Page 101 of A Study of Blood and Ichor

“Go help him. I’ll be right there.”

Another ominous boom shook through the penthouse, loud enough to rattle through to my bones. Ava flinched in our arms and Vain turned his gaze back to her.

Shift her out of here, I said. We need to get her somewhere safe.

It won’t matter, he replied.

I would have given anything to be able to strangle him in that moment. If Ghen is here for the book let’s just turn it over and be done with it!

He’s not just here for the grimoire. His stern answer silenced me. “He’s here for me,” Vain said aloud and stroked his thumb along Ava’s cheek, tracing the planes of her face as if he were committing her to memory. “I can’t shift you away. Even if I did, he would always find his way to you.”

Ava’s brows pulled together before a look of understanding took over her expression. She pressed her trembling fingers to her lips, a little more than a whisper escaping through the cracks between them. “Because I wasn’t the one who banished him when I first summoned him thirteen years ago. The connection was never fully severed.”

Vain nodded. “I understand Ghen well enough to know that he may once have never cared enough to track you before; he prefers not to involve himself with mortals more than necessary. But now that he knows you are mine—that you are my weakness—he’ll hunt you down forever if it means he will cause me to suffer for it.”

“Why?” she asked. “What does he want with you?”

“There’s no time to explain now,” Vain said. He tugged her hand into his lap and then pressed his forehead to hers. “Just promise me that you will stay here where it is safe. I can handle him.”

“Vain—”

“Do not fight me on this, mellilla.”

“But I can help!”

“No! You are still too weak. You only just woke up after days of being unconscious. I will not put you in his path. He’s far too dangerous and unpredictable, and I won’t take that chance.”

Vain settled his lips over hers, hard and demanding, and she reciprocated in answer as she wound her fingers through our hair. Before he could fight me on it, I tugged myself forward into the driver’s seat and kissed her back. Whether she knew it was me or not didn’t matter. I just needed to feel her mouth on mine. I had her for only the briefest moment, and then Vain retook control before he broke apart.

“Promise me,” he whispered against her mouth.

She nodded, and Vain tore himself away from her, rising from the bed and rushing toward the door.

“Stay,” he ordered, throwing Ava one last warning look before flying through the penthouse in search of Nesera and Alastair.

We found them outside on the terrace. Alastair knelt on the patio, hands splayed over the ground, while Nesera stood over him with her hands on his shoulders. She swayed on her feet, looking as if she might collapse at any moment.

What is she doing? I asked.

Allowing him to siphon off her energy so he can throw as much power as he can into the wards.

But we could both feel it still wasn’t nearly enough power to keep them up. A heavy groan whined through the air that only grew more threatening by the second, evidence of the strain as the wards struggled against the force of an archdemon attempting to knock down every last one. The drone reached a near-deafening level, loud enough that I curled back into myself in order to keep it from tearing at the very fabric of my soul.

“Alastair! Nesera!” Vain’s voice boomed from my chest. “Stop!”

Even with the terrace doors flung wide open, neither of them could hear his shout over the wailing screech that felt more like an imminent warning just before the moment of destruction. But just as Vain was about to run out to pull them away to safety, a flash of red out of the corner of our vision stopped him, and he whipped his head toward it.

Ava stood at the threshold of the great room, her skin so ghastly pale and her legs wobbled as she propped herself up in the doorway.

The air vibrated. Louder and impossibly louder until it felt as if the universe itself were on the verge of shattering.

“Ava!” Vain shouted and threw his body over hers at the last possible second before the building pressure released in a cataclysmic surge and exploded outward. It sounded like the sky was screaming, a great roar tearing through the night. Glass shattered, sending millions of shards sailing through the penthouse, and a heavy thump landed across the other side of the room.

From beneath us with her face buried against our chest, Ava clung tightly to our shirt and screamed.

The initial blast was over quickly, but the aftermath of the shockwave left our eardrums ringing for long after. Vain peered up from the crook of Ava’s neck and saw Nesera and Alastair’s bodies intertwined, lying in a crumpled heap on the floor against the far wall of the kitchen. Their limbs shifted slowly and Vain breathed a sigh of relief knowing they were, at the very least, alive.

Vain braced himself up on his forearms, still shielding Ava with our body as he pushed up shakily.

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