cold. 'Idiot,' Al grumbled to himself. 'You've got a familiar, why by your mother's ashes aren't you using her?'
He smiled at me, thick eyebrows high in anticipation. 'Ready to work, Rachel, love?'
My breath froze in me. Panicking, I stared up at him, feeling my face go pale and my eyes go wide. 'Please don't,' I whispered.
He grinned all the wider. 'Hold this for me,' he said.
A scream of pain ripped from me as Al tapped a line, sending its strength thundering into me. My muscles jerked and a spasm shook me until my face hit the pavement. I was on fire, and I clenched into a fetal position, hands over my ears. Scream upon scream beat upon me. I couldn't block them out. They hammered at me, the only thing that was real besides the agony in my head. Like an explosion, the force of the line ran through me, settling into my center, spilling over to set my limbs on fire. My brain felt as if it had been dipped in acid, and all the time, that awful screaming racked my ears. I was on fire. I was burning.
I suddenly realized the screaming was coming from me. Huge, racking sobs took their place as I managed to stop. An eerie, keening wail rose, and I managed to stop that, too. Panting, I opened my eyes. My hands were pale and shaking in the light from the car. They weren't charred. The scent of burnt amber wasn't my skin peeling away. It was all in my head.
Oh God. My head felt like it was three places at once. I was hearing everything twice, smelling everything twice, and having no thoughts that weren't my own. Al knew everything I was feeling, everything I was thinking. I could only pray that I hadn't done this to Nick.
'Better?' Al said, and I jerked as if whipped, hearing his voice in my head as well as my ears. 'Not bad,' he said, yanking me unresisting to my feet. 'Ceri passed out with only half that much, and it took her three months to stop making that awful noise.'
Numb, I felt spittle slip from me. I couldn't remember how to wipe it away. My throat hurt and the cold air I sucked into me seemed to burn. I could hear dogs barking and a car engine. The light from its headlamps wasn't moving, and the snow sparkled. I hung loose in Al's grip, feet trying to move as he began walking again. He dragged me out from in front of the car, and in a slippery squeak of snow and ice, it sped away.
'Come along, Rachel, love,' Al said in the new darkness, clearly in a good mood as he pulled me over a snowplowed hill and onto the shoveled walk. 'Your wolf has given up, and unless you submit to me, we have a good bit of city to walk before I can get you to a ley line.'
Stumbling, I lurched after Al, my feet in my socks long cold and unresponsive. His hand gripped my wrist in a shackle stronger than any metal. Al's shadow stretched behind us to where David panted, shaking his head as if to clear it. I could do nothing, feeling nothing as David's lips pulled back from his muzzle. Silently, he lunged. Numb and uncaring, I watched as if from a distance. Al, though, was very much aware.
'Celero fervefacio!' he exclaimed, angry, and I screamed as the curse burned through me. The force of Al's magic exploded from his outstretched hand and struck David. In a flash, the snow melted underneath the Were, and he writhed on the black circle of pavement. I screamed from the agony, catching it—smothering it—hearing it trail into the keen of a banshee.
'Please…no more,' I whispered, spit falling from me to melt a spot of snow. I stared at the dirty white, thinking it was my soul, pitted and sullied, paying for Al's black magic. I couldn't think. The pain burned through me still, becoming a familiar hurt.
The sound of frightened people pulled my bleary gaze up. The neighborhood was watching from doors and windows. I'd probably make the news. A sharp bang drew my attention to the house we had passed, an elegant snow castle with turrets and towers gracing one corner of the yard. The light from the open door spilled over the trampled snow, falling almost to Al and me. I caught my breath at Ceri standing in the threshold, Ivy's crucifix about her neck. Her nightgown flowed to the porch, white and billowy. Her unbound hair floated about her, coming almost to her waist. Her posture was stiff with anger. 'You,' she said, her voice ringing clear over the snow.
From behind me came a warning yip, and I felt a tug of a pull. Through Al's knowledge, I instinctively knew that Ceri had set a circle around Al and me. A futile sob escaped me, but I fastened on the feeling like a hungry cur on trash. I had felt something that wasn't from Al. The demon's own emotion of annoyance was quick behind my depression, covering it up until I forgot what I felt like. From Al, I knew the circle was useless. You can make a circle without drawing it first, but only a drawn circle is strong enough to hold a demon.
Al didn't even bother to slow down, dragging me into the sheet of ever-after.
My breath hissed in as the force Ceri had put in the circle flowed into me. I screamed as a new wave of fire coated my skin. It ran from where I first touched the field, flowing like liquid to cover me. Pain searched for my center. It found it, and I screamed again, twisting out of Al's grip as it found my chi full and bursting. The ever-after rebounded, scouring through me to settle in the only place it could force room: my head. Sooner or later it would be too much and I'd go insane.
I clenched into myself. The rough sidewalk scraped my thigh and shoulder as I convulsed. Slowly it became bearable, and I was able to stop screaming. The last one trailed off into a moan that silenced the dogs. Oh God, I was dying. I was dying from the inside out.
'Please,' I begged Ceri, knowing she couldn't hear me. 'Don't do that again.'
Al yanked me upright. 'You're an excellent familiar,' he encouraged, his face split in a wide grin. 'I'm so proud of you. You managed to stop screaming again. I think I'll make you a cup of tea when we get home and let you nap before I show you off to my friends.'
'No…' I whispered, and Al chuckled at my defiance even before the word escaped me. I could have no thoughts without him knowing them first. Now I realized why Ceri had numbed her emotion, preferring to have none rather than share them with Al.
'Wait,' Ceri said, her voice ringing clear over the snow as she ran down the porch steps, past the chain-link fence, and into the yard before us.
I sagged in Al's grip as he stopped to look at her. Her voice flowed over me, soothing my skin and mind alike. My eyes warmed at the hint of respite from the pain, and I almost sobbed in relief. She looked like a goddess. She granted release from pain.
'Ceri,' Al said warmly, his attention only half on David as he circled us, his hackles raised and a frightening savagery in his eyes. 'You're looking well, love.' His eyes traveled over the elaborate castle of snow behind her. 'Miss your homeland?'
'I am Ceridwen Merriam Dulciate,' she said, the command in her voice like a whip. 'I'm not your familiar. I have a soul. Give me the respect that calls for.'
Al snickered. 'I see you found your ego. How does it feel to be growing old again?'
I saw her stiffen. She came to stand before us, and I could see her guilt. 'I don't fear it anymore,' she said softy, and I wondered if an unaging life was what Al had lured her into being his familiar with. 'It's the way of the world. Let Rachel Mariana Morgan go.'
Al threw his head back and laughed, showing his thick, flat teeth to the cloudy sky. 'She is mine. You're looking well. Care to come back? You could be sisters. How nice is that?'
Her mouth twitched. 'She has a soul. You can't force her.'
Panting, I hung from where Al held me. If he got me into a line, whether I had a soul or not wouldn't matter. 'Yes, I can,' Al said, cementing it into fact. His brow furrowed, and he jerked his attention to David. I had seen him circling us in a wide path, trying to make a physical circle with his footsteps with which he could bind Al. The demon's eyes narrowed. 'Detrudo,' he said, gesturing.
I gasped, jerking as a thread of ever-after flowed from me to work Al's charm. Head erect, I choked back whatever awful sound was going to come out of my raw throat. I managed to keep silent as it raced from me, but all my efforts to stay quiet did no good when a wave of ever-after surged in from a line to replace what Al had used. Again fire immolated my center, overflowing and making my skin burn, finally settling in my thoughts. I couldn't think. There was nothing but hurt in me. I was burning. My very thoughts, my soul, were burning.
Shocked, I fell to my knees, the pain from the icy sidewalk going almost unnoticed as a cry of misery escaped me. My eyes were open, and Ceri cringed, standing barefoot before us in the snow. A shared pain was mirrored in her eyes, and I fastened on them, finding peace in their green depths. She had survived this. I could survive this. I would survive this. God, help me find a way to survive this.
Al laughed as he felt my resolve. 'Good,' he encouraged. 'I appreciate your effort to be silent. You'll get there. Your god can't help you, but call for him anyway. I'd like to meet him.'
I took a shuddering breath. David was a shaking puddle of silky fur in the snow some distance from where he
