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I’m dreaming. I know I am as I still feel Marcelo’s lingering touch on my arm, still feel the ghost of his presence next to me. But I’m not in bed, I’m not in his apartment in the church—I don’t even think I’m in Belmouth.

I am . . . elsewhere. Other. Nowhere, maybe.

No, no—I am somewhere . As the fog begins to clear in the dream, I slowly recognize things I’ve seen before. Stone, gray and brown, broken, crumbled. Pillars. Symbols.

I’m in the burned convent.

It looks different than it did earlier, the burn marks almost seem fresh against the stone. Pieces of blackened wood are scattered around me, and the candles from earlier look brand new, barely used, if used at all.

This is a different time, I realize, before the sigils were drawn everywhere, before the painting was added. This room I now stood in was just the beginning of . . . of whatever it was that happened here.

I pad across the room, not sure exactly what I’ll find. It’s strange—I’m not afraid like I was earlier. I don’t feel like a trespasser, but rather a fly on the wall, another stone amongst the many, an unlit candle with all the others. Where the altar had been in reality now sat a box filled with papers and books, things so very human. Peaking through, I found a notebook with some of the sigils drawn scattered amongst the pages. Notes in a language I didn’t know were written all around, and I couldn’t tell if it was actually another language or just effects of the dream. But four words stood out to me throughout the notes, four words that weren’t written in letters exactly, at least not the English letters I recognized. But the words still engraved themselves into my brain, decoding, deciphering, becoming words I did recognize.

Asmodeus.

Leviathan.

Bael.

Devil.

The last one cut through me like a knife.

Of course I’ve heard of the other names; TV shows, books, movies—they were all familiar. But something about them feels like more . Like . . . like they’re what connects everything .

A piece of wood skitters across the floor behind me, as though it were kicked. The book falls from my hand as I jump and swiftly turn around. All the air—fictional or not—leaves my lungs, my eyes are wide, unblinking, and I can’t move an inch, no matter how much I will my body to. I’m stuck, frozen, paralyzed.

Before me stands the black shadow I’ve seen so much, only now . . . now the shadows are leaving him, melding into the darkness of our surroundings—revealing him.

He’s tall. Really tall. Towering, even. Maybe eight feet tall. The demon wears a billowing cloak, hiding his body, but I can tell even with it that he’s massive, broad, and terrifying. His skin is a deep, deep red and his long curled hair is like an ink spill. But as I’m frozen, paralyzed in his shadow, the main thing I can’t take my eyes off of are those huge, looping horns. They jut out from the sides of his head, curving far up before sloping down into a small spiral around his ears—like horns somewhere between that of an antelope’s and a ram’s.

The demon’s face was mostly covered in the shadow of the robe, but those looming horns moved, as if he were slowly looking up to face me.

“Your priest is not who he seems.” His voice is a fiery mix of sultry and menacing, gravely in all the right places, but the timber so low and deep, it vibrates through the floor and up my spine. But more than that, it’s his words that shake me. Marcelo, not what he seems? I strongly believe I’ve learned exactly who he is, mask and all. If there’s more to him he’s hiding, then . . .

The demon takes another step closer, his clawed feet peeking under the long hem of the robe. That step is just what I need to finally kick myself out of this paralyzing fear. I scrabble back, fully aware that while this is definitely a dream, who fucking knows how Freddy Krueger this horned man is about to get. “Your fear is misplaced, Junia Forester. Here and in your church.” The demon stops shortly, still halfway across the room. His glowing eyes squint at me before he sighs and shakes his head. The act is so very . . . human. It looks more unnatural on him than his red skin, his horns. The demon scratches the back of his head before looking back up at me. “Protect him. Promise me you’ll protect him. That is all I ask of you.”

Him? I think. Who’s him?