“No,” Dervish says. “We have to alert the others. Tell people what they’re up against. They might not believe us, so we’ll have to be firm. Get them out of here, even if we have to force them. Fight if necessary—and I expect it will be. If we’re lucky, we’ll only have to worry about Chuda and his human accomplices.”

“And if we’re unlucky?” I murmur.

“Let’s not think about that,” he says, then opens the door and walks out to face whatever hell awaits.

ASSEMBLY CALL

On the outskirts of Slawter. Proceeding slowly, Dervish slightly ahead of Bill-E and me, one hand held palm up, trying to determine whether or not there’s a barrier in place. He said we should determine the lay of the land before raising the alarm. No point trying to herd dozens of people out of town if they’re going to be knocked out by a magically enforced shield.

“Why aren’t we hungry?” Bill-E asks, checking the date on his watch. “We’ve been asleep for… hell on a Harley! Six days! We should be ravenous but I don’t even feel peckish.”

“Trust you to be thinking about your stomach at a time like this!” I snort.

Dervish laughs gently. “No, it’s a good question. The answer’s simple—magic. We were cocooned from the demands of the real world. Hunger and thirst will hit us later, if we make it out, but right now we’re still operating by the magical rules of Slawter.”

“Is there anything magic can’t do?” Bill-E asks.

“Not much,” Dervish says, then draws up short. His fingers are trembling. He moves his hand left, right, left again. “Can you feel it?”

“No,” Bill-E frowns.

“Yes.” I take a step forward, sniffing the air. It doesn’t smell different, but it feels wrong. I raise a hand like Dervish, slide it forward, sense power building against it.

“No further,” Dervish says. “We don’t want to disturb the fabric of the barrier—it might tip off our enemies.”

“What is it?” I ask.

“In non-technical terms, a bubble of magic. They’ve sealed off the town. Enclosed it within a magical sphere, like putting a giant glass bowl over everything.” He frowns. “No demon is powerful enough to create a barrier this size, not in our universe. They’re using the stone you saw in the D workshops. It must be a functioning lodestone, a reservoir of ancient power. There aren’t many left in the world. The magic drained from most of them centuries ago. Others were deliberately destroyed, to prevent them falling into the hands of demonic mages.

“This is worse than I thought. With the power of a lodestone at their disposal, they can build a tunnel. Dozens of demons can cross and run riot within the barrier. Stay as long as they like. Nobody will be able to escape.”

“We have to stop them!” Bill-E gasps. “We can, can’t we, Dervish?”

“Of course,” Dervish says wearily, lowering his hand. “If we shatter the lodestone, the bubble will burst. But now that we know about it, the Demonata will have increased security around the warehouse. They’re not stupid.”

“We have to try,” I say quietly. “We can’t stand by and let people die.”

“You’re forgetting our earlier conversation,” Dervish says with a bitter smile. “The Disciples often let people die. In a situation like this, we’d normally sit back and let the Demonata run their course. We don’t have the power to stop them. Better to conserve our strength and fight them when we have a chance of winning.”

“But this is different,” I growl. “We know these people.”

“That’s not enough of a reason to get involved. I’ve had to sacrifice friends to demons before.”

“Don’t tell me you mean to—” I start to explode.

“Easy,” Dervish calms me. “We won’t stand by idly. We can’t. Because you’re right, this is different. We’re caught up in it. If we don’t find a way out, it’s not just the cast and crew of Slawter who’ll perish—we’ll die too.”

Heading into the heart of town. Dervish says there might be another way out of this mess—burst through a small section of the bubble, creating a temporary gap through which we can flee. But we’re not powerful enough to do it ourselves. We need to pin a demon against the bubble, then explode it with magic. By focusing the energy generated, we should be able to blast a hole through the barrier, which we can keep open for a while, allowing people to slip out.

Should. No guarantees.

One of our main problems will be getting a demon in the right place, at the right time. We can’t just march into the D Workshops and ask one of them to come to the barrier with us.

But before that, we have to figure a way to convince the rest of the crew and cast that we’re not crazy, their lives are in danger, demons are real, they have to trust us if they want to live. To that end, we’re heading for Davida Haym’s offices. If she’s innocent—bloody unlikely!—Dervish hopes to recruit her and use her to issue a general alarm. If, as we suspect, she’s in league with the Demonata, he plans to make her confess in public, to persuade the others to trust us.

It’s hair-raising stuff, sneaking through town, ducking down side-alleys, keeping out of sight. We don’t know who our enemies are. Dervish doesn’t think many humans will be working for the demons, that most of the people here are innocent. But we can’t be sure who to trust. We know a few of the traitors—Chuda Sool and Tump Kooniart, the guards who were with Kuk and his father when they disappeared, probably Davida. But there will be more. We can’t expose ourselves and risk raising the alarm.

I suggest making ourselves invisible. Dervish vetoes the idea. “Powerful demons can sense magic being used. We’ve been lucky so far, but every time one of us draws on the power in the air, we risk pinpointing our position.”

So we steal through town unassisted by magic. Luckily, although it’s afternoon, Slawter is quiet, not many people about. We make it to Davida’s offices unnoticed and let ourselves in. One of her secretaries is usually stationed at the front desk, but our luck holds—the chair is vacant. We slip past and into the main office, the hub of operations, from which all orders flow.

Davida isn’t here. The office is empty. Lots of papers, small demon models, a miniature set of the town, maps on the walls with scores of dates, names, times, schedules. But no Davida Haym.

“Go through the drawers,” Dervish says, hurrying to one of the many file cabinets in the room. “Look for anything that might give us an advantage—plans, a list of demons, spells, whatever.”

“You think she’ll keep details like that in unlocked cabinets?” Bill-E asks.

“No,” Dervish sighs. “But it’ll keep us busy. And you never know—we might strike lucky.”

Rooting through drawers, pulling out folders, glancing through the pages, then discarding them, scattering them across the floor, not caring about the mess we’re making.

I’m halfway through a drawer when Bill-E makes a shushing sound and hurries to the door. He listens for a second, then nods—people are coming. Dervish and I move up next to him, taking cover behind the door, crouching low so as not to be visible through the upper panels of glass in the office wall.

Footsteps. Two people talking. The door opens.

“…have to get it right,” Davida Haym says, stepping into the office. “This is a one-time deal. If we blow it, we won’t—” She spots the mess and stops.

“What the hell?” Chuda Sool says, stepping up beside her.

Dervish springs to his feet. His right hand comes flying up, fingers curled into a fist. He punches Chuda’s jaw like a professional boxer. Chuda grunts and spins aside, smacking hard into the glass of the upper wall, cracking it. Bill-E and I leap on Davida as she screams. We pull her down and cover her mouth with our hands. She tries to bite but we jam our hands down more firmly.

Dervish closes in on Chuda, who’s dazed but still on his feet. Chuda tries to block Dervish’s next punch, but it penetrates, grazing the side of his head, not connecting as firmly as the first blow, but knocking Chuda back a few more centimetres. I always knew Dervish was stronger than he looked but I’ve never seen him in this sort of kick-ass mode before. It’s cool!