Tempt the Stars

squeals and elephant-like trumpets, but my brain had given up trying to make sense of this crap and had just started tossing random junk in there.
    So yeah.
    Could have gone better.
    On the other hand, the vibrate-y, noisy stuff had caused me to retch and flop over. And collapsing into nothing, not even a floor because I still couldn’t feel it properly, just
nothing
, was something I could live without ever experiencing again. But the good news was, it had gotten us kicked out on our collective asses.
    The bad news was, Pritkin hadn’t come with us.
    I stared at the big double doors leading back into hell’s inner sanctum and, despite everything, had a sudden urge to run back in there. And I guess more than an urge, because the next thing I knew, I was halfway to my feet and Caleb’s arm was holding me back. “Not a chance,” he grumbled.
    “I just want to listen—”
    “To what?” he demanded. “The shrieking?”
    “They won’t let you in anyway,” Casanova reminded me. “They said no humans in the deliberations.”
    “Pritkin’s in there—”
    “He’s the accused. That’s different.”
    “That’s what I’m afraid of!”
    “Here.” Casanova handed over his precious bottle of hell juice.
    I blinked at him.
    “You’re white as a sheet,” he said gruffly.
    I took the bottle, a little gingerly. And okay, if I’d needed confirmation that things were bad, I’d just gotten it. Casanova was being nice to me.
    We were so fucked.
    I drank. People, or things, or things pretending to be people came and went, paying no attention to the three bums sprawled in the corner. Caleb kept glancing around, but not like he was tensing to fight. More like the bland familiarity of the lobby was reassuring to him.
    It wasn’t doing a lot for me.
    Long minutes passed.
    “Maybe it was intended as a negotiation tactic,” Caleb suddenly blurted out.
    I glanced over at him. He looked a little less freaked-out, but no happier. I knew the feeling.
    Having time to think was a bitch.
    “What?”
    “You know,” he told me. “All of that stuff about the gods . . ”
    I passed over the bottle. “You think Mom was lying?”
    Caleb took a swig, and made a face. “I’m not saying that. We’ve already had one god show up, and the punk-ass kids of another. But she could have been exaggerating. She was bargaining with them, and in a negotiation, you always ask for more than you hope to get. We want Pritkin, so your mother asks for—”
    “An army?” Casanova said incredulously. “A demon
army
?”
    Caleb scowled. “I thought you were the one who thought that was a good idea. You spent half the damned walk into Rosier’s capital bitching about—”
    “The fact that we could use some help with the war
we already have going
,” Casanova said, snatching his bottle back. “Not being informed that there’s an army of ravenous gods preparing to lay waste to the hells, and planning to use earth as a staging ground!”
    He belted back a couple shots’ worth, all at one go.
    “Well, forgive me for hoping it’s not true,” Caleb retorted. “As someone who’ll have to fight it!”
    Casanova leaned over me to stare at him. “And the rest of us won’t? You think the gods are going to wipe out the war mages and just leave everyone else—”
    “The Corps is the obvious target, yes. We’re the only ones with enough magic to oppose them—”
    “Oh, please!” Casanova said fiercely. “If those things—did you see those things?—in there are shaking in their boots, what chance do you think you have?”
    “Better than you think, or they’re expecting. The Corps isn’t the ragtag little group they remember—”
    “Yes, which is why
the goddess who started your order
just said we’re screwed without the demons! Face it—if the gods get past that damned spell, we’re dead, we’re
all
—”
    “Stop it,” I said, but no one was listening.
    “Thus speaks the great military mind of a casino manager!” Caleb snapped.
    “Who has lived long enough to have seen a few wars in his time,” Casanova snapped back. “And it’s never just the combatants who suffer—”
    “I didn’t say it was—”
    “And we both know it’s easier to run a staging ground if you don’t have to worry about sabotage!”
    “Stop it!” I told him. But he didn’t.
    “If I were them, I wouldn’t want anyone anywhere near my only doorway to this universe, not after what happened last time. Easier to kill us, kill the