Demon Huntress

Daquan ran a hand through the spiky brown hair she knew from pictures hadn't changed since his Army days. "She's dead, isn't she?"

"Yeah."

"Goddammit." He sank onto the couch and sprawled backward, legs spread, head back as he stared at the ceiling fan that spun in lazy circles. "Where? We need to retrieve what we can."

"We went into the sewers at the Aspen entrance. She's a few blocks north of that."

Her stomach churned. The Hunter wouldn't find much, if anything. Ya qin's body had probably been taken or eaten by now. Every Hunter knew and accepted the risks of dying in demon territory. But it was the survivors who suffered when their comrades fell.

"We'd flushed out two Anzu doing the nasty behind a Dumpster. We killed the female, but the male tucked tail. We gave chase, tangoed with a Abraxas demon, and the Anzu demon ambushed us."

Ting and Daquan exchanged looks. It didn't take a Velma to figure out what they were thinking. A Anzu demon shouldn't have been able to take out two experienced fighters. No way could she mention the truth of what had happened, how she'd lost the use of the right side of her body during the battle. The Berus had doctors in their service, and Daquan, a former Army medic, performed most of the patch-up work, but despite her feelings of guilt, deep down she knew she had to keep her strange symptoms a secret. If the truth came out, she might be taken off the streets and relegated to training or paperwork. Or worse, kicked out of The Berus altogether.

This was the only family she had left, and she wouldn't lose it. Couldn't. An ex-Hunter with no job prospects and without the tools and protection of The Berus could measure her life expectancy in days. No, she'd keep her condition to herself, and she'd continue to hunt, but from now on, she was a solo act. No way would she risk another Hunter's life.

"I'm not sure how it all happened," she said, "but I saw her die. The Anzu demon attacked me. That's all I remember until I woke up in a hospital."

"Hospital?" Daquan shot forward like he'd hit a brick wall doing ninety in his Mustang. Shu lan half-expected him to rub his neck from the whiplash. "What hospital? We'd have heard."

Ting stood, and ice formed in the room. "You know, shu, you don't look worse for wear."

Yeah, as family-oriented as The Berus was, a healthy dose of suspicion kept everyone alive. Shu lan understood that, but the Regents' reactions stung. The Berus was all she had, and she'd felt secure in the knowledge that she soldiered on a team where everyone relied on each other, where everyone put aside personal differences while in battle. You might hate your partner on a personal level, but at least he or she was human, and in a fight with a demon, that was all that mattered.

But now a crack had formed in the brittle bubble in which she'd been living, and a frisson of insecurity shivered through her veins.

Slowly, Shu lan lifted her shirt, revealing her well-healed scars and the one wound that still festered. "It was a demon hospital."

Ting and Daquan said little as Shu lan told them what she knew about Underworld General. She left out the fact that she'd knocked boots with a demon.

Twice.

And a niggling sense of . . . something . . . told her to, for now at least, leave out how the said demon was tied to her bed, his big body dwarfing the twin mattress.

"That's just what we need," Daquan said, as he pushed off the couch. "Demons treating the wounds we give them. Infiltrating our medical schools. Learning our physiology and weaknesses."

"We've got to destroy it." Ting paced the hardwood floor so quickly Shu lan expected to see sawdust fly.

"We can appeal to the elders for help. They won't ignore something this big. Maybe they can ask the government for assistance, as well."

The government might help, indirectly, of course. From what Shu lan had gathered, officials in very high places knew of the underworld threat and worked closely with the elders, twelve Berus members who prevailed over all cells worldwide. And in every city, ex-Hunter and berus sympathizers could be found working as doctors, cops, taxi drivers . . . all willing to lend a hand.

"We can try appealing to them." Scowling, Daquan ran his hand over his hair, his frustration evident in the abrupt move. The elders was famous for refusing requests for assistance, forcing Regents to contact other Regents from nearby cells for help. "Shu lan, can you hazard a guess on a location for this hospital?"