Xever opened a desk drawer and withdrew a short combat knife. My gut dropped as he joined Saul at the table where the glowing harpoon pinned Zylas.

Panting, Zylas pulled desperately at the abjuration spell.

“All twelve Houses,” Xever murmured, raising the knife. “I’ve waited a long time.”

He slashed the knife down—Zora grabbed my elbow as I lunged forward even though there was nothing I could do. Nazhivēr’s wings twitched at my movement, the demon ready to intervene.

Dark blood welled in the slice Xever had cut across Zylas’s thigh. The summoner held the empty vial to the wound and blood trickled into it. When it was full, he capped the vial.

“You have what you need, Xever.”

Saul’s voice came out in a harsh rasp, and my attention darted to him. His venomous stare was fixed on me, his teeth bared and chest heaving. Faint white scars webbed his pale skin, covering every inch of his face and over his short hair, where patches were missing entirely.

“Now let me kill her. I’ll peel her skin from her flesh for what she did to my sons.”

“No, Saul.” Xever tucked the vial of Zylas’s blood in his pocket. “Not until I’ve confirmed whether she and the demon have a banishment clause.”

My jaw clenched. Xever had threatened to kill me before, but that must’ve been a bluff—one I hadn’t doubted at the time.

Twirling the blood-smeared knife, Xever assessed the five mythics flanking me. “But we do need to deal with these interlopers. Saul, keep Zylas under control. Nazhivēr will handle the rest.”

Beside me, Zora hissed an incantation under her breath, her knuckles white around the hilt of her sword.

“Kill everyone but Ro—”

Before Xever could complete the order, something the size of a marble flew over my head, arcing toward Nazhivēr’s face. Sneering, the demon swatted it away.

The instant his hand touched it, it exploded.

As the blast knocked the demon back, Drew’s steel sphere rose off his palm, then shot at Nazhivēr as though fired out of an invisible cannon. It hit the demon in the chest with a dull thud, knocking the demon back another step.

Nazhivēr’s lips curled, then he launched toward us.

The Crow and Hammer mythics scattered, Zora yanking me with her. I fell onto my knees as she pivoted, sword swinging. Venus lobbed another potion at Nazhivēr. As he ducked it, Drew gestured. The potion shot straight down and exploded between the demon’s shoulder blades, knocking him onto one knee as his blood splattered the floor.

Scrambling up, I ran toward Zylas as the demon wrenched the spell out of his chest.

“Ori novem,” Saul said. Another violet harpoon shimmered into his hand.

“Ori eruptum impello!” I gasped.

As the sorcerer swung the harpoon down toward Zylas, my spell flashed out. Papers flew into the air, blown off the desk, and Saul hurtled backward. The silver dome expanded into the window behind the desk, and cracks burst across the floor-to-ceiling glass.

Zylas rolled off the desk, landed on the floor, and launched into an attack—away from Saul and toward Nazhivēr. The winged demon was choking Andrew with one hand and had just lifted Venus off the floor by her arm with his other hand. Her scream rang out as his powerful grip snapped her wrist.

Crimson talons forming on his fingers, Zylas sprang at Nazhivēr’s back and rammed his talons down into Nazhivēr’s shoulder.

Snarling in pain, the winged demon dropped his human victims and reached back for Zylas. As Andrew fell to the floor, Drew darted in with a thrust of his hand. His steel sphere flew out of nowhere and slammed into the pit of Nazhivēr’s stomach. Clinging to his back, Zylas sunk his other talons into Nazhivēr’s opposite shoulder, and Zora swung her sword, slicing the membrane of Nazhivēr’s wing.

Silver runes from her blade flashed up the demon’s wing. The appendage sagged as though it had gone numb.

A hand grabbed my hair.

Saul threw me down on the table and closed both hands around my throat, cutting off my air. I grabbed his wrists, my fingers slipping on the silver rings that ran up his arms.

“Pathetic, mewling bitch,” he hissed. “I don’t care what Xever wants. I’ll kill you for what you did to my boys.”

My lungs screamed, limbs spasming. Teeth bared, Saul glowered hatefully into my eyes—then lurched back as a long blade swept through the spot where his head had just been.

Zora spun into a roundhouse kick, her foot slamming into Saul’s chest. The sorcerer staggered back, and she slashed with her blade again, forcing him to dive away. He slipped on scattered papers and fell.

In the far corner of the office, Xever tugged on a handful of chains around his neck—and no less than five pendants appeared from beneath the collar of his shirt. He selected an infernus from the collection.

Red light blazed, and a new demon took form—seven feet tall, lean and powerful, with a hairless skull adorned with bony ridges. His long tail lashed as he fixed his glowing eyes on Nazhivēr and his attackers.

Panting and coughing, I sat up on the table and grabbed Zora’s arm. “Get the others out of here!”

She shot a fearful look at Xever’s second demon, then rushed toward her comrades.

As the new demon advanced on the battle, crimson force exploded off Nazhivēr, ripping through the office. Gwen shouted an incantation and a crackling barrier of light arched over Venus and Andrew—but Zylas and Drew were hurled in different directions.

Zylas twisted in midair and landed in a crouch on the table beside me, skidding on the scattered papers. Red power flashed up his hand, and he swung his arm to point at Xever. A spell circle flashed around his wrist, power pulsing—

“Ori quinque!” Saul spat.

Zylas’s spell erupted, blasting toward Xever, and at the same moment, Saul’s silvery force hit Zylas, flinging him back. His arm caught me in the chest and I pitched backward with him.

He hit the window behind us, the sound of the impact so horrifying it consumed every ounce of my attention: shattering glass.

Sparkling shards danced all around me.

Zylas yanked me into his chest as we plunged through the broken window. A gale of icy wind hit us, propelling us like weightless leaves. We were spinning, falling, plummeting. A dark, reflective wall flashed past, the city lights whirling, Zylas’s arms the only thing that felt real.

Howling wind—a dark shape—then we slammed to a halt.

The force wrenched me from Zylas’s hold. I plunged down, then agony jarred through my arm as he grabbed my wrist. I jerked to a stop for a second time in as many seconds, hanging from one arm.

The sudden jolt caused Zora’s little black radio to fall from my pocket. The tiny earpiece yanked from my ear as the device plummeted.

Zylas clung to the side of the tower crane, one hand gripping a steel support and the other clutching my wrist. The roaring wind buffeted me, blowing me away from the structure, trying to tear me from his grasp. My feet swung through empty air, five hundred feet above the miniscule cars creeping along the roads below.

Five hundred feet. Six seconds. If Zylas’s hold slipped, I’d be a splatter on the pavement in six seconds.

Baring his teeth, he pulled me up. I stretched my hand out and grabbed his belt, then clambered onto his back and wrapped my legs around his waist, clinging to him so hard my limbs ached. I panted, my senses overwhelmed by the howling gale that beat at us. Inside the building, it’d been so quiet, so peaceful, while this windstorm raged on the other side of the glass.