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Dead girls.

I’d never heard anyone call them that before. Usually, they were the
missing girls
or the
abducted girls
, or, more recently,
the bodies
. Hearing Dimitri refer to them that way made the possibility of Alara getting hurt feel more real.

What if he was right, and there were vengeance spirits hunting us—or possessing people who were under Andras’ control, like my aunt’s black-eyed neighbors?

Could Andras control people and spirits from in here?

“I still don’t understand why she ran off.” Gabriel shook his head. “You aren’t prisoners. I thought you all wanted to be here to help your friend.”

“She is trying to help him.”

Gabriel dropped into the chair next to Dimitri’s and closed his eyes. “But who’s going to help her?”

Maybe he had a point. Alara
was
at the site of a haunted prison with a mechanical engineer who built BattleBots in his spare time. How much help would he be if they encountered vengeance spirits like the ones that tried to kill us the last time we were there?

“She went back to Moundsville.”

Dimitri tensed. “The prison? Why?”

I couldn’t tell them, and Alara wouldn’t want me to. She and Priest didn’t trust Dimitri and Gabriel, and Lukas and I were still on the fence. We didn’t know enough about them, or how much of what they’d told us was true.

Gabriel jumped out of his chair. “I’m going to find her.”

“You can’t be gone that long.” Dimitri snatched his coat, his expression grim. “Andras is getting stronger every day. At this point, if we lose control of him, Azazel is our strongest weapon.”

The whip coiled tighter, as if the demonic weapon recognized its name.

“You’re the only one who can command it.” Dimitri swept past him and down the stairs. “I’ll find her.”

Gabriel stood at the railing until the tails of Dimitri’s black coat disappeared through the doors.

“Can I ask you a question?” It was something I’d wanted to ask him the last time we were alone, but I was afraid to hear the answer. “The Order sounds like it was full of monsters. Was my mom hurting people?”

“The Order was working against the Illuminati from the inside for a long time. They believed the best way to protect the world from demons was to learn to control them.” He took a deep breath. “They were conducting experiments—summoning weaker demons and trying to train them like pets. But what they were actually doing was letting demons into our world and giving them a chance to learn about us.”

“They didn’t see that coming?” I asked. When Dimitri and Gabriel told us about the Order, I imagined a group of Illuminati extremists, not a bunch of misguided scientists secretly training demons.

“I guess it’s like being the guys who invented the atomic bomb. You think about all the ways your invention can help people. But in the wrong hands, that same invention can destroy the world.” Gabriel hunched over
the railing, staring at his hands. “It took me a long time to figure out the truth about their
research
.”

“What gave them away?” I asked.

“I started spending time in the labs. I thought we were using the demons to make weapons.” Gabriel unhooked the whip and let it roll out across the floor, the ivory bones unhinging one by one. He looked over at me, his eyes full of sadness and shame.

“How do you think I made Azazel?”

A
fter Gabriel and Dimitri finished lecturing me, I relayed the details to Lukas, Priest, and Elle. Everyone agreed with my decision to tell them that Alara had gone back to the prison. She still had a few hours’ head start on Dimitri. Maybe she’d find the Shift before he made it there.

The possibility of finding the Shift sent me down to the containment area. I needed to see Jared. The walk through the tunnel alone was the worst part—wondering whether I’d find Jared or Andras on the other side of the bars.

I always held my breath until I knew, the way I was holding it now.

Jared sat on the mattress, wringing his hands in front of him. The names of the dead girls were still on the wall. But now there was something new. Circles and strange
symbols that looked like they belonged in an old alchemy book, some repeated over and over in manic sequences.

Dimitri had left sticks of chalk and charcoal in the cell, hoping to see if Andras would write anything else. Maybe he’d know what the symbols meant, but I didn’t want to. The sight of anything written by the demon’s hand made me sick.

Jared looked up when he heard my footsteps, his pale eyes sad and heavy.

It’s him.

Relief washed over me, and for a long moment, neither one of us spoke. There was too much to say and no way to say it.

I wrapped my hands around the bars, longing to be closer to him. “Are you okay?”

Is the demon hurting you?

Jared adjusted his ripped thermal to cover the worst of the burns on his neck. “Yeah. How about you?”

“Me? I—” My voice cracked, and I pressed my fingers against my eyes.

Don’t cry. You can’t do that to him.

When I moved my hands, Jared was standing in front of me, a few feet away from the cell door. His expression was full of concern—for me, instead of himself.

“I’m fine. I’m just worried about you.” I kept my voice even, so the lie would sound like the truth.

I miss you and I need you and I want you back.

“What’s that stuff on your face?” He pointed at the black marks on my cheeks.

“Sigils. Gabriel taught me how to paint them.”

Pain flickered in his eyes. “What are they for?”

“Don’t do this,” I whispered.

“What are they for?” he repeated.

“Protection.” I couldn’t look at him.

“From me.” When Andras was in control, Jared’s eyes never expressed any emotion. But now they betrayed everything he was feeling. “I want to hear you say it, Kennedy.”

“Why?”

Jared lifted his hands, letting the chains hang between his wrists. “I’m chained up like this for a reason. I’m a monster, and you can’t save me.”

My heart hammered in my chest. “Andras is the monster.”

“Don’t you get it?” Jared shook his shackled wrists in front of him. “He’s
inside
me.”

“We’re going to figure out a way—”

He didn’t wait for me to finish. “I don’t want you to come down here anymore. I can feel him getting stronger. Sometimes I can even hear him thinking, like we’re the same person. His thoughts, the things he wants to do to you…” Jared turned around, hiding his face. “You can’t ever come down here again. Promise me.”

I couldn’t stay away. Knowing he was hurting and not being able to hold him or comfort him was hard enough. “That’s not a promise I can make.”

Jared slammed his palms against the wall, then pushed off and walked toward the bars. “I’m not going to make it out of this alive. If the strain of the possession doesn’t kill me, Andras will once he doesn’t need my body anymore. That’s his plan. By then, he’ll be stronger and impossible to stop.”

“Did you hear something in his thoughts?” It could be the break we needed.

Jared shook his head. “There’s only one way. We both know that. If you won’t kill me, I need you to help me do it myself.”

For a second, I was speechless. “No. There has to be another—”

“There’s no other way.” He pulled his arms over his head until the shackles were resting behind his neck. “If I’m going to die, I want to take him with me.”

My throat burned, and tears rolled down my face. “We have an idea. Just give us a little more time.” I couldn’t risk telling him the details, not with Andras reading his thoughts.

Jared’s gaze trailed from the wet cell walls to the burns covering his chest and up to the Eye of Ever on the ceiling. Finally, he looked at me, his face marked with pain I could see as easily as the scars. “I don’t know how much time I have left.”

I stared back at him, trying to make sense of the words. My stomach clenched, and every part of me felt numb.

He moved closer, and I stepped back too fast.

“I’m sorry,” I said, realizing what I’d done.

He walked up to the bars, his movements tentative. “I just wanted to—” His blue eyes were full of pain and confusion.

It’s Jared. He won’t hurt me.

If I was wrong, he could kill me.

As long as I don’t have to kill him.

I took a step closer, then another, until we were only a foot apart.

“I just wanted to say good-bye.” He reached through the bars, and I didn’t move. “There are so many things I wish I’d told you. The way I feel about you…”

My heart pounded. “Tell me now.”

He wiped a tear from the corner of my eye with his thumb. I shut my eyes. I wanted him to know I trusted him, even if it was stupid or reckless.

Jared’s fingers curled in and touched my jaw, and he traced the path of my tears with his thumb.

My eyes flew open and I caught his wrist, pulling it away from my face. “Don’t. The sigils will burn you.”

His pulse thundered against my skin. “I’ve been burned before.”

“Not like this,” I said.

“I don’t care.”

“But I do,” I whispered.

Jared let his finger trail down my cheek until it reached my lips. I kept my eyes locked on his as the ash burned him. He didn’t flinch. Then he pulled his fingers back inside the bars and held up his palm.

I raised my own, until our hands were almost touching—like a reflection in the broken mirror that had become our lives.

Our palms met against the iron, and he closed his hand around mine. “Every person has one thing that defines them. A truth they believe in above everything else. You are my truth.”

When I opened the door to our room, Elle was sitting on her bed with a book. She jumped and shoved it under her blanket.

“What are you reading?”

She didn’t respond right away, a strange expression passing over her face. Then she slid the frayed volume out from underneath the blanket and held it up.

“
Summoning Circles in Demonology: Doorways to Darkness
? Where did you get that?” I asked.

Elle shrugged. “Dimitri lent it to me. I wanted to learn more about paranormal entities.”

Paranormal entities?

“When did you start using ghost-hunting terminology?” A few days ago, she thought
EMF
was an acronym for
electromagnified ghost finder
.

She stiffened, which wasn’t like her. Elle never got uncomfortable; her specialty was making other people feel that way.

“Does this have anything to do with Lukas?”

Her shoulders relaxed a little. “Maybe.”

“Maybe? That’s all I get?” Usually, Elle spilled every detail about a guy she liked, and plenty about the ones she didn’t like.

“I’ve done enough reading for tonight.” She dropped the book on the floor. “Do you care if I turn off the lights?”

“Not if you’re tired.” I barely had time to crawl into bed before she flicked the switch. Part of me expected her to turn them back on and tell me everything. But she didn’t.

Instead, I replayed my visit with Jared, focusing on the happy moments.

His voice.

Touching his skin.

You are my truth.

Thoughts of him lulled me to sleep and filled my dreams.

The chains are gone.

Jared is standing in front of me, shirtless in his frayed
jeans. He’s soaking wet and barefoot. His coffee-colored hair is wet, too—messy and curling at his neck.

My eyes sweep over the scars on his chest and up to his face.

He smiles at me, and his pale blue eyes light up beneath long black eyelashes.

He’s still in the cell, but the door is open, and I’m in there, too.

Together.

“Come here,” he says.

I walk toward him, unable to speak.

The nightmare is finally over.

I can feel it in my bones—in my heart. It’s the way he’s looking at me, and the fact that the chains are gone.

When I’m close enough, he hooks a finger through the belt loop of my jeans and pulls me closer.

We’re a foot apart, and he holds me there. “I want to look at you.” He tucks my hair behind my ear, and the moment his fingers touch my skin, I shiver. “I never thought I’d be able to touch you again.”

I don’t try to hold back my tears. I feel happy in a way I’ve never experienced before. “Me too.”

Jared slides his hand behind my neck and steps closer. Our lips are touching, but he hasn’t kissed me yet. “I dreamed about this,” he whispers. “All those nights I spent locked in this cell. This is what I thought about.”

I push up on my toes because he’s so much taller than
me, holding his shoulders for balance. I kiss him, and he relaxes against me.

Everything is going to be okay now.

He pulls back and looks at me, cradling my face. “On the worst nights—when I slept on the floor because it hurt to move, from Gabriel’s whip digging into my flesh and holy water burning every inch of my body—I thought about this moment.”

Jared’s hands drift down to my neck, and his grip tightens. “And what it would feel like to be inside your skin.”

His blue eyes are lost in shadow, the black ink filling them until every trace of the boy I am falling in love with is gone.

The nightmare jolted me awake, and it took me a moment to realize it was a dream. I caught a glimpse of Bear curled up in Alara’s bed without her, and I turned on my cell.

One new text.