“This,” I replied, sliding off the stool, “is a set of instructions for creating magic. I’m going to make a spell.”

“You are going to cast vīsh?”

“Well … more like build magic than cast it.” I opened the cabinets in search of the tools I needed. “Mages and psychics can use their magic instantly, like you do, but that’s not how sorcery works. Aside from cantrips, my magic involves putting spells into an object. We call those artifacts. Some can be used over and over, while others can only be used once.”

Zylas followed, watching curiously. “We have vīsh like that too. That we put into objects.”

“You do?” I turned excitedly toward him, my arms full of rulers of different shapes and angles. “Like what?”

He tapped the armor plate over his heart. “This is magic so it does not break.”

“Did you make it yourself?” I asked as I piled the rulers beside the circle on the floor.

“Who else would make it?”

“I don’t know.” Returning to the cabinets, I searched around until I found drawing utensils—odd markers that smelled like candy canes, and a spray bottle I assumed was for cleanup. “Do demons trade or barter for things they can’t make?”

“Sometimes. Or we kill and take what we want.”

“How are there any demons left?” I muttered, placing the textbook beside the circle for easy reference. “I’m surprised you haven’t wiped your whole species out of existence.”

“We used to be many more.” He crouched beside me as I flipped to a step-by-step diagram that illustrated how to draw the spell array. “The oldest demons say we did not always kill so much.”

As I laid the longest ruler across the circle, I looked up. “You didn’t?”

“They say that long ago, Dīnen were powerful and wise. They commanded my kind to be more …” He canted his head. “To hunt each other less.”

“What changed?”

“The powerful Dīnen were summoned and never returned. The next Dīnen were summoned away, and the next. The new Dīnen were younger and more zh’ūltis.”

An uncomfortable chill ran through me. “Zylas …” Bits and pieces of comments he’d made spun through my head. “How often are Dīnen summoned?”

He gazed at me, somber, almost sad, as though pitying my lack of understanding. “Only Dīnen are summoned, drādah.”

The chill in my blood deepened with disbelief. “What do you mean? How can only demon kings be summoned? That would mean all the demons here in my world are Dīnen.”

“Yes. We are all oldest of our Houses, given the power of Dīnen when the one before us dies or disappears.”

“But … but there are only twelve Houses.” Shaking my head, I tried to make the math work. “And—and—how many demons are summoned each year? I don’t even know—”

“Hundreds and hundreds,” he answered. “Most from the third rank. Their Dīnen do not rule. They disappear before any of their House know who was next.”

Horror muted my voice.

“Dīnen were wise in the old times, but now they only think about the short future, because they will not live to see the long future. There is no one to tell us to stop killing.”

Demon summoning was, more often than not, a death sentence for the demons called into our world, but I’d never considered that summoning might have a larger effect on demonkind—that we were destabilizing their society. That we were stealing their leaders, the oldest and wisest males of their species, and making them our slaves.

Did summoners know they were calling the demons’ kings away, one after another, so swiftly that some Houses had lost all structure? But how could they know? What demon, trapped in a circle and forced to give up his autonomy for a slim chance to return home, would reveal that?

No wonder demons hated humans.

Too disturbed by this new knowledge to ask more, I returned my attention to my spell and began the painstaking process of drawing the array—the longest and most tedious part of artifact construction. Over fifty lines and curves would fill the circle by the time I was done, but despite having to measure each angle about six times to ensure I wasn’t screwing anything up, excitement buzzed through me. My very first spell!

“What is all this?” Zylas picked up a monster-sized protractor and turned it over in his hands. “This is magic?”

“No, these are tools for making spells. I have to draw it all out very carefully. See this here?” I pointed to the hexagon I’d drawn inside the circle, its corners touching the white ring. “This contains the spell and directs the magic inward. And this”—I indicated a triangle with one line missing, positioned like a downward-pointing arrow with its tip outside the circle—“will direct the power into whatever object I place here.” I touched the small circle I’d drawn under the triangle’s point. “It all has to be exactly perfect to work.”

Turning to the book, I flipped three pages ahead and showed him the finished array. “I have to add more lines to direct the different elements, and runes to dictate how I want the magical forces to behave.”

I expected a scoffing “zh’ūltis” but he was frowning at my book.

“You will draw this on the floor? And that will make the vīsh?”

“Yes. When I’m done, the magic will be imbued into an artifact.”

Another frowning appraisal. I waited. His tail swished, then he sat beside me, legs sprawled out, and propped himself up on one arm.

My eyes narrowed. “Aren’t you going to comment? Tell me how dumb and useless and pointlessly complicated this magic is?”

He smirked, which only increased my defensiveness. “I already knew vīsh hh’ainun was weak and slow.”

Ah, the insult. Finally. I felt better now. “Well, we can’t all wave our hands and make magic appear out of thin air like you.”

Smirk widening to show a hint of teeth, Zylas pulled the book away from me.

“Hey!”

I reached for the text but hesitated, confused by his intense focus. He analyzed the detailed arrangement of lines, angles, shapes, and runes, the seconds ticking past.

At three minutes and fifty seconds—I counted—he handed the book back to me. Answering my unspoken question with the return of his wolfish smile, he raised his arm. Crimson light sparked across his hand and veined his wrist. He spread his fingers as concentration tightened his face.

A glowing red circle flashed into existence, hovering an inch above the floor, perfectly aligned with the white one permanently marked on the smooth surface. But his spell was … was …

I looked down at the diagram in the book. Back up at his glowing red spell. Pure demonic power … in the shape of an Arcana array. The Arcana array I’d barely begun to create, except his was complete, showing every line and rune. Based on how perfectly his spell aligned with my work in progress, I didn’t doubt that every angle was flawless.

“How …” I whispered.

He relaxed his hand and the glow died away. “My vīsh is not so different, but I do not draw it. So slow. Gh’idrūlis.”

“Then how do you …” I recalled his careful study of the diagram. “You memorized it?”