Page 94 of Strike It Witch

Ida held her ground. Her feet were anchored to the earth, shoulders back, head held high. Power flickered around her in stormy flashes.

A tiny flicker of light appeared in the darkness by Ronan’s truck. I blinked, and it was beside Floyd’s SUV. Another blink and it was beside Ida, cradled in the skeletal hand of Bertrand Sexton.

“Cease your ridiculousness, Belial.” Everyone, including Ronan, winced. Sexton’s voice was the auditory equivalent to raking your teeth down a cheese grater. “Release the witch. She is my employee and, therefore, under my protection.”

Employeewas stretching the parameters of our association, but this felt like the wrong time to bring that up.

“She summoned me, gravedigger.”

“Liar. She opened a portal. You saw an opportunity and took it. There was no summoning involved.” My ears popped.

From the corner of my eye, I caught sight of Ronan’s wolf. He’d stopped digging and was now batting at his ears with his massive paws. Apparently, Sexton affected shifters even worse than he did the rest of us.

Belial opened his too-wide mouth and let out a high-pitched buzzing sound. He was speaking Celestial, a language understood only by demons and angels.

Sexton responded in kind.

I caught Ida’s gaze. Her eyes seemed to be telling me tobe still, shut up, and pay attention. I recognized the look because I’d turned it on her the night we’d summoned Gnath.

“The circle keeps you out as it keeps me in,” Belial said, this time in language I could understand. “There is nothing you can do to stop me killing her. Unless…” He glanced at me, his blood-red gaze lighting up. “The witch breaks the circle.”

“Not a chance,” I croaked.

Breaking the circle would set Belial free. He’d kill everyone here then move on to the town. I’d die before I allowed that to happen—even if I was sure Sexton was trying to help, and I wasn’t. Not entirely. Demons were duplicitous, self-serving, and power hungry. It was never smart to trust one.

Even if he was being sincere, there was a chance the gravedigger demon couldn’t control Belial, and I couldn’t risk my friends. I looked at Ida, who’d been joined by Fennel andCecil. The cat was nestled against her leg, the gnome perched on her shoe. Ronan’s wolf sat on his haunches on the other side of Sexton, intelligent golden eyes focused on me.

Not friends.Family. These were my people—and cat and gnome—and I’d be damned if I’d allow Belial to hurt them.Literallydamned.

The pain I’d felt being shoved through the hell portal returned in a visceral flashback that gripped me in terror. Every cell in my body balked. I did not want to go back to that place.

Yet I would, if I had to.

I was really hoping it wouldn’t come to that, though.

As Sexton argued with Belial, I began to chant. My body was starting to respond again but standing wasn’t an option yet, so I crept on my forearms to the spot where Belial had broken the inner circle. If I could repair it, I’d at least delay his escape once the second half of my spell took shape.

Because that part of the spell was a hell of a long shot.

Joon’s soil still glowed faintly on my chest. I reached for my magic, and the soil brightened like enchanted glitter, dusting over me from my torso to my fingertips. The spell took hold, and salt separated from the surrounding dirt and returned, grain by grain, to the circle. There was a muffledwhomp, and the circle was back up.

Could Belial break it again? Maybe. It would hurt him, though. His charred finger was a testament to that. It hung uselessly from his hand by a scrap of flesh.

I flopped onto my back in the dirt and lifted my hands toward the portal between our worlds. Power flowed from me, what little I could pull from Joon’s soil and the dwindling amount I innately possessed. It wasn’t nearly enough. I was weak, and the soil here was dead to me. But it was all I had.

The demon jerked his attention away from Sexton. “What are you doing, witch? What is this magic?” He went to one knee beside me and gripped my throat.

I continued chanting.

“Did I not tell you to release her?” Sexton’s voice was much closer, but I didn’t dare look.

I was nearly finished with the spell, plus, stars were bursting around the edges of my vision. If I got out of this, I was going to find a spell that would burn the shit out of anyone, corporeal or spirit, who put their hands around my neck. I was more than done with being choked.

Sexton let out a Celestial scream.

Belial dropped me and spun around. He backed away from the other demon, and one of his heels came down hard on my hipbone. I wanted to throw up from the pain.

Still, I chanted.

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