“You must have been shocked to see me,” I noted.

Another shrug. “Not then. I didn’t recognize you until later. It had, after all, been a very long time.”

For some reason, that made me angrier than everything she’d said before it. When you helped torture and murder someone for a decade, the least thing you could do was recognize her!

Ian suddenly filled the doorway, but a sharp shake of my head kept him from entering. “So, you’re offering to keep quiet about Ashael if I don’t hunt you down like the filthy scrap of vermin you are,” I summarized in a hard tone. “And I’m supposed to believe in your sincerity about this why?”

Her brow rose. “I grow tired of doing Dagon’s bidding. His last task, sending me to destroy Yonah’s island so he could claim credit afterward, nearly killed me, as you know. But, if you kill him and agree to spare me,” her smile crinkled the corners of her eyes again, “I’m free. Is that sincere enough for you?”

Was she capable of such back-stabbing selfishness? Of course she was. I knew that better than anyone. But I didn’t trust her. Still, that didn’t mean she was without usefulness.

“Sweeten the deal. Give us a location on Dagon first.”

“He doesn’t report his whereabouts to me,” she scoffed. “When he wants me, he uses the tie in my brand to find me.”

“Then tell me where you are so I can find him that way.”

She gave me a look that was so worldly, it reminded me that she’d lived for as many years as I had. “So you can kill me and lie in wait for Dagon next to my bones? I think not.”

I gave her a savage grin. “Worth a try.”

Her image started to fade. “The spell is nearly depleted. Accept my terms, Ariel. Unlike Dagon, I am not trying to kill you, so killing me would only be salve to your pride. Is that truly worth more to you than Ashael’s life?”

Yes! part of me wanted to shout. I wished that part came from my other half, but no. I owned all of it.

My sigh exploded out of me. When I spoke, it was through teeth clenched from long-denied rage. “Tell no one of Ashael,” I gritted out, “and I vow that I will never kill you, Ereshki.”

The last thing I saw was her smile. To anyone else, it would look like the carefree grin of a pretty Middle Eastern woman in her twenties. To me, it was venom sliding through my veins.

I threw the water into the sink, then pushed past Ian without speaking. I couldn’t stand to hear his recriminations or have him urge me to go back on my word. I already knew why Ereshki didn’t deserve a shred of my honor, but if I only kept my word when it was easy, then it was as worthless as she was.

I was so agitated, I walked out of the house and onto the boardwalk. The sun was up, its bright rays warming the cold wood beneath my feet. I didn’t stop until I’d left that wood for sand, then left the sand for the icy embrace of the waves.

Ian, no surprise, joined me. I had on a robe that floated around me in the waist-deep water, but he wasn’t wearing anything except an oddly satisfied smile.

“What?” I said. “Going to tell me you were right about me being too stupidly honorable for my own good?”

“Not at all,” he replied in a cheery tone. “I’m too busy envisioning how I’m going to thank Ereshki.”

“Thank her?” I repeated in disbelief.

His smile slid into a grin that rivaled the freezing waters for its coldness. “Before, I couldn’t fathom how I’d get to kill her without robbing you of your well-deserved vengeance. Now, she solved that problem, so I fully intend to thank her before I slaughter the little bitch.”

I started to laugh, which I wouldn’t have thought I was capable of only moments before. But this truly was funny, in a karma’s-coming-for-you way.

Ereshki had gotten free before because Ian’s guards had made the mistake of underestimating her. She’d just made the same mistake with Ian. Ereshki thought she was safe because I’d vowed not to kill her? Wait until she saw what Ian could do.

“I’m suddenly in a good mood,” I said.

“So am I,” he replied, his grin turning wolfish. “Because thanks to her contacting you, now I can also feel where she is.”

Chapter 39

The blur that made up my surroundings stopped with the same nauseating abruptness I’d grown used to with teleporting. We’d driven to Dummerston, Vermont, but left our car at a gas station to teleport the rest of the way. Now, Ian stopped a full half kilometer short of where he said he felt Ereshki.

We stayed at the edge of Route 30. The narrow, north-south road was mostly free from cars despite this being the hour where most human workers would be on their way home. Still, this section of Dummerston looked like it hadn’t been clogged with rush-hour traffic in decades, at least. I pulled out a pair of binoculars from Ian’s bag and aimed it where he pointed.

Winter had stripped many of the trees bare, allowing me to see past them to a three-story white lodge with a rust-colored fence. There were two tiny shacks on either side of it, but the lodge was the main structure, with the mountain towering up behind it. A faded sign out front proclaimed that this had once been a ski mountain, but from the empty slopes, lack of lights, and missing ski lifts, it had been closed for many years.

It might have one resident inside, though. I couldn’t tell. The windows I could see were all boarded up.

“I can’t see inside, and it’s too far away for me to hear a heartbeat,” I told Ian, lowering the binoculars.

“Ereshki’s in there,” he said with absolute confidence.

Then she’d chosen her hideout well. The former ski lodge wasn’t near any rivers, and when I sent my senses out to check the ground for water reservoirs, the lack of energy that bounced back practically screamed Parched! to me. There wasn’t even snow on the ground despite this being the height of winter.

“I suppose the Sahara was too far for her to travel,” I said, only half joking. With the earthquake spell at Yonah’s, the teleporting spell to leave Ian’s house, and contacting me through the water spell, Ereshki might not have had the energy to go farther than Vermont. Thousands of years demon-branded or no, that was still a lot of magic for her to wield.

Ian let out a grim snort. “If she wanted to live, then she should’ve conjured up another teleporting spell.”

“She’s probably out of juice,” I replied.

He flashed me a predatory look. “Then this will be easy.”

If it was, it would be the first easy thing that had come our way since we teamed up months ago. Still, I could hope.

“Let’s find cover,” he said, hefting our three heavy bags.

We chose the remains of a large tree for our hiding place on the opposite side of route 30. It was a hundred meters farther from the lodge, plus the surrounding patch of evergreens blocked our view, but Ian assured me that he could feel it if she tried to leave. I hadn’t seen a car in the lodge’s parking lot, but Ereshki could have hidden one in the back. Or she could have done what we’d done and left her car elsewhere—assuming she’d driven to this section of Vermont. This could have been where she’d teleported to when she escaped from Ian’s. That had only been a day ago, even if it felt much longer.