My hand was wrapped around Zylas’s warm fingers. I wasn’t sure why. So we’d look more natural and couple-like? So I could squeeze his hand in warning if he did something too demony? So I could feel like we were connected in some small way?

The distinct wheeze of a bus engine reached my ears, and the large vehicle turned the corner. I gulped as it rolled to a stop and the doors slid open.

Clutching Zylas’s hand, I stepped inside the bus and stuffed two tickets into the receptacle. The middle-aged man didn’t follow us onboard, and the doors slid closed. A group of teenagers sat near the front, chatting loudly. They didn’t spare us any attention as I nudged Zylas ahead of me, pushing him toward the rear doors.

The bus accelerated away from the curb. At the sudden movement, Zylas wobbled—and his tail appeared as he instinctively swung it out for balance.

He snapped it up around his waist again almost as fast, and I glanced over my shoulder in a panic. The teens’ chatter went on. They hadn’t noticed.

We moved into the gap beside the rear doors, Zylas’s back to the driver and group of teens. When I wrapped my hand around the center pole, he copied me, the bus’s dim overhead light washing the red undertones from his skin. He raised his eyes, two crimson spots reflecting on the window as dark storefronts slid past outside it. The bus trundled to a stop at a traffic light.

“You are not there.”

My gaze flicked from the window to his face.

“Since I left the circle …” The engine’s low roar almost drowned out his husky voice. “… you have been in my mind. Always. Sometimes quiet, but always there.”

We swayed in unison as the bus slowly took a corner.

“I’d only just gotten used to hearing you in my head,” I mumbled. “Now you’re gone. Our connection is gone.”

He slid his hand down the pole until it touched mine.

I let out a shaky breath. “I can’t share your magic anymore. We can’t communicate mind to mind. You can’t hide in the infernus.”

In other words, all our special advantages were gone. We were just a demon and a human, separate and independent of each other. Our special link, our intimate bond, had been erased.

Why did losing the infernus feel like a piece of my soul had been severed?

“We have to replace it,” I whispered, my panic spiking. “As soon as possible.”

He gazed at me, then tugged on my jacket, pulling me closer. As I tipped into him, my eyes widening, he leaned down. His nose touched my cheek, his breath warm on my skin.

“You are afraid.”

I said nothing. Didn’t know what to say. I’d never been more helpless to read his meaning or his mood.

Somehow, standing on a bus dressed in human clothes, he seemed as mysterious and incomprehensible as he had the first time I’d seen him in the summoning circle in Uncle Jack’s basement.

Chapter Sixteen

The safe house door banged shut. I leaped off the sagging sofa and hurried toward the hall.

Amalia strode to meet me, her jacket zipped up to her throat and a plastic bag hanging off her arm. She waved me back into the living room and dropped her purse on the floor.

Zylas looked over. He sat in his new favorite spot by the window, still wearing his black hoodie. Not the sweatpants though. He’d forgotten about his greaves and the metal armor had torn the knees out of the cotton pants when he’d sat down.

“Got one,” she announced, pulling a cheap cellphone out of her bag. “Thank god for twenty-four-hour stores.”

I bounced nervously on the balls of my feet as she pried the packaging open, inserted a new SIM card into the phone, and turned it on. The few minutes it took for the phone to boot up and connect to the network made my skin itch.

“Calm down, Robin,” she muttered. “You’re making me jumpy.”

“Sorry.”

She finally dialed, and the phone rang on speaker. Six rings, and it went to voicemail. She redialed. It started ringing again—and the line clicked.

“Who is this?” a gruff male voice demanded.

“Your daughter,” Amalia said, rolling her eyes. “My first burner phone. You should be proud, Dad.”

“Where are you?”

“The Lee Building apartment.”

“Is Robin there? Are you two okay?”

“I’m here,” I said quickly, a warm feeling pushing through my anxiety. Uncle Jack actually sounded worried about us. “We’re fine.”

“And is … uh … Zeelas there?”

“Zuh-yee-las,” Amalia corrected. “Get his name right, jeez. And yes, he’s here.”

Uncle Jack puffed out a breath, and a rustling noise suggested he was repositioning. Considering it was after midnight, he was probably in bed. “So, what happened?”

“We were helping some guildmates with illegal Demonica shit and got busted by Odin’s Eye,” Amalia summed up with admirable succinctness.

“Illegal shit like a demon mage? What were you thinking, Amalia?”

“How do you know about that?”

“MagiPol pushed the bounty alert to every mythic in the city. You’ve been charged with harboring a demon mage and performing prohibited Demonica magic. There’s a sizable bounty on you both.”

Amalia swore.

With my gut sinking at the confirmation of my fears, I asked, “Do you know if Ezra’s been captured?”

“Not yet, but the combat guilds are searching for him and his buddies—and once they’re dealt with, the guilds will be coming after you two.” He cursed under his breath. “I taught you better than to get involved in this kind of thing, Amalia! Didn’t I tell you—”

“Yeah, yeah,” she interrupted. “Let’s come back to that. First, I need to know if an infernus can be replaced.”

“Replaced? You mean, if an infernus is damaged?”

“Yeah.”

“Typically not, no.”

“Why not?” I demanded.

“Legal contracts, and most illegal ones, don’t allow the demon to regain its autonomy under any circumstances. If the infernus magic ceases to function, the demon can’t act on its own and basically freezes up.”

“Ah, shit,” Amalia muttered. “You can’t set up a new infernus without the demon accepting it, and if the demon is frozen, it can’t do that.”

I looked from the phone to Amalia and back. “Frozen? You mean, the demon just … turns into a statue? And it’ll just stand there forever?”

“No contractor would just leave it there,” Uncle Jack corrected. “But yes. There’s nothing to do but put the demon down.”

Bile rose in my throat and I swallowed hard. “That’s barbaric. It isn’t the demon’s fault if an infernus breaks.”

“It’s necessary.” Impatience sharpened Uncle Jack’s voice. “Otherwise, the demon would be free to kill its contractor—or anyone else nearby.”

I pinched the bridge of my nose. “What about a demon that hasn’t frozen up?”

“Then you could theoretically repeat the infernus ritual, assuming you can make the demon agree to—wait, are we talking about your infernus? With Zeelas?”