He roared back and gripped my arms, pulling my hands off his neck. "You are weak!"

Clawed hands dug into my flesh. Blood welled, and pain shot up my arms. His grip tightened, and I felt my bones cracking from his grip.

If he wins, everyone will die. If he defeats me, Elyssa is his.

No. I couldn't let it happen. We could still stop it. Vallaena's plan was crazy, but it offered something I thought we had lost after the latest disaster. It gave all of us something we could hold onto and draw strength from.

Hope.

"We," I said, pushing my hands toward his neck. "Will"—I clenched my teeth so hard I could feel them cracking—"win!" I believed we had a chance. I believed this plan could work. And most of all, I believed this stupid bastard wasn't about to have his way with the love of my life.

Fear suddenly lit in his eyes. Without warning, strength seemed to flee from him, and flowed into me. I gripped his throat and throttled him. I picked him up by the neck and held him above the ground, choking the life out of him.

"Who's the boss?" I roared, my voice echoing in the void.

He gave me a furious look, and snarled.

I squeezed harder. Blue blood ran between my fingers, trickled down my arm. He thrashed like a wild animal, clawing at me, but his attempts did nothing to harm me.

"Who's your boss, you effing moron?" I shook him like a rag doll. "Submit to me or I will crush you to pulp."

"You cannot kill me," he said. Tears of blood streaked from the corners of his eyes. "I am part of you."

"Then I will keep you in torment," I said, taking my other hand, and gripping one of his horns. I pulled the horn, and he screamed in pure agony.

"Stop!" he cried.

"Who's the boss?" I said in a low growl.

All the fight went out of him. He sagged. "You are," he said in a whimper.

"I didn't hear you."

He looked at me, expression bleak, like a child denied candy on Halloween. "You are the boss of me."

I grunted. Set him down. "Good."

The void shattered, and suddenly I was looking into Vallaena's blue eyes. "Ah!" I shouted, startled.

"What happened?" she asked.

"I had a discussion with my inner self."

She cocked her head like a curious dog. "You talked to yourself?"

"I took control."

She cocked her head like a curious puppy. "How troubling, and yet interesting. Very well, try to sense the other side now."

I repeated my swallowing ritual, and felt my senses turn inward. This time, my demonic side surrendered, and the world suddenly felt a whole lot bigger. I sensed beings—countless beings. Some brushed past my senses without stopping. Some were so minute as to be almost unnoticeable. Others felt strangely human. I let my senses drift, and felt something truly gargantuan pass by. I felt like a dingy in the wake of a cruise ship at its passing, and felt my physical body stagger.

"You have just sensed a very powerful being," Vallaena said. "They will usually pay you no mind, Justin, but you must take care not to draw their attention. Without their name, you would be as easy to squash to them as an ant."

"I can see that," I said in a weak voice, still keeping my eyes shut so I wouldn't ruin my concentration. "How do I know which ones are hellhounds?"

"Remain passive. You will eventually gain a sense of what is what. This is the part that takes time."

I did as she asked, eyes closed in concentration, my senses extended into the demon world. I sensed all kinds of things. Some sent cold chills down my spines, their presence like insatiable hunger. Vallaena told me they were crawlers—creatures which devoured the essence of mortals until they were nothing but brittle husks. I remembered Shelton's story about Hooch, and hoped I didn't find any more of the creatures.

"Does everything live in the same place" I asked her some time later. "So many seem to pass by whatever spot I'm sensing."

"Although you think you are remaining still, your senses are actually moving. The demon plane operates much differently than here."

"Well, my feet really hurt," I said. I'd remained standing for much of the duration since it was hard to sit down while maintaining my connection to the spirit world.

I suddenly felt something approaching. It grew closer. I wished I could actually see the demon plane, but apparently that wasn't possible, according to Vallaena. I felt a bit exposed, like a man sticking his arm down a tree stump to feel inside at the risk of being stung by an alien scorpion creature with poison that would drive him mad and make him beg for death.

The presence stopped. It actually seemed to sniff my presence and then stopped nearby.

"Um, I think I found a dog," I said, and described the sensation. I hoped it didn't try to sniff my demonic butt.

"Yes," Vallaena said, her hand gripping mine. "Now, envelop it with your senses, open your eyes, and will it to manifest before you."

It sounded easy enough, so I did as she asked. The being in the demon world seemed to sense something was up, and tried to make a run for it, but I—for lack of a better word—lassoed it with my tendril, opened my eyes, and thought, Manifest.

The ground turned murky black. The presence in my senses began to slip away. As it did, a form took shape in the oily pool, struggling to free itself. It squirmed, and fought, and a tarred shape took form. A head pushed free of the muck, followed by a body. Trembling legs quivered and unglued from the earth. To my utter amazement, a hellhound stepped forth.

Vallaena looked at the hellhound as it wagged its tail and ran circles around me. She burst into genuine laughter, picked up my hellhound, and kissed it on the nose. "It's so cute!" she said, sounding like a little girl.

I buried my face in a palm. Just great. My first hellhound wasn't big and scary. In fact, it might have trouble scaring a cat.

Great job, Justin.

My first hellhound looked like a freaking miniature poodle.

Chapter 45

"What went wrong?" I asked Vallaena, watching as my admittedly adorable little hellhound licked her nose, and wagged its tail.

"What did you imagine when you ordered it to manifest?" she said.

I thought back to that instant and remembered an image of my former best friend's dog flashing into my head. Except his dog was big. Why mine turned out so tiny was a mystery. I told her this, and she shrugged.

"The spirit you pulled forth might also be young. There are many factors which can affect it." She kissed the hound on the nose again, and set him down. "In any case, you must now banish it."

My hellhound looked up at me with huge adoring eyes, his little tail wagging. "But—but I can't. He's too cute."

She sighed, tapping her fingers on her leg, and nodded. "I agree. Summon another hound, but try not to make it cute so you can banish it without emotional trauma."

I went back through the process, and found a similar presence to the first, though this felt a little different. It actually felt as though it was more intelligent, older. I pulled it through, and ended up with a dog the size of a Doberman. It didn't wag its tail, but just stood there looking at me, as if waiting on a command.

"Sit," I said.

It looked at Vallaena, back to me, and remained standing.

"Some of them require training," she said. "Although this is definitely a much older spirit. He would be a fine hellhound."

"And I have to banish him."

She nodded. "You need to learn how." She walked to the newly minted hellhound, and petted it. It grudgingly gave its tail a wag or two, as if it found the whole process somewhat degrading. "Using your Daemos senses, grip its spirit, and imagine the manifestation portal swallowing it whole."

I tried as she said, but had trouble grasping the soul. It felt slick. When I explained this, she told me that since it was in a physical shell, it would be harder to grasp, but to continue trying. Thankfully, the new hellhound didn't seem to mind, and sat on its haunches while I tried to banish it back to hell. I finally managed to latch into the creature's soul. How exactly, I did it, I wasn't quite sure. It was like trying to latch a suction cup on a porous surface, and finally finding the exact area where it can grip.

Willing the manifestation to reverse itself was easy after that, and the oily pool swallowed the hellhound whole. The baby hellhound whimpered as the other one sank into the earth without so much as a bark, and huddled at my legs.

"It's okay," I cooed, picking—I checked between its legs—him up and petting him. He seemed to take comfort.

"How sweet," Vallaena said, her voice weary. "Now, let us keep practicing."

By midnight, I'd repeated the process numerous times. Every hellhound was different. Some were mean and had to be restrained. Some were full of energy and wanted to race after every squirrel they saw. Others were calm and stoic like the second one.

Most of them didn't come through fully trained, and that was the hard part. Vallaena explained that if I manifested one who refused my orders, the plan would fail.

"When I manifested the hellhound inside the shield," she said as we walked back to the mansion, "it took a great deal of energy. I was so tired, it took all I had to banish it."

"So I might only have one try at this," I said.

She offered a grim nod.

I was beyond exhausted, so trying tonight was out of the question. That left tomorrow, and a short window on Saturday. We were cutting it too close.

Once home, I set the puppy on the floor. He raced around sniffing everything, tail wagging like mad.

"How cute!" Bella said when she saw him, and knelt down to pet him.

He made a little growling noise, and backed away. Even if he was a puppy, he was still a hellhound. One bite from those little teeth, and it wouldn't be good for Bella. My felycan friend, Stacey, had almost died from hellhound bites, and I'd almost died saving her.

"Behave," I told him in a stern voice. "She's my friend."