Attack

  “They do attack me.”

  “Because you’re meeting them with your sword drawn. You’re confronting them as for battle—provoking them. They have no choice.”

  She shook her head. “Sometimes you talk like a crazy man.”

  “Has there been anything different about these entities? Anything . . . unusual?”

  “You’re talking about demons.”

  “Even the demonic has its own normal. You’ve encountered enough to know what is and what isn’t.”

  “Yes,” she said finally. “They’ve been . . . like animals, but not . . . not like they usually are.”

  “Describe them.”

  “They’re a pastiche. The last one, it was a wolf. But a spider too. I’ve never seen a demon in a form like that.”

  He nodded. “It makes sense. They’re coming to you like this for a reason, Reese. And it isn’t to fight you.”

  Her eyes flashed as she turned to face him. She could barely make out his features in the darkness; the cabin was dark on the inside too, with no light escaping from cracks in the door. “What are you trying to say?”

  “Demons that embody like you say these are doing are not working for anyone. They’re taking on forms as they please, trying to establish an identity or personality. They don’t do that if they have a master, because they simply allow the master’s personality and identity to inform theirs.”

  She raised an eyebrow. “I’m being approached by demonic mutts?”

  “They see a master in you,” Jacob said. “They’re offering their help.”

  She was on her feet before she knew what she was doing. Shaking.

  “Don’t just reject this gift, Reese,” Jacob said, his voice rising. “They’ve never come to me like this. They’re offering themselves to you because you’re a warrior and a power they can recognize. Most of us have to earn their allegiance. You already have.”

  She turned on him. “I don’t want that! I don’t want anything to do with them!”

  “Don’t you?” he asked. “What if they can help you get what you really want?”

  “And what is that?” Reese asked, trembling even harder now. The sword was beginning to form in her hand, but it was only half-there, a response to her anxiety.

  “The same thing I want,” Jacob said. “Justice.”

  He stood. She heard the boards creaking under his weight. He paused at the cabin door and turned back to her.

  “They didn’t trust you to deal with him,” Jacob said. “They were afraid you would demand justice if he didn’t change. So if he doesn’t—if he hasn’t—they will simply let him go on, unchanged and unrepentant, and gloating over the damage he’s done you. Think about that.”

  He went through the door and shut it behind him.

  And Reese still shook.

  Finish reading Renegade!

  Other Books by Rachel Starr Thomson

  Novels

  Worlds Unseen: Book 1 in the Seventh World Trilogy

  Burning Light: Book 2 in the Seventh World Trilogy

  Coming Day: Book 3 in the Seventh World Trilogy

  Exile: Book 1 in The Oneness Cycle

  Hive: Book 2 in The Oneness Cycle

  Attack: Book 3 in The Oneness Cycle

  Renegade: Book 4 in The Oneness Cycle

  Rise: Book 5 in The Oneness Cycle

  Taerith (Fantasy)

  Theodore Pharris Saves the Universe (Juvenile/Humour)

  Lady Moon

  Angel in the Woods

  Reap the Whirlwind

  The Babel Chip

  Short Stories

  Magdalene

  Butterflies Dancing

  Ogres Is

  Fallen Star

  Journey

  Wayfarer’s Dream

  The City Came Creeping

  Of Men and Bones

  Non Fiction

  Tales of the Heartily Homeschooled (Humour/Memoir)

  Heart to Heart: Meeting With God in the Lord’s Prayer

  Letters to a Samuel Generation: The Collection

  Fifty Shades of Loved

  Mind Soul Ink Paper

  Now For the Not-Yet

  Undivided Devotion

  Still Praying in the Wilderness