Trent looked at me, and it was all I could do but not laugh for crying. He had the drive, I had the strength, and neither of us had the skill. What in hell had Al been talking about?

“I’ll go,” Bis said, and I reached out after him, cursing my hesitation.

“Bis, no!” I shouted, his tail a whisper across my neck, and then he was through our bubble, darting madly to evade Ku’Sox’s thrown charms.

“Hey!” I cried, and Trent dove through the bubble as well, rolling to a stop behind a slump of rock. I was surprised that the circle around me hadn’t fallen. Perhaps the slave rings enabled us to share the same energy fields.

My head snapped up as wild magic coursed through me and Trent threw a charm. “Adsimulo calefacio!” I shouted, sending my own curse hot on the heels of Trent’s.

Bis flipped in midair to avoid Ku’Sox’s strike, his wings gray in the moonlight. Trent’s spell hit the demon’s raised shield, and the hazy black shattered with the sound of glass. Unhurt, Ku’Sox turned, his eyes widening as my incoming curse hit him square in the chest.

“Yes!” Trent exclaimed, elated as Ku’Sox was thrown back, an ugly gold and black crawling over him, making his back arch. But I wasn’t so confident, and I pulled heavily on the line, stockpiling energy until my head hurt and Bis’s hair stood on end as he landed on a crag of stone.

“Again!” Trent shouted, his face grim, and together we struck.

Ku’Sox jerked, a haze covering him for an instant as he jumped out of the way, and our combined curses hit the empty ground and exploded, light seeming to splinter and fly.

I ducked, throwing myself behind a rock as our curse flew like shrapnel. Fire burned in my mind, and I rose up, horrified. Trent had taken refuge under a bubble, and since our broken curse held his aura, the energy tore right through it.

He was down, his lab coat filthy with rock, the gritty wind shifting his hair about his closed eyes. But he breathed.

“Rachel! There!” Bis shouted, pointing, and I spun, my breath catching as I saw Ku’Sox leaning against a boulder the size of a small car. The demon smiled, hurt but alive.

“This is only making your sunrise harder, love,” he said, and I ran to Trent. I could feel Bis following above.

I slid to a stop, my mind delving deep into Trent’s, running the counter curses before the damage could seep in any further. Trent came to with a snort, jolted to full awareness by my stinging mental slap. The rings made it possible. “Perhaps I shouldn’t have done that,” Trent said, and I helped him up again, dragging him back into our uninvoked circle.

“You can’t kill me. Therefore, I win.”