Zylas pulled his arm from my weak hold. “Now should I kill her?”

“No,” I gasped. “Don’t—don’t touch her. She—she’s—she’s my—”

I broke off, panting desperately, and wrapped my arms around myself. Panic built in my head. I couldn’t take a proper breath.

I was alone in a reeking alley in the middle of the night. I didn’t know where I was. I had nowhere to go. Amalia had left and I was all alone. What was I supposed to do? All I had was my suitcase, cellphone, and a demon who wanted to kill everyone nearby.

Tears streamed down my face and I sank into a crouch, holding myself and fighting to breathe. I couldn’t do this alone. I needed help—but there was no one. Amalia had left. My parents had died. Any other mythic I turned to would report me to the MPD—assuming Zylas didn’t kill them first. I couldn’t go near anyone, not with Zylas. Anyone I exposed him to would be in danger.

A shadow blocked the streetlight. Zylas crouched beside me. “What are you doing?”

I shook my head, gasping and crying and losing my mind with panic.

He prodded my shoulder. I tried to pull myself together, but I was caught in a spiral that was dragging me deeper and deeper. Every time I fought its pull, the realization that I was alone and had nowhere to go or anyone to help hit me all over again.

“Payilas,” Zylas growled. “Stop it.”

I hunched inward and pressed my face against my knees, hiding from him.

He pulled on my shirt to make me sit up. I lost my balance and fell on my butt, then curled into an even tighter ball. I couldn’t breathe right. The ground was rolling and tilting.

“What are you doing?” he snarled. “Stop it!”

“I—I can’t! Leave me alone!”

He sprang to his feet and whirled, the barbed end of his tail just missing my face. He paced away from me, glanced back with his teeth bared and eyes blazing, then disappeared into the alley’s dark depths.

Now I was completely alone. The maelstrom of panic spiraled deeper, my pulse racing and heart heaving in my chest. If only getting rid of the demon were as easy as sending him away, but he was bound to the infernus. Just like me. I was an illegal contractor bound to a demon I couldn’t control.

Mom, what should I do?

My heart broke all over again, and I wept into my knees. Minutes crawled by, and my sobs weakened until I was sniffling pathetically, my cheek resting on my knee. I stared blearily into the darkness where Zylas had vanished.

A black shape appeared among the shadows, drawing closer. Two points of crimson glowed—demonic eyes.

Zylas stalked down the alley, irritation radiating off him with each gliding step. And under his arm …

Amalia hung from his arm like an oversized sack, her hands scrabbling vainly at his wrist. Her hair was a wild tangle, her face pasty white beneath her makeup.

Zylas swept over to me and tossed Amalia onto the ground. She hit the pavement in her third painful impact of the evening, a gasping whimper rushing from her throat. She shoved onto her hands and knees—and Zylas stepped on her back, flattening her. Her sharp cry echoed off the alley walls.

Leaning his weight on her, he grabbed her hair at the scalp and bent her head back to look into her terrified face.

“Listening, hh’ainun?” he snarled. “The payilas wants your help, so you will help her. If you don’t, I will take you apart piece by piece by little piece. Sounds fun, na? Or would you rather help her?”

Amalia’s mouth moved but no sound came out.

He pulled harder on her hair. “Answer or I will decide for you.”

“Zylas!” I shrieked, breaking my horrified silence. “Let her go!”

His glowing eyes didn’t shift from Amalia’s face.

She whimpered weakly. “I’ll help. I’ll do whatever you want.”

“Smart hh’ainun,” he crooned, opening his hand. He stepped off her and folded his arms expectantly.

I stared at him, then at Amalia, my limbs quivering. Her teary glare burned with hatred as, wincing and cringing, she gingerly sat up.

“I—I didn’t tell him to do that,” I choked. “I didn’t, I swear.”

Her mouth trembled as she fought back tears. Sucking in a breath, she straightened her spine. “I dropped my backpack. I need to go get it, then we should find a hotel.”

Just like that, she was tough-Amalia again, pretending nothing had happened and a vicious demon wasn’t one word away from ripping her apart. I wished I had half her backbone.

“Okay,” I mumbled, climbing to my feet.

Amalia got up far more slowly, each movement triggering a wince. Without the contract, without Zylas’s promise, he could have done the same to me. His interpretation of “protect,” whatever it might be, was all that kept me safe from his strength, his claws, and his merciless brutality.

He watched me, arms folded, tail lashing impatiently.

I was bound to him. He was my demon. And if I couldn’t control him, he would kill a lot of people before he and I landed in an early grave.

Chapter Seventeen

Amalia scrubbed both hands over her face, then dropped them into her lap.

“Let me see if I’ve got this right,” she said. “You were feeding the demon in the library because … I still don’t understand your reasoning, but whatever. You were feeding it. Travis saw you.”

I nodded.

“This afternoon, while we were out, Travis took you downstairs and Dad’s clients were there. Travis had made a deal with them.”

I bobbed my head again.

“And then …” She took a deep breath. “And then you made a contract with the demon to save yourself.”

“Yes,” I whispered, not minding that she’d skipped over the worst part.

We were sitting side by side on a stiff bed, heads bent together to hear each other’s quiet murmurs over the blaring television. This was the first motel we’d found and we’d checked into the double-queen room thirty minutes ago. Amalia had cleaned and bandaged her scraped elbows and knees with the first-aid kit from the front desk while I told her the whole story.

“You couldn’t have had much time to lay out a contract,” she muttered, picking at a tear in the skirt of her dress. “You definitely missed a few key clauses.”

“What are the key clauses?”

“There are a lot. What did you include in your contract?”

“Well, he …” I fidgeted with the infernus’s chain around my neck. “He has to protect me.”

“That’s vague. What else?”

“In exchange, I’m supposed to … make him cookies.”

She stared at me expectantly, waiting for the joke’s punchline. “Are you serious?”

“I was bleeding to death,” I mumbled in embarrassment. “It was all I could think of.”

“You’re supposed to promise the demon your soul when you die.”

“Why would I give him my soul?”

“Don’t you know what the Banishment Clause is?” When I shook my head, she sighed. “Okay, so once a demon is summoned to Earth, it can’t return to its own world—except with a soul it’s bound to. When you die, the demon is supposed to use your soul to escape our world. The Banishment Clause is crucial to a contract because without it, your demon is set loose when you die.”

“Zylas wanted my soul, but I said no.”

She huffed. “The demon must’ve been more desperate than you to agree to that. What else did you negotiate?”

“That’s it.”

“No, I mean, what other clauses did you two agree on?”

“None.”

“What do you mean, none?”

I shrugged self-consciously. “He protects me in exchange for baked goods. That’s … that’s the whole contract.”

Horrified disbelief twisted her face and she turned toward the room’s opposite end. I followed her gaze.

Zylas was crouched on the dresser, his tail swishing back and forth in front of the drawers. His nose was an inch from the wall-mounted TV, his head tilted. As we watched, he leaned sideways to peer behind the screen, trying to figure out where the picture and sound were coming from.

“Protect you,” Amalia whispered with a shudder. “You know a proper contract is about fifty pages long, right? You have to cover every possible scenario or the demon will find a loophole. Did you even define what ‘protect you’ involves?”

“No. He says he gets to decide what it means.”

Shivering again, she lowered her voice to a whisper. “Do you realize that demon doesn’t have to obey you? It can do whatever it wants, as long as you aren’t hurt in the process. I don’t understand why it isn’t already on a killing spree.”

Zylas’s tail lashed, thudding against the dresser. He peered around the other side of the television.

“I explained to him how I’d be executed if the MPD found out I’m in an illegal contract,” I told her. “I think that’s why he’s behaving so well. If he draws attention to himself, it would put me in danger.”

“And putting you in danger would violate the protection clause,” Amalia murmured. “That’s a good sign.”