Page 61 of The Sinner and the Scholar
“Get back,” I warn them. “Normal weapons won’t work on these creatures.”
Pride doesn’t listen. He leaps in front of Alice and flicks out his claws with a feral roar that rattles my spine. Envy, too, has switched into defensive mode. Flashes of lightning arc up his arms and crackle at his fingertips.
“Get them out of the water,” he bellows at Pride.
Before I can protest, Pride snakes a hand around mine and Alice’s waist and lifts until our feet dangle. Outraged,I’m ready to stab him—Wesley needs me.
An image flashes in my mind—a demon dragging a man to hell through the ground, a child trying to save him.
Wes.
“Let me go,” I growl and twist, but Pride won’t release me.
Envy slaps his hands into puddles at his feet. His eyes narrow on Vepar, and he unleashes his power. An arc of purple lightning flashes along the ground, skipping through the interconnected wetness. Wes won’t survive. Adrenaline surges through me, and I flip the knife to aim at Pride. I’ll never make it to Wes in time. He’ll get fried. But before my knife connects with Pride, the lightning runs its course and misses Wes completely. Miraculously, he’s not standing in a connected puddle… or maybe his rubber boots saved him.
My relief is short-lived when I realize none of the demonic minions were affected, and certainly not Vepar.
“What the hell?” Alice mutters.
I hit Pride. “Let me down.”
Faster than I thought he could move, Wes rips a vial of holy water from his bag and slams it on Vepar’s tail. Glass breaks—steam and smoke hiss from the contact. Vepar screams, but Wes is already chanting something and holding a crucifix wrapped in a torn cloth as he circles the demon. He holds a lighter before the crucifix and blows air from his mouth. It shouldn’t work. Breath is not an accelerant. But fire streams from the lighter, through the cross, and toward the demon like it’s come out of a blowtorch. Vepar’s screams increase as she writhes. Rain stops, and water reverses down the drains. No more demonic minions manifest through her pustules.
Pride drops me. I run toward Wes with my blessed dagger brandished. A grotesque fish on four legs leaps at me, and I run the blade through its body. My heart wants me to go to Wes, but there are too many minions—and now I’m not even sure if the others can see them or if they’re too stunned to move.
I slice and stab each minion with sharp, methodical movements until none are left.
When I glance up, Wes is standing over the demon. His spectacles have fallen, water drips from his hair, and he seems a little shell-shocked. He doesn’t see her as I do. He sees the woman in a business suit. He’s probably doubting. Maybe the demon is in his head.
That’s the only reason I can think of why he’s not defending himself as the demon rears up to face him.
I flip the blessed dagger, readjust my grip, and then throw. It embeds in the demon’s heart, and just like the man outside that club, pure evil streams out. Only this time, I see it. The demon becomes a woman as a black swarm of darkness shoots into the sky and disappears.
It’s over in a matter of seconds. I’m soaked from head to toe, and my fist hurts from clenching the dagger.
“You okay?” I jog to Wesley.
He stares at the corpse, at the dagger protruding from her chest. Black mascara runs down the woman’s damp cheeks like she’s been crying. Her nails are the perfect shade of fire engine red. One of her red-soled Louboutin heels has fallen off. Her toenails don’t match her fingernails. They’re chipped and hidden. She probably spent every cent on making an impression and couldn’t afford to pamper the parts no one else saw.
The gravity of it hits me. I killed a woman. She had a life. Hopes. Dreams. A powerful demon possessed her, but she didn’t deserve to die. I’m used to killing deplorable men, easy targets.
Maybe that man at the nightclub wasn’t evil before the demon took him.
Maybe they’re all just vulnerable, traumatized victims like Prudence.
I killed an innocent woman. Wes was in danger and... I didn’t hesitate. This is Prue’s fate if we don’t find the relic.
My pulse quickens. My fingers and extremities go numb. I recognize the beginnings of shock and force myself to breathe and get a grip. I can’t lose it in front of Wes. Not now.
“Wes.” I pick up his fallen spectacles and clean them with my drier undershirt. When I touch his back, he startles and meets my gaze.
“It was her,” he rasps, eyes wide.
“I know.”
He puts his spectacles on with fumbling fingers and then returns to being the scholar who knows everything. He points at the demon fish and says, “They’re not supposed to be here.”
“You see them?”
