Darika’s eyes met Sera’s, approval glowing in them. “Lady Serjana is correct. While we do not have the luxury of time, we are here to help the mortals, and to determine the true cause of the infestation. Time is not on our side, and if the demon plague becomes too much to contain, we will have no other choice but to reset the balance. However, I will work with Lady Serjana and Lord Kyle to find the root of the evil. You have my promise that no other action will be taken without just cause.”
“How long before there’s no other choice but to purge humanity?” asked a Ne’feri Sera didn’t know.
“Weeks, if that.”
The collective gasp was loud. Sera met her mother’s troubled gaze across the room. They had so little time to save the mortals—barely a blink in the history of the universe—but any chance at all was better than the alternative. Darika had given them all a brief reprieve. A chance to save everything and everyone they loved.
“In the meantime, continue to fulfill your oaths,” Taran said, his voice booming across the space. “We are all in this together.”
As Taran continued, Sera made her way to where Kyle was standing, stiff and defensive. She ushered him out into the hallway.
“Are you okay?”
His cool gaze met hers. “How would you be if everyone hated you that much?”
“They’re scared. It’s a human response to a terrifying situation.”
“Yeah, and I’m the terror.”
Sera stared at her best friend. His defeated tone was worrying, and she went for humor to diffuse the situation. “Whiny, much? I seem to recall a boy who laughed in the face of the worst Demon Lord of hell.” His gaze fastened to hers as she smirked. “Forget those losers. Come on, let’s find Darika. She’s the one we have to thank for giving us more time.”
By the time they ventured back into the room, most of the crowd had dissipated, including the Davenport family, for which Sera was grateful. She looked for Dev but couldn’t see him, though she could feel his presence. A small group had convened near the front of the room, including her parents, Darika, and the two Yoddha from the library, Mara and Ilani. They both bowed to her as she approached, but remained silent and watchful. Sera knew that they were there for her protection.
“So who’s got a plan to save the world?” Sera joked. No one smiled, though her father’s lip twitched. “Tough crowd tonight.”
Kyle scowled at her and propped a booted foot against a nearby wall. “I fail to see the humor in any of this. None of your necks are on the line.”
“All of our fates are on the line.” Darika smiled gently in his direction, and his scowl faded slightly. “And the lives of the human race.”
“We don’t have many options, short of going to Xibalba ourselves and confronting the Demon Lords,” Sam said, frowning. “Though . . . if we could catch a demon here, we could interrogate it.”
Darika’s eyes drifted to him. “As though a demon would tell us anything.”
“It wouldn’t have to,” Sam replied. “Kyle could delve into its mind, learn how and why they’re infiltrating the Mortal Realm. When I was an Azura Lord, it was not difficult to see demons’ desires.”
“But these demons are different,” Darika said, mulling over Sam’s proposal. “They’re too clever to give anything away.”
“It’s worth a shot,” Sera said, spotting Dev returning from an outer balcony out of the corner of her eye. She could sense that he was agitated.
What’s wrong?
She only had to think it for Dev to look up, his golden gaze meeting hers from across the room. Over the past few months, their ability to communicate had grown from sensing each other’s feelings to being able to converse through thought. Sera was still getting used to supernatural abilities like this one. Of course, she could close her mind to him, should she so choose. A girl had to have boundaries, after all.
Taran thinks the Ne’feri are going to do something rash to deal with Kyle, he replied mentally, making his way toward her.
Sera bit her lip as Dev reached her side, his hand falling to her lower back. She looked up at him and continued their silent mental exchange. They’re wrong about him.
Maybe.
A frown drew her brows together. What do you mean?
It can’t be a coincidence that the demons are appearing in close proximity to him.
Her thoughts were like firecrackers, igniting with frustration. The demons are here because this is where the KaliYuga nearly happened four months ago. This was where the biggest portal to Xibalba ever recorded was formed. It makes sense that this is where they would gather. And that’s not because of Kyle. That’s because of Azrath and Ra’al!
Calm down, my love. You’re right, and I promise we will get to the bottom of it.
Dev’s hand drew slow, soothing circles along her back, but his reassurances did little to temper the storm brewing inside of her. Sera curled her fingers into a fist, willing her inner tumult to subside.
Kyle pushed off the wall, drawing Sera’s attention. “Then the place to catch a demon is Silver Lake High.” He shrugged as the stares of the others converged on him. “Don’t look at me. I only just found out that demons love teenagers. But high school is pretty much a demon smorgasbord, so what better place to trap one of them?”
“Kyle’s brilliant,” Sera agreed. “Silver Lake is our best bet. We catch one of the demons, and we use it to figure out what’s going on.”
Sophia frowned. “I don’t think that’s a good idea. I can’t be there to protect you.”
“Mom, I’ll have the Yoddha. Mara and Ilani have been spying on me for weeks, anyway.” She rolled her eyes in the direction of Dev, whose overprotectiveness knew no bounds.
He only smiled. “Your safety was paramount. And you’ve proven to be unpredictable. Jump first, think later.”
As much as she loved him, sometimes she wanted to punch him in his perfect, patronizing face. She might only be seventeen in this life, but counting the many accruals of her lifetimes, she was as old as he was. And his domineering nature was starting to wear on her.
“I can take care of myself,” she said, bristling.
His response was soft. “I know. I’m just not used to having my heart on the outside of my body.”
Oh. A lump rose in Sera’s throat.
“I’ll be there with you,” Darika said to her. “And my sister, should she choose to be.”
“Choose to be?” Kyle asked.
“Kira does what she wants. She will come if I summon her, or if there’s something exciting that draws her. But she is . . . unreliable. She doesn’t tend to follow the same rules that we do.”
“That’s an understatement,” Kyle replied under his breath.
To Sera’s surprise, Darika grinned at him, nodding emphatically. “We agree on that then.”
After saying their goodbyes, Darika, Kyle, and the Yoddha took their leave. Dev pulled Sera to the narrow parapet and tucked her into his side. They stood pressed together for what felt like an eternity, saying nothing.
“I’ll be fine, Dev.”
“I know. But I don’t like leaving you here. I’d rather you be safe in Illysia, where you belong.”
She tilted her head to face him. “I belong here.”
“You belong with me.” He buried his nose in her hair, tightening his embrace, as if he had no intention of letting her go. He took her left hand and brought it to his lips, his mouth skimming over the rune there. His rune.
Sera’s insides felt like liquid. No boy had ever been able to make her feel the way Dev did. One touch of his lips, even in the midst of so much chaos, and she was lost.
His unique scent curled around her—the smell of spice and marigolds. Sera wound her arms around his neck, sealing her lips to his. When he held her like this, kissed her like this, everything fell away. They weren’t deities. They weren’t immortal. They were two people in love. Dev’s kiss was warm and sweet, telling her what no words could—that everything would be okay
.
She wanted to believe him. But as they broke apart, a cold numbness settled upon her heart like a layer of frost. “Be careful,” she whispered to him. “I love you.”
“And I you.”
Sera turned to rejoin her parents, but paused when she heard Dev say her name. “What is it?”
Dev cleared his throat, as if afraid of how she might react to what he was about to say. “I know you trust Kyle. And I do, too, but promise me you won’t be blinded by your feelings if it turns out that we are wrong about the rules of succession.”
“I won’t.” She exhaled. “And we’re not wrong about Kyle. He’s with us. With me. He always has been—even in the bowels of hell, when he could have been tempted to turn on me. If we give up on him now, he’ll have nothing. I’m not about to let that happen.”
Her parents were waiting for her, but she stopped to say goodbye to Kyle, who stood leaning against his car. His face was shuttered, but Sera could see past the mask to the worry he was trying to hide.
“It’s not you,” she told him firmly.
“What if it is?”
“Then we take care of it,” she said with a shrug.
His smile was crooked. “That easy, huh?”
“Who said anything about it being easy?” Sera chucked him on the shoulder and signaled to her parents that she’d be there shortly. “But all of this has got to be worth fighting for, right? Evil doesn’t just go away after being vanquished once. It’s always looking for ways to come back.”
“When did you get so smart?”
“I was always smart, but technically those words of wisdom are Nate’s,” she said. “Kid is some kind of genius prodigy. Wouldn’t be surprised if he took over the Ne’feri Order one day.”
Kyle shoved his hands into his pockets. “Yeah, me too. He was the one who figured out what Azrath was doing—and I still can’t believe he infused himself with deifyre to negate the wards of Illysia. Kid’s clever.” He grinned and scanned the area, as if searching for Nate’s mop of blond curls. “Kind of surprised, actually, that he wasn’t here, eavesdropping from the rafters.”
“He’s at a sleepover. Otherwise I wouldn’t put it past him. Honestly, I still don’t. He’s half human and half Sanrak—he could be here and we wouldn’t even know it. Although, Mom’s been on the warpath lately with all the demon sightings. Even Nate knows when to cool his heels.” The sound of her father’s car horn made Sera jump. “Sorry, have to go. I’ll see you in school tomorrow, okay?”
“See you.”
“And Kyle?”
“Yeah?” he said as he slid into the driver’s seat.
She winked at him. “I’ve always got your back.” She reached in to squeeze his shoulder. “You’re with me, right?”
“I’m always with you, Sera.”
She watched as he drove away, then jogged to her parents’ car. The ride to her house was quiet, but Sera could feel her parents’ unease. Neither of them spoke, but she knew that they, too, were worried about her safety. And Nate’s.
Her father spoke as he pulled the car into their driveway. “Is that Jemitra?”
Sera glanced up to see Jem sitting on the porch, and felt a rush of guilt at the sight of the textbooks in his lap. “Darn, I told him we could study tonight. We have a climate project due in a couple of weeks that I said I’d help him prepare for. He must have been waiting for hours.” She hopped out of the car.
“Hey,” Jem said, waving to her parents as her father slowed the car on the way into the garage. “Mr. and Mrs. Caelum.”
“Jemitra, how you’ve grown,” Sam said with a smile. “We need to reschedule that dinner soon. It was too bad that Vik had to cancel at the last minute.”
“Yeah, Dad had an emergency. But I’d like that a lot.”
“I’ll give him a call,” Sam said. “Set something up. I want to know more about what you’ve been up to. Always thought you had a lot of potential.”
Jem went red, and Sera rescued him. “Dad! You’re being weird.”
Her father laughed and drove past. “Sorry.”
“You know how he gets,” Sera said to Jem. And he did—when Jem had been a kid, he’d followed her dad around like a shadow. His own father hadn’t been the affectionate sort, but Jem had taken to Sam immediately.
Jem shrugged. “He’s a good guy.”
“So how long have you been here?” Sera asked. “I’m so sorry, I totally forgot I had a thing with my parents tonight.”
“Not long at all. And I was studying anyway, hoping I wouldn’t embarrass myself once we got started.”
“Why didn’t you text me?”
“I don’t have your cell number. Is it too late for us to cover a couple things?” He shot her a hopeful look.
The last thing she wanted to think about was world geography, but she owed him. “Of course not,” she said, heading inside and gesturing for him to follow. “Make yourself comfortable, and I’ll go grab my books,” she added, indicating the dining room table. She usually studied in her bedroom, but she was sure that wouldn’t go over well.
It didn’t matter that Sera was several thousand years old; her mother was still overprotective when it came to boys. Sera bit back a smile, remembering the last time she’d caught Kyle in her room. Not that she was remotely interested in Jem. He was cute, sure, but she had more than enough boy trouble on her plate with Dev and Kyle. What she did want was a friend—and she and Jem had been close before.
She raced up the stairs to her bedroom and grabbed her geography books before retracing her steps. “I’m so sorry you had to wait,” she apologized again.
“No problem, seriously.” He drew a breath and opened the book. “So climate change and world topology. Where do I even start?”
Sera jabbed a finger at the chapter heading. “Have you read this chapter yet? It should give you an idea of what kind of topics you can come up with.”
“How did I get stuck with climate change?” he grumbled.
Sera laughed at his expression. “Hey, you could have gotten the effect of modern technology on the environment.”
“Good point.” Jem stared at her, tapping his pencil on the open pages. He chewed on the end of his pencil, then shot her a surreptitious glance. “You seem so different.”
Her pulse tripped, despite the innocence of the question. “How so?”
“Just more composed. The girl I remember was all devil-may-care attitude.”
Sera grinned. “Seven years is a long time. I’d be worried if I still behaved like a ten-year-old.”
“You hated it when Nate was born,” he said and leaned back in his chair. “Remember that? You used to want to put him out with the trash.” Jem chuckled and looked around as if expecting to see Nate in the dining room with them. “Where is he? I haven’t seen him since we’ve been back.”
“He’s at a sleepover. And you won’t believe what a little know-it-all he is.” She shook her head. “And he kind of grew on me. Little brothers . . . pains in the butt. But I guess I don’t want to put him in the recycling bin anymore.”
“That’s why I’m glad I’m an only child.”
They exchanged a grin and Sera relaxed into a comfortable groove. It felt good. Normal. Like how it had been when she’d helped him with fourth-grade math and he’d helped her with messy art projects. She could be herself with Jem. Well, the girl she used to be anyway.
You’re not that girl anymore.
Her inner voice was quiet, and Sera ignored it. She might not be the girl she once was, but that didn’t mean she didn’t crave what she’d lost. An ordinary adolescence. Having a friend over to do homework, laughing about pesky little brothers, and not prepping to defend the world from the apocalypse.
She exhaled. “It’s really good to see you, Jem.”
“You, too,” he said. “You have no idea.”
“So how was it? London or wherever you guys were? You moved around a lot, right?”
Jem nodded. “Started out in London, t
hen Zurich, then Frankfurt, and we ended up in Paris for a while. Can’t complain though. It’s been amazing being able to live in all those different countries. My favorite city was Zurich. I went inside an actual glacier. It was mind-blowing.”
“Sounds like fun,” Sera said. “Better than here, anyway.”
Jem grinned and shot her an amused glance. “What? You mean Silver Lake hasn’t gotten any more exciting in all the years I’ve been gone? Come on. I’d have thought that all these tennis moms would have revolted by now over something—like the lack of decent coffee on Main Street.”
“Oh, they have. Only it’s over organic produce and appropriately zoned crosswalks.” Sera laughed at his comic expression.
“Sounds major.”
She wondered what Jem would think of the near apocalypse a few months before he’d moved back, or the demons crawling all over Silver Lake. Most people didn’t believe in the supernatural, and before she turned sixteen, she’d been one of them. Now, however, she believed. She’d been to Xibalba—seen its horrors—and nothing could erase the memory of it from her brain.
She smiled at her old friend, determined to keep that part of her life closed off. “Not much more than that happening here, I’m afraid. So, what was school over there like? Did you have a girlfriend?”
“At first I was home schooled because of the language barriers, but I seem to have a knack for foreign languages. Then I enrolled in the local lycée. That’s the high school.” His lips quirked. “And it was hard to have a boyfriend when we moved around so much.”
Sera blinked, and Jem laughed easily.
“What, I thought everyone knew after Ryan Davenport punched me in the nose in fifth grade on the playground.”
“He punched you?”
“I did try to kiss him.”
She laughed. “God, I wish I’d been there. Unfortunately, not much has changed. His body grew, but his mind stayed the same. Small and stupid.”
“Maybe he needs another kiss.” They dissolved into laughter as Jem’s blue eyes sparkled with humor. “It’s great to be back, Sera. I missed hanging out with you. Feels like home.”
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