I grabbed at my chest, finding no chain. “My infernus!”

Nazhivēr hit Zylas again, the sound of the impact like a blow to my gut.

Zylas’s crimson talons flickered out. He wasn’t struggling. He wasn’t moving.

Amalia disappeared from my side. I tried to push onto my feet and pitched forward, retching. Bracing myself, I looked up again.

His knee on Zylas’s chest, Nazhivēr held a small metal object—a steel vial. Lifting Zylas’s limp arm, he raked his claws over the demon’s inner elbow. Dark blood bloomed across his skin.

“Robin!”

Amalia beside me. Amalia shoving something into my hand—a flat disc on a broken chain. The infernus.

Nazhivēr held the vial to Zylas’s bleeding arm.

Daimon hesychaze!

Zylas shimmered into light, and Nazhivēr’s armored knee hit the pavement with a crunch. Crimson power streaked across the alley and filled the infernus, the silver medallion buzzing as Zylas’s spirit entered it.

This time, he didn’t burst back out to defend me.

Nazhivēr rose to his full, terrifying height and turned toward me, that steel vial still in his hand. His dusky lips curved in a mocking smile.

Zylas!

In answer to my mental cry, the dark flare of his mind met mine. Heat flowed through his presence—and it flowed through me. Fire in my veins, scorching my innards.

Power pulsed between us, and my pain faded to the background of my awareness. I raised my arm, palm pointed toward Nazhivēr.

Crimson veins streaked over my hand and ran across my wrist.

Nazhivēr’s eyes widened with shock—and in that instant when he hesitated, I imagined a five-foot-wide rune in the space between us. It appeared in glowing red.

“Impello!” I yelled.

The invisible blast flung Nazhivēr back. He twisted in midair, wings flaring for balance, and landed on his feet with his tail lashing. Magic blazed over his hands for a counterattack.

I created another rune, even larger, my magic faster than his. “Impello!”

It hurled Nazhivēr backward.

I created a third one. “Impello!”

He smashed into a building, the bricks cracking with the impact of his body. As he lurched off the wall, I summoned a fifteen-foot-wide rune right in front of him and screamed, “Impello!”

The wall exploded inward, Nazhivēr disappearing with it. Bricks tumbled from the jagged edges of the hole.

The heat of Zylas’s magic burned down my arm and scorched my chest, but I ignored it as I called up one more rune—a different rune. It appeared on the side of the building, spanning the entire wall.

“Rumpas!” I shouted.

The wall shattered. Brick and concrete collapsed with a cacophonous roar, a cloud of dust billowing outward.

I didn’t wait to see if Nazhivēr would reappear. Grabbing Amalia’s hand, I bolted in the opposite direction, leaving the toppled wall and unseen demon behind.

Chapter Twelve

Every step jarred my aching bones, but I kept walking. Amalia paced beside me with her arm around my shoulders to steady me. My infernus, tucked safely in my jacket pocket, clinked quietly against my impello artifact.

“Okay.” Amalia blew out a long breath. “Okay … are we going home?”

I squinted blearily at her. My glasses hadn’t survived Nazhivēr’s attack. “Isn’t that the direction we’re walking in?”

“Yes, but maybe we shouldn’t go back. It might not be safe.”

“I don’t think Nazhivēr is following us. He would’ve attacked already.”

She shoved her tangled hair away from her face. “Not what I meant. I’m talking about Odin’s Eye. They knew Ezra was a demon mage, and they saw us in that basement with him. And what if they saw the huge-ass Demonica ritual all over the floor? If our names weren’t on their bounty list before, I bet they are now.”

The winter night suddenly felt much colder. “But that means …”

“I don’t know what MagiPol will charge us with—illegal Demonica, an illegal contract, or even harboring a demon mage—but the guilds are going to hunt us too.”

“So … we’re rogues now?”

“More or less, yeah.” Her jaw tightened, then relaxed. “My dad drilled us on this stuff. I know what to do. To start—oh! Right. Give me your phone.”

Stopping on the sidewalk, I felt around in my pockets and located my cell. The screen was cracked, but I could just make out the time: 3:32 a.m. I passed it to Amalia.

She stuck her arm over the curb and let go. My phone plunged straight through a sewer grate. A clang rang out as it hit something under the surface.

“Amalia!” I gasped.

She fished out her phone and dropped it too. It followed mine into its subterranean grave. “First rule. Phones can be tracked. We’ll pick up a burner in the morning.”

“But you didn’t give me a chance to write down any phone numbers!”

Her look was incredulous. “You don’t memorize them?”

“Uh … no?”

“I memorize every phone number. Dad taught me that when I was, like … five, I think? I know all the important numbers.”

“Even Ezra and Tori and—”

“All of them.”

“Oh.” I peered miserably at the grate. “Should we have turned them off first?”

“They won’t last long down there anyway. Let’s go.” She steered me back into motion. “Normally, we’d head straight for a safe house, but—”

“But we’re not leaving the Athanas grimoire,” I interrupted fiercely.

“Exactly. And I have to get some stuff. Also, we can’t abandon Socks.”

“Absolutely not,” I agreed.

“Then it’s decided. We go home first, get everything we need, then get to a safe house.”

“Do we have a safe house?”

“The safe houses are technically Dad’s, but yeah.” She glanced both ways, then crossed a quiet street a block from our apartment. “There could be an ambush waiting for us at our building.”

I struggled to concentrate through the pain in my head. “We used a fake address in the MPD database.”

“But those two agents found us, remember? The abjuration sorceress and her snarky sidekick.”

“Lienna and Kit,” I mumbled. “That’s true. I was so shocked when they showed up that I didn’t think about how they showed up. Did Ezra give them our address? He’d filed a report that included our names …” I trailed off uncomfortably.

Amalia frowned for a few steps—then jolted to a halt. “Oh hell no.”

“What?” I gasped.

“It wasn’t Ezra,” she groaned, slapping a hand against her forehead. “It was me. My patent paperwork. I didn’t put our real address on it, but I did put my real name. I should’ve realized they’d processed it too fast!”

“What are you talking about?”

She looked at me guiltily. “I think the agents followed me home after I picked up my patent approval.”

My mouth dropped open. “You—you’re right! They knocked on the door minutes after you got back.”