“You… what?”
“I trapped it.”
“Youtrappedit?”
Iris nodded, a malicious glint in her eye. “It’s only a single-level prison ward, since I didn’t have time to run around the block to get the back door, but it’ll be strong enough. As soon as you came out, I activated it with my blood. The demon is trapped inside.”
Lily stared at her sister with her mouth open.
“Do you know what this means, Lil?” Her eyes flared with perverted excitement. “I’ve trapped a real live demon. And I’m going to find a way to kill it.”
This was too much. Iris had gone too far. Even if Mist was a demon, which she highly doubted, there was no way Lily was letting her twin kill him in cold blood.
They had good cause to be fearful, however. Humans were under the protection of Heaven unless they chose to dabble in the supernatural, like practitioners. Blood-born witches, on the other hand, were considered supernatural beings and were therefore ineligible for heavenly protection from birth, thanks to whatever was in their blood that gave them their abilities.
It didn’t help that there was an old myth that stated the original blood-borns came from the offspring of a human and a demon—an impossibility, since demons weren’t capable of procreation.
Whatever the case, demons could kill witches without breaking rules, and Heaven would not intervene.
If Mist was a demon, it meant he’d come into her life with some ulterior motive to lie and trick her. And if he discovered what she was, he could kill her simply because it entertained him. The thought froze her blood and broke her heart at the same time.
But she still didn’t wish him dead, and she didn’t condone murder of any kind. Of any creature. Call her weak, spineless, whatever. She wasn’t a killer, and she wasn’t letting Iris travel down that path.
“Iris, listen to me,” she began, head spinning. “You can’t just—”
She trailed off as the front door opened.
Mist stood there, looking between them, the lily flower she’d given him still in his hand.
She and Iris froze. How much had he overheard? Was he really a demon? Would he try to attack them?
But he couldn’t because of the prison ward. He was trapped, which she wasn’t sure was a good thing. If there was any way to piss off a demon, that was it.
He lifted a hand, and she flinched. Except he stopped with his palm flat and almost seemed to be miming an invisible wall—
The barrier.As his palm connected, the energy warped around it. Green light flashed where he made contact—the color of Temporal magic. Though indiscernible to the untrained eye, both Lily and Iris could see the shimmering of the ward’s forcefield.
Oh god, he really was a demon.
He pushed against the barrier. They both tensed as it flexed outward, but it held.
“You’re trapped.” Iris’s voice was hard, but the slightest tremor betrayed her nerves. “If you want to make it out of this alive, you’d better tell me who the fuck you are and what you want with my sister.”
Mist said nothing, gaze fixed on Iris with a penetrating stare, head cocked slightly. He dropped his hand and stepped forward.
Leaning one shoulder against the barrier, he pushed again. Green light traveled down his arm—the ward was electrocuting him. The pain must have been excruciating, but a muscle ticking in his jaw was the only indication of discomfort he allowed.
“You won’t be able to break it,” Iris said. “So you might as well give u—”
He pushed through.
His shoulder gave way first, and he stumbled a little. Then, steadying himself, he stepped over the threshold and stopped on the welcome mat, staring them down.
Iris made a choking sound. “H-how…?”
Amber eyes that were far too bright fixed on Iris’s stunned face. Lily’s heart pounded so loud it was hard to hear anything else.
“It would take a far stronger ward than that to trap me, witch.”
