Page 92

My stomach still felt as though it were made of sunbeams and laughter. A shy grin spread across my face. Was this how mates felt when they found one another? I’d never been kissed, so I wouldn’t know.

Asher’s eyes returned to my mouth and I saw him swallow. He glanced away, his attention moving above us.

“We should get going—before I start another fight,” Asher said.

Another fight on my behalf.

I tried to suppress my smile, but failed. The look he gave me was a bit more troubled.

I should be troubled as well. Falling for the hunter would be bad for so many reasons. It didn’t matter, my heart couldn’t be reasoned with. Already it was fluttering at the memory of his lips on mine.

I let him take my hand and lead me through the streets; he walked a step ahead of me the whole time. I found it a bit strange—the silence, the distance. I assumed natives talked about these things, but what did I know? Human customs were strange. So I settled instead on drinking in in the sculpted muscles of Asher’s back and the tousled hair that Itouchedonly minutes ago. My stomach felt like all the cicadas we ran from were now trapped inside it. I let myself smile again, high on the feeling. And I let myself hope for the first time since we met that this might end well.

I glanced at our entwined hands and bit my lower lip.

It might end really, really well.

Asher

Back in myroom at Grandmaddox’s house, I paced in the tiny space between the bed and the French doors, furious with myself, then spun and kicked the bed frame. The whole house shuddered.

Come on, Asher.

What were youthinking?

Kissing her? Are you insane?

I stormed back to the opposite wall, where hideous paintings of ghoulish demons leered down at me... judging me.

In that moment, everything had melted away. Me being a human, her being a demon. In that moment, she was just a beautiful girl, and I was a lonely, lonely man.

You idiot.

I’d never felt this way about a demon before. Attraction. Desire. Protectiveness.

How could I justify that when demons had cursed my family? When they fed off us like parasites? When their very existence meant humans must suffer? Demons were a vile pestilence that needed to be eradicated.

Yes, demons.

But not Lana.

In my brain, there was a category for demons like Azazel, Grandmaddox, the portal master. But Lana wasn’t in that category. She was in her own category, all by herself. A category for what...innocent demons?Please. It was an oxymoron. There was no such thing.

If I followed that logic, the portal master should go in that category, too. He wove portals, he didn’t kill. In fact, few demons killed willingly now that their civil war was over. It was their blood magic that killed, that cursed, that wreaked misfortune. She might be a healer, but Lana had culled human blood to do it. She had cursed humans unwittingly.

How many wrecked families were her doing? How many widows? How many fatherless children? How many weeping parents?

An innocent demon...

Evil wore all kinds of faces, a pretty one the most deadly of all.

But Lana wasn’t evil. She couldn’t be.

Guilty, but not evil.

But not innocent either.

No, she belonged in her own special category because she was a demon I could forgive.