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The light from my fire dances shadows across her face, making it difficult to see her expression, but I think she blushes.
As an ignis demon, I’m one of the few with whom Merri can entirely let herself go. Even with Marceau, she must be careful not to take too much of his fire, because she can’t feed it back to him at the same rate she can consume it.
But her fire only makes me, a being of flame, more powerful.
Many times in the past, we tested those limits, pushing each other to find the breaking point of our power. We’d been foolish and reckless back then, without the burden of immortality to fall back on.
It’s shocking we made it as long as we did without one of us killing the other.
Until I killed all of us.
Merri’s smoky voice breaks me out of my reverie. “What do you suppose dug this tunnel?”
I pause to raise my hand overhead and study the curved ceiling. “Could be a magabilumis demon.”
“If we had a giant worm problem, half the city would be sunk by now,” Merri says dryly. “Besides, they’re dirt eaters. They wouldn’t be kidnapping boogeymen.”
“A black-market dealer could have gotten their hands on a baby, and it escaped.” I sweep my hand down toward the curved ground. “You have to admit, this tunnel is rather circular. Most beings who dig through the ground create a level path to walk on.”
“You just want it to be a magabilumis demon so you can set it on fire,” she accuses.
A smile spreads over my face. “Would you rather it eat you by mistake and be shit out its back end?”
“And that right there says thisisn’ta magabilumis demon.” She steps up alongside me to point at the ground. “No shit. And we’d have smelled it before we even climbed into the hole.”
“True,” I relent with disappointment. “You’re correct.”
A magabilumis demon’s excrement has a distinctive earthy odor mixed with bile. And the tunnel would be covered in the sludge leftover from the dirt it consumes. Even after it dries, it leaves traces that differ from the dirt that surrounds us.
Not to mention, magabilumis demons are rare. They cluster up and the bigger ones eat the smaller ones by accident as they move beneath the ground with their maws wide open, consuming anything in their path.
I glance down at the top of Merri’s head. “Well, what tunnel dweller doyouthink this is?”
“I’m not… What’s that?” She grabs my arm and drags my flaming hand to the left.
The flickering light dances over the earthen walls, illuminating a small white rock embedded into the soft surface.
Merri strides forward to dig it out, sending a shower of dirt to the ground.
I join her and bring my fire closer, shedding the long finger bone into sharp relief.
Merri prods the concave tip. “This isn’t human.”
“No.” Unease curls through me. Any demon who died here should have disintegrated, their energy core returning to the demon plane. “Perhaps a relic from a Hunter?”
The evil witch group likes to use their twisted magic to bind demons to their corporeal bodies and harvest their body parts to use in their spellcraft.
Merri shakes her head. “I don’t feel any energy bound to the bone.”
Demon energy creates our bodies. If there is nothing left, then the bone should not be left, either.
Merri digs her fingers into the soft wall, expanding the hole, but no more bones appear.
Disquieted, we continue farther down the tunnel until we reach a branch.
I walk down each side several feet, lighting the way, before returning to Merri’s side. “They both curve farther in, so I can’t see where they lead.”
She tips her head back, gaze focused on the dirt ceiling. “We should be back near the market right now, which means the tunnel on the right leads toward the wall, where the wards should stop anything from entering or leaving.”
