I need to keep him talking. “Let me go. I know it’s not your fault.”

He shakes his head. “He told me you’d say anything to get me to let you go free. Even try to tempt me.”

“He’s a fake and a liar.” I have to do something to disrupt his train of thought. He’s like a cult member repeating a line over and over again.

“You wouldn’t understand him. Your world is so small,” he says.

“I see through his tricks. He’s just a cheap magician.”

“Everything is a trick to you. You’re just a magic whore from a family of whores.”

“You’re not a murderer. This isn’t you.”

“You’re right. I’m not. I’m a temple priest about to perform a transformation.” He steps back with the camera and aims it at me again. “You were right, Lord. She’ll say anything. She’ll accuse me of anything.”

I can’t let him finish this video the way he wants. “This man violated me. He said I was his to play with.”

The man can’t decide if he should stop the camera or not. “Go on. Tell your lies.”

“He said he had doubts about you. He said that he was afraid of you and only doing this to protect himself. He asked me if I could help him.”

He drops the camera and runs toward me. He punches me on the jaw. The blood I’ve been swallowing flies all over my blouse. The subject of sex made him very uncomfortable. This is his weakness. This is how I humiliate him. I rip my blouse open on the edge of the trunk, revealing a black bra. “Video this, asshole. How’s he going to feel when he finds out you violated his sacrifice?”

He looks genuinely confused. He wants to hit me again, but he knows it will only make things worse. I watch a vessel bulge in his forehead, then fade away. He smiles. “It’s a test. He knows you’ll try this. It’s not working.”

He picks up the camera again and aims it at me. “Everything you said is true, Lord.” He spins around and aims it at a mountain in the horizon. “There she waits, my Lord.”

I don’t recognize the mountain, but its shape is unmistakable. Half of it is caved in. I’ve been asleep for more hours than I can count.

Have I been out for days? All I know is that I’ve been brought to one of a dozen volcanoes in the United States. I’m too numb to tell if it’s cold out. This could even be an active one in Alaska or Oregon.

The Warlock’s follower pulls the canister from his pocket and sprays me again. It’s a long spray. He does it until it’s empty. I’m pulled backward into a black lake.

63

I FEEL LIKE I’M flying again. This time the sensation is milder. I realize I’m being carried. My head is filled with champagne bubbles. Damian’s pills are fighting the drug. I’m not sure who is winning. I can’t sense much other than a shoulder in the pit of my stomach and the up-and-down motion of walking.