Orion pushes off from where he’s leaning. His first steps are sloppy, but he gains momentum as he goes. “I’ll find him. You take another minute to recover.”
I don’t want to recover—I want to know Asher is safe.
Eliza comes to stand in front of me, and I get the feeling it’s more to keep me from getting up than anything else. “So, did it work? Did you break the people free from the demon?”
“Partly.” I swallow, my mouth dry, the taste of char and demon funk acrid in my mouth. “The first part worked. The ghosts are free. Then, from what I’d guess, Tharuzel felt the disruption, tracked my energy back here, and the next thing you know, we’re ass-deep in demons.”
“But the spirits are free,” Sebastian says. “And that cuts Tharuzel’s energy draw in half.”
I cup my hands against my eyes, a killer headache taking root. “But the demon marks are still on the people of Emberwood."
"Half a win is still more than we had before you tried,” Eliza says.
I tilt sideways and push up to my feet. Yes, I’m wonky, but I need to see if Orion is having any luck finding Asher.
Izzy has finished healing Clara and has her sitting up at the base of the stone where she went down. “Sebastian, you’re up. Let me see how bad it is.”
Sebastian looks between Izzy and me, and I wave his concerns away. “I’m fine. Go get yourself put back together.”
With Sebastian now occupied, I give Eliza what I hope is a confident smile and fight to look steady as I step away.
There’s no scenario in which this fight ended, and Asher didn’t run to check on me and Orion.
Something is wrong.
And with each added moment I don’t know where he is or what’s happened, my world is crumbling a little more.
“Found him!” Orion shouts, somewhere below the clearing of the standing stones. “Izzy, I need you.”
I follow Orion’s voice and do the funhouse shuffle as quickly as I can to get there while the ground is heaving and waving beneath my feet.
Okay, so I might not be perfectly fine, but I don’t care.
Orion found Asher, and the first thing he did was call for our healer. That gives life to all my worst fears.
I crest the edge of the clearing and jog down the grassy slope toward the forest. Asher is on his side, curled in on himself, fifteen feet below the stones.
His shaggy blond hair is dark with soot, and his skin looks scorched. Even worse, his body is literally radiating so much heat, he’s steaming.
“Did one of those fucking demons try to barbecue him?”
Izzy frowns, passing her hands over him. “I can’t say, but from what I can tell, other than being unconscious, he’s fine.”
Oh, thank you, Goddess Mother.
I drop to my knees and grab his shoulder, rolling him toward me. "Asher? Sweetie?”
His hoodie is bundled against his chest, clutched tight in both hands even with him being unconscious.
Something inside it moves.
Orion recoils and curses the movement of his arm. “Fuckity-fuck, what was that?”
“I don’t know, but I know my bestie. He’s curled around it, as if it’s worth him protecting.” I lean forward and peel back a section of the cotton, revealing first a small black nose, thena paw, then the unmistakable shape of a small, limp, bat-eared demon gremlin balled up against Asher's sternum.
S'Nark.
“Oh, Asher, what the hell did you do?”
