I clucked my tongue in sympathy.
“If I decide to kill you, the shield will make little difference. You can drop it and feel just as safe,” I said with a smile.
“How do we know we can trust you?” Armstrong said.
“Because I’m the good guy here. As long as my friends haven’t been harmed, you stand an excellent chance of getting out of here alive.”
“Rowle said you were the bad guy,” Frazier said.
She was still playing charades, and I couldn’t decide what purpose it would have. Did she really believe Rowle was a good guy or was she just trying to keep Armstrong in the dark? I guess I could always use a truth potion to make them talk.
“But then Rowle isn’t here, is he? He let you go up against me knowing that the most you could do was delay–”
Man, I can be slow. This whole thing was a delaying game to keep me away from the site of the breach Rowle was planning. Frazier had said noon. If she’d been honest about that much, then they were coming through in the next few hours. I glanced back toward the room where I’d so recently been a captive. The airport lights were bright enough that I couldn’t tell if the sky was still dark or if dawn was upon us.
I noticed that Tess had rightened the chair I’d been using and had sat down on it in that little undamaged spot of the floor where she’d cast her spell. Her head was bent low over the crossbow that lay across her lap.
“Are you all right, Tess?” I asked.
She nodded weakly. “I’m good, just get my Aunts.”
I turned back to Frazier and Armstrong. “Times up, ladies. Step into the hallway and take me to my friends or I’ll kill you both and find them on my own.”
The women exchanged glances and then through my enhanced senses, I saw Frazier’s shield wink out.
I stepped back from the doorway and collapsed my shield down to an inch from my body. First Armstrong and then Frazier entered the hallway and moved in the direction Armstrong had indicated earlier.
They stopped at the last door on the left side of the hall and opened it.
I motioned them back and looked in.
“Rafe,” Ashley exclaimed.
The two women were sitting side by side at a small metal table. A metal ring was set in the table, and a single pair of handcuffs linked one of each of their hands to the ring. The rest of the room was empty, but there was a large mirror covering much of the right wall. My enhanced senses could see figures in the next room.
“Jenifer, you have an interrogation room? How butch of you. Emily, Ashley. Are you two all right?” I asked.
“They haven’t hurt us, except for the black eye Emily’s going to have,” Ashley said.
Her eyes moved slightly to something behind me, and she opened her mouth to shout a warning.
Armstrong’s handgun discharged about a foot behind my head.
Chapter 26
Raphael
The bullet smacked into my shield and ricocheted into the ceiling.
I triggered an energy blast as I raised my hand. Armstrong was blown through the door on the opposite side of the hall and into the far wall. She hit hard and crumbled to the floor in a heap.
While I was dealing with her, Frazier completed a spell with a pop of energy.
For a fraction of a moment, I thought something had gone wrong with her spell because I couldn’t see anything coming at me. I turned to check on Tess’s aunts, but they were okay. Except for still being restrained. I spoke a spell of unbinding and the handcuff holding them fell open.
Emily leapt to her feet in an instance and then pointed as once again I had my back turned to the wrong people.
I whirled, strengthening my shield as I did in preparation for Frazier’s assault.
An orange and black multi-horned demon had appeared in the hallway between Frazier and me. The demon stretched out, bringing it to its full height, and its top two horns buried themselves in the ceiling. Its cloven hooves cracked the tile floor wherever it stamped them. It was blatantly male and sported parts that would have made most stallions jealous. The fretha demon curled up its fist and shook one of them at me.
“Raphael, you worm,” the demon snarled. “I’ve been hoping some fool would summon me while you still lived.”
Uh-oh. I’d only banished one fretha demon, and that was more than thirty years earlier. Who knew those things still bore a grudge after that much time?
“Well, I can’t say I remember your name, but I’ve no beef with you today. Step aside so I can kill the mage that summoned you and you can be about your business,” I said as I stepped slightly to the side. If I could get a good shot at Frazier, the demon summoning would reverse itself with the summoner’s death.
“And pass up my chance to eat your marrow? No, Wanderer, your service to Fate ends this day.”
It punched out, aiming at my face with a fist the size of my head. The impact on my shield drove me back down the hallway the way I had come. I slammed into the wall at the end. The concrete block shattered under the impact. More debris rained down on my shield and fell to the floor around me.
I extracted myself from the wall, raised my right hand, and triggered an energy pulse. I didn’t hold back as I had with Armstrong. A full strength blast would have pulped her flesh against the outer wall.
My blast forced the demon back three steps before it got its balance.
Damn, how had I fought this thing all those years ago?
The fretha demon shook its head free of the ceiling, dropping more burned plaster and blackened drywall onto the floor. It spoke a spell in some dialect that I couldn’t remember hearing before.
I raised my left hand and summoned lightning. The runes
