Motion on the ground below caught her eye. Two wolves, a bipedal werewolf, the two bears, one slightly wounded, and a female figure that had to be a vampire were racing across the parking lot. Behind them, moving at much, much slower human speeds were two figures, one short and compact, the other tall and lanky.

Another glance at the fetal trans dimensional portal showed she was maybe ten or fifteen seconds from her exit being ready and open. For the first time since getting that obnoxiously powerful blast from that child witch’s wristband, she smiled. Maybe she could salvage this whole mess in one fell swoop. And swoop she did.

Chapter 36

Declan raced after his team partners, but witches had long ago chosen gifts of power very much different from the superhuman speed and strength of the more predatory species. His warlock glyphs might have helped, but they drained power and he needed everything he had. So he and Mack fell farther and farther behind, the others pulling away, some of them already arriving at the base of the building while the two humans were still only just entering the outer boundary of the co-op’s parking lot.

He could see flares of fire lighting the sky over the building, illuminating a spinning, twisting aerial fight fifty to seventy-five feet over the roof of the artists’ building. But the sky was dark and cloudy and Draco’s incendiary flumes, the result, almost instantly destroyed his night vision, so that he lost sight of the primary focus of the fight almost immediately.

“Where is she? You see her?” he demanded, sparing a glance at his buddy. Mack was spinning in place, looking almost directly above them rather than at an angle in front like he had. “I lost her, but she was headed this way,” Mack said.

“What? Where—” was all Declan had time to ask before a giant blue form slammed into him, taloned feet first.

Massive claws sank into his shoulders, snapping both collarbones like twigs in a mind-searing eruption of pain. He screamed involuntarily, his body driven toward the ground then was yanked upward as the demoness flapped powerful wings, attempting to lift him bodily off the pavement. The crush of her claws, the massive impact, and then the immediate reverse lift upward knocked the young witch unconscious almost instantly, his scream cutting off in mid-yell.