Page 110 of Spirit Storm

The demon and Asher's shoe both go sailing across the chamber with a burst of golden light and crash into the wall.

"Dealt with." He sounds deeply satisfied. "But the little jerk took my Nike Air."

I don't have time to respond before the air snaps and my demon familiar materializes at my feet.

"What do you—" S'Nark's beady little eyes blow wide. "No, no, no. Why am I here? I don't want to be here."

"Then go to Arcana. Tell Mica we need those weapons here, now. Whatever she has. Then, have Violet call Garrison and bring them and reinforcements here. And hurry."

He's gone in the next heartbeat.

I spin and take in the room, gauging what I've missed in the seconds I was distracted. Tharuzel is still blocking the entrance. Which also means he's blocking our exit.

He stands in the ragged hole he made in the tunnel wall, his freakishly long arms eliminating any chance of getting past him, his tentacles writhing like horrific ropes, lashing toward anything that moves.

Demons pour around him like sludge running down the gutter after a hard rain, and for every one we put down, another two crowd through the gap.

He sees me, but doesn't seem to be targeting me. Maybe I'm right and he really doesn't know what to do about Asher's goddess energy.

Wylder is on one knee beside a crack in the chamber floor, both his palms flat against the stone. A cluster of roots tear through the far wall and wrap around a demon's legs, dragging it backward and crushing it against the rock before it can reach Priya.

"Getting low on growth down here." His jaw is tight. "This stone is old and deep in the ground."

"I've called for backup. Try to make do."

He looks up at me briefly. "I'll try."

I catch a demon mid-leap with a spirit-fire strike to the chest, and drive it back into another. The two of them tangle and go down.

Dae-Jung is there in an instant, driving the heel of his palm down in a concussive burst that finishes both of them at once.

"Are we making progress?" he asks, breathing hard.

"No." Priya's voice is impressively even for someone with a bleeding gash across her forehead. "For each one we kill, two more take their place."

She's not wrong.

The gap in the wall is a wound that keeps bleeding. Tharuzel is feeding more of his minions through at a steady pace, throttled enough to keep us burning energy without giving us a clean finish line.

He's not trying to win quickly. He's exhausting us.

He has the chance to destroy nine spirit witches at once. I'm sure that would go a long way in securing his plans of freeing his mentor. But I think the wildcard is Asher. If he can't get past Asher's shield, he's in big trouble. Because as of now, ten of the thirteen lockstones are up and protected.

We’re holding him back, but that isn't the same as winning, and the chamber is getting smaller as debris accumulates and the ceiling continues its slow, threatening complaint every time something hits a support wall too hard.

Still, I need to give S'Nark time to get those weapons and bring reinforcements.

Not that I'm even sure Mica's got weapons for us.

I drive back the immediate press in front of me with a wide arc of spirit fire and take a breath to think.

Nine spirit witches. One plant witch. One guardian angel. We're holding our own, but spirit magic isn't a direct attack against a demon. And honestly, we've been through this enough times that Tharuzel's minions know what's coming for them.

He understands spirit magic. He's sitting back and watching. He knows what powers we've got, and he's biding his time. At least, he thinks he does.

He thinks he knows what I am, but he doesn't—not completely.

I stop reaching for the spirit fire and reach instead for the other side of things. The power that still feels new and strange and unstable.