“My vīsh must be perfect too. I learn and learn it, practice it until I can never forget.”

His insane memory—the way he could memorize a thousand puzzle pieces in a few minutes—suddenly made a whole lot of sense. All those complex, tangled demonic spells I’d seen him cast … they didn’t appear from some mysterious spell cache in the ether; he’d memorized them all in perfect detail, down to the exact angles and tiniest runes.

“Wow,” I whispered.

His lips curved, but I wasn’t sure if he was gloating or flattered by my awe.

“Are there limits?” I asked. “How many spells have you memorized?”

“I do not know the number. Hundreds and hundreds.” He leaned back again, braced on one hand. “Sometimes it is hard to think of the one I want.”

“But if you know it, you can cast it instantly?”

“Hnn. I need … some seconds? I must see it perfect and clear in my mind before I cast. Bigger spells are more difficult. If it is wrong, it is …” He tipped his head back, gazing at the skylight. “It is dangerous.”

I absently ran my finger down the page of the book. “That sounds like it requires a lot of concentration.”

“Var. If I am fighting, I do not always have time to cast.”

“Still, your magic is really powerful and faster than mine. But,” I added brightly, “mine will still be pretty fast once it’s ready, assuming I can make it right.”

He waited, with only the occasional impatient scoff, as I resumed building out the array. Though he’d memorized it in a few minutes, his reproduction of the spell was powerless. Anyone, mythic or human, could speak an artifact’s trigger incantation to activate it, but only Arcana mythics like me could create them. I was a conduit, and through the process of creating the array, my passive magic would infuse it.

It took me two hours of careful, intensive work to finish, every line and angle measured and remeasured. Then I spent another hour adding the runes in painstaking detail.

When I went to the cupboards, Zylas stirred out of his bored stupor. I collected bags of iron powder, salt crystals, copper calcinate, and black sulfur, as well as a jar of oil. Using the scales on the counter, I measured out exact amounts and added them to the small, circular nodes I’d drawn into the array.

Finally, I selected a thin rectangle of pure iron the size of a domino. With a small silver marker, I drew three runes down the front as shown in the text, and placed it in the node at the point of the open triangle—the spot where all the magic would be directed.

“There,” I declared proudly, standing over my work. “It’s ready.”

Zylas wandered to my side. He stared down at the array, dotted with piles of colored powder and three drops of oil.

He waited a beat. “Now what?”

“Now”—I consulted the book—“the array needs to charge for at least sixteen hours.”

“Charge?”

“Arcana is powered by the natural magical energies that flow across the earth. Spells like this absorb that energy, then expend it when they’re triggered.”

He scrunched his nose. “You spent hours making this, now you must wait even longer? So slow, drādah.”

I shrugged. “Making the spells is slow. Some of these”—I patted the book—“have to charge for months before the sorcerer can complete them.”

“What will you do while you wait?”

“Well …” I drew in a deep breath. “Zora thinks she found the vampires’ hideout—where the ones controlling all of this might be. She’s taking a team in tomorrow morning.”

His bored lassitude vanished as he focused his full attention on me.

“I’m not invited on their mission. And even if I were, I couldn’t search for answers with a bunch of witnesses. If we’re going to learn what’s really going on, and why the vampires are so interested in Uncle Jack, I think we need to go see this place for ourselves … before she and her team get there.”

Zylas glanced at the skylight, the dark glass reflecting the room and my Arcana array back at us. “Then we have until the sun returns.”

Which meant we needed to go now—when the vampires were at their strongest.

Chapter Sixteen

This vampire “lair” was several steps up from the last one. Not that the last one had qualified as a lair, really. I didn’t know what to call them. Hideouts? Dens? … Habitats?

I lurked in a shadowy doorway across the street from the building Zora had marked on her map. Tucked deeper in the shadows behind me was Zylas. His heat radiated into my back as he studied the building over the top of my head. Traffic zoomed past, headlights glaring in the misty rain.

We were in the heart of downtown. In fact, we weren’t far from the storm drain I’d escaped through last night.

Neither the tallest nor the nicest building on the block, the tower was anonymous among its neighbors. It could be full of offices or condos, and stood out from the rest only in that the front doors were blocked off by construction barricades and the second through fifth floors had plywood in place of windows.

“What do you think?” I whispered to Zylas.

“Too many hh’ainun here. They will see me.”

Though darkness had fallen, it was still early evening and the remnants of rush-hour traffic was whizzing by. Zylas, with his horns, tail, red eyes, and armor, was a tad noticeable.

“I’ll go around to the back,” I told him, “and let you know when it’s safe to come out again.”

Crimson light rushed over him and his power returned to the infernus. I hugged my arms to my chest—having lost my coat, I was wearing three sweaters instead—and ventured into the light rain.

A few minutes of nonchalant ambling later, I entered the back alley and whispered, “Okay, Zylas.”

He materialized beside me, and together we studied the new view—a blank wall with a loading bay and a single, featureless steel door. Red light flared up Zylas’s arm, forming a pattern of runes, and he pressed two fingers to the thin gap between the door and frame. Crimson power blazed out of the gap, then he pushed on the steel.

The door swung open.

I squinted suspiciously. “Where did you learn to do that?”

“It is how the metal box in the summoner’s house was opened.”

Uncle Jack’s safe, broken open with demonic magic. Zylas learned too fast for comfort.

A dark hallway waited for us. The dusty smell of drywall hung in the air, and a layer of white grit covered the concrete floor, yet to be finished with carpet or tile. I followed Zylas, my heart thudding so loudly I wouldn’t have been surprised if it was making more noise than my shoes.

The corridor led us to an unfinished lobby, lit only by the streetlamps outside. The ceiling was full of missing tiles, and bundles of wire and unattached ductwork hung from the dark space above. Steel studs were piled beside a stack of drywall, buckets were scattered around, and extension cords snaked across the floor. An industrial fan pointed toward the closed and blockaded front doors.

I nudged my toe through the dust. The half-completed construction appeared abandoned.

Zylas angled toward the opposite end of the lobby, his steps silent. He paused at a door, then pushed it open. The soft clack of the latch echoed through the dark concrete stairwell on the other side as he started up the steps.