Page 25 of Fool Me Twice

There’s a flash of movement in Ez’s peripheral vision. Frowning, she glances over to see‍?—

A stray tabby cat, peeking out at the chaos from underneath a parked car. All at once, sympathy stabs through Ez. “No summoner to give her a true form. She probably just panicked and copied the appearance of the first living creature she saw,” she says, and she raises her voice, ducking and weaving through the crowd. “Everybody, stand down! She’s just scared!”

“That’s why we’re not shooting,” one of the police officers‍—Matthias, according to his nametag‍—says, an edge to his voice. “The hell took you so long?”

I don’t even work here!“It’s a full moon,” Ez says flippantly, and she cautiously approaches the neophyte demon, hands outstretched. “Hey‍—hey, you’re all right now, okay? You’re going to be just fine. This is Nostringvadha’s realm, yeah?Wanderer, Avenger, Memory-Keeper, Beloved‍—Nostringvadha is here among us, and…”

Out of the corner of her eye, Ez sees Roma start with surprise. She ignores her, focusing her attention on the demon. Tamaros doesn’t really have an audible language‍—back in their home dimension, they’d communicate mostly with light and sound and color‍—but neophyte demons tend to learn human languages fairly quickly.

And, even if they don’t completely understand the words at first, they can usually parse their meanings from tone and body language. So Ez keeps her voice soft and her movements gentle, invoking Nostringvadha’s name to convey what she really means.

You’re safe now. Nothing bad is going to happen to you.

You can trust me.

Eventually, the demon calms down enough for Ez to step close, placing a hand on her furry shoulder. “I’ve got this, Officer Matthias,” she says, nodding at him. “You guys can head back to the precinct.”

Matthias doesn’t budge, his gun still at the ready. “We’ll head back to the precinct once she’s off the street. Do you, uh, need any help?”

Ez shakes her head. “I’m just going to rift her to‍?—‍”

“Gutierrez!” Without warning, three humans‍—threehunters‍—push their way through the crowd. With a jolt, Ez recognizes one of them as Bryant Nehemiah, the third member of JJ’s old strike team. Bryant gives Ez a distasteful look before her recurve bow appears out of thin air, an arrow already nocked and aimed. “What are you waiting for? We‍?—‍”

The neophyte demon lets out a low, liquid growl. Hastily, Ez jumps back into her soothing nonsense. “Hey,hey‍—you’re still safe, all right? You’re still safe with me, still safe here in Nostringvadha’s realm, still‍?—‍”

“Stand down!”Unexpectedly, Roma grabs Bryant’s arrow and jerks it down, eyes narrowed at her strike team partner. “We’re outgunned this time.”

Ez gapes at her, stunned. Bryant looks almost outraged.“Outgunned?Roma, it’s four of us against Laguerre. We can take her. We‍?—‍”

“Pardon me,” Officer Matthias cuts in, giving Bryant averyflat smile. “But Ms. Laguerre has this situation under control, and as an officer of the Redwater Police Department, I’m releasing the neophyte demon into her custody. You can head back to the Sanctum.”

Instantly, the tension on the street ratchets up. Ez steps closer to the neophyte, holding her breath as Bryant and Matthias size each other up. Most civilians in Redwater‍—andespeciallythe police‍—usually don’t take sides in the ever-present demon versus hunter conflicts, but‍?—

But it can’t be denied that humans tend to trust the demons more than the hunters. After all, demons live among them in town, shop at all the same stores, run a few small businesses. They’re friends, neighbors, even food truck operators.

The hunters are just the cult on the hill.

Bryant’s voice is frosty. “I’m not sure what Tabitha Nasir will think of that decision. And I’ve been told she’s good friends with the sheriff.”

“Bryant,”Roma snaps, shooting her a glare. Bryant glares right back. “Just drop it, okay? We didn’t win this one. Let’s just‍—let’s just go home.”

Ez squints at her, confused. Back at Lakeside a few weeks ago, Roma was ready to fight for custody of the three neophytes despite being at a similar disadvantage. Why is she giving up so easily now? Why would she‍?—‍?

Roma’s eyes flicker to Ez, dark and searching. Abruptly, Ez’s blood runs cold.

I saw all three of them in the Sanctum’s prison last week.

Roma isn’t letting Ez take this demon back to the Chain because the hunters are outnumbered. She’s letting Ez take her tosee what happensto her.

To see if she ends up in the Sanctum’s prison, just like the others. Considering the fury on the other hunters’ faces, Roma is clearly risking the Sanctum’s wrath to figure out this little mystery that she pulled Ez into.

Theirlittle mystery, maybe.

Ez’s throat feels strangely dry. She swallows hard to clear it out. “Well, on that note,” she says, and she snaps open a rift before anyone can argue. “I’ll be taking my leave with my new friend over here. Let’s not do this again.”

And she tries her hardest not to look back at Roma’s piercing gaze as she guides the neophyte demon through the rift to the Chain.

12

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