I looked into his eyes, pale as winter, so very unlike Gabriel’s.

“I can’t stand by. I have to do something,” I said.

“Why not? Why do you need to sacrifice yourself in some Quixotic quest to save humanity?” He pointed to the TV. “This is what you want to preserve? Reality TV? Big Macs?”

“It doesn’t matter if you hold us in contempt. It doesn’t matter if we eat junky food and watch junky TV. It doesn’t matter if we’re desperate, selfish or vain. It doesn’t matter if we’re loving, giving and modest. It doesn’t matter if we’re not perfect. Anyway, I’ve yet to meet an angel who is.”

“You are talking as if you are one of them,” he said. “You are not. You are more than they are.”

“No, I’m not,” I said. “I’m human. And I’m not going to stand by and watch my own kind be wiped from the planet.”

Nathaniel turned back to the spectacle on the television screen. “You may not have a choice.”

3

THE NEWS HAD RETURNED FROM A COMMERCIAL break. Now the footage showed the surging vampires leaping over the raised bridges and assaulting the fortified roadblocks. The positions were quickly overwhelmed.

Suddenly there was a massive explosion behind the sandbagged wall set up on Michigan Avenue. It wasn’t clear who had set the explosives but there was a tremendous ball of fire where the National Guard used to be.

Flame whooshed through the crowd of vampires, and the eerie piercing wail that rose up was the sound of the death throes of monsters. The vamps that hadn’t yet leapt over the bridge paused for a moment as their brethren turned to ash.

“Those soldiers sacrificed themselves for the greater good,” I said. “How can I do any less?”

“Their sacrifice is meaningless,” Nathaniel snapped. “There are many more vampires than can be halted by a small explosion.”

“But they tried.”

“Is that what it is to be human? To try? To push, like Sisyphus, ever more fruitlessly at the boulder that will simply roll down the hill and over you again?”

“That is part of being human,” I said. “To struggle, to succeed.”

“What if you never succeed?”

“You still try. You have to.”

“I will never understand humans,” Nathaniel said. “It makes no sense to repeat the same behavior over and over when you know the outcome.”

“But you don’t know the outcome,” I replied. “It’s why people play the same lottery numbers week after week, year after year. They’re hoping their luck will change.”

“There is no such thing as luck. Only chance.”

“Most people would have said that there’s no such thing as vampires, either, and yet here we are,” I said, gesturing to the television.

“That is only because they did not know any better,” Nathaniel said.

“Who’s to say that you don’t know any better, either? I know luck has saved my life plenty of times.”

“You were saved by your own skills, your own wits, which are more prodigious than you give yourself credit for.”

“Don’t let Beezle hear you say that. He thinks I just stumble around setting things on fire.”

“Well, you do that as well,” Nathaniel allowed. “But stumbling around setting things on fire seems to be a key component of your skill set.”

I would have laughed, except that at that moment the pix demon crashed through the ceiling and landed on my head.

Its gelatinous body molded itself to my shoulders and head so that I couldn’t see. Clawed fingers raked up the side of my throat and blood spurted from the wounds.

I reached up and grabbed the monster’s ankles and blasted electricity through my palms. The demon growled but held on tight.

“Nathaniel,” I gurgled. I could feel the torn flaps of skin on my neck, could feel the hot flow of blood running under my shirt.

There were sounds of a struggle, and the smell of ozone filled the air.

“More,” Nathaniel grunted, and I knew I’d have to save myself. I was bleeding out too fast for Nathaniel to help.

Nightfire didn’t seem to bother the pix much, nor electricity. Which left the most destructive tool in my limited arsenal.

Everything burns.

I pushed my power through my blood, through my heartstone, where it was lit by the heat of the sun. That spell poured through my palms and through the skin of the pix demon. It screeched and released its grip on me, falling to the floor and writhing as it burned from the inside out.

I wasn’t that great at the healing spell, having performed it only once, so I slapped my burning hand on my own neck to cauterize the wound.

This time I screeched, because the pain was agonizing. Sometimes I really wonder about my ability to think things through to their logical conclusion. It hurt like nothing I’d ever felt before, and the wound probably looked horrific, but after a moment there was no more flowing blood. I lurched around to see Nathaniel battling three demons.

I stumbled forward, dizzy and still in pain, and latched on to the neck of the nearest pix. My burning hands blasted magic through its skin. Smoke poured from its mouth. The pix tried to break away from my grip but I held fast, pouring fire inside until the air filled with the stench of burning.

Nathaniel was fighting with two other demons. The bodies of three others lay at his feet, their heads missing. He slashed out with his sword, keeping them at arm’s length, but his blasts of nightfire didn’t seem to do much more than annoy them.