JOVIENNE’S HEART SANK. The last thing she wanted to do was fight Araxiel in Andrei’s body. She couldn’t kill Andrei. She wouldn’t. Not again.
But that wasn’t the demon’s intent. The tip of the golden sword rose to Andrei’s throat.
Jovienne shouted, “No! Don’t!”
Andrei grinned wickedly and side-stepped to the small circle. “Open the Hellgate or he dies.”
She drew a shaking breath to speak. “Okay, okay…for you. I will. But not for him. You can’t take him with you.”
“You don’t make the rules anymore. Open it!”
Jovienne sobbed. She wouldn’t send Andrei to Hell to suffer the same fate as Damnzel.
“Better the man die now, rather than escort you home,” Eitan said.
Andrei laughed. “This sword will take more than his life half-breed. It will eat his soul.”
“Don’t!” Jovienne eased a step forward. “Don’t take him. I’ll open it, but you take me, instead.”
“Jovienne, no,” Eitan said.
“Deal,” Andrei said.
Jovienne stared at the floor, at the silver sword laying between her and Andrei. She had an idea. Araxiel didn’t know her blood was already in the small circle.
“No,” Eitan whispered.
She took one step closer to Andrei. “I don’t trust you not to take him anyway. Give me a reassurance.”
Andrei laughed. “No.”
She looked around them again, let her gaze fall on the sword. “Trade blades with me.”
“No. Open the Hellgate, now!”
With her hands palm-out in a show of non-aggression she said, “I have to add my blood to it for it to work. If I take it with your sword, you know you’re getting my soul, and you have no reason to take his.”
“You’d like me to put this one down, wouldn’t you?” He sneered. “I have a broken arm! I’m not falling for it.”
“Then we do it this way.” Before he could object, she lowered herself to her knees. Reaching toward the blade of the silver sword, she turned it so the hilt was toward him, and then she pushed it slowly to his feet.
He considered it. “Your dagger. How do I know you won’t throw it?”
She removed the lion-headed weapon and scooted it toward him as well.
“Stay down but back up. You, too, half-breed.”
Both she and Eitan retreated a few steps. Andrei cautiously lowered the scimitar, watching them both warily, and traded it for the silver blade. “Now, crawl to me, abhadhon bitch. Draw your blood and soul with the unholy blade and I will leave this man here.”
Jovienne crawled forward only as much as needed to reach the golden blade. With a tentative touch, she found it burned her fingers. “I’m going to get the dagger to cut a piece of leather from my pants so I can hold it, okay?”
“Fine.”
When finished, she belted the dagger and used the leather to maneuver the sword into position, laid the hide across the hilt and gripped it. She scooted back and stood.
Holding the lion-headed dagger, she turned to Eitan. “I want you to take this back.” She kept the golden blade tip down before her and twisted loose the cap as she stepped in front of him and offered the dagger.
“Don’t do this,” he said, not accepting the smaller blade.
“You know I have to.” She twisted the lion-headed dagger point up. She felt the holy water pour from it onto the back of her hand holding the golden scimitar. Shifting her hand the water hit the blade directly. “Look after Andrei for me?”
Eitan glanced down and his eyes widened as he realized what she was doing. His expression hardened and he met her eyes. “I will,” he said, accepting the blade and capping the end with his thumb. “You’ve…you’ve always impressed me, Jovienne.”
She held his gaze a moment longer, and then turned.
Araxiel had moved Andrei to the other side of the small circle, and held the silver sword at his throat. “C’mon. I am eager to see the unholy blade pierce your heart.”
She sank to her knees before the circle and lifted the sword into position. “You will leave him here. You swear it?”
Araxiel stepped two paces back and also sank to his knees. His mouth curved into a sinister smirk. “You’re all the trophy I need.”
They stared at each other across the circle.
Jovienne took a deep breath.
“Do it!”
“Kehena puka hamama!” With the last syllable, she pulled the blade inside her chest.
Razor sharp, it was easy, but the pain, fiery and intense, seized the whole of her body at once. The warehouse filled with her scream, “Ahi!”
When it ended, she wanted to breathe and yet she could not remember how. The scent of blood filled her nostrils. Her mind reeled. Dizzy, nauseous, and weak, she swayed. Unable to catch herself, she fell. Her head cracked on the floor.
Her vision blurred and refocused on the flames licking up from the small circle as the interior fell away and an orange glow flashed before something huge surged upward. A demon’s three-toed foot stepped free of the barrier she’d made. Another foot lifted out and the ground shook as it stood.
The demon had leathery blue-gray skin and two massive horns jutted forward where its eyes should have been. Ten feet tall, the thing’s torso was more than a yard across. It moved like a gorilla because its arms and shoulders were so laden with muscles its bottom half seemed to belong to a smaller creature. A reptilian tail flicked behind it.
Between the legs of this demon, she saw Andrei’s body collapse and she knew Araxiel had left him as she hoped.
But this pain was more than she’d felt when doing this before. The scimitar had not ejected from her chest. The holy water didn’t work.
“Come, little abhadhon.” The voice was deep but had a quality about it that told her it was Araxiel. He’d claimed this demon. A huge blue-gray paw with raptor-like claws reached for her. She felt herself rise, felt the sword waiver at the movement and tear her heart open wider. She wheezed, spasmed, and choked on blood. “You too, half-breed. We are going to have so much fun.”