Dancing With The Devil, Witches Anonymous Step 5(25)
Do NOT go into the scary forest, Amy.
I stood. There was no church in sight. No downtown Eden with empty buildings. Just me, the forest and the fog from earlier, curling around behind me, thick as mud.
Turning my back on the forest, I walked into the fog just to see what would happen. Not that I wanted to get lost in a swampy fog where Freddie or Jason might be lurking, but I’d take Hollywood movie monsters over whatever waited for me in that forest.
The fog closed around me, a cold, heavy blanket, and two feet in, I hit an invisible wall.
I cursed, kicked the wall a few times and finally laid my forehead against it, my determination hitting a matching figurative wall. Was this really it? The forest or nothing?
Returning to the edge of the woods, I shut down the mental histrionics. Time to face the music. Or whatever it was waiting for me in that forest.
Wait. Maybe my magic no longer worked to get me out of purgatory, but could it work to bring someone in?
Closing my eyes, I pulled up my favorite mental image of Luc. We were in Paris, holed up in a flat with a view of the Seine, decadent food and wine in abundance, a claw foot tub and a bed that took up the entire living area. Every night, we fed each other chocolate-covered strawberries, and like a modern day Scheherazade, I made up wild stories about couture-dressed witches seducing fallen angels.
Every tale was a tale of seduction, magic and love, with a side of humor that made Luc laugh. I loved to make him laugh. Loved the expression on his face when he did so.
That’s the image I called up now.
Lucifer.
I kept my eyes closed and my mind focused, ignoring the creepy sensations emanating from the trees and the sense of hopelessness taking root inside my chest.
Work, dammit.
A scuffling noise came from the forest. Cracking open one eye, I peered into the dark recesses. “Luc?”
A flash of white teeth appeared, then a growl. Uh, oh. I knew that growl...
Hell hound.
I froze…a rabbit, hoping to go unnoticed by the big, bad wolf.
A bulky Rottweiler stepped from the shadow of the trees. Her teeth were bared, fangs ready to rip me to shreds. But when she saw me, her dark eyes softened. “Dude. I’ve been looking all over for you. What the hell are you doing here?”
Yep, the Hell hound was talking to me. “Nikita?”
She trotted over, cocked her giant boxy head. “Purgatory, huh?” She swung that head to look over the landscape, panted a couple of times. “You don’t have much of an imagination, do you?”
“You’re criticizing my version of limbo?”
“You gotta admit, it ain’t much.”
Nikita had been one of Lilith’s assassins, bent on taking me to Hell. The hound had wormed her way into my life as a loyal pet, then stabbed me in the back—or bit me in the leg, as the case was—and killed me.
Is it any wonder why I’m a cat person?
When I turned the tables on Lilith and Gabriel raised me from Hell, the queen of demons was so mad, she kicked Nikita out of Hell and cursed the assassin to forever stay in dog form.
Nikita, in turn, became pissed at me and tried to take up residence at my apartment. I’d managed to shove her off on Cephiel and now enjoyed the irony of a Hell hound becoming Immaculate Conception’s mascot while driving my guardian angel batty.
Who says there’s no justice in the world?
“Why are you here?” I asked, keeping an eye on the woods behind her.
“Lucifer sent me. He’d come himself, but he’s lost his magic.”
Lost his…“Say again?”
Nikita licked her lips, panted. “He didn’t realize it was gone until he tried to shimmer to Keisha’s party. He thinks it happened after you two did the horizontal hula, and he’s never had his powers go belly-up before, so he’s at a loss as to how to get them back.”
“You’re kidding me.”
She gave me a look that said I don’t kid. “He can’t help you get out of here.”
I rubbed my eyes and blew out a tired sigh. Was it my fault Luc had lost his powers? It was one thing to have magic and choose not to use it, another to have it taken from you. “So he sent you to help me?”
“Don’t sound so dubious.” She grinned, showing her teeth. “I don’t bite.”
“You tricked me, killed me and took me to Hell a few months ago at Lilith’s request. By biting me. Trusting you is like playing with a stick of dynamite.”
In the forest, a shadow moved. A big shadow. Not archangel big, but definitely scary-monster big. Vicious footsteps crashed through the undergrowth and we heard what sounded like a heavy weight being dragged across the forest floor.
Nikita shifted her beefy paws. “Doesn’t look like you have a lot of options.”