Alex reached beneath her collar for the string of salt pearls. Gone, they’d fallen off somewhere … No, the broken wire was still there, two pearls hanging on. She seized one and crushed it in her hand, hurling the dust into the moist air.
The thing on top of her shrank back, a sharp, high mewl escaping its lips.
Its eyes were black, not that Ocean Pacific blue Alex loved so much. Because this monster wasn’t Hellie at all. Because magic never did the kind thing.
There would be no prize at the end of all your suffering. There was no reward but survival. And dead was dead.
“That’s what I thought,” Alex said, spitting leaves and dirt from her mouth, staggering as she tried to push to her feet. How many times before she didn’t get back up?
“You left me,” Hellie said, and her voice was broken.
It didn’t matter that Alex knew it wasn’t really Hellie. Nothing could stop the hurt inside her, the regret. Those were real. But this time Alex could see something else in Hellie’s eyes, not just pain but something eager. Appetite.
Demons are nourished by our base emotions. Fed by lust or love or joy.
Or misery. Or shame.
“You’re hungry, aren’t you?” Alex said. “And I’m just standing here filling you up.”
Hellie grinned, sweet and familiar. “You always taste good to me, Alex.”
“You’re not Hellie,” Alex snarled. Her arm shot out, and the little Gray entered her with a high, wailing scream on his lips. She tasted camphor, heard the clip-clop of horse hooves, smelled rose water—his mother wore it. She shoved the demon with both hands, but it didn’t stumble backward. It leapt onto the low wall that bordered the garden, body poised.
Alex’s mind was screaming. Angel-not-angel. Hellie-not-Hellie. But it looked like her, moved with her grace.
“You can’t just leave us,” the demon said with Hellie’s voice. “We’re your family.”
And they had been. Not just Hellie, but Len too. Betcha. They were all she had for such a long time. She’d wanted to scrape it all clean, leave nothing but a hollow, just like that bomb-blast hole at the old apartment.
She’d built something new and shiny right over that empty place.
“Why do you get the second chance?” Hellie demanded, stalking toward her. “The new life?”
Alex knew she should run, but she found herself trying to form an answer, some reason it had been her and not Hellie. It’s a puzzle. It’s a trap.
But it was also true. Hellie should have been the one to survive.
Hellie’s hand slid around her throat, squeezing. It was almost a caress.
“It should have been me,” she said. “I was the one who was meant to bounce back. I was supposed to leave you behind.”
“You’re right,” Alex gasped out, feeling fresh tears on her cheeks, the will to fight slipping away from her. “It should have been you.” Alex had never belonged in this life, every day a struggle, a new opportunity for failure, a war she couldn’t win. Hellie would have breezed through it all, beautiful and brave. “It should have been you,” she repeated, the words breaking on her sobs as her fingers closed over the last of her salt pearls. But it wasn’t.
“Life is cruel. Magic is real. And I’m not ready to die.”
She slammed the pearl into the demon’s forehead, feeling it explode beneath her palm. It was as if the thing’s skull gave way, crumpling in like wet sand, dissolving into a bloody crater. The demon shrieked, its skin hissing and bubbling.
Alex ran—down the stairs, into the street. The Hutch was closer, but she bolted for Il Bastone, letting the little Gray’s strength carry her. She needed the library. She needed to feel safe again.
She fumbled with her phone and called Mercy without breaking her stride. “Where are you?”
“Home. I have your bag. You—”
“Stay there. Don’t open the door to anyone who … I don’t know …
anyone who shouldn’t be alive.”
She hung up and sprinted across Elm. Even with the Gray’s strength, her legs were already shaking, her muscles exhausted from the ordeals of the last week.
Alex risked a glance back, trying to scan the crowds of students in their hats and coats. She paused to punch another number into her phone. She was running again before Dawes picked up.
“Are you still with Tripp?” Alex asked. Her voice was thready and breathless. “Get to Il Bastone.”
“We’re not allowed at Il Bastone.”
“Dawes, just get there. And get Turner and Tripp there too.”
“Alex—”
“Just fucking do it! I brought something back with me. Something bad.”
Alex looked over her shoulder again, but she wasn’t sure what she expected to see. Hellie? Len? Some other monster?
There was nothing to do but keep running.
30
As she raced down Orange Street, Alex could feel the little Gray clamoring to be released, rattling around her head like someone had given him too much sugar. But she wasn’t letting him go until she knew she could get inside Il Bastone.
Alex took the steps in a single, awkward leap. What would it mean if this door remained closed to her now? If the Lethe board had already banished her from this place of protection? From quiet and safety and plenty?
But the door flew open. Alex lurched inside, falling forward. She felt the little Gray’s ghost yanked free, the wards preventing him from entering, even hidden inside her body. He left in a sulky rush, taking his strength with him.
The door slammed behind her, hard enough that the windows shook.
Alex felt her thighs wobbling with fatigue. She used the banister to pull herself up, felt the cool wood beneath her palm, pressed her forehead against the finial, the ridges of the sunflower pattern hard against her skin. This was home. Not her dorm room. Not the wreckage she’d left behind in Los Angeles.
She drew a few long breaths and made herself peer through the window in the front parlor. Hellie—or the demon pretending to be Hellie—stood on the sidewalk across the street. How had Alex mistaken a monster for the real thing? Hellie had the confident grace of an athlete, easy in her beauty, even when their lives were fraying at the edges. But the thing across the street held itself taut, wary, its hunger barely leashed.
I was the one who was meant to bounce back. I was supposed to leaveyou behind.
“Shut up,” Alex muttered. But she couldn’t pretend those words were a demon lie. The wrong girl had died at Ground Zero.
Alex picked up her phone and texted the group. There’s a blonde outside of Il Bastone. Looks like a girl. IS NOT A GIRL. Use salt.
But her eye caught movement on the sidewalk. Dawes and Tripp. Had they seen her message?
Alex hesitated. She didn’t have time to raid the armory for salt and weapons. She had no salt pearls left. Fine. She couldn’t stand there and do nothing.
