Damien conjured a soul force seal over the mouth of the flask and landed beside Jen. She’d handled the battle with Dad’s animated corpse better than he feared when he first saw it. He’d expected her anger to get the best of her, but she mastered it. That horror was a poor imitation of their father, but if she’d gotten careless it would have killed her all the same.

“That wasn’t so bad.” Jen leaned on her sword, her core almost empty, gasping for air.

Damien couldn’t help smiling at her attempted bravado. He doubted she could fight again if their lives depended on it. The smile faded when he thought about the massive amount of corrupt energy pulsing in the cave. “That was only a fraction of the demon’s essence. The majority of it is still inside. I’m afraid our work is nowhere near done.”

Jen pushed herself straight and rested her sword on her shoulder. “We’d best get to it.”

She wobbled when she took a step toward the cave. Damien guided her to a flat boulder and helped her sit. “Why don’t you rest here and let your soul force recover?”

“We’re doing this together.”

“Yes. You finished your part, now I have to do mine. It’ll be a fifty-fifty split. You can’t ask for a fairer deal than that.”

Her face twisted like she wanted to argue some more, but exhaustion defeated stubbornness. “If you haven’t returned by the time I recover I’m coming in after you.”

“Deal.” If he wasn’t back by the time Jen recovered he’d never be back, not alive anyway.

Damien paused on his way to the cave and waved Lizzy at Dad’s dismembered body. It disintegrated in an instant. No one would defile his father’s remains again.

He had barely set foot in the cave when the oppressive presence began to bear down on him. Damien pushed through, sending more power to his shield just in case the demon tried to attack before he reached its main body. That was the problem with an opponent that lacked a physical form: it could attack from anywhere.

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Damien reached the end of the tunnel. The instant he entered the final chamber a hazy curtain formed over the exit.

That’s what it did last time.

Yeah, but unlike Dad, Damien had more weapons at his disposal than Lizzy. Ahead of him the smoke demon began to take on a humanoid shape. Before it fully coalesced Damien conjured the same tornado he used outside. The small end emerged from his flask and it grew wider as it spun toward the demon.

Particles were sucked into the vortex. Damien felt the corruption in the flask getting stronger and more dense. He divided his power, using a portion to reinforce the flask. If it broke then his efforts were for nothing.

The moment he withdrew a portion of his strength the demon pulled away from the vortex. Damien snarled and leveled Lizzy at the creature. Streaks of gray fire mixed with the golden vortex as she infused her power.

The demon’s form bent and stretched as it fought the suction. Soon, instead of a human-sized, broad-shouldered form it resembled a piece of overstretched rubber. A third of it was inside, but the rest still resisted.

“Give it all you’ve got!” Damien shouted.

Lizzy’s power rushed out. The tornado expanded and engulfed the demon, drawing it into the flask. Damien spun and pointed the flask at the haze blocking the exit. The barrier vanished instantly. When he no longer sensed any corruption, Damien capped the container with a plug of dense soul force formed from the remains of his portion of the vortex. He didn’t dare try and use Lizzy’s power to reinforce it. He needed more practice weaving their power together before he’d trust that he could maintain the dual flows.

Lizzy’s gray flames vanished. Damien allowed himself a moment to breathe. The hardest part was over. A slow, steady stream of power would gradually shatter all the bonds holding the monster in this world. It would take time, but that he had.

When Damien had collected himself he trudged back down the tunnel. Jen was silhouetted in the opening as she strode up the little slope to find him, her core mostly refilled. She looked no worse for her battle.

“Is it done?” she asked.

Damien nodded and offered a weary smile. “It’s caught. All I have to do now is finish it off.”

“Halt, villains, and accept your judgment!”

Damien spun toward the unexpected voice. At the base of the hill stood a woman similar in age to Damien and Jen. She had strawberry blond hair and wore shining mail with a white tabard bearing the device of a blue shield surrounding a black fortress. In her small hands she held a maul. The weapon’s haft measured five feet and its head alone must have weighed fifteen pounds.

The young woman lifted the weapon like it weighed nothing and charged. It seemed they were about to meet their first paladin.