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“Put that back.”

“So you’re twenty-eight,” she said, reading my birthday from the front page.

“A demon that can subtract.” I stuffed the packet back in the glove box and slammed it shut, now wishing it locked. “Whoop-de-doo.”

“I learned arithmetic before I came here, I’m not stupid. You take away the year you were born from the year it is now. It’s hard, but I learned how,” she said proudly.

“Kids learn that in second grade here. That means you have a second grade education.”

“Second grade, huh?” She seemed impressed with this and sat up straighter. “Is that a high grade? What grade are you at, Jame Asher?” She challenged me with an eyebrow raise.

Had to think about this one. “Sixteen,” I said finally, unable to mask my smirk.

“Gradesixteen?” Her her voice betrayed hurt. “How did you get to grade sixteen?”

“Six years of elementary school, two years of middle school, four years of high school, four years of college,” I listed off. “You think arithmetic is hard? Try multivariable calculus. You learn that in grade thirteen.”

Her violet eyes flashed crimson for a moment. “And I suppose you think you’re some kind of wise man? Because you got to grade sixteen?”

I flashed her a warning look.

“Your education is useless,” she said.

“I don’t disagree—”

“Do you know how to train a gargoyle? Do you know how to craft a bone shiv? Do you know how to weave a portal? Do you know how to cull blood and coax out magic? Do you know how to resurrect the dead? Do you know how to control your mind and body so your heart beats only once per day?” She folded her arms. “I didn’tthinkso.”

“And yet,” I said, “you’re the one eating Snowballs and drinking Slurpees and stuffing your face with candy like it’s Halloween... you second-grader.”

We made it four hundred miles—a measly six hour drive—before I couldn’t take being in the car with her anymore.

By then we’d left Virginia and crossed into Tennessee. Thirty minutes shy of Knoxville, I took an exit for the nearest town and pulled into an Econo Inn.

It wasn’t that I didn’t have money, I did—being a mercenary for demons for half a decade paid well, and I was still living off that. Yeah, funding my war against them with dirty money. I didn’t lose sleep over it.

But I wanted to keep a low profile.

So Econo Inn it would be.

I checked us in and unlocked a room reeking of mildew with a single queen bed and a pullout couch. Bruised and moldy from water damage, the ceiling peeled and sagged under its own weight. Long as it didn’t fall on me, I wasn’t complaining.

But it might fall on me.

Lana crinkled her nose at the smell of the place, her gaze also warily taking in the scenery.

“Ooh, this is nice.” Lana, ever the fucking optimist, ran her fingers along the moth-eaten bedspread.

“It’s not,” I said, sinking onto the mattress to unlace my shoes. “I thought you were some kind of princess? You guys don’t have linens?”

“Of course we have linens,” she said. “And skins and furs and rich tapestries, but the craftsman who wove this must have been an artist... and the design, accurate down to the individual thread... it must have taken years to accomplish.”

“It was woven by a machine,” I said, “in a factory, where they’re mass-produced as cheaply as possible and dozens are rolled out every minute.”

“Oh.” She frowned. It struck me how impressionable she was.

“This place is a dump,” I said, “but it’s got a bed, and it’s got a bathroom... so now you don’t have to ask me every time you have to piss.” I kicked off my shoes.

She saw what I was doing and took that as permission to step into the bathroom and lift one foot into the sink. Thinking that’s what we were doing now, she turned on the faucet and started scrubbing down her own boots, clotting the basin with mud and grime and remnants of her Slurpee while humming a strangely haunting tune. For a moment, I couldn’t help but stare at her, transfixed by the graceful, unselfconscious surety of her movements, the way her long, dark mane shimmered down her back, the ends of it fading out in smoky wisps. She was such a wild, savage creature. An exotic creature.