“How long have I been asleep?” Sunlight streamed through the blinds covering the window, but I couldn’t see a clock anywhere in the room. Or anything else that wasn’t an absolutely necessary piece of furniture. Bed, nightstand, dresser, and armoire—all in a very sturdy-looking blond wood. The bedding was in muted autumn tones and the walls were a dusky blue. It looked exactly as I would have expected Ryan’s room to look.
“It is midday,” Eilahn replied.
I grimaced. “Shit. I wish you hadn’t let me sleep so long.” Small wonder that I’d crashed so hard, though, between the scant sleep and the normal exhaustion of performing a summoning. I tried to run a hand through my hair, but the tangles made that impossible.
“I tried to wake you a couple of hours ago,” Ryan said sourly. “She wouldn’t let me.”
Eilahn inclined her head slightly. “It is truth. You were in dire need of rest, and those few hours would have been insufficient.”
I stood up, feeling as if I’d slept in one position the entire time. Someone had been kind enough to remove my boots and gun at least. “That’s great,” I said as I tried to get my vertebrae to behave and line up properly. “But there’s too much that needs to be done.”
“And you need to be clear-headed and at your peak performance for such tasks,” Eilahn replied, slight smile curving her lips. “The kiraknikahl briefed me on the nature of the threat you are facing in this construct, and I concluded that it was highly probable that you would need to employ your arcane abilities in order to thwart it. Thus your need for further rest.”
I glanced again to Ryan. I didn’t think anyone could look more annoyed at the moment. I sighed. “Eilahn, his name is Ryan. Please cease referring to him as ‘the kiraknikahl.’ ”
“As you wish,” she replied.
I suddenly realized that Eilahn was dressed in something other than sweats—black jeans, form-fitting gray T-shirt, and boots. She looked like a fashion magazine version of How to Look Fabulous in Urban Casual. “Did you two go shopping?”
Ryan’s scowl deepened, if that was even possible. “No,” he gritted out. “She refused to leave, and made me go shopping. For her.”
I tried to picture the tough FBI agent shopping for women’s clothing and failed. “How on earth did you know her size?”
He folded his arms across his chest and glowered at the demon. “I estimated and bought a bunch of shit in a bunch of sizes, and tomorrow I’ll go and return all the shit that doesn’t fit.”
“Oh. Thanks for taking care of that. I’ll pay you back.”
“No, you won’t.” He smiled tightly. “She owes me, not you.”
I looked doubtfully between the two. I wasn’t so sure it worked like that since Eilahn was here to serve me, but to my surprise she merely gave Ryan a slight nod coupled with a faintly amused smile.
I heard a door open and close somewhere in the house. Ryan glanced down the hall. “That’d be Zack. I told him to bring food. C’mon and eat, lazybones.”
My gun and bag were on the nightstand and my boots were on the floor beside the bed. I quickly donned boots and gun, then grabbed my bag. But I paused before following Ryan out of the room.
I turned to Eilahn after Ryan was out of earshot. “Did Lord Rhyzkahl tell you why I needed protection?”
She dipped her head in a brief nod. “He advised that there had been attempts to interfere with you, and that you might be at risk for being summoned to the demon realm.”
“What would happen if I was summoned?” I asked, gut tightening.
“It is the same as when you summon demons to this sphere. There are bindings, and terms are negotiated. Save for one difference.” She paused, and whether she intended it to be or not, it was seriously ominous. “Only a demonic lord would be capable of opening a portal to summon you to the demon realm. And a lord would have more than sufficient potency available to bind you against your will, negating any need for your willingness to set terms.”
My throat was completely dry. “Like the Symbol Man was going to do to Rhyzkahl.” I croaked. A slave.
“Yes,” she said quietly. “And with far less effort.”
Fear sliced at me, and for a moment I had trouble getting breath. Then Eilahn put a hand on my chin and gently forced me to meet her eyes.
“I will protect you,” she said with such utter conviction that it was impossible not to believe her. My terror faded to apprehension and wary caution. I could handle that.
She dropped her hand and gave me a warm smile. “Come. You need to eat.” She turned and exited the room. After a heartbeat I followed her out and down a short hallway. It opened out into living room where Ryan was waiting for us. From what I could see, the rest of the house was more of the same as the bedroom. Somewhat spare, incredibly neat, sturdy-but-nice furniture, autumnal tones. There were blinds over the windows, but they were open enough for me to see that Ryan lived in a subdivision—a somewhat older one to judge by the number of trees visible. I realized I still had no idea where Ryan lived.
Off to the left I could see into a spotless kitchen, where Zack was standing at the counter with his back to me and a number of grease-stained paper bags before him.
Zack turned as I came into the living room. “Hey, Kara,” he said with a smile. “I didn’t know what you liked on your burgers, so I asked for ...” He trailed off and went still as he caught sight of Eilahn. She froze as well, eyes locked on Zack. Any doubts I’d harbored about whether or not Zack was a demon were suddenly gone as an electric tension filled the room. Neither made a move, but I had the unswerving feeling that both were milliseconds away from doing something blindingly fast and vicious.
“Zack, this is Eilahn,” I said, shattering the strange tension as surely as if I’d thrown a rock at a window. “Rhyzkahl sent her to protect me.”
He remained silent and still for another three heartbeats, then abruptly smiled a normal Zack-smile as he grabbed several bags and came into the living room. “Nice to meet you, Eilahn,” he said with a cheerfulness that felt jarring after the tableau of seconds before. “Hope you like burgers!”
Ryan took one of the bags from Zack, apparently unaware of the brief tension. But then again it hadn’t lasted very long. I’d probably only noticed because I knew about Zack.
“Love them,” Eilahn replied with a bright smile that was just as jarring as Zack’s cheerfulness. “Thanks!”
Zack passed me a wrapped burger, meeting my eyes and giving a slight nod that I took as a sign of approval. I felt a weird surge of relief. At least if I had to have a demon dogging my every move, it was one that apparently met Zack’s standards.
“I need to call my sergeant,” I said after inhaling half a burger. The last food I’d had was a piece of cheese right before summoning Eilahn, and I was feeling it. “Since he’s pretty much on board with the whole ‘magic’ thing, it’ll be damn useful to have him along.” I glanced at Ryan. “Another witness for our side, so to speak.”
“And what’s your cover story going to be for Eilahn here?” Zack asked with a nod toward the demon.
Crap. I hadn’t thought about that. “Um, a visiting cousin or something.”
“If I might make a suggestion?” Zack said. “If she’s here to protect you, then she’ll need to be in a position to be near you fairly often.”
I set my half-eaten burger down. “So she needs to be a cop or something.” Maybe Crawford could figure out a way to get her hired? But then how would she get through the background check? I’d have to get a whole identity forged for her, and I had only the barest idea of how to go about doing that. I could probably scrounge up some contacts, but it would take time and be risky.
“It’ll be too difficult to get her hired on with your department,” Zack continued in an echo of my thoughts. “With any department, for that matter, and you don’t have the luxury of time to do anything that requires detailed work. The easiest thing to do would be to have her be another member of our task force.”
I glanced at Eilahn to see how she was handling being talked about, but she seemed unconcerned, leaning against the wall with her thumbs tucked into the pockets of her jeans. Apparently she recognized that Zack had been through this before and was willing to benefit from his experience. Or least that was my assumption. At some point I was going to pin Zack down and squeeze more info from him.
“Great,” I said, “so she’ll be another FBI agent.”
But Zack shook his head. “No, still too easy to check that. Easier to make her foreign—here on an exchange program, or that sort of thing.” He flicked a glance at the silent demon. “That will also help cover any slips she makes with regards to culture or social stuff.”
I slid a look to Ryan. He was focused on Zack, and he had an odd expression on his face as if he was trying to remember something. Zack suddenly grinned cheekily. “I knew all those suspense thrillers would pay off!”
The confusion cleared from Ryan’s eyes as he smiled. A strange chill crawled down my back. So, if Zack is also Ryan’s guardian, is part of his duty making sure that Ryan doesn’t remember whatever it is he’s not supposed to remember? Is he a guardian or a prison guard? Or was the line between guard and guardian a fine one? Like a reverse Stockholm syndrome.
My appetite had disappeared, so I left the rest of my burger and excused myself to the hallway to call Crawford. When I pulled my phone out I realized that I’d several missed calls from him, and I groaned. Great, I wrecked my car and didn’t show up for work. Nice way to earn points with the rank.
“Goddamn it, Kara!” he said when he answered, in lieu of hello or anything of that ilk. “What the fuck is going on? Are you all right?”
“I’m sorry, Sarge. I’m okay. Had an unwelcome visitor last night.” I paused. “Ten-twelve?” Ten-twelve was the code for “Can you talk freely/are you alone?”