The woman in the image had coiled a massive golden whip out of her hand, and was using it to lash the giant fey in front of her. She should have been terrified; he was huge and furious, and kept slinging silver lightning bolts that I didn’t remember, maybe because my whip had grabbed them and thrown them aside as if they didn’t matter, as if they were nothing. And in between, the great golden strand darted back in, cutting bloody rents in Aeslinn’s body, ones that even his prodigious healing powers seemed to be struggling with.

The end came much as I remembered, with Aeslinn kicking up a tidal wave from the river to buy him a moment, and stepping through a portal that had opened up behind him, even as my whip tore one last gash across his face.

Then he was gone, and the image faded, leaving the room dark once more.

I hugged my pillow and stared at the hell beast beside me, and at the black steam boiling off him in waves. He didn’t say anything, maybe giving me time to absorb all that, although I didn’t know why he thought I needed it. I’d been there.

“You ended too soon,” I finally said. “You cut out the part where I almost died.”

“But you didn’t. Aeslinn fled before you, back to Faerie, vanquished and beaten—”

“And I almost drowned in a watery footprint!” I threw the pillow aside and got up, furious again, but too tired to wonder why. I rounded on the demon. “What do you want?”

“What I’ve always wanted: to help you.”

I laughed. “I’m sure.”

“I helped you today—or yesterday. It is difficult to keep track with all the time hopping you do. But recently, I showed Lord Mircea how to borrow an ability from Emrys, one that we absorbed from another demon once, so that he might rescue you. Or did you think he grew those wings on his own?”

I had been about to say something, but at that I stopped. “You did that?”

He brushed it away. “Vampires are easy. They love power. Show them a new one and they grab it with both hands. I had barely indicated the possibility when his new accessories were sprouting from his shoulders.” He shot me a look. “Would that others felt the same.”

I frowned.

“Later, on the river, I helped you again. You had power, but did not know how to use it, how to fight as the gods once did. I showed you—”

My frown tipped into a scowl. Now I knew he was lying. “You showed me nothing!”

“The whip? That was my idea. I planted it in your mind—”

“That was my power!”