Without hesitation, he drove his hands inside the diamond, grabbed a handful of its essence, and pulled hard. After a brief resistance, the taffy-like substance gave way, spilling itself out of the hole he’d made until it was inside out. Keeping his hands on the oozing, stinking mess, he forced it to reveal its true form—a box with glowing eyes.

Demons were created when a nightmare fed enough to create and independently maintain a physical manifestation in the Real. In the Dreamscape, a demon’s power was magnified a hundredfold as it was bolstered by the fears of humanity. Judging by its size and the way it cringed from him, this one wasn’t very old. If Marshall had been at full strength, unmaking this demon would have been a cinch, but right now?

Marshall felt his fragmenting mind solidify—Jack must have tapped his own generator. Now Marshall could focus on what he needed to do—unmake a claustrophobia demon.

The box tried to make itself bigger so it could draw him inside, but Marshall opened his arms and took the fear into himself, allowing it to Be. Terror built inside his chest and tried to suck him down into panic and despair, but Marshall had been doing this far longer than the demon had been around.

He would be a poor guardian indeed if a shivering box with eyes defeated him. He laughed at the thought, and the demon he embraced shook with fear. He focused on amusement. It was the key. He should have known that a group of witches wouldn’t be able to attract a powerful demon to do their bidding.

He laughed again, forcing himself to focus only on ridicule of the pathetic creature. If he didn’t, the thing would grow and feed off any chink in Marshall’s focus. He drew from Jack’s power and laughed harder.

The thing popped like a soap bubble.

As soon as the demon was gone, Marshall could feel the Dreamscape again. He wrapped it around himself and took his exhausted team out of the colony.

Once they materialized outside the walls, Marshall sprawled out on the beach, unable to stand, and reveled in the Source as it poured into him, filling up the empty spaces of his being.

Remembering his duty, he lifted his head and locked the castle down so nothing could get in or out. His head flopped down on the sand, and he rolled to his side just enough to look at his teammates.

Jack.

Adelle sat on the ground, cradling in her lap as much of Jack’s enormous body as she could. “He pushed me away before I was tapped out.” She sniffed and brushed a lock of hair away from Jack’s too-still face, the usual warm brown of his skin now chalky and sallow. “I could have given more.”

Marshall went cold. The warmth of the Source was nothing compared to what he was looking at. “How did this happen? He just tapped his generator.”

“Marshall, he tapped his right after I tapped mine. The boost you got at the end was—” Adelle’s voice broke.

“...Jack.” Marshall finished for her. He pushed himself to his hands and knees shakily, feeling nothing inside. “But… his body is still here,” he heard himself say from far away.

“I can’t feel him.” Adelle hugged Jack’s body to her chest and began to rock back and forth.

Marshall crawled to his sister’s side and sat heavily. Numbness raced through his body, threatening to swallow him. Defensively, his mind went into action, trying to stave off the truth. “His body would be gone if he were…” He couldn’t say the word dead. Not in relation to Jack.

When a dreamwalker ran out of magic, the body dissolved, becoming nothing more than scattered remnants of the Source. Had Marshall subconsciously dreamcrafted an image of his friend as they materialized outside the Blaike colony?

It was highly unlikely. A crafting of that nature would take more energy than a half-dead Marshall should be able to manage.

His hand kept reaching out and pulling back, reflexively. He wanted to touch his friend to see if he could sense something. Anything. But the idea of touching Jack—a man with more vitality than anyone Marshall had ever met—and feeling nothing, made him want to curl up in a ball and howl.

So he sat there and did nothing.

For a while, he and Adelle sat on the rocky shore and looked up at the castle, watching as the nightmares threw themselves against the barrier Marshall had erected.

Once Marshall’s magic had replenished itself enough, he held out a hand toward the castle and closed it into a fist, crushing the colony and its monsters. When he opened his hand, he saw the remains of the castle sitting in it like so much sand, and he let it fall on the beach beside him.

Dusting his hands on his pants, he stood up, feeling every single one of his one hundred and thirty-seven years.

The void in him that had swallowed the loss of his parents and his young charge Nova had opened once more to take his best friend—a friend who had been doing his best to keep Marshall from succumbing to despair. A friend who had given everything to keep his teammates alive. A friend Marshall was certain he couldn’t live without.

Now Marshall found himself teetering on the edge and wondered if it was worth the effort to fight his way free once more like he had after losing his father.

The sky around them grew dark, and the wind picked up. In the Dreamscape, Marshall’s will was law; if he lost to despair here, the consequences would be deadly. Enough people had died to keep him alive, and he knew in his heart he wasn’t worth it.

“Give him to me,” he rasped, throat aching with barely suppressed emotion, bending down.

Marshall couldn’t leave his friend behind, and he had to make it back to the Real before he was swallowed by grief. At least in the Real he wouldn’t create something horrible when he lost control.

Adelle nodded wearily and uncurled her body to give him access to Jack’s… to Jack.

When Marshall’s hand touched Jack’s arm, a multicolored spark leaped from him to his friend. Jack’s body arched off Adelle’s lap, and he began to cough violently.

Marshall tumbled backward and landed on his ass, speechless while Adelle gripped Jack securely, trying to give him support while tremors wracked his body.

“Took you… long enough.” Jack’s voice was weak, but color began to leach back into his cheeks. Jack blinked up at Adelle’s astonished face. “Can’t keep your hands off me, can you?”

Marshall jerked Jack out of Adelle’s lap and into his own, crushing the giant man to his chest. “I thought…” His throat closed.

“Yeah, I know what you thought, idiot.” Jack’s voice was muffled against Marshall’s shirt. “Next time check before you write me off as dead, okay?”

Adelle began to rain a flurry of slaps on Jack, which Marshall could feel through his friend’s body. “Why. Did. You. Make. Me. Think. You. Were. Dead?!" Each word was punctuated with a smack.

“I was! Well, mostly.” Jack rolled off Marshall as fast as his rebooting body would allow and hid behind him for protection. “Mars, keep her off me, man.”

For once, Marshall ignored the nickname he hated so much. He was too confused to do otherwise. “What the hell did you do? How did you survive?”

“I threw everything I had left into you. I didn’t know if I could do that, but surprise!” Jack grimaced, giving a lie to his flippant tone. “I knew you were going to die if I didn’t, and I knew if there was anything of me left once you were done, you’d get me back to my body.”

Marshall buried his face in his hands and wanted to cry in relief, fear, and anger. Instead, he laughed—a strangled sound that sounded like a bird hitting a window.

He pulled both of his teammates in for a hug, and they all sat huddled together staring at the aurora that appeared overhead. As blue, amber, and multicolored jets of light danced playfully in the sky, the team quietly adjusted to the near miss they’d just experienced.

Eventually, Marshall stirred. “Okay, here’s the plan. We’re going to stay here until every single one of us is completely tanked up. Once we’re back in our bodies, we’re going to wallow in that palatial lounge of Clayton’s, and have all of Jack’s favorite foods delivered to us, which we will then proceed to eat in front of him while he watches. Because, I swear to the gods, Jack, if you ever do something like that again, I’ll fade you myself! Copy?” His voice shook with emotions he couldn’t even begin to process.

Adelle nodded soberly in agreement. “Copy.”

“Copy,” Jack said, though his mulish expression told Marshall the gravity of the situation was lost on him.

“And after that, we are going to show the Blaikes exactly how we feel about witches who consort with demons.”

Chapter 14Fourteen

The moment Cym’s compulsion faded, Fourteen skidded to a halt, tires squealing. The smell of burning rubber filled the air.

His heart raced like he’d torn halfway across the city on foot rather than on his bike, and sharp spikes of anger flooded through him, desperately burning away at the conditioning that riddled his mind.

God fucking damn Cym.