Long Hot Summoning

He shook blue-black hair off his face. “Your spell will not hold it for much longer, wizard. I would rather be facing it and ready to fight when it breaks free than running away with my back exposed.”

“Fine.” He had a point. “Then back away, but give me some room to work and try to remember that you must stay alive.”

“What are you planning, Keeper?”

Switching the compact from hand to hand, she wiped her palms against her skirt. “I’m going to get it to chase me into this refrigerator.”

“Are you totally mental?”

A good question. Exactly what Diana would have asked were she around. Claire spent a moment believing her little sister was up to whatever she might have to face, then flashed the assembled mall elves a confident smile. Belief and confidence both for the benefit of the Otherside. “Trust me. Just don’t close the door until I find my way out.”

“Of the refrigerator?”

“Yes.”

The shadow swayed left, the elves shifted right, and Claire felt a cold wet nose bump up against her shins. “I’m going with you.”

“No, Sam, you have to watch out for Arthur and the elves while I’m gone.”

Amber eyes narrowed. “You can’t tell me what to do!”

The shadow rose up, then snapped flat. Arthur swung his sword like a nine iron and sliced a piece off as it tried for his ankles.

“I’m not.” Too many years with Austin for her to even attempt it. “I’m just telling you what the right thing is and hoping that you’ll do it.”

“But what…”

No time for extended arguing. “You attacked the shadow, didn’t you? Kept it from sneaking up on Arthur from behind?”

“Yeah but…”

One of the knots released. Held at only one point, the shadow lashed out at the elves, fell short, and gathered itself up for another attack.

“You kept him alive. We need him alive.”

“Fine, but…”

Claire took that as an agreement and shoved Sam aside with one leg just as the second knot gave way. Snapping open the compact, she caught Arthur’s reflection in the mirror and wrapped the seeming around her. This wasn’t exactly what this had been intended for, but…

…close only counts with horseshoes and hand grenades.

Which wasn’t at all reassuring.

“Hey! Tall, dark, and two-dimensional! Over here!”

A choice between two targets.

But only one of them with a blade sharp and shiny.

Claire threw herself sideways as the shadow attacked, yanked open the refrigerator door, stepped up onto the top of the double crispers, and dove inside. Substance began to distort. Caught her. Then, as an icy touch stroked the bottom of one bare foot, caught the shadow. She jerked her foot away, tumbling through the unformed reality. Allowing the path to take her where it would, she concentrated on splitting it off behind her, on sending the shadow to its ultimate defeat.

Nothing definite. Not exactly imposing her will— Her subconscious was in full agreement with her conscious when it came to destroying that thing.

For an instant, she smelled woodsmoke and burning marshmallows and heard high, girlish voices singing rounds. Then smells, sounds, and shadow were gone.

Another slow tumble and there was water all around her.

She dropped the compact and began kicking for the surface.

*   *   *

“How much longer until the Keeper emerges?”

Sam’s ears flattened, but his gaze remained locked on the half-open refrigerator door. “I don’t know.”

Arthur crouched down beside the cat, stretched out a hand to stroke him, and thought better of it. “I think that she is safe. I think that she has defeated the shadow. I think that even now, she makes her way back to us.” When Sam’s only response was his tail tip, jerking back and forth, he sighed and straightened. “I will leave you, then, to your vigil. I think that the Keeper will be pleased to see you here when she returns.”

As the footsteps of the Immortal King faded into Women’s Accessories, Sam sighed. “I think that Austin’s going to kill me.”

*   *   *

Head up, Austin remained motionless on Claire’s pillow sifting the night for what had awakened him.

Dean? No. One arm stretched up over his head, bare chest rising and falling in the slow rhythm of sleep, Dean hadn’t moved for hours.

Something outside? No. He could hear the occasional car going by on King Street, two raccoons up a tree arguing about whose turn it was to dump the garbage but nothing unusual. Nothing to lift the fur along his back.

He glanced toward the wardrobe, Claire’s preferred entrance to the Otherside. The door was closed. Even if there was trouble, nothing could seep through.

But something had wakened him. Something had lifted the fur along his back. Therefore, something was wrong.

He stood, stretched, walked over Dean’s stomach to the edge of the bed, and jumped cautiously to the floor. Over the last year or so, the floor had developed a nasty habit of being farther away than it should be.