I looked around at the suddenly-empty street. Not liking this one bit, flying by the seat of my pants again, I followed. One step into the dark and pain hit me like a bus. I stumbled to my knees, agony ripping through my bones. Gray light, brighter than the dark around me shot out. “Oh, crap . . .”

No wonder I didn’t like using magic around people. Not only was it hard to explain, but they became a liability. I could have held the crushing masses off all day, except for the crushing part of the masses. People just kept showing up from alleyways and side roads and pouring out of bars and restaurants, none of them paying any heed to the great stench-ridden demon velociraptor in the street. They pushed against my shields and the shields pushed back until I began to sense the partiers’ discomfort, and then their pain. Loss of breath, elbowed ribs, stepped-on feet, all turning toward sour panic. I caught a glimpse of Jane unloading what looked like a full complement of bullets into the demon velociraptor, and relieved, gave up the fight.

Crowds flooded in again, panic abated, and only too late did I realize the velociraptor—he needed a shorter name—was not down for the count. I shoved a tipsy blonde sideways and reached for the one weapon I had: a silver rapier I’d taken off a god a while back. It materialized as I plowed toward the demon, and I let healing power surge down the blade in a blue blaze as I lifted it to slam into the bastard’s back.

He screamed holy living murder. I staggered back, wheezing with satisfaction.

Then silver bullets—fléchettes, actually—began to rain down between his giant-ass cloven hooves, and the sword gash that should have severed his spinal cord melded together and disappeared.

The son of a bitch was immune to silver. I stared at his healing back for maybe half a second, my gut churning with dismay, and then got pissed.