The Demon’s Surrender Read Free Page A

noise from the audience rose to an excited pitch.
    Clearly, this crowd had been informed that whoever was thrown a fever blossom had the dancer’s favor.
    Sin laughed, and threw.
    The single point of red drew every eye and painted a fiery streak against the sky, like a tiny falling star.
    Nick was standing alone and looking bored, his eyes hooded. He caught the fever blossom in one hand.
    Sin left the dance and walked toward him. His lids lifted as she came close. There was a gleam his eyes.
    “You ready to dance?” Sin asked.
    “With you?”
    “Don’t tell me you were considering someone else.”
    Nick smirked. “Why, will it break your heart?”
    “No,” said Sin. “I just won’t believe you.”
    She saw the glint of appreciation touch his cold face, curving his mouth at the very edges. Nick never showed much emotion, but even the smallest hint of a reaction was like a victory. And he’d always appreciated directness.
    “Well, I don’t lie,” he said, tucking away the fever blossom and offering her his hand. “And I don’t want to dance with anyone but you.”
    The summoning circles were cut, the drums were beating, and Nick was in the circle overlapping hers before she spoke to him again. Even then, he didn’t speak back.
    He couldn’t. They always used a speaking charm so Alan could talk to the demons for him.
    “Good luck,” Sin murmured, and they both smiled because the idea he might need luck was a joke.
    The music had started as a trickle and became a flood now, cascading over the sand and into the ocean, echoing off the pale cliffs, coursing like sweet electric shocks through Sin’s bones. Sin could see the tourists’ heads turning even more than usual, as she looked at them with eyes that lured them into drawing closer and Nick stared at them with eyes that said to draw closer if they dared.
    The music from the new drums was better, the tiny rattle of skulls adding an edge to the melody. Lines and circles leaped into fire under Sin’s feet.
    She turned to fire with them, muscles burning as she twisted and turned and pushed them to their limit, blood burning in her veins as she spun. She was never so aware of her body as she was when she danced, of her body as a weapon honed to a perfect edge and a decoration polished until it was perfectly irresistible. Every pair of eyes resting on her, every breath she took away, was a triumph.
    Sin never doubted the demon would come.
    And Anzu did, golden wings meeting over his head like a crown, empty glass-colored eyes fixed on Nick’s. Nick stared back without flinching: a real dancer, who would never in a thousand years stumble or fall.
    Alan’s voice came out of the darkness beyond their burning circle, sure and calm. Sin had to admit, he always knew just what to say.
    She’d hardly been aware of her partner as she danced, aside from the fact that she could trust Nick never to make a wrong move. But she was always most grateful for Nick when the demons came. Nothing ever frightened him.
    Sin looked at him and saw the same satisfaction she felt, the same rush and thrill of daring death and doing it just right, and was absolutely certain that later tonight there would be making out.
    Then a magician sent a fireball through a stall.
    Merris Cromwell sent the alarm bells ringing for an attack, Matthias and his pipers started playing music to work everyone into a battle frenzy, and Carl from the weapons stall threw an ax at the head of the first magician in the sweeping rush.
    Sin and Nick had to stay perfectly still. If they moved, they might break through one of the lines, they might cross the circle, and that meant the demon could tear off their talismans. That meant possession: that meant worse than death.
    They were left totally exposed.
    “Scared, my beautiful dancer?” Anzu the demon whispered in her ear. “Sure you don’t want to run?”
    “I dismiss you,” Alan said coolly, as if nothing was happening. The demon’s fury curled around