Fire And Ice Ch 08

Ryan grasped hold of the desk in front of him tightly and closed his eyes and tried to even out his breathing. Something was happening, he had felt incredibly angry, he had just wanted to punch that smug look off that toad's face. He knew that Clarke was smarter than that, to hand him self-incriminating documents, something more was happening.

He had felt off balance since he had received those fake files from Clarke, the aggression he had felt welling up inside of him when he had discovered the fact that he was trying to frame him as well. The tension inside of him was made even worse with Ms. Rodgers come ons, he had an inexplicable urge to push her over the desk and slam into her like she appeared to desperately want.

He had to gather together all the evidence so he could sort through it with Demetrius later, he took a calming breath before letting go off the desk and then reached over to the drawer to open it when he could have sworn something brushing up against him.

"You still can't trust him... he's keeping things from you... secrets are dangerous... you know it well enough... he has been acting strangely..."

Now he was hearing voices, he couldn't have a mental break. He couldn't spare the time, not with everything that was currently going on. Tightness grasped his chest as sweat beaded on his forehead and began to slide down towards his neck. His breathing increased as a pervasive feeling of anxiety crawled into his chest, he had never had a panic attack before. He tried to force his breathing to slow down but it was like a runaway train.

Something wasn't right, he couldn't slow his breathing down, whatever it was. He didn't think it was him, it was trying to push him into panicking. The voice that had bounced around inside of his head was trying to make him think that Demetrius was untrustworthy. But with everything he had seen, to disregard that would to descend into paranoia. Whatever it was he knew he would not be able to continue working until he had sorted out what was going on inside his head.

A knock at the door and the grasping tightness on his chest suddenly released and the veil of paranoia and anxiety lifted. He quickly grabbed the folder out of the desk draw as he called out to the door," Come in."

Demetrius opened the door and stepped into the room, and suddenly the hairs on the back of his neck stood up. Something unclean had been in here very recently, he looked at Ryan who was visibly distressed. He could see the glistening sweat that had streaked down from his forehead, and the tension that creased his brow. "Did everything go ok with The Cougar?" he asked.

Ryan looked up from the desk, "Yeah, everything went fine there, we'll be signing the contract at the next meeting she just wants to have her lawyer look over it. But the deal is sealed up, just need the signatures. How did the meeting with Ms. Valencia go?"

"Everything went as planned, she signed the contract so the assets will be transferred to our business accounts tomorrow. So how are we going to proceed with Mr. Clarke?" asked Demetrius. He watched Ryan cautiously. Now he had settled into the room, he could feel something unsettling coming from Ryan. He knew it was him as it was different from the other entity he had felt in the room.

He'd feel a whole lot better if he had a solution to this whole problem, but he needed to wait for Katherine to get back to him. He would find the demon who had poisoned Ryan and make them pay a million torments for it. His demonic part snarled inside of him wanting to rend flesh, the sensation almost threw him off as he had never felt something so violent from his demon side even when it had first arrived in its madness.

Ryan looked at him cautiously before saying, "We need to see if we can trace anyone else connected to this first before we make things public. It will need to be as solid as possible before we send the evidence to the police."

Demetrius had hoped to avoid this, he had tried to keep a good distance between himself and Ryan so it wouldn't be as bad when he had to leave. But now he knew he had to disclose his secret, he couldn't afford to do it right now, not with what was currently happening with him. But he knew he had to do it to protect him from future incidences so he could at least talk to him. Tension was building up inside of him as his demon was prowling around intensely analysing the darkness in the room.

"I think the best way would be if we order a board meeting for the morning so we can discuss this, but honestly we both need to relax. It's been exhausting dealing with Clarke. So why don't you come to my apartment and we can watch the game on cable, after we finish clearing the rest of the day's schedule?" he asked.

"That sounds good, haven't had much time to relax over the last few weeks. So 7pm before the game starts?" asked Ryan.

"Yeah sounds good, I'll see you then," he grinned and got up off the chair and opened the door and left the room. He breathed a sigh of relief the pressure of the dark, slimy feeling lifting, he had never invited Ryan back to his apartment before and under the circumstances he knew that this would make Ryan even more suspicious but he had to keep him close so he could monitor the changes. He hoped Katherine could find what she was looking for.

***

Katherine looked up from the books scattered around her living room floor and sighed, she still hadn't found a powerful yet safe enough spell she could use on Ryan. She had come to the grim conclusion after hours of research that white magic could not help, as the exorcism would has the strong potential of turning him into a vegetable.

It was another reason she couldn't stand the white magic witches with their false virtues. A lot of the powerful cleansing magic took no real regard for the victim's safety. There was no question the spells would work, but if she used him she would likely be condemning Ryan to less than life. Only mere existence, she wouldn't do that do him. That only left black magic and she had a feeling that no basic magic would work.

Not to mention that black magic was a lot more offensive and had far less propensity for cleaning things up afterwards. She needed to imprison the darkness, but with how powerful the corruption she felt radiating from him. The corruption may have already passed over the boundaries of what she could do. Of what any witch could do, because if the corruption seeped into his spirit it would become him and an extraction or exorcism would not work and would most likely kill him.

She got up from the floor and walked over to her bookcase and grabbed the book that had been irritating her since she had sat down. It was her biggest and oldest black magic tome, there were some seriously dark spells in this grimore and she knew that what she had been looking for wouldn't be in here. But still something had urged her to pick it up, she sighed and pulled it open, the irritating urge wouldn't stop until she found whatever it was that was making it.

The major darkness of this book wasn't necessarily the spells involved, the graphic depiction of some of the resulting effects were just as dark as the spells themselves. She flipped through a few more pages until she came to an elaborate drawing of a naked woman, ancient arcane symbols seeming to glow off the page at her were placed over the body in the spiritual focuses. As she read the description, she knew why it had been so insistent.

Sometimes black magic would reach out and insist that you look at them, this spell she thought was Ryan's only real chance. As she read through the spell, it came clear to her that Ryan was not escaping the fate that he had been marked for. He would become a demon, but this spell would not expel the corruption. It would merely replace it with another source, when she read the rest of it she knew what it would be.

Demetrius' soul energy would replace the corruption as she knew that Demetrius had been sired by the demon she highly suspected did it the corruption would be easily absorbed. When she turned the page, there was an equally elaborate drawing of a naked male with the more arcane symbols pulsing from the page. But they were different, and in different locations, when she read the inscription a sudden torrent of lust washed through her, it was telling her that she needed to the channel.

She would filter the current and allow the power exchange to run smoothly, she considered the placement of the glyphs and she knew that she would be pressed between their hard bodies, heat flooded her body as she pictured what it would be like. The angry, biting force of the corruption infesting Ryan's soul and the rough, dominating force of Demetrius' energy.

She wondered what Demetrius' reaction to this would be, she knew that they were permanently bonded to each other so she wondered how that would affect his reaction. She needed to look through the other books she had to confirm the fact that this was the only way so she could impress on him that this was the only way that he could save his friend.

Hours later Katherine got off the floor and began putting her books back onto the shelves, she had done her best to find an alternative. But there was no safe way that she could find that would keep Ryan human and healthy. So she could only go with the transference ritual she had discovered in the black tome, she needed to consider what she was going to say to Demetrius to get him to accept her plan.

She felt for him through their connection and felt anxiety swirling around him, she wanted to talk to him. To ease his anxiety, but she felt another presence with him, Ryan was with him. This next part would be difficult, she would need some kind of barrier to prevent Jasrahel from reaching out. She was certain it was his doing to have Ryan infected, and when she conducted the transference, she would be taking his energy into her body and transferring it Demetrius strengthening the bond momentarily.

She could only hope that everything would play out as planned, she would make use of Demetrius' apartment to boost the power of the ritual and hopefully boost the power of the barrier to prevent interference. All she could do now was wait until the morning before she could contact him.

***

She hadn't gotten much sleep during the night, a mixture of her own anxiety and the feeling of Demetrius' stress had amplified it and made it near impossible to shut down her brain so she could sleep. She looked up at the richly appointed apartment tower, this would be the first time she would see his apartment. Now she would see how he lived, she strode past the entrance desk with confidence before moving to the elevators, when the doors opened she stepped in and focused on Demetrius for a moment before pressing a number, surprised she noted it wasn't closer to the top.

The closer she got to his floor the tighter the anxious feeling got in her chest, she knew that this wasn't her own anxiety it was flowing out of their connection. She knew that he would have had just as bad of a night as she did. When the doors opened she quickly made her way to his apartment and knocked on the door.

When Demetrius opened the door only wearing his pants, the words caught in her mouth for a moment as she took in the sight of his bare chest. "We need to talk Demetrius," she said as his eyes flared amber and silver. He grinned and grasped her arm, she gasped as heat and sparks raced up her arm as he pulled her into her apartment and shut the door.

"You can talk, while I finish getting ready for work," he said as he turned away from her. She groaned as the muscles of his back flex, she knew that he had done that purposely. She had to retain her focus and get through what she needed to do. She would have to get all the supplies she needed to erect the barrier and create the runes for the ritual.

"There is only one spell that is guaranteed to work, but the problem is. It's sex magic, it's a transference spell and it uses a medium as the sieve to limit the speed of the transfer," she said. As soon as she had said sex magic his muscles had locked up. She knew he wouldn't have liked to hear it, even though she knew she would enjoy it. She could feel it even now, the possessiveness rolling off him. But she knew that she would feel much the same if it had to involve another woman, she wouldn't want any other to touch him.

"I looked through all my books and that was the only spell that didn't threaten to melt his brain or blow him up. So that is all we have, and unless you want to deal with the consequences of not doing it, it's the only way forward." She didn't want to be so harsh with him, but she knew that they only had a very limited amount of time before either Ryan gave in to the corruption or it sent him crazy.

Demetrius entered his bedroom and soon came out with a dark blue dress shirt and slipped it on, she still couldn't help but look as his pecs and abs rippled with the motion, "If it's the only way, I don't want to lose him as a friend." He took the news better then she had expected she thought until his eyes flared hot as the skin around his neck and cheeks began to glow. "But this will be the only time it happens, you're mine Katherine. Don't forget that," the growl that came from him sent shivers through her body.

If she could melt, she would do it right now, all that heat, power and raw male dominance locked up inside of him. She knew that no man would ever come close to him, she licked her lips as she felt cold rush over her cheeks and up her neck. "No man could ever compare to you though Demetrius, this is all for Ryan. He'll be sired to you after this is done because he will become a demon."

Demetrius growled as the glow increased for a moment before dropping off as he quickly buttoned his shirt. "How are you going to do this?"

"Right here, the wood floor of your living area will be a perfect place to conduct this ritual. It will require an incredible amount of power to do this right but because we are now linked. I don't think there will be a power problem. What I need to construct is a barrier of sorts to keep out unwanted forces, the transferral will shine like a beacon. Like an open invitation to your sire, its more dangerous for you and me as it will be for Ryan, as they'll be hunting us instead of him," she said as he disappeared again into his bedroom and returned with a black suit jacket.

As he slid it on he looked at her, "What do you need for this barrier? I have basic wards on my apartment to keep minions out. But I don't think they will work for what you need."

She had felt the dim pulse of the arcane wards as she entered his apartment and she knew he was right. They weren't strong enough to deter what would be attracted, "Don't worry about my preparations, I know what I need to get for it. I just have to visit the mage store and collect the ingredients. What I need you to do is ensure that Ryan comes here, it's an unusual situation. Normally demonic corruption doesn't spread quite so quickly. I sensed something when I met him, some kind of spark, there is something there I think is enhancing the strength of the demon seed, forcing it to grow faster."

"I've been thinking about it since we met, I'm going to talk to Ryan today and show him what I am. That should hopefully stop any reservations about this, and like you said the corruption is progressing quickly. He should be more open as he would be hearing voices right now, that bastard Jasrahel is very convincing it took me a long time to find my way out from under his trickeries and deception," said Demetrius his eyes still glowing.

He put on his socks and slipped on his shoes before saying to her. "I'll bring him over tonight, that should give you enough time to set everything up?"

"That will be plenty of time, I will have everything sorted out by then. We can save him, then we'll discuss what to do about the problem of your sire," she said.

"That would be good, then hopefully we can get things back to as normal as possible," he grinned. "Time for me to go to work now."

"Bye, see you tonight," she grinned before he disappeared in front of her. She took a moment to take in the atmosphere of his apartment before she took the keys off the side table near the door and walked out and made sure the door was locked before going down the long hall back to the elevators.