LITMIR.BIZ

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all through the room. With three demons firing at once, it looked like an otherworldly octopus, its tentacles grabbing objects and zapping them to showers of ash. Merlin’s bookshelf exploded, burning pages filling the air as if he was trapped in an apocalyptic snow globe.

      “Making friends again?” Clary asked, flicking ash from her shaggy blond head. Her words were flippant, but her face was tense.

      “Stay low. They’re demons.”

      Clary’s witch-green eyes went wide. She was Vivian’s opposite—a lean, fair tomboy with more attitude than magical talent. She was also everything that Vivian was not—honest, kind, thoughtful and far too good to be in Merlin’s life. She was a drink of clean water to a man parched by his own excesses, an innocent despite what she believed about herself. Everything about her had beckoned, woman to man, but he’d kept their relationship professional. It was bad enough that she had begged him to teach her magic. He should have refused. Nothing good came to anyone who lingered near him.

      And right now lingering was not an option.

      “Move,” he snapped, forcing her to creep backward one step at a time. The slow pace was nerve-racking, but it gave him a moment to weave a protective spell around them both.

      He was just in time. Lightning fried his worktable, shattering a row of orderly glass vials, and then his bicycle sizzled and warped into a piece of futuristic sculpture. Merlin scowled as the seat burst into flame. Maybe he should rethink the slow and steady approach.

      Vivian’s clear voice rang from the agate globe. “Curse you, Merlin Ambrosius. I vow that you shall not escape me, but shall suffer due vengeance for what you have done!”

      “What did you do?” Clary whispered. “She’s really mad.”

      “Not now,” Merlin muttered. Not ever, if he had a choice.

      He sprang at the agate ball, intending to break the connection between his workshop and the demon realm with a well-placed bolt of his own. Before he was halfway there, a purple tentacle of energy lashed out and fastened on his chest. A blaze of pain sang through him, fierce as a sword stroke. He thrust out a hand, warping the stream of power away before his heart stopped.

      Then Clary cast her own counter spell, just the way he’d taught her. The blow struck, but only clipped the edge of the stone ball, rolling it outside the containment of the ritual circle. Merlin pounced, but the damage was done. Once outside the circle, the demons were free to cross over into his world. As he groped on the floor for the agate, Vivian’s armored boots appeared in his field of view. He looked up and up her long legs to her shapely body and finally to her furious eyes.

      “Who is this witch?” Vivian pointed a claw-tipped finger at Clary. Her long black tail swished back and forth, leaving an arc in the ashes coating the floor.

      “Darling. Sweetheart. She’s my student,” he said in calming tones as he got to his feet, still clutching the stone. The agate sparked with the demons’ power, as if he held a heavy ball of pure electricity.

      “Does she know what you really are?” Anger twisted Vivian’s beautiful face. “Or should I say, does she have any idea how low you will stoop for power?”

      Clearly, the demon was still mad that he’d stolen her spell. Or, more likely, she was furious that he’d left their bed without a word—but there had been no choice, under the circumstances. It was that or hand Camelot and everybody else over to the hellspawn.

      Vivian’s furious form was just a projection of energy—half in her own world and half in his—and yet Merlin took a cautious step back. “Clary is only a student, Vivian. I can promise you that much.”

      “I’m standing right here,” Clary snapped.

      It was the wrong tone to take with an angry demon. Vivian flicked a bolt of power from her fingertips that hurled Clary against the wall. To Merlin’s horror, the young witch stuck there, suspended above the floor like a butterfly on a pin. Clary grabbed at her chest, tearing at the zipper of her leather jacket as if she needed air.

      “Enough!” Merlin roared. “She is nothing to you.”

      “But she is something to you. I can smell it!”

      “She’s under my protection.” He lashed out, breaking Vivian’s hold.

      The demoness rounded on him, fixing him with those hypnotic violet eyes. Her predatory beauty held him for a split second too long. As Clary crumpled to the floor, Vivian’s claws slashed at the girl, leaving long, red tracks soaking through the sleeve of thin burgundy leather. Vivian snarled, showing fangs. In moments, Clary would be dead—and for no reason other than because she’d interrupted his ritual.

      Desperation knotted Merlin’s chest. He lifted the agate globe, infusing it with his power. Part of him screamed to stop, to guard his own interests, but the fever of his grief and guilt was too strong. With a howl, he smashed the globe to the floor. It exploded into a thousand shards, taking most of his earthly wealth with it. Vivian shrieked—a high, pained banshee wail—and vanished with a pop of air pressure that left his ears ringing. A heavy stink of burning amber hung in the air, borne on wisps of purple smoke. Clary began to cough, a racking, bubbling gasp of sound.

      Merlin fell to his knees at her side. “It’s over.”

      He put an arm around the young woman, helping her to sit up. The warm, slender weight of her seemed painfully fragile. Witches were mortal, as easily broken as ordinary humans, and Clary’s face had drained of color. He touched her cheek with the back of his hand to find her skin was cold.

      His stomach clenched with panic. “How badly are you hurt?”

      She didn’t answer. She wasn’t breathing anymore.

       Chapter 2

      Clary jolted awake. Power surged through her body, painful and suffocating. Her spine arched into it—or maybe away from it, she wasn’t sure. Merlin had one hand on her side and the other on her chest, using his magic like a defibrillator. The sensation hammered her from the inside while every hair on her body stood straight up. When he released her, she sagged in relief. A drifting sensation took over, as if she were a feather in an updraft.

      Merlin’s fingers went to her neck, checking for a pulse. His hands were hot from working spells, the touch firm yet gentle. In her weakened state, Clary shivered slightly, wanting to bare her throat in surrender. She was a sucker for dark, broody masculinity, and he projected it like a beacon. All the same, Clary sucked in a breath before he got any big ideas about mouth-to-mouth. If Merlin was going to kiss her, she wanted wine and soft music, not blood and the dirty workshop floor.

      Another bolt of power, more pain, another pulse check. Clary managed a moan, and she heard the sharp intake of Merlin’s breath. His hand withdrew from her pulse point as she forced her eyes open. He was staring down at her with his peculiar amber eyes, dark brows furrowed in concern. She was used to him prickly, arrogant or sarcastic, but not this. She’d never seen that oddly vulnerable expression before—but it quickly fled as their gazes met.

      “You’re alive.” He said it like a fact, any softness gone.

      “Yup.” Clary pushed herself up on her elbows. She hurt all over. “What was that?”

      “A demon.”

      “I got that much.” Clary held up her arm, peering through the rents in her jacket where the demon’s claws had slashed. Merlin’s zap of power had stopped the bleeding, but the deep scratches were red, puffy and hurt like blazes.

      “Demon claws are toxic.”

      “Got that, too.”

      “I can put a salve on the wound, but you’d be smart to have Tamsin look at it,” Merlin said. “Your sister is a better healer than I am.”

      “She’s better than anybody.” Clary said it with

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