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When Joan turns back around, she’s holding an enormous book, and just by looking at it, I know it’s ancient. The grimoire is handsomely bound in rich red leather, its cover carved and gilded with arcane symbols. Beyond that, it’s practically singing with the very same type of magick I’ve always known. Books and languages and forgotten stories. Only this time, it’s more powerful than I’ve ever felt before. Even from where I stand on the other side of the small office, I can feel it reach for me.

“Here,” she says, extending her arm to hand the book over.

As soon as I touch it, all the air leaves my lungs. My vision fails, and suddenly I’m no longer standing across from my best friend.

I have no idea where I am.

Chapter 30

Allie

The world around me is dark, with two pale moons hanging in the sky.

That, at least, helps orient me. The demon realm. As soon as my head stops spinning, I see that I’m standing near the Veil. The color within isn’t white or red or green. No, it’s shining a lovely, light pink.

The color of rose petals.

Transfixed, I take a few steps toward it. In some muffled, rational corner at the back of my mind, alarm bells are ringing. I ignore them. The pale pink light and the gentle tug of magick seeping from the Veil are enough to make me forget everything else entirely.

When I get close enough, a faint voice calls to me from inside that ether.

“A sacred vow and a lover’s kiss,” the strange voice whispers in my mind. “An iron-clad deal with a demon prince. An end to strife and pain. An era of peace will reign.”

Over and over, the words echo through me. If I can just step into the Veil, maybe I can answer. One step closer, then another. I’m almost there, so close I can feel the soft kiss of ether reaching out to greet me.

Suddenly, I’m jerked out of whatever spell the grimoire was weaving around me and tossed back into the mundane world. Staggering, Joan keeps me upright with an arm around my waist. My ears are muffled, ringing with muted sound, and I take a few seconds to realize she’s speaking to me.

“Allie!” She sounds stricken. “Allie, what’s happening?”

The book is still in my hands, and I don’t realize I’m clutching it so tightly until my fingers start to ache. I toss it onto the desk and take a few quick, shaky steps away from it until my back is pressed up against the office door.

Joan lets me go, watching me with fear-widened eyes.

“The book,” I say, voice urgent. “Who gave you the book?”

A few beats of silence. We both stare down at the grimoire. I half-expect it to be glowing with the same magick seeping from the Veil in my vision, but it’s not. It’s sitting there, deceivingly ordinary.

Joan shakes her head. “I don’t… I can’t…”

“When you mentioned it to me at the Tithe, you said one of your regulars gave it to you.”

Her eyes widen even more. “I don’t remember saying that.”

“What do you mean?” I ask, confused. “Do you remember who gave it to you?”

“No,” she says, closing her eyes and shaking her head slowly. “I feel like I should, but there’s just… nothing. When I try to remember, there’s nothing.”

We both fall silent again.

Whatever the book is, it’s no ordinary magick. Suspicious, I pick up a dish towel from a stack at the side of the room. Keeping it wound around my hand, I approach the desk and the book.

“Allie,” Joan says, putting a hand on my wrist to stop me. “I don’t think you should—”

“It’s important,” I say, interrupting her with a certainty that comes out of nowhere.

Cursed, or blessed, or whatever this grimoire is, I at least know that to be true. It means something, that it’s here, that I’m here. That certainty only solidifies when I open the cover to see the first page written in the same arcane language I encountered in the demon realm.

“I have to take this with me,” I tell her, flipping the cover shut. “Do you have something I can use to wrap it up?”