon

exact words. He pushed at the blade, pushed toward her. You run like hell!

“That,” Rafe said with profound disgust, “was a complete waste of time and of my staff.” The only uninjured man among the three knelt by his bleeding buddy.

“That,” Mac grunted, “would be a matter of opinion. I think it went pretty well.” Work on that leg, Keska. He sent it out not as a request but a command—to work it hard and fast, whatever patch job would do, whatever the price. And then he barely contained a startled gasp as the blade, fired up by action and blood, sprang to work—a lightning bolt stitching flesh from the inside out. His face flushed against the chilling night, sweat dotting out along his temples.

Rafe only smiled—understanding as no one else could. “It won’t be enough. You’re too young, and you know too little. But you’ve impressed me. I might give you a second chance—if you walk the road with me now.”

Mac didn’t relent—pushing the blade, pushing at Gwen, and pushing right back at Rafe. “You mean I just took out the two men you had chosen for my blade.”

A one-shouldered shrug. “That, too.” Rafe held up his own blade, watching as Mac’s blood soaked into the gleaming metal. “Our thirst is endless. You decide.”

Gwen hesitated at his back—he felt it more than saw it, knowing she’d finally understood him through the blade and pendant. Feeling from her the wild hope that he could do what needed to be done and somehow live through it...and then find her again.

Because she was going to run—she and the pendant.

Mac grinned, a dark, wry thing full of self-awareness—he knew his odds here, even if he’d obscured them from Gwen. Warmth filled his leg, spreading the length of the long muscle so badly damaged—and it filled his hand, forming to a grip not quite as familiar as most but nonetheless welcome.

The frontier tomahawk. Cruder than most of the blade’s forms, but just as thirsty, just as keen-edged...and as accurate in the throw. Even without the time or space to set his feet, line up the throw...straight back, straight forward, release.

The blade couldn’t turn a wild throw straight. But it could make a straight throw fly true against the odds.

Rafe frowned at this evidence of Mac’s intent, annoyed and just wary enough to be smart. Rafe’s muscle man hesitated.

A man had only so many fingers to lose.

Gwen turned tense and trembling, hovering on the moment, and Mac said, “Yeah. Decision made.” He rolled to his feet, favoring the injured leg and compensating with balance and determination. “I’ve decided not to die today.”

He eyed Rafe’s muscle man, ignoring the gun. “How about you?”

Rafe snapped, “Your continued existence is no longer your choice. It’s mine, and I’ve made it.”

Go, Gwen. Go!

He wouldn’t hold them both for long. And as soon as the uninjured man gave up on his buddy...

“Really?” he said to Rafe’s man, eyeing the gun, letting his skepticism show. “With your off hand? To protect a man I bet you’ve never seen take on someone who could fight back.”

From the flicker in the man’s eye, he knew he’d hit target. From the anger on Rafe’s face, he was certain of it.

“Lifetimes,” Rafe said, his speech no longer quite as clear. “I have lifetimes of survival. You haven’t even made it through one.”

Go, Gwen. Go NOW!

Gwen spurted away in a scrabbling run, hands as much as feet until she gained a stride or two—and then Rafe’s man was on her, eschewing the gun to throw himself bodily across her with an impact that squeaked all the air out of her body.

“Wrong,” Mac said, “decision.” Swift as his movement, the tomahawk glimmered into war club, slamming down across the man’s shoulders—breaking flesh and bone with an audible crunch that left the man in paralyzed shock and Gwen cursing beneath his weight, clawing to pull herself out from under him.

Mac hooked the man’s side with his club and flipped him over, halfway freeing Gwen—and that was all he could do, as blade shimmered back to tomahawk and he pivoted around, all one motion, to release the throw as Rafe finally came for him—finally goaded beyond endurance to physical action.

No surprise that Rafe blocked the blow—he’d had too much time, too much space to do it, his blade a stout scimitar that showered showy and improbable sparks through the night as it parried Keska away.

It didn’t matter. Because as Mac dove for Keska—knowing it would find his hand more readily than he ever truly thought possible—Gwen scrambled free from the weight of Rafe’s dying muscle man and sprinted away.

Rafe cried out in wordless outrage, standing with legs splayed and arms spread—completely open, if Mac had only been in a position to do something about it. Not that he had any compunction at all about whipping the tomahawk around into the shallow angle of Rafe’s back, but damn if that leg hadn’t given out on him, just enough to lose the moment.

Rafe didn’t even notice Mac, all his attention on Gwen. “No!” he cried, honest horror in his voice. “Watch out!”

Because Gwen ran straight for the concrete arroyo. Gwen, who’d only been in this city a matter of days and who’d never experienced the violence of a monsoon storm. Gwen, who probably hadn’t even realized what the arroyos were or that the noise behind them was six feet of water rushing along at a startling speed.

“Gwen!” Mac cried—but no, he’d told her to go, he’d pushed her with everything she had. She wouldn’t stop now.

Still, she jerked around—just for an instant. Just before her foot hit that first step on a steep wet concrete slope.

She went down with a startled cry; it turned terrified as she plunged out of sight, and then it cut short with a splash, barely audible over the rushing water.

Mac saved his breath on a curse, bolting forward—a lurching, awkward run that took him to the edge only just before Rafe made it there, both of them stricken. But if Mac was wild with it, Rafe quickly turned to cold fury —watching the dark rush of water, foam and rapids and debris churning along faster than the average man could run.

I’m not average. For the moment, Mac forgot he was on one-and-a-half legs and forgot he stood beside the man he was sworn to stop. “Gwen!” he shouted out over that roiling water, a deep notch of concrete draining straight to the Rio Grande. “Gwen!”

But he heard nothing in response...not so much as a distant cry. Deep within, a jerk of thought slapped up against him. Rafe. Right here beside me.

The man he had to stop. The one from whom he’d thought to save Gwen, at the cost of his own body.

He hadn’t done that—hadn’t kept her safe at all. But he damned sure wouldn’t let it be for nothing.

As if Rafe hadn’t figured that out.

Even as Mac turned on him, the man’s blade sliced air, aiming to cut him through. Mac stumbled back—fell as the leg went out yet again, but rolled more nimbly this time, barely off his feet and up again, Keska striking out in a cutting sheen of metal—coming back at Rafe fast enough so the older man swore and slapped at the blade, a clumsy move.

Oh, yeah, it’s been a while. For how many lifetimes had the man been living by proxy, sucking down the emotions of others—evoking what he wanted, manipulating the results, watching the agony and sorrow of his own making and then profiting from it? Never putting himself out there, never facing direct retribution.

But Rafe struck back, a flurry of blows—his form strengthening, his movements growing more fine and subtle, his blade slowly straightening to match the sweep of Mac’s saber.

Not long enough, apparently.

And Rafe wasn’t already winded...wasn’t already bleeding...wasn’t already exhausted from days of battling an unknown foe along with his blade.

He smiled with grim satisfaction as Mac missed a parry from low to high guard, his blade skipping along the outer edge of Keska to nick Mac’s arm, then flicking down to slash shallowly across his thigh while Keska chased its