Clara nodded to me. “I’ll work on it, but I don’t know that I know how.”

“At least your spells aren’t making them more powerful!” I heard a thud from upstairs, then turned my attention to the imps trying to swarm…and do other things to…the people in the room. The gateway was a hole in the floor, in the middle of what looked like a pretty typical summoning circle. Part of it had, of course, been inadvertently erased.

I wasn’t going to ask what they had been trying to do. Use them as an aphrodisiac, maybe? I really didn’t want to know.

I did want the gateway closed. The high priestess was under a particularly large imp pile and sounded like she might not be too unhappy about it. Mercilessly, I started to toss them off her.

She was going to close the gateway and then she was going to apologize. I wasn’t sure to who – the imps seemed to have been quite enjoying themselves when we showed up – but the woman was making me regret having talked the ghost out of possessing her. Efreets and now lust imps.

One of which was trying to braid my hair. I shook it off – maybe I was hotter with braided hair, but I didn’t have time for it. I grabbed another one and threw it onto the one mundane thing here, the pool table. It skidded across the felt and ended up with its tail in a pocket.

“Nice shot!” Clara called.

“Close the dang hole.” I finally got most of the imps off of the priestess. “That goes for you too. I’ll deal with the imps.”
More were trying to climb out through the hole, but Clara seemed to be slowing them down. The priestess glared at me, but did move to help her, albeit with some reluctance.

Good. I was confident it would be closed now.

Somebody threw an imp down the stairs right as the hole irised shut. It bounced twice and landed at Clara’s feet. She casually stepped on it before finishing her spell.

I wondered how much she’d learned from them and how much from other sources. “Okay…that…”

“Why did you call her?” the priestess demanded, indicating me with an elbow.

“Because she’s good at this kind of thing,” Clara noted, mildly. “Oh, by the way. I’m out.”

“Oh no you aren’t. You swore an oath.”

“I did not sign up for being attacked by lust imps and you are not my type.”

Which explained the lust imps. I shook my head. “She’s under my protection now.”

The high priestess blinked, widened her eyes, and then threw a spell at me.