And I would do that. In a minute.

“Mostly.” He gave me a faint smile. “Twisting the wraith spell to send them after Dagon still has me all sixes and sevens, but I’ll recover. Good thing it worked.”

“Yes, good thing,” I breathed. “Though you should never have attempted it. That spell could’ve gotten you killed in several different ways.”

His smile faded. “We were outnumbered, Dagon wasn’t taking our bait, and he was more powerful than either of us anticipated. It was a choice of possible dying versus absolutely dying. Given the choice, I’d always rather go down fighting.”

I brushed my lips over his knuckles. “So would I.” Then, even though it was the last thing I wanted to do, I released his hand. “Speaking of fighting, those demons screeching over their salt wounds aren’t going to kill themselves. Stay here. I’ll be back after I take care of them.”

This time, his smile looked more like the usual Ian: half teasing, half enticing. “Give me a moment, and I’ll join you. Can’t have you tiring yourself out. We have a celebration to—”

His smile froze and he stopped speaking so abruptly, I looked back at the demons to see if one of them had gotten up and started doing something threatening. But no, they were all still writhing on the ground more than thirty meters away.

Then I looked back at Ian—and screamed.

His right eye was now black and smoking.

Chapter 41

Ian’s head drooped and he listed to the side. That’s when I saw the hilt of a bone knife sticking out of the back of his head. Dagon—how? HOW?—was rising up behind Ian. His eyes, healed back to their icy blue color, stared right at me as he shoved another blade into the back of Ian’s skull.

“Don’t!” My scream broke from sheer panic. “Please, stop!”

Dagon did, though his hand remained on the knife that was half-buried in Ian’s skull. Shudders wracked Ian, filling me with relief and rage. Those shudders meant the second knife hadn’t bitten too deeply yet. He still had a chance.

A little smile played on Dagon’s lips as he leaned over so he could see me fully past Ian’s shoulder. “What will you give me if I don’t kill him, girl?”

“. . . n’t.” Ian’s harsh grunt was barely coherent, but his remaining eye blazed with green and his expression translated it plainly. Don’t. “. . . eave . . .” Ian forced out, his stare drilling into mine. “. . . by . . . owr’ . . . s’ell . . .’ing . . . us . . . I . . . commaaaaan . . . ou . . .”

I choked back a sob as I pieced together what he was trying to say. “You can’t command me to leave by the power of the spell binding us. I got out of its hold almost two weeks ago, when I killed the body it was tied to.”

Incredibly, a smile ticked the corner of Ian’s mouth. “. . . ’eat’d,” he said, approval clear in the broken word.

Tears overflowed and I didn’t care that they made Dagon grin. “Yes, I cheated. I didn’t trust you then, so I wasn’t about to make a deal I couldn’t get out of.”

Dagon tapped the hilt of the bone knife. Anguish flashed across Ian’s face before he tried to conceal it. “If you want him to live,” Dagon purred, “you’ll make another deal, girl. Only this one, you won’t get out of.”

Of course Dagon wanted my soul, my abilities, my subjugation, or all three. Could I stall him while I siphoned enough power to free Ian? There was no lake, pond, or other water source nearby. But if I stretched my senses, I might be able to find one farther away that I could tap into. I had to try.

“How did you survive getting your eyes stabbed out? You couldn’t have been playing dead. The wraiths vanished as the spell broke with your death and your body started decomposing. I had no idea you were so powerful. Do other people know?”

His laugh was his delighted one, chilling me because it usually heralded horrible things to come. I tried to ignore it as I sent my senses outward, skipping over a dried-up well that had once been used for this park but wouldn’t help me now.

“Almost no one does.” Dagon’s tone was as carefree as a child’s. He even shifted to make himself more comfortable. Then he tapped the knife hilt again as if to warn Ian not to move. “I suppose I have you to thank for the idea.”

“Me?” What felt like it used to be a stream was now dried into the merest trickle. Damned climate change. I pulled what little I could from that and kept searching.

“All your dying and coming back.” For the barest instant, hatred filled Dagon’s expression. Then his bright smile was back. “Such incredible power, wasted on a half-mortal brat. Still, if one as pathetic as you could beat death, I could, too. Demons already had access to the right power source. We’d just been transferring it instead of harvesting it.”

Power source? Did he mean the magic that all demons inherently had? But demons didn’t transfer magic. They enhanced their abilities with it . . . though they did transfer something else.

“Souls?” I asked, so sickened by the prospect, I stopped searching for water for a second.

Now his laugh sounded genuine. “Very good!”

Then his laughter cut off and his deceptively youthful features twisted with all the rage that his eons of living had allowed him to store up.

“And you cost me two: one to harvest for my resurrection, one to heal my body so I wasn’t trapped inside a half-rotted corpse. Souls aren’t as easy to come by anymore, girl. People are more loath to bargain them away. I also have to send some up the chain, or I’ll draw suspicion. That’s why you’re now going to sell me yours, unless you’d rather see your lover die?”

Dagon tapped the knife hilt again, harder. Ian’s features tightened until his cheekbones stood out in sharp relief and his jaw looked carved from steel. His gaze lasered on me, not a hint of pleading for his life in it. Instead, defiance blazed out.

Don’t you dare! that look said. Sod Dagon and his filthy deals!

I understood that rage. Oh, how I understood it! I also hated the idea of giving Dagon anything he wanted, especially—especially!—this. But as I stared at Ian, I found myself unable to tell Dagon I wouldn’t do it.

There are ways out of deals like this, I rationalized. Ian had almost gotten out of his deal, except for Dagon’s surprise resurrection trick. For all I knew, my father might be able to help me get my soul back, too. Furthermore, I didn’t stay dead after I died. Dagon would have a much harder time trying to collect a soul from someone who couldn’t be killed. I still had a chance if I did this. If I said no, Ian didn’t.

“I’m sorry,” I whispered to Ian. “I don’t want to, either. But I can’t . . . I can’t just let you die.”

Dagon began to smile. That rage and tightness left Ian’s face. His expression filled with a wistful sort of tenderness that made no sense considering our terrible circumstances.

“. . . ud’ve . . .’uv’d . . .’oo,” Ian said, struggling to get each syllable out. Then, he closed his eye.

“What?” I asked softly.

I was still trying to translate what he’d said when Ian slammed his head backward, the violent motion ramming Dagon’s knife all the way through his remaining eye.

Chapter 42

Smoke burst from Ian’s ruptured eye. At once, his body began to collapse into itself, that silky ivory skin turning to leather that cracked and split until his features were unrecognizable. Horror froze me into immobility while my mind screamed endless denials. Then pain roared through me, until I felt like my bones had been replaced with a storm of knives.