“It didn’t work,” I said, my voice low as I watched him from around my stringy wet hair. “Get out of my kitchen.”

“I’m going to have you, Morgan,” Al snarled. “If I can’t take you by right, I’ll by god beat you into submission and pull you in, broken and bleeding.”

“Oh yeah?” I came back with. I glanced at the pot that had held my aura. His eyes widened in surprise as he knew my thought the instant I had it. The bond now went both ways. He had made a mistake.

“Get out of my kitchen!” I exclaimed, dumping the line energy he had forced me to hold back through our familiar link and into him. I jerked upright as it all flowed from me and into him, leaving me empty. Al stumbled backward, shocked.

“You canicula!” he cried, his image blurring.

Staggering to remain upright, he tapped the line, adding more force.

Eyes narrowing, I set my thoughts to loop it right back at him. Whatever he was going to send into me was going to end up right back in him.

Al choked as he sensed what I was going to do. There was a sudden wrench in my gut and I stumbled, catching myself against the table as he broke the live connection between us. I stared at him across the kitchen, breath rough. This was going to be settled right here and now. One of us was going to lose. And it wasn’t going to be me. Not in my kitchen. Not tonight.

Al put one foot behind him, taking a deceptively relaxed stance. He ran a hand over his hair, smoothing it. His round smoked glasses appeared, and he buttoned his frock. “This isn’t working,” he said flatly.

“No,” I rasped. “It isn’t.”

Safe in her circle, Ceri snickered. “You can’t have her, Algaliarept, you big stupid,” she mocked, making me wonder at her word choice. “You made the familiar gate swing both ways when you forced her to give you her aura. You’re her familiar as much as she is yours.”

Al’s momentary placid face blossomed into anger. “I’ve used this spell a thousand times to milk auras, and this has never happened before. And I am not her familiar.”

I watched, feeling tense and ill as a three-legged stool appeared behind Al. It looked like something Attila the Hun would have used, with a red velvet cushion and horsehair fringe going to the floor. Not bothering to see if it was behind him, he sat, his expression puzzled.

“That’s why Nick called,” I said, and Al gave me a patronizing look. When he took my aura, it broke the bond I had with Nick. He had felt it. Aw, crap. Al was my familiar?