“What happens if he violates a clause?”

“Demons never violate their contracts. The magic binds them somehow. You can violate it, though. If you do, the contract magic weakens, so make sure you bake that bastard all the cookies it wants.” Her face hardened and she leaned close to whisper in my ear. “You’d better keep that demon one hundred percent convinced you can’t survive without me.”

I nodded earnestly. If Zylas decided Amalia wasn’t necessary anymore, he’d kill her.

She sat back against the headboard. “All right, first things first. You’re an illegal contractor, which means you’re officially a rogue and—”

Crunch.

Zylas, still crouched on the dresser, now held the television, which he’d ripped off its wall mount. As a crappy made-for-TV movie blared from the speakers, he studied the television’s back, then tore the cord out. The sound cut off and the picture went dark.

Amalia continued as though we hadn’t witnessed anything out of the ordinary. “You’re a rogue, so your best bet is to find a rogue guild and—”

“Wait,” I interrupted. “Doesn’t Uncle Jack have a system for forging his clients’ paperwork? So they can be legal contractors?”

“Yeah, but he uses special forms that his MPD contact has prepared, and without those …”

She trailed off as I jumped up. Zylas paused midway through prying the plastic backing off the TV to watch me dig through my suitcase. I pulled out my cantrips textbook and flipped it open. Taking the folded papers, I closed the book on the copy of the grimoire page and handed Amalia the forms.

She unfolded them, her expression incredulous. “How did you…?”

“Uh …” Admitting that I’d considered blackmailing her father seemed unwise.

“Whatever,” she sighed. “This is good. We can register you as a legal contractor, but you’ll also need to join a guild with a Demonica license.”

“A Demonica license?”

“Yeah.” She unplugged her phone from the wall charger and pulled up an app. “Guilds need a special license to have Demonica members. Most guilds don’t bother with it—they don’t want contractors. Let’s see … guilds with a license …”

I recognized the MPD app on her screen. Along with making and enforcing laws, the MPD required anyone with magic to join a guild by eighteen years old. Guilds provided support but also monitored their members, helping enforce the rules and laws.

Since I wasn’t a practicing sorceress, being a guild member was kind of like having a gym membership I never used. I paid a monthly fee and scheduled an annual checkup every spring, but not all guilds were that passive. Some were tight-knit communities, some were weekend clubs, and some were businesses with members doubling as staff.

“Okay,” Amalia said. “There aren’t many around here. Your options are the Grand Grimoire, Odin’s Eye, M&L, the Crow and Hammer, and the Seadevils. That’s it.”

“The only one I recognize is M&L.” That guild was also an international bank—the same one my father had worked for. They employed a lot of mythics, and most of us did our banking with them.

“You don’t want to join M&L. They’re sticklers for rules, and I think they only take Demonica mythics for security jobs. Let’s see … the Seadevils guild has one contractor and the Crow and Hammer has none. That’s no good. You’ll need to blend in.”

Unease churned in my gut at the thought of transferring to any of those guilds, but this was my new reality. Until I could get rid of Zylas, I had to accept I was a contractor. An illegal one.

“So that leaves the Grand Grimoire and Odin’s Eye—oh, but Odin’s Eye is a bounty-hunting guild. You’d never get in, and you want to stay far away from bounty hunters anyway. It’s gotta be the Grand Grimoire. They’re a Demonica guild, so you’ll blend right in with the rest.”

“Okay,” I mumbled.

“Let’s get this form filled out and—” Her phone beeped loudly. She tapped the screen and read something, her full lips pressing into a grimace. “The MPD just sent out the alert.”

“What alert?”

“For an unbound demon. Took them long enough. You sent in that tip hours ago. They must’ve lost the demon, but now they’ve located it and they need the combat guilds. See?”

She held out her phone, the message displayed in bold text.

MPD Emergency Alert: --CODE BLACK-- Suspected unbound demon active in your area. All CM assemble at GHQ ASAP. NCM take shelter. PROCEED WITH UTMOST CAUTION.

Unused to MagiPol acronyms, it took me a moment to parse the whole message. Combat mythics were to assemble at their guilds, while non-combat mythics should take cover. With that alert, every mythic in the city now knew about the escaped demon, and they’d be either terrified or preparing to face the creature’s unchecked magic in the hope of killing it. I squirmed, painfully aware of my role in the demon’s escape.

“Anyway,” Amalia said, tossing her phone onto the mattress, “let’s get these forms filled out. Dad made me do his paperwork all the time, so I have the MPD guy’s email memorized.”

We busied ourselves filling out the form while Zylas systemically gutted the television. Amalia scanned the paperwork with her phone, sent it off, then stood and stretched.

“As soon as we get confirmation that he’s inserted your paperwork into the system, you can apply to the Grand Grimoire. You need to move fast or it’ll look suspicious.”

I nodded. “Thanks, Amalia. I would’ve been screwed without your help.”

Her gaze darted to Zylas. “None of this will save you if your demon doesn’t behave as if it’s properly contracted. That part is for you to figure out. I’m going down to see if the front desk guy can recommend any late-night delivery options.”

Giving Zylas a wide berth, she swung the door shut behind her. I sighed, figuring she wanted to get away from the demon more than she wanted to visit the front desk. Unconcerned by her absence, Zylas snapped a chip board out of the TV’s innards and examined it from every angle.

“Having fun?” I asked him dryly, flopping onto the mattress.

He tossed the board into the gutted television and hopped off the dresser. Gliding over to the bed, he looked down at me, his dark pupils constricted to slits in the yellow glow of the bedside lamp. I wondered if he wanted to break me open and examine my insides the way he had with the television.

“You have a plan?” he asked in his strange accent.

“I think so.”

“Join a guild? Blend in?”

“You were listening?”

His hand closed over the front of my sweater and he pulled me upright. My head spun from the sudden movement—and my breath caught when I found myself nose to nose with him.

“You expect me to behave?” He sneered the word. “I must be obedient? What is the difference between surrendering my will and pretending to?”

I cringed back but he didn’t release my shirt. He towered over me, his upper lip curling to reveal his sharp canines. “I have to, Zylas. It’s the only way to—”

“What if I refuse to behave, payilas?”

Alarm shot through me. “You—you have to protect me!”

“I decide how.” His unsheathing claws pierced my shirt with a tearing sound. “I did not give you my will.”

My pulse thundered in my ears. “Zylas … what do you want?”

“Ih?”

“Back in the circle … you asked me what I wanted and I said protection. But what do you want? I know it isn’t cookies.”

“I wanted your soul, payilas, but you would not give it to me.”

I let out a slow breath. “You want to go home.”

Without my soul, he couldn’t escape this world. When my death released him from the contract, he’d be set adrift here. Though he’d escaped the circle alive, he now faced a human lifetime spent babysitting a helpless girl, then however much longer wandering my world until he died or someone killed him.

“I’ll find a way for you to return home.” Only after I’d said the words did I stop to consider them—and the magnitude of the offer I was making.

Zylas went very still. Watching me. Waiting.

“There has to be a way for demons to get in and out of this world,” I plowed on. “If there wasn’t, how would the first human have learned how to summon demons?”

“You think you can discover this?”

“I can’t promise I’ll succeed, but I promise to try.” I stared up at him anxiously. “It’ll take time—a long time, maybe years.”

“Years,” he scoffed. “What do you know about those, payilas of twenty years?”

“What do you know? You can’t even tell me how old you are.”

He leaned down, his warm breath brushing my cheek, and I recoiled. He moved with me until I tipped over and landed on my back. Bracing a hand on the mattress, he tapped the infernus under my sweater.

“Our contract is sealed.” His red eyes drilled into me. “But you will promise to find this—a way I can return home?”

“I promise to try my best.”

He searched my face for a sign of deception. “Then I will try to … behave … so the hh’ainun zh’ūltis will think I am obedient.”