“And… the man?” I didn’t understand demons, but Barnes had been a human being. Fire was a horrible death.
“He was already gone. The necromancer sent Barnes back with the demon to the hell it came from.”
“Will he live there?”
Alaric’s lips twisted. “He was dead from the moment he invited a demon in. Only one man ever separated a demon from his victim and saved the host. That was decades ago, and the Weaver lives a long way from here. Once a sorcerer accepts the demon, they’re a dead person walking.”
“Oh.” It was a lot to take in. Everything was. Exhaustion hit me like my own two-by-two to the head. “Can I go home now?”
Behind me, Miriam said, “Let me just clear this.” The last wisps of white cotton cleared from my mind. She peered at me, sketched another symbol in white, then nodded as it faded and was gone. “There, all clear, no lingering traces. Alaric, we’ll clean up here. You take Robin home.”
“Right.” He kept his warm arm across my shoulders and turned me toward his car. “Come on, let’s get you back.”
“And Harry?” I twisted to look around.
“Right under your feet.” The rat gave a high chuckle. “Better get used to that.”
“What do you mean?” Alaric asked before I could.
“I mean, I’m not blind and I’m not a fool. I may not be a seer, but this future’s easy to make out.” Harry hopped onto the hoodof the car as we reached it. “Come along, my sorcerer. Let’s get your boyfriend home.”
Alaric snorted. But oddly, neither he nor I corrected Harry as Alaric opened the door, held my elbow until I slumped into the seat, then walked around to start the car and drive me back to my familiar world.
Chapter 4
Alaric
Robin stared at me out of the back door of the Three Rsnext morning. I’d chosen to ring the bell, not walk in, although I still had the spare key. He frowned and didn’t step aside, looking self-assured despite the casual clothes that replaced his suit. “What are you doing here?”
“I’m scheduled to start at eight, aren’t I?”
“It’s ten past seven.”
“I’m an eager beaver.” When his frown didn’t ease, I added, “I figured you’d be here.” I held out the key, as evidence of my goodwill.
Robin took it, hesitated, then swung the door wider to let me past. “I didn’t expect you to show up at all.” He closed the door behind me, reached as if to reset the alarm, and then sighed. A scorch mark surrounded the panel Barnes had fried with his magic and the box hung dead. “Crap. I’ll have to replace that.”
Robin wore loose jeans and a tidy dark-blue Henley with the Three R’s logo on the breast pocket. Deep shadows surrounded his eyes, and I wondered how he’d slept. His hair was its usual perfection, though, and his chin was clean-shaven as ever. “How are your wrists?” I asked.
He shrugged and tugged his sleeves lower. “Fine. Already forgotten.”
“And how are you?” Harry queried him from the floor six feet behind us.
Robin jumped and whirled. “How did you get in?”
Harry preened his whiskers. “You can’t keep a rat out. Whatever do they teach you humans in school?” He glanced my way. “No intruders. No spells. No trouble. See you later.” One leap took him to the second shelf of a nearby unit, the next to the top level opposite, and he vanished from view.
Robin sighed. “You know, I’d almost convinced myself last night was all a dream.”
“Do you want it to be?” If I backed away from Robin permanently, and nothing jolted his memories, the Great Spell would make sure his recall faded. Slowly, and probably never completely, given the intensity of his exposure. But the Great Spell would convince him that magic was a lot less powerful than he’d imagined.
“No.” Robin met my eyes and jerked his chin up. “I have questions, though.”
He’d been silent the whole drive home from Barnes’s place, so unlike himself I’d worried. I'd tried to persuade him to let me come in, let me take care of his cord-bruised wrists or at least explain, be a sounding board, let him yell, if nothing else. He’d told me to go home, though, in a tone that had no wiggle room. He’d looked distant, but not shaken to where I could ride over his wishes. So I’d gone.
I was glad to see him bouncing back. “I’ll try to have answers, but some of this is confidential. For my safety and for Harry’s.” I’d pressed that point home before I left him, but it bore repeating. “Remember the Upheavals?”
He frowned and nodded. Schools only taught a tiny fraction of what had happened in the 1990s when sorcerers and humans clashed out in the open, but there were enough deaths, especially among the sorcerers, to make my point. Enough prisons and torture and hunting folks down too. The Great Spell had softened human memories but the aura of disaster lingered.
