Chapter 186

Russo’s POV

Someone tapped on the door, and Lisa sat up with a start.

“Whatever this is between us,” she whispered, “I’m not ready to share yet.”

She hurried out of my bed and into her own, settling down and pasting an innocent look on her face.

I got up and pulled on a pair of shorts over my boxers, then went to the door between our rooms, and opened it.

Helen stood there, looking very wide awake and excited. “Did you guys have a nice night?” She shot me a teasing look.

I rolled my eyes at her. “We stayed up way too late reading the Key of Solomon.”

“Why did you do that?” She cocked her head. “I thought you’d already found the spell you needed in order to destroy the demon.”

I nodded. “We did. But that doesn’t mean that we should just go straight into using black magic without reading up on it. There’s a lot of information in the Key, and just because it isn’t necessary for our spell to kill the demon doesn’t mean that it isn’t relevant.”

“Did you find anything relevant?” Helen asked.

“A little bit,” I said. “For example, using substitutions for any of the ingredients required for the ritual might actually have catastrophic consequences.”

“Like what? Justin asked from the doorway.

“Like strengthening the demon rather than killing it. Or opening yourself up to possession, among other disasters. I have to make sure that we take the time to do this correctly.”

Helen nodded with her eyes wide. It was probably good that she’d heard the consequences that morning. Right off, I knew she wanted to rescue everybody that the Huntsman had hurt. Not to mention, she’d want to make the Huntsman stop his crusade against all supernatural beings and possibly even take a certain measure of personal revenge.

But no matter how excited she was to get started, she needed to know what the realities of what we were doing really wore.

“Okay. So, substitutions equal disaster,” Randy said, pushing past Justin and into our room.

He was wearing the same clothes I remembered him wearing last night, so whenever he went to Justin and Helen’s room, he hadn’t taken his pajamas with him. A teeny part of me felt guilty. The sight of the bed on the floor through the open doorway didn’t help my conscience either.

But then I thought of the connection that Lisa and I had made, and for that, Randy could spend a night uncomfortable on the floor.

“I didn’t find what I was looking for,” I admitted. “I was trying to see whether or not the ritual would work just as well on a half-demon as on a full demon. But there’s not really much in the Key about half demons.”

“Probably because Solomon never worked with them,” Lisa suggested. “He just called up his 72 demons and bound them to him as well.”

I rubbed my head. “If the lore is correct, then Solomon was a very busy man, what with the demons and all. And I’m not entirely sure how he had time to rule his kingdom.”

“Why do you say that?” Justin asked.

“Well, in addition to binding seventy-two demons to himself . . . although, maybe that was how he made the rest of his kingdom work. Maybe he made them do the dirty work for him. Anyway, I guess he had seven hundred wives and concubines combined.”

“Gross!” Lisa and Helen said at the same time.

Justin shook his head. “That sounds exhausting. I’m glad that’s not the kind of king I have to be.”

“You better hope not,” Helen warned him. “If you took any additional wives or concubines, you’d be one less because you could count me out.”

I chuckled. “Lycans aren’t really made that way, so I don’t think you have to worry about that. On the other hand, from what we read of the multi-colored coated pack that you are descended from, it seems like you might be the one to benefit from seven-hundred husbands and concubines.”

Justin let out a growl at the same time Helen smacked my shoulder.

“I’m with Justin,” she said. “That sounds exhausting. Not to mention I have enough trouble keeping up with one husband. I don’t need seven hundred husbands running around.”

“Did you realize it would take you over two years to sleep with one of them every single night?” Randy pointed out.

“Thank you for doing that math for us,” Justin said sarcastically. “Because we all wanted to know how many nights it would take Solomon to actually work through his wives and concubines.”

Randy shrugged. “Just saying.” He gave a shudder. “You want to think of something really scary? Imagine what would have happened if Solomon’s demons had gotten loose in the harem.”

Now I shuddered, too. “I can’t even imagine a world full of Huntsman. That definitely sounds like an apocalypse right there.”

“Do we need anything else while we’re here in your old town?” I asked Justin and Helen.

They both shook their heads. “I think we can head back to our home,” Justin answered for them both.

Randy crossed his arms, looking very serious. “I think you guys are all forgetting something.”

“What?” we all asked.

“It’s not just the Huntsman that we have to take out. That wizard who can control people and force their bodies to do things against their will is running around out there somewhere. If he’s working for the Huntsman, then we have one extra layer of trouble we have to work through before we can rest easy in the solution we uncovered.”

He focused his gaze on Justin. “And if that wizard is out there running around with your father, then killing the Huntsman is only taking care of one branch of the evil tree. We’re going to have to cut the whole thing down if you and Helen want to settle into a relaxed life together.”

We all turned to Lisa. “You’re a witch,” Randy said. “How is this wizard controlling people? Do you have any idea? And how do we stop it?”

She shook her head. “I don’t know how he would be controlling people. This particular wizard would have to be either in possession of some of that knowledge I told you was split amongst the Knowledge Keepers, or he’s gotten ahold of the wizard in possession of that knowledge.”

She sighed and rubbed tiredly at her face. “I’m assuming, since full body control isn’t a skill that most of us possess, that it was something that someone was trying to keep hidden. So I guess either that your wizard is the holder of that information, or they killed the holder of that information and took possession of it.”

“So you’re saying that you have no idea how he’s doing this or how to stop him?” Randy’s frustration was evident in his tone, though he didn’t look like he blamed her.

She got an evil glint in her eye. “That’s not entirely true,” she said. “Just because I don’t know how he’s controlling people doesn’t mean that I can’t stop him.”

“There are certain things that tend to work on wizards and witches. But they’re not the kind of things that we go about sharing. So, I’ll be happy to take this wizard out for you, but I’m not going to tell you how I’m doing it. Let’s just say I’ll be exploiting his weakness and poisoning him from within.”

“Well, if it’s as easy as giving him poison,” Russo said, “then we can help.”

Lisa shook her head. “No. It’s not like you can just give him a dose of poison the way you could kill most creatures. I’m talking about poisoning what makes him a wizard. And I’m not about to share that with anyone.”

She gave us all a stern look. “As you can see with the Huntsman and whatever this wizard is out there doing, information in the wrong hands can be devastating. And I’m not saying that any of you would use it poorly, but the more people who know, the more likely it is to get into the wrong hands.”

“Then it sounds like we’re pretty much ready to head home,” Justin said. “Lisa, is there anything we need to take you back to your house to pick up?”

“Like my toothbrush?” she clarified.

Justin shook his head. “No, only dire things like pets.”

“No,” she said. “I don’t have anything like that.”

“Then we’ll give you everything else that you need for the time being. The last thing we want is for anyone to see you with us and come after you.”

When Justin ordered the car service, he made sure that the person picking us up was going to have tinted windows, and we hurried Lisa into the car first, making sure that we kept her concealed for her own safety—and ours. The last thing we wanted was for the Huntsman to speed up whatever he was doing because he thought we were working with a witch, as well.