That was enough for her to swallow right now. I’d save the part about him taking me over for another time.
She eyed me skeptically. “You’re not playing some kind of prank, are you? Because I am in no mood for…”
I drew an X over my chest. “Cross my heart. I’m as serious as can be.”
She stared at me, waiting for me to crack a smile. When I didn’t, she widened her eyes. “Holy shit, Ash. A demon?”
“I know. On the plus side, he’s given me some insight into the rift ordeal. Though that’s not good news either.”
She squeezed her eyes shut and shook her head, no doubt biting back all the profanities she wanted to sling at me. Holland witches never dabbled in dark magic. Not even by accident.
I set my mostly full plate next to hers. “Do you need time to process, or should I continue?”
She made a circle motion with her hand. “Keep going. Get it all out now before I lose my ever-loving…” She drew in a deep breath.
I cleared my throat. “The veil has been weakened, and there will be more rifts. The fibers are deteriorating because someone summoned a demon prince. Or so Chaos thinks, right?”
“Correct.”
I nodded. “He says yes.”
She looked sideways at me. “Is that what he says? And I suppose he is the demon prince whose summoning caused this mess?”
I shook my head adamantly and held up my hands. “For once, this is not my fault. His brother Discord, who was also in the dark prison, got out a while ago. Chaos thinks that must be what weakened the veil. My summoning him made things worse, but I was not the catalyst.”
She raked her fingers through her hair. “So someone else summoned a demon prince…Discord?”
“Right.”
“Who? Why?”
I explained the conversation I’d had with Chaos in the kitchen and how it could be a rogue witch or someone from the coven. “Maybe John will reveal the culprit when we talk to him tomorrow.”
She picked up her empty beer, shook it, and set the bottle back on the table. “What on earth would someone in our coven want with Discord? I can’t wrap my mind around it.”
I sighed. “I don’t know. We don’t even know how long ago he was summoned. Time is different across the veil, but…”
Ember arched a brow, silently urging me to continue, but I pulled a Chaos and kept my mouth shut. I had an idea of who…and why…and it wasn’t good news.
“Talk to me, Ash. What are you thinking?”
“Activity has picked up tremendously over the past month, right? You’ve had more beasties to hunt than ever.”
“Yeah. We’re getting close to Halloween, though. The veil is at its thinnest in October.”
That was true, but this seemed like too much of a coincidence. “Wouldn’t you say the activity started picking up right after Cinder disappeared?”
She froze, her mouth half open, whatever words she’d planned not making it across her lips.
I tapped the tattoo on my arm. “I found the page of sigils in Cinder’s room, under a powerful spell. She was hiding them from me. From us.”
“No way. Cinder would never summon a demon. She was High Priestess. She had all the power she needed. She…”
“She was desperate to find Mom and Dad. She insisted they were alive out there somewhere.”
Ember kept shaking her head. “She wouldn’t, Ash. A Holland witch would never summon a demon. Never.”
“I did.”
“By mistake. Cinder doesn’t make mistakes.”
“She ran off to find our parents. Her protection sigil didn’t work. What if she found out what happened to Mom and Dad and summoned Discord to make a deal to find them? What if he killed her? What if she sold her soul to him to protect us? What if…?”
My mind reeled. There were too many what-ifs to consider. “Would he kill her, Chaos? If she released him from his prison, wouldn’t he owe her? Or would he need to feed and kill the first person he saw?”
“Demons do not feed like ghouls,” his voice rumbled in my head. “He would be in debt to whomever freed him.”
I blew out a breath. “Oh, good.”
“However…” Silence stretched inside my head. Crap. Whatever he said next would be bad news. Again. “If their request was not in proportion to their favor, he would require a price be paid for his assistance.”
“Oh, shit.”
“What’s he saying?” Ember asked.
“That any what-if scenario could be what happened.”
She drummed her fingers on her knee. “We don’t know Cinder is the one who started this.”
