Though I didn’t look back, I felt Zylas watching my every movement.

I ducked into my room, shut the door, and stripped out of my soaked bra and underwear. As I peeled the fabric off my wet legs, ridiculous thoughts kept popping into my head. Like whether Zylas had ever seen that much of my skin before, or whether he found my soft, pale human body attractive compared to a payashē.

Banishing the topic from my mind, I dried off and opened my closet. Sturdy jeans, long-sleeved shirt, sweater with a hood, warm socks. I dressed quickly, then pulled my wheeled suitcase from the back of the closet. The sight of it sent anxiety spiraling through my chest.

I remembered packing it the night before I left my childhood home forever. I remembered living out of it while interloping in Uncle Jack’s home, miserable and unwelcome. I remembered it bouncing along behind me as Amalia and I fled Tahēsh, venturing in the dark city on our own.

Grabbing my favorite books, I stacked them at the bottom, then pulled clothes off hangers and stuffed them in next. Tossed in my toiletry bag. Selected a few other small items from around my bedroom. Ducked into the main room to get Zylas’s landscape book.

I slid it in with my other treasured belongings, then tugged the all-important metal case from beneath my bed, whispered the incantation, and opened the lid.

The Athanas grimoire sat in its nest of brown paper, and lying atop it was the Vh’alyir Amulet. I snapped the lid shut, then tucked the case alongside the landscape book.

As I zipped my suitcase, the sound of running water cut off with a clunk of the tap. A moment later, my bedroom door opened and Zylas came in, a purple towel hanging over his head as he rubbed the water from his hair. His steps weaved as he walked to the open spot in front of my bed, tossed the towel aside, and sat on the carpet.

Crimson power lit his hands and arms, and I backed out of the way, pulling my suitcase with me. The glowing circle of demonic healing magic appeared—but unlike the usual rock-steady lines, it wavered and blurred.

He huffed out a breath, eyes squinched as he struggled to focus with a concussion—or the demony version of one.

I held my breath while he painstakingly brought the magic into focus, then lay back. Power flashed, the glowing magic rushing over his body, and he arched up in agony as his wounds filled with crimson light, then shrank and disappeared.

He sagged onto the floor, breathing hard, and his eyes cracked open. Dim coal-red, not bright crimson. He was still running low on magic.

Sitting up, he flicked his fingers at me. “Vayanin.”

I walked over and sat facing him. He cupped the sides of my head. His cool magic tingled through me, and under the guiding pressure of his hands, I stretched out on my back, my eyes closed.

His magic was cool, but also warm, rushing through me in waves of differing temperatures. His touch was gentle as he used the rare skills he had learned from an unknown master to repair the damage to my fragile human body.

So breakable.

Dark thoughts, tinged with dread, swirled through my psyche.

Nazhivēr knows. He will break her.

The magic flowing over me flashed hot, and agony burned my body, concentrated in my skull where it had struck the pavement. The pain softened, then disappeared, leaving a dull ache in my head. I drew in a deep breath.

I am not strong enough.

My eyes opened, finding scarlet eyes that had darkened several more shades. Zylas was leaning over me, damp hair tangled across his forehead.

“Vayanin, you said … if it wasn’t for me, you wouldn’t need protection. No one would be trying to hurt you.’”

“Did I?” I said weakly.

“Is that still the truth?”

I opened my mouth, then closed it. Where was this coming from? Why was he asking now? Was he worried about what would happen to me when he wasn’t around to heal my injuries?

Forcing a smile had never been so difficult. “Once we deal with Xever and Nazhivēr, I’ll be safe. You don’t need to worry about me. After you go home, I won’t be an illegal contractor anymore and I can go back to living a peaceful life.”

A peaceful, lonely, empty life. But I couldn’t say that.

His stare searched mine, a faint frown curving his lips. Flickers of his thoughts brushed against my mind, but I didn’t sense any relief from him. I wasn’t sure what he felt.

“Zylas,” I began hesitantly. “What—”

His hand clamped over my mouth, and he held perfectly still, not even breathing.

Listening. He was listening for something. I sucked in a lungful of air and held my breath too. His head turned side to side, slow and careful. My human ears couldn’t detect anything but the creak of cooling water pipes.

He released my mouth, uncoiled from the carpet, and ghosted through the bedroom door. Scrambling up, I rushed after him as silently as I could. He crept to the apartment door and canted an ear toward it.

His lips peeled back, baring his teeth. “There are hh’ainun in the hall. Males. At least four.” His gaze slashed to me, then he pointed to the balcony. “We will leave that way.”

Eyes wide, I rushed into my room to grab my suitcase and jacket. When I hurried out again, Zylas was striding out of Amalia’s room. She was right behind him, her face pale and a roller suitcase larger than mine gliding behind her. In her other hand, she carried a small cat carrier, Socks’s eyes glaring reproachfully from inside it.

Zylas slid the balcony door open, letting in a rush of icy wind.

Dropping from balcony to balcony, he took our suitcases down first, then climbed back up the same way. Next he carried Amalia down, who had a death grip on Socks’s carrier. The kitten yowled plaintively at the cold breeze, and I flinched at the sound.

They reached the bottom. As Zylas leaped up again, grabbing the second-floor balcony railing, I glanced into the apartment.

The front door swung open.

I darted away from the glass doors and pressed my back to the narrow wall at the balcony’s edge. Footsteps from within the apartment. Male voices murmuring. Drawing closer. The balcony door was halfway open, beckoning them.

The voices got louder, closer. I tried to calm my panicked breathing.

Zylas appeared beside me, clinging to the railing spindles. I flung my arms around his neck, and he pulled me over the metal handrail.

As we silently dropped, the glass door slid all the way open with a thump.

Zylas swung off the bottom of our balcony and landed on the one below it. He ducked into the shadows beside the unit’s dark glass door, holding me tight to his chest.

A long, breathless silence.

“Clear,” a rough male voice called in an undertone. “Looks like they already booked it.”

The glass door slid shut, and I sagged against Zylas, feeling as much relief as despair. We’d escaped capture—but our haven was compromised and we could never go back.

Chapter Thirteen

Of Uncle Jack’s several safe houses, the nearest one was south of the Downtown Eastside in a very old Vancouver neighborhood. The “Lee Building” was well past its prime at over a century old, but it’d been renovated … forty years ago. And its age showed.

Our sixth-floor unit featured a tiny kitchen that offered the only access to the bedroom, a cramped L-shaped bathroom with a stacked washer and dryer in the corner, and a decently spacious living room, furnished with a dining table, sofa, coffee table, and floor lamp. Everything was liberally coated in dust.