Fury of the Demon

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I clung to the pain like a badge of honor. Blood dripped in a slow splatter from a deep gash in my forearm, and my left knee throbbed from a vicious twist, but I couldn’t suppress my grin. I dragged my sleeve across my face to clear some of the sweat and grime, and squinted at the massive demon who crouched beside the white trunks of grove trees a dozen feet across the clearing. Two blue-white splodges of arcane potency writhed on his chest like knots of electrified worms where my rounds had struck. That had to sting.

“Well played,” Gestamar rumbled as he stretched his leathery wings wide then folded them close. He bared wicked fangs, bright white against the rich bronze of his heavy-featured bestial face. “You have been practicing.”

“Every single day,” I replied. It was the first time I’d won in nearly four months of games, and it felt damn good. “Games” with Gestamar—the demonic lord Mzatal’s essence-bound reyza—were like a combination of hide and seek, tackle football without pads, and hunting, all while trying to reach and defuse a bomb that happened to be on the other side of a kick-your-ass obstacle course from hell.

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