Page 33 of Midlife Vampire Unexpected

“Apparently,” Hilda said. “I’ve never seen it before, myself.”

At the center of the portal, when the light and smoke had died down, there stood one of the largest men I’d ever seen in my entire life. Body armor covered him all except his naked chest and back. His long hair was pulled back in multiple braids that laid down his back. He stepped through the portal and bellowed out to those of us gathered around. “Where is my demon?”

“He’s in our friend,” I said, pointing at Jane.

The demon king lips curled as he looked toward me. Clearly, he didn’t have much of a fondness for vampires, but I didn’t care. It wasn’t my fault I was a vampire. At this stage, well, it was what it was. As long as it didn’t stop me from doing my job, I wasn’t going to be too worried about it.

Thrain came over as several more demons stepped through the portal behind him. I gave a low whistle. I’d always thought that demons were supposed to be evil and ugly, and well, demonic, but these guys were far from that. One had a wolf tattoo on his chest and another had a Rune symbol. They stood, waiting for Thrain to investigate Jane. He prowled around her as if he might eat her for lunch, but at the end of his rounds he grunted. “I want my demon back.”

“Good, because we want our friend back. Can you make that happen?” I asked.

“The only way she will survive possession is if she’s strong.” Thrain brushed his chin with his hand as he stared at Jane.

“You hear that, Jane?” I said. “You’ve got to be strong for this one.” I reached out and clasped her hand as I held her body. I looked up at the demon lord.

“Make it happen, number one,” I said.

“Number one?” he asked

"Never mind. Just please can you do it without hurting her.”

Thrain raised his staff in the air bringing lightning down into the center of the stone at the very top. He brought his staff down hard, harnessing the lightning and sending it right into the ground where it split. Thousands of little bolts splayed out like a huge firework, before sucking in on themselves and firing into Jane’s body

She screamed in what sounded like excruciating pain.

“Are you sure it’s working?” I screamed over the sound of the electricity.

“No,” Thrain said. But if anything is going to work, this is it.”

More lightning bolts flooded into Jane. Finally in a burst of light, the demon’s body separated from Jane’s, but this time instead of walking off into the forest as it had done last time, its body disintegrated into a pile of ash. A gold flame went up and blew through the air, landing at the feet of the demon lord, Thrain.

“Thank you for reporting him,” he said, stepping through his portal. “You’d be amazed how many times people don’t want to report it. It’s so much easier if people would let us know what they’re seeing out there.”

The portal vanished leaving nothing but singed and blackened grass where it had been standing.

“Where is Bianca?” Antonio’s question startled me.

Chapter 23

Each of us quickly scanned the area. Bianca was nowhere to be seen. “Did she go into the portal?” Mae asked.

“I didn’t see her when I first got here,” I said, “and I was the first one here after Antonio.”

Jane was weak. I knew we needed to get her back up to the estate. “Let’s get Jane to the car.”

“I’m going to go look for Bianca,” Antonio said.

“I’ll go with you” I said as I put Jane in Mae and Trina’s arms.

Mae looked a bit frazzled. “I can’t be everywhere.”

“Just focus on getting Jane better,” I said. “We’ll go and find Bianca. She’s got to have left a trail behind and Antonio is going to be able to follow it better than anyone we know.”

“Anyone besides Bianca,” Mae said ruefully.

“Do you think a bounty hunter got her?” I asked.

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