Chapter One
ONE
BECKET
“I’m a good person! I swear I’m a good person!
I just have ... argh! ... the shittiest luck possible.
” I’m not proud of the grunt that emerged when I swung the fire extinguisher I’d ripped off the wall of the train station’s restroom.
“I don’t deserve this! I don’t deserve you! Will you stay dead, dammit?”
“No,” the demon snarled, a nasty smile stretching its lips way too wide for the human form it wore. “You cannot destroy me, artificer.”
“Maybe not, but I can take you out of the game for a little bit,” I said in between pants as I swung the fire extinguisher again, this time connecting with it. The rebound almost knocked me on my ass, while the demon immediately lunged for me.
“Hey, Becket, you’d better hurry or we’ll miss the train to Prague—what the hell?” Billie, the band’s drummer, froze in the doorway, staring with huge eyes as the demon and I rolled on the (thankfully, just cleaned) bathroom floor.
The demon snarled and tried to slash my face with fingernails that grew into yellowed claws, the look in its eyes filled with glee.
“Hit it!” I screamed, twisting my body underneath the demon, narrowly missing its gouging out one of my eyes, trying desperately both to get out of the iron grip it had on my arms and to knee it in the noogies.
If it wanted to wear a male form, I was going to take advantage of any weak spots.
“Fire extinguisher! Hit it on the head!”
“But—maybe I should call Skye—” Billie hesitated, and for a moment, I damned the fact I had allowed the demon to sneak up on me.
“Just hit it!” I bellowed, making a monumental effort, at last managing to twist and kick enough I got out from under it, but not before it freed one hand and punched me hard in the eye.
Evidently the sound of my head cracking backward from the blow was enough to send Billie into motion.
She snatched up the extinguisher that I’d dropped, and hit the demon on the head, providing enough of a distraction that I could roll away.
Although breathless from the altercation, I got to my knees, quickly whipping the strap from my bag around its neck, attempting to throttle it while Billie stood waving the extinguisher in a threatening manner.
“It takes ... goddess, I think I may vomit ... a lot longer to strangle someone than I imagined,” I said, collapsing back when the twisted strap did its job, and the demon slumped forward.
“Is he ... dead?” Billie asked, her voice rising on a note of pure panic.
“Demons can’t die,” I reminded her, frantically trying to get breath into my lungs.
I leaned against one of the stall doors, my butt on the cold, slightly damp floor, and felt like a newspaper that had been out in the rain for a week solid.
“Well, they can, but it takes someone with serious power to pull it off. This one’s form is toast. Unfortunately, it’ll be back. ”
“That’s a demon?” Billie’s nascent panic attack faded immediately as she set down the extinguisher and bent down to peer at the crumpled form. At that moment, it disappeared into a puff of oily, nasty black smoke. “I’ve never seen one up close. Are they all that violent?”
I stiffened my wobbly legs as I hauled myself upright, reclaimed my bag, and glanced at the mirror. All it showed was my horrified expression. “They’re demons, Billie. That kind of implies they’re evil. Crap. We’ve got four minutes. Are the others on the train?”
“Yes. They sent me to find you.” Billie had a slight French accent, her manner of speaking breathy, a trait I’d always admired. “I didn’t think you would be attacked in the toilet.”
Two women entered as I limped out and made my way toward the platform that contained the overnight train to the Czech Republic, amongst other places. Since it was almost midnight, the train station was blessedly sparse of travelers.
“Demons don’t give a damn about things like needing to pee,” was all I said as we hurried.
I wrapped an arm around my waist, wondering if the demon had cracked a rib.
It certainly hurt to take a breath, and I felt like I might vomit at any second, no doubt heightened by the shambling run I adopted toward the train.
“I hope it takes that one a while to get a new form, because if they get on the train with us, I’m a goner. ”
“We’ll protect you,” Billie said as she boarded, casting a confident look over her shoulder.
I didn’t say anything to that, knowing there was little the three other women who made up our band could do against demons, especially if Candy and Andy—the big guns, demonically speaking—made another appearance.
“And once we get to the CR, we should be safe, what with the festival being run by a troll.”
“Vampire,” I said absently, collapsing on the bottom bunk of the compartment we were to share, then corrected myself.
“Dark One. And I don’t know how much they have to do with the actual running of the music festival.
It’s held on the grounds of one of their castles, but that doesn’t automatically mean it’s a demon no-go zone.
No, thanks, I don’t want anything in my stomach until it settles. ”
She murmured something about staying hydrated and set down the bottle of water on a tiny table. “I’ll go tell Skye and Deni that you were attacked, and I smashed the demon’s brains in.”
I cocked an eyebrow at the fact that Billie—the mildest of our foursome—looked so pleased at the idea of hitting a demon, but since my ribs and swollen eye and just about every other part of me was in pain, I decided it was far better to simply lie still on what was a surprisingly comfortable bunk until my natural healing abilities kicked in.
Just in case the demon reported my appearance, I crafted a new glamour, ready to don when we hit Prague.
By the time we emerged into the glorious sunshine of a late-summer Czech day, my limp was gone, and although my ribs still hurt, I could walk without wincing.
“Train to Brno is in half an hour,” Skye said as she stopped in front of where Deni, Billie, and I were sitting. She passed out tickets, and cast a critical look over me. “Brunette doesn’t look right on you. You’re too pale for such dark hair. Maybe make some glamours with warmer tones?”
I glanced down at my hands, swearing to myself. I had been out of it so much when I made the glamour that I hadn’t remembered to change my skin tone to match the rest of the new appearance. “Crap. You’re right. I’ll fix it once we’re on the train.”
“Should we form a protective cordon around you, or can you make it to the train without your evil ex sending more demons after you?” she asked some twenty minutes later when we headed for the train.
I ignored the spike of guilt that struck whenever the band mentioned my cover story, telling myself that I was doing what I could to make up for the fact that I wasn’t entirely truthful with them.
I couldn’t be. Not if I wanted to make sure they survived.
“I think I’ll be OK, since there were three trains leaving last night, and the demon couldn’t be sure which one we were taking, but let me know if you guys see anyone watching us a bit too closely.
” I pushed down the fear that I might have to stop working with the band if the demons tracked me down again.
An hour later, as we sped southeast to the small town of Brno, where a yearly music festival was held, I touched my hair and asked Skye, “OK, I fixed my skin tone. Does it look right with my hair now?”
“Yes, it is much more agreeable to the eye. And the trousers you picked for the glamour are better than that frompty dress you had on before.” She tapped on her phone, bringing up a notes app. “Did you decide on the set? Other than Billie’s ballad?”
“My dress was a bit frumpy, I guess,” I said slowly, mildly insulted that what I thought of as a perfectly nice sundress had drawn criticism. “And yes on the set list.”
The conversation turned to what songs we’d perform at the festival. Deni, Skye’s cousin, who with Billie was sitting opposite us, pulled out an earbud and asked, “Did they update the website? Are the rounds announced? And how much do we get for winning a round?”
“They’re waiting for everyone to check in before announcing the schedule,” Skye said in a soothing tone. “And the money has not changed. It’s a hundred euros per band for each win. If we go all the way through the ... the ...” She paused and glanced at me.
“Brackets,” I answered, gently pressing my side.
It didn’t feel too painful, which meant my healing abilities were doing their job, if slowly.
I needed to be able to breathe to sing, though, and I wondered if I shouldn’t work up an illusion glamour just in case my voice wasn’t enough to carry us through.
“And a thousand euros guaranteed to the top three teams who make it to the end battle,” Skye said, her eyes back on her book. “Top band takes home five thousand.”
Deni sat back in her seat, a satisfied expression on her face, her eyes on me. “Which will be us, because we have a siren.”
“Half siren,” I corrected, leaning my head against the window, watching as the scenery zipped by.
Some of the little farms we passed set up a deep sense of longing in me, a need to have a place of my own, one filled with peace, and happiness, and animals who didn’t give a damn about what magic I could work.
Why couldn’t I have been born to normal parents? Why didn’t they protect themselves better, so I wasn’t left alone at fourteen? And most of all, what demon lord was trying so hard to capture me?
My shoulders drooped as I gave in to worry, miserably wondering what was in store for me.