EARLIER THIS MORNING


Above the camera, a small dot of red light begins to flash insistently.

“Okay,” Trent says, withdrawing his hands from the keyboard. “That means it's time to talk.”

“What?” I ask, baffled. “Just like that?”

He walks across the room and starts fiddling with the radio console. “Just like that.”

“But I haven't had any time to rehearse.”

“You don't need to rehearse.”

Swallowing hard, I look at the camera. Then to the left of the still-flashing light, only to see my own face blinking back at me from the computer monitor. I look just as uncomfortable as I feel. Fantastic.

“Do I just start... reading off the paper, then?”

“No.” Trent sounds thoroughly bored now. A rush of static emits from the radio speakers as he twists the dial to the left. “Introduce yourself first.”

“Why am I doing this again?”

“All the rest of us have done it.” The patience has returned to his voice. But he's still focusing on the radio, not me. “Now it's your turn.”

“I'm not good at talking to people.”

“I've noticed. Fortunately for you, this is a camera, not a person.” Eyebrows furrowed in concentration, he gives the dial just a slight twitch to the right. The static cuts off suddenly, to be replaced with complete silence. It sounds as if either the radio's stopped working, or he's found a black hole in the airwaves. No sound. No music. No voices.

But we both know what it really is. The Network.

“Do you have to do that now?” I ask him, simply for the sake of giving myself a bit more time. The light above the camera is still blinking steadily. “I'm trying to record something here.”

“We've got to earn money somehow.”

“But it's Drake's birthday. We've all arranged to have the day off – ”

“We still aren't even halfway to making this month's rent,” Trent reminds me. “And it's nearly over. We need cash.”

Swallowing, I turn back to the camera. It's no use arguing further. Glancing down at the trembling sheet of paper in my hands, it's horrendously tempting to just start reading from the first line. But Trent will make me record it all over again if I don't do what he says. When it comes to his precious video logs, he's practically a ruthless dictator.

“Uh...”

“Start out with the date.”

“But it's right there in the corner.” I point at the bottom corner of the screen, where the date and time are displayed in small red letters.

Bent over the radio, Trent shrugs. “Do it your way, then.”

He's so bossy when he's in this room, as if being surrounded by things he's built singlehandedly offers some sort of huge boost to his self-confidence. “All right. The date.” I force myself to look at the camera instead of the screen. “It's seven-oh-three, on the twenty-second of November... Even though you know that already.”

“Now your name,” Trent prompts me.

“But the only person who'll watch this is you!”

“You don't know that for sure. Just tell the camera your name.” He sounds maddeningly patient now. “You're the one making this difficult for yourself, you know.”

“My name is Kassandra Williams,” I tell the camera through gritted teeth. “I turned seventeen a month ago.”

Over my shoulder, I glance at Trent to see if he has any more suggestions. I'm hoping he does, so I can give in to the urge to tell him exactly where to stuff them. But the silent radio has suddenly come to life, and he's listening hard.

“Uh... Is this even working right...? Um, I'm Rhonda, and there's something in my garage. This is... this is the Network, right? I called the right number...? It was on the flyer.”

“Keep talking,” Trent says suddenly. At first I think he's talking to the radio – then I realize he's addressing me.

“Can I read off the paper now?”

“Go ahead.”

Relieved, I turn back to the camera and look down at the paper in my hands. Most of my anxiety has faded, and the letters aren't jumping around on the page anymore. “'All slayers know several universal rules.'”

“But anyway, there's something in my garage. And there's blood leading up to the door. I thought it might be a cat – but I peeked through the door, and it... it had s-scales...”

“'If you know where to look, you can always find demons.'” My voice has settled into a monotone, now that I don't have to search for things to say anymore.

“Is there anybody there? I'm too scared to go look again. Please, somebody help me – ”

The desperation in the woman's staticky voice finally gets to me, and I turn around. Trent's got the phone receiver in his hand, but he hasn't dialed anything.

“Are you going to call?”

Trent holds up a finger.

There's a click on the radio. Suddenly another voice speaks, a smooth male tenor. “How much are you willing to pay, ma'am?”

A moment of silence. Then the woman's stammering voice. “I-I'm scared...”

“No one will help you for free, ma'am,” the man says kindly. “We've got to make a living, too. How does fifty sound?”

“You'll get it out of the garage? It'll never come back?”

“I'll send it back into the chaos from whence it was spawned, ma'am. It's what we do.”

“Th-thank you. So much.” Stammering relief. “Fifty dollars is fine.”

“Just give the operator a moment to transmit your address to me.”

“You've stopped talking,” Trent says accusingly.

Annoyed, I speak without looking at the camera, my eyes fixed on the radio. “'Similarly, if you know where to look, you can always find a demonic cult.'”

“I'll be there in an hour, ma'am.”

Click. Click.

And the airwaves are silent once more.

“'Contrary to what most people think, cults – the kind of well-hidden, painfully selective cult open only to those who know the truth – '” I squint down at the paper. “Trent, you've written 'truth' in all capitals.”

“That's because it's important.”

“'... are never established in homage to any sort of demon. Cults are the commercialized, superstitious institutions where people who have somehow stumbled upon the truth of demons come to dabble in a bit of summoning and demon lore, and go home at the end of the day reasonably well-fed, a little disturbed, and overall injury-free.'”

“This is the Federal Communications Commission. We are calling to inform you that you are broadcasting illegally and without a license. This is explicitly prohibited by recent acts passed by the national government. If you do not wish to face severe consequences, you must immediately halt all rogue transmission activity – ”

Click. Disconnected.

“'Another rule: a cultist and a slayer will almost never be found in the same company.'”

“The present situation excepted,” Trent says. His back is turned to me, but I can hear the smirk in his voice.

I throw an empty plastic cup sitting next to the keyboard at him, but he dodges neatly and it hits the wall, knocking down one of Lucas's swords. Oops. “I left the Nightmares months before I met you.”

“Once a cultist, always a cultist, eh?”

“Oh, shut up.” I squint down at the paper again. “'To a slayer, a demonic cult is what a public golf green is to a professional golfer.' What?”

“Just keep reading.”

“Hello? Uh, my name is Brad... I've got a farm just outside the city limits. Something killed my cow last night...”

“I can't focus with that damn radio on!”

“You don't need to focus. You're reading sentences off a sheet of paper. Go on.”

“You can be so irritating. 'But a businessman who goes to the green on Sundays to polish up his hole-in-one will never change the world or write his name down in the history books. For a few hours, he's a golfer – then he steps off the green, and he's a businessman again.' This doesn't even make sense anymore!”

“Be quiet. I'm trying to listen to this.”

“... and it got some of my chickens a week ago. It isn't a wolf – the prints are too big, and we don't get bears around here...”

“It's the demon apocalypse,” I snap at the radio, patience slipping away by the second. “Why can't these people just get to the point? 'There's a demon in my backyard. Come kill it, please. I'll pay you.' Honestly, just that would do the trick.”

“Give them a break, Kass. They're scared.”

“I sent my dogs after it this morning, and I think they managed to hurt it... But it got away, and I think it's hiding in the marsh somewhere. One of the dogs didn't come back.”

“'But being a demon slayer is different,'” I say loudly, trying to drown out the sound of the radio. “'It's constant paranoia. It's knowledge that honing the edge of your skill a little more every day is not only useful, but necessary for survival. It's making the world a little safer, at least in theory. It's competition with other slayers who do the same thing you do, but for vastly different reasons.'”

“Quiet down a little.”

Trent's got the phone in his hand again. This time his fingers are poised over the buttons. Is he going to call?

“'Rarely, if ever, does a cultist become a slayer.'” Frowning, I read over the sentence again. “Trent, this isn't right! Did you type this?”

“Read the next line.” He's got one slim, deft finger just touching the 5.

My eyes drift down to the next paragraph, and I read it aloud.

“'I was the exception.'”

“Hello,” Trent says suddenly. I glance over, ready to start swearing at him – but he's got the phone to his ear. “Brad?”

“What the hell are you playing at, Trent?”

While I speak, Trent's voice is issuing back over the radio speakers, thin and staticky. “Hello. Brad?”

“Is that a slayer?”

“Yes.” Yes. “Describe the demon for me.” Describe... demon... me. “Did you see it?” Did... see...?

“Just briefly. It was big. The size of a bear. Old Cotton only brought back half her tail. But it didn't have fur... just scales. Like some sort of mutant gator.”

“Do you live alone?”

“Yeah. Just me and the dogs.”

“Stay inside. Do you hear me? Don't go into the marsh.”

“Wouldn't stray near it for all the world. But I don't think you can take it alone. There could be more than one – ”

“Don't worry yourself, Brad. I'll bring company.”

“Trent,” I say warningly.

He ignores me. “Five of us, to be exact.”

“Five... slayers? All on my farm at once? I'd be lying if I said that didn't make me nervous... but I'll pay. Turtle was a good dog. I'll miss him.”

“Three hundred dollars.”

“Trent! We only need two hundred for the rest of the rent – ”

“Three hundred...? Christ... Three hundred it is.”

“Very good. I'll see you there in an hour.”

“I'll keep my dogs inside.”

“Trent, Drake isn't gonna like this – ”

Click.

“Go tell the others to get their things ready.” Trent replaces the phone receiver, switches off the radio, and straightens up.

I don't move. “It was your idea. I'm not about to go get yelled at for it.”

“I'll tell Drake about the book.”

“What?” Now I'm really angry. “You can't blackmail me. I'll tell him about... about...”

“About what?” He's smirking. “You've got no idea what I'm giving him.”

Unfortunately, he's right.

“I'll go tell them.”

“Turn off the camera before you go.”

I reach out and switch it off. At last, the red light stops blinking. “You are so manipulative. I'm never forgiving you for this.”

His smile only widens. What would the others think if they saw him like this? Confident, self-assured, full of poise. Only in this room, and only around me, does shy, mild-mannered Trent Bailey become a scheming bastard.

“You'll have forgotten by tomorrow morning.”

“That was hell.”

“It was a bit too wet to be hell.”

“Personally, I've never thought of hell as being a hot, dry place.” Leaning back against the dashboard with her entire body twisted around backwards in the passenger seat, Jolene stares musingly up at the stained car roof. “It sounds a bit too much like a vacation spot. What if it really never stops raining there?”

Squinting out the droplet-spattered windshield, Drake snorts. “In that case, welcome to hell. Otherwise known as Portland, Oregon.”

“I'm never going to get all this blood out of my hair,” Jolene moans.

I'm starting to wish that we were back in the blind. It wasn't much more crowded than Lucas's car, which Drake is now driving simply because he got to it first. I'm squeezed in between Lucas and Trent in the backseat, shivering in the silent tension radiating between them. Wherever it is, hell is bound to experience a dramatic climate change before those two ever get along, or even call their private Cold War to a truce.

It doesn't help that we're all dripping wet and soaked in a disgusting mixture of mud and blood. I've gotten used to the smell by now, but Jolene's complaints are starting to get on my nerves. None of us were injured – the demon wasn't nearly as dangerous as the farmer made it out to be. What was his name again? Brett? Bradley? I'm never answering anyone on the Network with a name starting with B ever again.

Not to mention he didn't even fork over the three hundred. He gave us two hundred and claimed that he needed the rest to take his maimed dog to the vet. Of course, Drake bought his sob story. And even though he was the only one, none of the rest of us protested. We didn't really need the extra hundred anyway.

Personally, I'm in favor of turning the farmer (whose name I still can't remember) over to the police. It's just him and three dogs – well, two now – on that big farm. He's got plenty of room to house some of the refugees sleeping in streets, libraries, cinemas and churches now, all over downtown Portland. His barn alone could put up at least fifty, with all that hay to sleep on.

But it wouldn't really be fair to turn him in. He could have just as easily called the cops on us and earned a hefty reward for doing so. Although, in that case, he wouldn't have anybody to clean the demon out of his swamp.

“You'll get it out,” Drake reassures Jolene comfortingly, ever the peacemaker. “You always do.”

“But we're nearly out of shampoo. And that stingy old man didn't even give us enough cash to buy more.”

“Be reasonable, 'Lene. He needed the money for his dogs. It's almost impossible to find a doctor these days – ”

“He needs a vet, not a doctor.”

“They're all practically the same now. One thing's for sure – none of them are getting paychecks. Can you imagine it? All those years in med school, and now they're making less money than a bunch of teenagers.”

“We're not just teenagers,” Jolene objects.

Drake arches an eyebrow. “Right. I'm a thirty-something Russian demon slayer. I'm sure he bought that.”

“A thirty-something Russian demon slayer with a mustache,” Trent corrects him. It's the first he's spoken since we got in the car.

“Of course. How could I have forgotten?”

I heard on television that Portland freeways used to be crazy during rush hour. People commuting back and forth from Washington, or something like that. But now, Interstate 5 is nearly empty. Drake cruises down the asphalt at a leisurely pace, not even bothering to stick to one lane.

No one leaves the city limits unless they absolutely have to. Not even the police. People have given up using cars for the most part. Downtown, refugees fill the avenues with military-issue tents and sleeping bags, leaving no room for cars to get past. There simply isn't enough space in parks and public buildings anymore.

Every morning and evening, crowds line up in front of the public transit stations, which are now being used to distribute food and survival supplies. Armed men in uniforms stand on nearly every street corner in the city, watching for signs of an impending riot – there's practically no difference between military and the police anymore. All of them work for the same people now and receive the same equipment. Both branches have been jointly christened the “National Defense Force.”

The National Defense Force. A barrier against attacks from demons, foreign nations hoping to take advantage of the newly crippled United States' weakness, and our own people.

Fortunately, our apartment complex isn't located downtown. We live in one of the suburbs that have been mostly abandoned, due to the threat of isolation from the rest of the city. At night, Lucas bolts the front door and all of the windows – and sits guard until dawn while the rest of us sleep in relative peace, thanks to his paranoia.

“Home, sweet home,” Drake sings off-key as the car pulls into the apartment lot.

The five of us pile out of the car and troop tiredly up two flights of stairs to the apartment. Technically, we have the entire complex to ourselves. Everyone else has fled inside the protective wall formed by newly erected military strongholds within the city. We – and the other slayers operating in the area, though our paths never cross – are the only ones left outside. By choice.

The only other person still living here is the landlord, who almost never ventures past his front door. In return for four hundred dollars a month, he doesn't call the police, and we are allowed to remain here. Of course, what he really wants is our protection – otherwise he would have fled for the city long ago.

But we chose to keep our third-floor apartment, simply for the sake of remaining hidden and close together. Fewer and fewer slayers have answered calls to the Network lately. They're getting picked off, one by one. The only safety we have left is in numbers.

“Kass! Stop moping and go take a shower.” Drake pretends to wrinkle his nose in disgust. “You smell worse than I do.”

But Jolene's already claimed the single shower in the apartment, so I wander into the storage room instead.

Everything looks the same as it did this morning. The room is a small, dusty storage unit with one window. We keep our weapons here, along with other equipment. Drake's computer. Jolene's guitar. Trent's precious mechanical equipment. Lucas's ever growing collection of firearms. And, of course, the radio.

Trent slips into this room every morning to fiddle around with his wires and screws and circuit boards, as well as listen to the Network. He claims to work for his own amusement, but he has turned out many seemingly innocuous inventions that proved invaluable to us later – a grappling hook that saved my life three months ago, a wristwatch he gifted to Drake for his last birthday that contained a concealed communication device, and countless others.

All of us have our hobbies, the things we do between battles – except for me. Drake tells me that if I had something to do with my hands when I'm not killing, I might feel better. He's probably right, but what could I do? I was never exceptional at anything before I became a demon slayer. It was like I didn't exist – didn't have a life until I learned to kill.

Stop it, I tell myself. This is no time for morbid thoughts. Not with demons and government agents alike tracking our every step, waiting for one of us to make a mistake.

“Kass?”

Trent inches into the room. I can tell from one look at him that he's retreated into his shell again. Trent's behavior is impossible to predict; one minute he'll be snarking off and blackmailing me in private, and the next he'll act as shy and innocent as a lamb. At this point, I don't know which one is his real personality, and which one is the mask.

“We're getting ready to go.” He reaches up to adjust his glasses, flashing his middle finger. I still haven't got a clue whether he does that on purpose or not. “Jolene's out of the shower.”

“Really? That was quick.”

He shrugs. “Maybe we are out of shampoo.”

“We should pick some up on the way, then.”

“I'll tell Drake.”

He drifts out of the room and disappears into the kitchen. I go the other way, heading for the vacated bathroom. The mirror is fogged up, but with Jolene having taken such a short shower, at least the hot water can't be all gone. I wipe the mirror clean with my sleeve and take a look at my reflection.

Well, Drake was right. I do look like a mess, and I'm sure I smell the part. My hair, an odd color that looks red in some lights and brown in others, is caked with mud – though I've managed to avoid getting blood on myself. And my clothes are stained and soaked.

Somebody hammers on the door. “Hurry up!” Drake calls through the wood. “I made reservations for six.”

“Pfft. Reservations. Yeah, right.”

Turning away from the mirror, I busy myself with stripping off my dirty clothes and running the hot water. It could have been worse. That's what I tell myself every day.

We could all be dead by now.

A year ago, we flaunted our identities. The people who knew the truth knew who we were, and anyone who didn't wouldn't believe us anyway, so why not? Demons weren't widespread, and we worked on request only. We got a lot of calls from cultists whose summonings had gone wrong. Saving lives always felt nice, even if they were cultists.

Five slayers is generally four too many to handle the average job, so we worked separately. Every night – or frequently early morning, since cultists like to summon at night – we all returned to our base of operations to sleep, eat, and bandage up whatever wounds we might have sustained. Our “base of operations” was actually a normal house. Jolene's family had lived there once, but after her parents had divorced and her father had moved out, her millionaire mother had moved back to Italy and left the house to her teenaged daughter. According to Jolene, they hadn't been close anyway.

It was like having a family. Of course, there weren't any parents, and our bedtime routine generally included polishing weapons and dismissing summons of our own. But even in that big, drafty house with too many bedrooms and all the suffocating trappings of grandeur, I never felt alone.

Then, the twenty-first of December. 2012. Apocalypse Day.

Honestly, like any respectable slayer, I thought the whole thing was a joke. The Mayans had lived hundreds of years ago. They'd gotten a brief mention in history class, but I didn't remember much. Sure, the human race was all puffed up about 2012, but humans tend to get suspicious about anything they aren't sure about. The world didn't end in 1000 or 2000. So why 2012?

Getting proven wrong is painful, sometimes.

What I know – what every slayer knows – is that demons don't appear naturally in our world. They are summoned here, sometimes successfully, sometimes less so. Sometimes information gets dug up by the wrong sort of people, who hope to unleash some sort of doomsday on humankind. Generally, they get killed before getting very far. Still, there are the demons to clean up.

All the demonology books I read when I was a Nightmare spoke of the “planar wall.” It isn't a tangible thing. Rather, it's something in the weave of things that keeps our world and the demonic realm separate. We both occupy the same space, but in different dimensions – at least, that's how I understood it.

The planar wall is unbreakable. It is simply there. Like gravity, an unconquerable truth.

But in 2012, the planar wall vanished.

For one godforsaken day... it just disappeared.

I only have disjointed memories of that day. A hellhound appearing in a flash of smoke on our kitchen table. Jolene shrieking. Drake stabbing at the thing with his steak knife until it died with a howl and collapsed on the table. The room in flames. Running outside. The entire block on fire. Drake grabbing my hand and pulling me along as I stare, open-mouthed, at the smoking remains of our house.

Somehow, the subway lines were still open. The demons hadn't gotten underground yet. Strange – it's the first place I would have expected them to go. We got out of the city as fast as we could, traveling all night. Sitting in a Boston diner the next morning, exhausted and soot-caked and shell-shocked, and seeing the flashing headlines on the television: NEW YORK RAZED TO THE GROUND.

The city where I had spent my entire life. Gone, just like that.

The days afterward were filled with smoke and grief and terror. After some deliberation, we went west. Demons were everywhere. We met other refugees; when we told them we were slayers, they practically mobbed us, begging for our protection. Eventually, we stopped telling people. Just a ragged band of teenagers, doggedly traveling by night and sleeping by day.

The Northwest turned out to be the last safe place left. Rainy, dismal Portland, Oregon, to be exact. Exhausted, cold, and dripping, we crossed into the city limits just as they closed the state borders. Too many people. Not enough food or shelter. Refugees were starving out the people who already lived there.

Only two weeks had passed since the massacre at New York.

Eventually, things calmed down. The military regrouped. Countries who hadn't been so hard hit offered international assistance and refuge for millions of displaced citizens. As far as I could gather, the impact of the so-called “apocalypse” in different parts of the world had been more-or-less proportional to the number of practicing slayers and cultists.

In other words, America was doomed. Europe was almost as bad. Asia, a little less so. And the Third World countries, the undeveloped places where people were generally too concerned with getting enough to eat, avoiding disease, and keeping their families safe to fritter away their spare time summoning demons... all left nearly untouched.

That's karma for you, I suppose.

It's 2013 now. Last year, after most of the American refugees accepted offers of accommodation in other countries, the five of us managed to get this apartment. Somehow, we manage to keep food on the table and weapons in our hands. Out of all the people in this city, if demons invade again, we probably have the best chance of survival.

Publicly, we aren't demon slayers. If we were, the government would have drafted us long ago. Our names are still on the lists posted in every state, in every town center, in every public building. KNOWN SLAYERS. With my picture staring out from around the middle of the list. Now that the public knows the truth, the government knows about us. More importantly, it knows that it needs us.

Hundreds of slayers have given themselves up, eager to fight for this country – but thousands more have stayed hidden. We're used to living concealed from the public eye. People don't know who we are or what we do, and that's fine with us. The public spit on us and called us liars and Satanists. Now, with the threat of a so-called myth staring them in the eyes, they're begging for our help.

I'm no hero. But I do believe in freedom and safety and – most of all – killing demons, and that's how I know that one day, I'll give myself up too. But not yet.

For the first time in my life, I have a real family. I don't want to leave that behind – not yet. And we're all so young. Lucas is the oldest, and he's barely twenty. I'm the youngest, at seventeen. Drake is determined that we train longer before giving in to the draft, and I know he's right. I still have more to learn than all the others combined – with the possible exception of Trent. But even he makes up for that by being, simply put, a genius.

The longer we remain together, the harder it will be for the government to separate us. And I know that whatever happens, I don't want to be alone again.

Down the street, next to an abandoned gas station, is a grocery store. The front door is locked, but the five of us gain easy entry through the massive, gaping hole in the side of the building. Inside, the whole place is a mess. Aisles knocked over, pools of unidentified substances on the floor, gutted cash registers, flies everywhere.

But the storerooms are nearly untouched. The electricity's still on, running from a generator somewhere – after all, while the store was still in operation, the managers couldn't have a power outage ruining all their perishables. Inside the coolers is a veritable treasure trove of food. Drake, who's got our shopping list, sends me looking for cake mix while the others root through the freezer in search of butter, milk, eggs, and everything else you need to make a cake.

After weeks of getting lost in the massive storerooms, I've finally mastered basic navigation. Drake wants chocolate cake mix, so I pick out the last battered box and head back to meet up with the others. On our way out, we stop at the cash registers to bag our “groceries,” and I pick up a candy bar to save for later. Nearly everything else is gone. In the first month or so after the store was abandoned, it was nearly cleaned out by looters. That was before everyone took refuge downtown. Now it's just us and the other slayers in the area.

“It's nearly six,” Drake says, checking his watch. “We'd better hurry.”

“Come on,” Jolene chides him as we set off down the street. “You know we're practically the Cook's only customers now.”

“I know. But that doesn't mean he won't shut the door on us if we don't show up on time, just out of spite.”

The five of us stop in front of a Burger King. The building is made out of solid brick and shows no sign of having been looted. All of the windows have been boarded up with sheet metal, and the front door has been cemented in place. Drake motions to the rest of us to stay back, and walks up to the drive-through window. The glass has been spray-painted black, making it impossible to see inside. Someone's put a lot of effort in turning this place into an impregnable fortress.

“Cook?” he calls out.

For a moment, there's no response. Then a gravelly voice replies from inside.

“You're late.”

“By five minutes,” Jolene says irritably, but Drake ignores her.

“I know. I'm sorry. But you're still open, right?”

The drive-through window slides open a fraction, and Drake is presented suddenly with the barrel of a shotgun, pointing directly at him. To his credit, he doesn't flinch.

There's a moment of silence as the Cook peers down the sights from inside, making sure that Drake is really who he says he is. Then the barrel withdraws and is replaced by a grubby, outstretched hand.

“You've got the goods?”

“Right here.” Drake places the handles of the shopping bags in the Cook's hand, and they're quickly yanked inside.

“What was it you wanted? A cake?”

“A chocolate cake,” says Drake, licking his lips. “The money's in the bag.”

“That'll be an hour.”

“Awesome. Thank you so – ”

But the window has already slid shut.

“Friendly guy,” Drake comments, rejoining the rest of us. We sit down in the outdoors dining area in front of the restaurant, though Lucas remains standing. The breeze sends his chin-length black hair splaying over his face, and he raises a pale hand to brush it away, scanning the empty street. The wary, watchful expression on his face makes me a bit nervous.

Don't be stupid, I tell myself. Lucas always looks like that.

I do my best to ignore him. At least he's keeping watch. The hollow, abandoned silence of the suburbs has ceased to unnerve me by now, but it pays to be cautious. Especially these days.

“I can't wait an hour,” Jolene moans, slumping over the table. The wind picks up strands of her silvery hair, gently twisting them back and forth in the breeze. “I haven't had cake in ages.”

“Luke's birthday wasn't long ago,” Drake reminds her.

Lucas looks at them briefly, then returns his gaze to the street.

“I know, but his cake was awful. Remember? We tried to get it with black frosting, but Cook misunderstood. It tasted like engine oil.” Jolene sticks out her tongue in mock disgust.

“At least we can still get the kind of food we like. All those refugees downtown, all they're getting is the slop left over from the soldiers' rations.”

“Not the landlord! I smelled roast beef from downstairs last night. And he didn't even offer to share!”

“At least he was smart enough to stock up on food before the raids.”

“And he was lucky enough to have five slayers there to protect him.” Jolene sniffs. “Why do we even bother paying him? He won't call the police on us. Then he'd have to move into the city and eat and sleep the way the rest of them do.”

“We're not criminals,” Drake reminds her for the thousandth time. “As long as he's still landlord, we're going to keep paying him. It's the right thing to do.”

“Hmph. Well, let me tell you, I'd rather like to be a criminal right about now. Seems they get the best of everything.”

“Technically, we are criminals,” Trent points out quietly. “If the police weren't so busy managing riots...”

Jolene waves a dismissive hand. “Look, what they want from us is ridiculous. Sign up for their fancy little army? I heard it's hardly organized at all. Most of the slayers they've drafted don't have any idea how to follow orders. And the ones in charge aren't slayers and don't have a clue what they're doing. I'm telling you, it's madness.”

“They're doing the best they can,” Trent objects. “No one was prepared for – ”

“Well, they should have been! Demons have been around for centuries. The government had plenty of opportunities to listen to us. But no, for years, we've been the crazy ones.”

“Hey.” I've kept silent too long. Jolene and Trent could spend the rest of the night arguing if someone doesn't stop them. “Save it for later. We're here to relax.”

“And eat cake.” Drake leans back in his chair, staring up at the moody gray sky.

Jolene looks unconvinced, but Trent shrugs. Beyond them, Lucas is still standing guard, tall and motionless. He cuts a rather intimidating figure in his long black coat, combat pants, boots, and black headband. If I were a demon, I certainly wouldn't mess with him.

Even if I were me, I still wouldn't mess with him.

Lucas is the kind of person who no one trusts. And it's not because of his dark clothes, his refusal to make eye contact with anyone, or even how dangerous he is in a fight. It's got something to do with the way he moves, the way he talks. It's like he's hunter and prey, both at once. Always on guard, never turning his back on anyone. Not even us.

He and Drake are like opposites. Never mind, they are opposites. Across the table from me, Drake is leaning back in his chair, laughing heartily at something funny Jolene's just said. The wind flicks his tousled golden hair back from his forehead, and he looks like a model in one of those magazines Jolene used to read. Even mud-streaked and wearing the ragged clothes of a nearly destitute demon slayer, Drake still possesses that rare kind of charisma that everyone was so taken by when we were children.

I look from him to Lucas, and the comparison is nearly as dramatic as the contrast of Lucas's black hair against his dead-white skin. Lucas is slim and wiry whereas Drake is tall and broad, and his features match the rest of him: refined, elegant, and dead-looking from lack of emotion.

I will perhaps never understand Lucas. But I know Drake so well we could be brother and sister.

Growing restless, I push my chair back and stand up. Drake trails off in the middle of his sentence, looking up at me. “What's up?”

“I can't sit here for an hour. I'm going to have a look around.”

“At what?” Drake looks baffled. Of course he would never understand why I feel the way I do. He could sit here for ages, jabbering on with Jolene and an unresponsive Trent while the sky grew dark. Nothing relaxes Drake more than a good dose of socialization. But I'm not like him.

“Let her go,” Trent says. He's looking at me, too. I realize from his eyes that he wants to come with me. He can't be having much more fun than I am. But he knows that I want to be alone.

“Alone?” Drake frowns. “It doesn't feel safe.”

“Nothing's safe anymore,” says Lucas unexpectedly.

“I won't go far.” I try to sound mollifying. “Just around the corner.”

“I guess that's all right,” Drake concedes. “Give a shout if anything happens.”

As I walk away from the small group of tables in front of the Burger-King-turned-fortress, I glance up at the sky. Clouds have gathered over the last hour, and it looks as if it'll rain soon. I've only spent one winter in Portland, but that was enough for me to grow thoroughly sick of rain. I'd never felt so happy in my life to greet the summer. Of course, rain is better than snow, especially for all the refugees sheltering in the streets downtown, but sometimes I miss the harsh New York winters.

The streets are quiet. As promised, I don't go far – just down to the corner. There, I sit down on the sidewalk with my back against a lamppost, and gaze into the stillness.

When I first arrived, the city was bustling with activity. Buses packed with refugees roaring in on all sides, and thousands more people on foot. Every few moments, a siren sounding, to clear the crowds as someone important came through – government officials and once, the President himself. The headquarters had to be moved from DC, of course, now that the country's practical boundaries had suddenly become much smaller.

Even after all these months, the thought still sends a chill down my spine. Everything has changed so suddenly. No one was prepared – not even we slayers, who were best equipped to deal with it. An apocalypse? How does one prepare for that?

If this even is an apocalypse. But it's hard to believe that it could be mere coincidence.

As I sit in silence, contemplating, I suddenly hear a scream.

My first thought is the others, left behind at the Burger King, and for a moment I curse myself for wandering off. But then rational thought returns. It can't be them – it was definitely a woman's scream, and it wasn't Jolene's voice. More importantly, it's coming from the opposite direction.


Heaving myself to my feet, I sprint back around the corner. Lucas meets me halfway.


“I came to fetch you,” he says shortly.


“Did the others hear?”


“Yes.”


He offers no further explanation. Irritated, I push past him and run back to the Burger King. Trent is the only one still sitting down. Drake and Jolene have risen to their feet, weapons drawn. Drake looks relieved to see me, but I give him no time to speak.


“There's someone in trouble. Over on the next block.”


To my consternation, they hesitate for a moment. Jolene speaks, twisting her binder's wand thoughtfully in her hand. “It could be a trap.”


“A trap?” Drake repeats skeptically. “What for?”


“Think about it. The police – sorry, the NDF – are looking for us. If they've been watching us, they know that we're the nice sort of slayers. The ones who'll go and save someone being attacked.”


“That's because we are!”


To my surprise, Trent raises himself to his feet and joins in the argument. “We can't just sit here and not do anything.”


“He's right,” I contribute. “We've at least got to go look.”


Drake nods firmly. Thank God he's still obsessed with being a hero, even after leaving behind the Superman bedsheets and Batman Halloween costumes. “Let's go.”


Jolene gives up the argument as soon as Drake takes the lead, of course. She's the only one who ever persists in disagreeing with him for long, and even for her it's rare.


The five of us set off down the street. Everyone's got a weapon out, except for me and Trent – I didn't even think of bringing one. How woefully unprepared I am. Really, it's only because of Drake and the others that I've survived this long.


Another scream. Louder, this time.


Drake breaks into a run.


“Wait!” I yell, but he isn't listening. He's got that concentrated single-minded look on his face that only appears before a fight. Oh, God, what if this is a trap? I could see from the look on Lucas's face that he agreed with Jolene. The two of them have been slayers for most of their lives, long enough to know what they're doing.


But when we round the corner, I see immediately that it isn't a trap. A woman is crouched in the middle of a deserted drugstore parking lot, hands over her head, still screaming. Circling her almost playfully are two long, sinuous demons. They've taken rather canine shapes, with ratty fur, long faces and canine teeth, but the proportions are off. It's obvious from a glance that they're demons, not starving strays.


And Drake is pelting straight toward them, his long jackknife gleaming in his hand.


“Watch out!” I scream. The rest of us are still on the curb.


The two demons look up at the sound of my voice. Then they see Drake running towards them. Ragged ears twitching, they lose interest in their prize and back away from the woman. They're small, no higher than my knee – are they retreating?


No. Of course not. Demons don't retreat – they don't know the meaning of fear.


Drake stops when he reaches the woman and places himself between her and the demons. At least he's still thinking rationally enough not to throw himself straight into a fight. For a moment, there's a standoff of sorts. The woman on the ground, Drake above her, the demons glaring at him from a few paces off with tails lashing back and forth. One of them is horribly disfigured, half its flesh bare of fur. It must have gotten on the wrong side of some other demon over the last year – but it takes a bit more to kill a demon than getting half its hide torn off.


Then the standoff comes to an abrupt end, as both the demons lunge towards Drake.


I'm nearly there – just a few yards away. The thought strikes me quite suddenly that I don't know what to do when I get there. With no weapon, I'm helpless. I'll only get in his way.


Caught in an agony of impotence, I stop.


But I needn't have worried. Drake slashes out with his jackknife, getting one of the dog-demons in the side. It lands heavily, crashing into the ground and skidding several feet. A blood trail glistens on the pavement in its wake.


The other demon twists aside at the last moment and dodges Drake by several inches. Yellow eyes glare with dumb fury. In some monstrous way, it is like an animal. A rabid, murderous animal.


And there are thousands just like it roaming the ruins of my hometown right now.


Drake raises his knife again. But now he isn't alone. Jolene comes at the demon from behind, brandishing a silver chain like a whip. I hear a resounding smack and the demon howls. The smell of burning fur fills the air.


“Finish it!” I yell.


Eyes grim with the righteous fury that belongs to all slayers, Drake sinks his knife six inches into the demon's side.


Blood and dark ichor spatter the pavement. The light leaves the demon's eyes, and a moment later, its body vanishes – sucked back into the other side of the planar wall.


“There,” Jolene says in satisfaction. In one smooth movement, she coils her silver chain around her wrist. Drake sheathes his knife, looks up, and smiles at me.


“Worried, Kass?”


“Of course not.”


Behind Drake, the woman on the ground slowly removes her hands from her face and stands up. Drake takes her shoulder and helps her up. “Are you all right?”


Crack! Drake staggers backward, clutching his cheek.


“Drake!”


Jolene makes a grab for the woman, but she's off and running before any of us can catch hold of her. She's barefoot, but she runs like a deer, dark hair streaming behind her.


“A slayer,” Drake spits, rubbing his reddened cheek. “Ungrateful little...”


Trent leans toward me, wearing one of his nearly invisible, devious smiles. “I think the look on his face was worth the slap.”


I laugh despite myself. “Yeah, it was.”


“Oh, come on, guys. My dignity is wounded enough without you guys laughing at – ”


Behind him, the second demon – the one Drake slashed with his knife – slowly rises to its feet. Blood drips from its matted fur as it bares its teeth, eyes glowing with hatred.


Trent sees it at the same moment I do. “Drake, look out!”


Drake turns, but his knife is still sheathed – and the demon strikes.


Bang.


Drake freezes, and so does Jolene. At first I don't understand where the noise came from. Then the demon disappears, and I turn to see Lucas standing a few feet to my left. Legs apart, back straight, one hand extended. The barrel of his gun is smoking slightly.


“My bad,” Drake calls out, breaking the silence. “I should've made sure it was dead.”


Without a word, Lucas slides his gun into its holster and walks off.


“Jerk,” Trent mutters.

“Happy birthday to you...”


The kitchen light is out; the bulb sputtered and died a few days ago, and we haven't been able to find any fresh ones in the looted grocery store. Candles flicker on the tabletop, stuck at random intervals into a tall, rounded mass – Drake's chocolate cake.


“Happy birthday to you...”


Jolene's singing is the loudest, of course. Trent and I are only mumbling along, and Lucas hasn't even opened his mouth. Not that I expected him to.


“Happy birthday, dear Dra-ake...”


As far as I can tell, Drake isn't even listening to the song. His eyes are fixed on the cake.


“Happy birthday to you!”


Jolene finishes with a flourish, and Trent sighs in relief. “Finally.”


“I know, right?” Without preamble, Drake picks up his knife and sinks it into the cake. “I've been waiting ages for this.”


Trent and I exchange glances, and he smiles.


I want to smile back at him, but I'm not sure if I can. A sudden wave of gloom has settled over me. Looking at the cake, and all the guttering candles Drake hasn't bothered to blow out, I can't help but think back to how we used to celebrate his birthdays. Before demons, before slayers, before desperate daily bids for survival.


Is that amusement park we used to go to still there? Or have the demons burned it down?


I stand up. Drake gives me the same startled look he did an hour ago. “I'll go get your present,” I say before he can ask questions, and he smiles.


It's so easy for them to smile. All of them. Have they all grown accustomed to this already?


The apartment suddenly seems too cramped. I need air. Leaving the kitchen, I head for the front door. Outside, the night air is moist and just a touch too cold. It's begun to rain again, so I sit down on the stairwell and watch from under the shelter of the eaves.


The entire street is dark. The streetlamps have gone out, since the city isn't supplying electricity to the main grid anymore. We get the power in our apartment from the backup generator down in the basement. Even though most of America's remaining citizens are cooped up in this city, it feels like a ghost town. It feels like we're the last people on earth.


But there's still hope. I have to remind myself every day. The planar wall hasn't vanished again since last year, and the only demons left are the ones who came through that day. If there's a finite number, then there's still a chance that we can eradicate them all – or at least enough to make a difference. All America needs is a chance. We can come back – can't we?


Down in the dark street, I see a flicker of light. For a moment I sit in silence, wondering if I'm hallucinating. It's too similar to the thoughts that were just running through my head a moment ago. A tiny light of hope in the darkness. But I blink, and it's still there. A tiny glow, like a candle. But you can't light a candle in the rain.


Two of them. Gleaming in the dark, so small they might vanish any moment. Without really thinking about it, I stand up and begin to slowly descend the stairs. My eyes are fixed on the twin lights, and it occurs to me that I still don't have a weapon. I stop, and the lights vanish.


I'm still standing there, staring out into the rain and the darkness, when Drake speaks from behind me.


“You know, I wish you wouldn't wander off like this.”


I turn. He's standing at the top of the stairwell, nearly invisible in the shade of the eaves. His voice sounds different from his usually cheery self.


“What do you mean?”


“You know what I mean. You've been different lately. I know something's wrong, Kass.”


I turn away from him. I've known Drake for a long time, but sometimes I forget how perceptive he really is. He just seems so oblivious all the time. “I don't want to talk about it.”


“Not in front of the others, I know. You've always been like that. But you know you can talk to me, Kass.”


Can I talk to Drake? It's true that I trust him more than anyone else in my life. But somehow I don't think he'd understand how I feel. He's never had trouble adjusting to new situations. That's probably why he makes such a good slayer. But me? Even after two years, I'm still wallowing in the past.


“Fine.” I cross my arms. “I miss New York.”


He doesn't look convinced. “That's it?”


And I miss the Nightmares, and I miss my family, and I miss my old life.


“Yeah.”


“Kass...” He sighs. “I know you never got enough time to grieve.”


Oh, no. He's really going to bring that up? Really? And here I thought he'd finally learned to read the atmosphere, at least a little bit.


“I know I was wrong... I should have let you go to that funeral... And I'm sorry...”


Now he sounds more upset than I do. Resolve fading, I start up the steps toward him. It isn't right that he should be so sad today – it's his birthday. It isn't every day you turn nineteen. “Stop it, Drake. You know you were right. It was too dangerous. I was stupid to get mad at you. Anyway, that was two years ago.”


“I know, but...” He swallows. “It takes a long time to... to get over that.”


Shame suddenly crashes over me with all the force of a battering ram. How could I have been so selfish? Drake has lost even more than I have. I've been moping around, thinking of my mother, cold in the ground for two years now... And Drake still has no idea what happened to his entire family after New York burned to the ground. His parents... his little sister, Cecile...


Dear Lord, I can't believe I'd forgotten.


I stare at Drake, speechless. What can I say? “Yeah,” I choke out at last. “It does.”


“I'm going back inside,” he says, sounding thoroughly miserable, and disappears into the apartment.


As soon as he's gone, I kick a stair as hard as I can, yelping in pain. Stupid, stupid, stupid. Not only am I a thoroughly dismal slayer, I'm also a horrible friend. The least I can do is march back in there, right now, and start grinning and acting cheerful with everyone else. Drake deserves to be happy for one day. I can do it. I can pretend. It can't be that hard.


Down in the street, the lights appear again.


For an indeterminate amount of time, I stare at them, transfixed.


What are they?


Reflections, the rational part of my brain tells me. Something shiny, lying in the street and reflecting light from the apartment windows.


Then the lights move.


Slowly, back and forth... The movement is hypnotizing.


I open my mouth to call out – and they vanish.


Looking around, I realize with a twinge of shock that I've reached the bottom of the stairwell. Another few steps and I would be out in the street, at the mercy of the still-falling rain. I didn't even notice that I was moving.


Turning, I look up at the apartment building. Light blazes in the third floor window – all the others are dark. Between the parted curtains, I can see the others sitting around the kitchen table. Drake is back, a wide smile on his face as he accepts a wrapped package from Trent. I always put down his rapid mood changes to an inconsistent personality before, but now I realize that he might just be a good actor.


He's hugging Trent now. Poor Trent's cheeks are bright pink. He always seems a little nervous around Drake, though I don't know why. He's used to being bullied by Lucas and Jolene, of course. But somehow his anxiety doesn't seem like fear to me.


I suppose I know how he feels. It's hard to feel completely confident around Drake. He's tall, good-looking, and practically exudes charisma. Couple that with Trent's natural insecurity, and I don't blame him for being skittish.


Lucas hands over his gift next. It's wrapped in brown paper – no doubt a gun or something equally murderous. I don't blame Drake for not opening it at the table. After it leaves his grasp, Lucas stands in one place for a moment, looking as if he doesn't know what to do next. Drake catches his eye, and he tries to back away, but it's too late. Drake snatches him up in a hug while Lucas's arms stick out awkwardly. Jolene's laughing hysterically, though I can't hear through the glass. After a few moments, Lucas frees himself and disappears into the living room.


Drake looks around then, as if he's waiting for someone else. Disappointment crosses his face, but fades quickly as Jolene engages him in conversation.


Was he looking for me?


I can't do that, I want to tell him. I'm like Lucas. If you hug me, I won't know what to do.


But at the same time, I feel a powerful yearning. Everyone looks happy now, in the brightly lit tableau of the kitchen window. And here I am, standing out in the dark, watching them.


Living with four other teenagers – well, three teenagers and one moody twenty-year-old – can get claustrophobic sometimes. Drake and Jolene certainly keep the place lively. Jolene and Trent argue constantly, but Drake tries to include him most of the time. Lucas seems to take up no space at all, due to his silence and propensity for disappearing for long periods of time with no explanation, especially on weekends. And then there's me.


I've never been used to being around people my own age. Drake doesn't really count – I've known him since I was little. We used to sleep in each other's beds, go hunting for nonexistent animals, and pretend to be monkeys together; it's hard to surpass that level of intimacy. Sometimes he's like an extension of myself. Other times, I watch him with Jolene and Trent and feel a sudden desire to leave the room.


I take a deep breath of chill November air. I'd better go inside.


Then the back of my neck begins to prickle.


My senses have been sharpened by a year of anxiety, constantly looking over my shoulder, waiting for an attack. The five of us went into hiding after that fiery day last December. The war has raged on in other slayer-populated countries, mainly in Europe, but the States – with the exception of New York – have mostly been left alone since then. For a year, we've been fighting only the demons we happen across, instead of seeking them out like we used to.


The truth is, we don't really need to look for them anymore.


By now, this unique sensation has become familiar to me. The knowledge that something is watching me – something that does not belong in this world and never has.


On the other side of the street, the lights appear again.


“Show yourself!” I shout.


Then everything starts to happen at once.

For a moment, all is silent except for the pounding rain.


Then the lights grow larger, and the impact throws me to the sidewalk.


A blur of wings and teeth and horrid stench. Suddenly flat on my back, cold pavement beneath me, breath gone. Demon perched on my chest like a murderous gargoyle. Yellow eyes peering down at me.


Small. No weapon. It could be worse.


Things speed up and slow down as my senses kick into action. I heave the demon off my chest with the sort of strength that only comes when I fight. It skids across the sidewalk, making a harsh noise that sounds like a whole flock of seagulls screeching.


“Kass!”


Rolling onto my hands and knees, I look up in time to see the front door burst open. Framed in a flood of light from inside, Drake stands still for a split second, taking in the situation. Then his eyes fix on me.


“Don't!” I scream, but it's too late.


Vaulting over the railing, he jumps off the staircase – from three floors up.


Recovering itself, the demon lunges at me again, and I frantically crawl backwards. Unarmed again! I'm absolutely useless! Out of the corner of my eye, I see the front door open again. A blur of silver. Saved! Jolene launches down the staircase, a feral grin on her face as she brandishes a knife.


But as Jolene lunges toward the demon, a blur of motion crashes into her, sending her flying to the side. My heart sinks. How many are there?


Lucas appears next. His slim, dark figure arches soundlessly over the railing, and he lands beside Drake – who's unharmed and ripping the paper off the package Lucas gave him. Thank God, he landed safely. What an idiot!


There are suddenly half a dozen throwing knives in Lucas's hands. Now they aren't in his hands anymore – they're flying in quick succession through the air. Before the first hits its target, the last has left his hand.


He moves toward the first demon. Smooth, controlled – like a stalking lion put into fast forward. I can't tear my eyes away. The demon hurls itself at him with another discordant cry. He's taken off balance by the sudden movement, but only for a moment. Then he's back on his feet, grappling with it, looking for an opportunity to stab.


Behind him, Drake finishes loading the gun he tore from the packaging. He stares around at the scene in confusion, looking for a target. Jolene and Lucas are too close to the demons – he can't fire without hitting them.


Then another demon appears on the awning behind him. “Look out!” I shout, but there's no need. Drake has eyes like a hawk. The confusion vanishes from his face, and suddenly he's all poise and calm. His arm comes up like clockwork. He fires without hesitation. His aim isn't as good as Lucas's, but it's a hit. The demon falls.


Another appears in its place.


I stand empty-handed. Frustration courses through me. If only I had a weapon...! Ah, but even then, I wouldn't be much help. Then I see Trent standing in the doorway, looking helpless. A sitting duck for any demons that might slip past the other three. I stumble over to the base of the stairwell, and he looks at me. No fear. Trent may be a poor fighter, but he is no coward.


“Stay down. Don't get hit,” I call up to him.


Obvious enough.


Trent closes his eyes and nods, looking furious with himself. I know the feeling.


Lucas has dealt with his demon easily enough. All that remains of it is a few drops of blood steaming on the sidewalk, the corpse having been sucked back into the world from whence it came. He's helping Jolene finish hers off, both of them twisting around each other like dancers with blades.


Drake is still shooting at the demons on the rooftop. There are three of them now, and he can barely shoot fast enough. His face is furrowed in concentration as he fires shot after shot. He's so focused that he doesn't see the net approach him in slow motion from behind, and neither do I – until it's too late.


“Drake!”


Moving. Lunging out from the safety of the stairwell. Can I reach him in time?


No!


The ropes wind around his body. He lets out a shocked cry, the gun spinning from his hand. He falls to the ground, trapped. Jolene and Lucas twist around to look, losing one fatal moment of concentration – the demon they were fighting seizes the opportunity, latches itself around Jolene's shoulders and bites deep into the side of her neck. She screams out in pain. Lucas turns around and starts stabbing the thing repeatedly, trying to get it off her.


Running. Drake, rising into the air, legs kicking and arms flailing. Shouts of frustration. I look up. And there they are, on the roof of the building across the street – directly above where I saw the lights. Eyes. Two humanoid figures, silhouettes black against the gray sky. The larger one is pulling up Drake's net by a rope, hand over hand, with no visible effort.


What... what are they doing here?


Cambions. Products of unholy trysts between demons and humans. At least, that's what the books say – I've never seen any pure demons similar enough to humans to, well, breed. Contrary to the myths about beautiful succubi, I've never seen an attractive demon. Cambions retain too much of their demonic parent's looks to pass for human. There's always something wrong with them, something instantly distinguishable.


Though I could care less whether the pair hoisting my best friend to certain death are attractive or not.


I launch myself into the highest jump I can make. My heart is drumming in my chest. Is he too high? Can I reach? Yes! My hands latch around his ankles and I swing. With our weight combined, we've got to be exerting at least three hundred pounds on the net and the cambion pulling it up.


No good. It's too strong. Rain pours down all around us – Drake's jean cuffs are soaked. My fingers slip. No!


I hit the ground hard. Something cracks beneath me, and pain shoots through my left foot. Struggling to my feet. Falling again – my foot can't take my weight. Dammit!


Someone rushes past me, white tennis shoes pounding the pavement. Trent, tearing something metallic from the lining of his jacket. He presses a button to make it spring open, like a giant metal spider, and tosses it into the air. A grappling hook, like the one he gave me last Christmas. It hits the roof with a clang – it's barely latched on and stopped sliding before Trent is climbing.


I have to give him credit – he's braver than he looks.


Too brave, perhaps. The smaller cambion spots the hook and kicks it off the roof with a derisive laugh. Nearly twenty feet up the wall, Trent falls. I barely have time to brace myself before he lands squarely on top of me. Another crack, but this time it isn't me.


Both of us lie there, winded and too stunned to move. The demons left on the roof of the diner jump down and swarm Jolene and Lucas. Jolene is in a bad way, bleeding heavily and swooning on the sidewalk. Lucas fights with terrifying, deadly grace, like a trapped wolf – but even he can only do so much with a knife. Wide, sweeping moves better suited for a sword fail, and the demons leap out of range, then pounce on him again.


On the rooftop, Drake is struggling, kicking out savagely through the net. The smaller cambion darts forward and stabs him with something too small to see. Drake goes stiff, twitching – then slumps lifelessly.


“No!” Trent and I scream in one voice. “Drake!”


Wings appear, arching above the demons and their prey. A giant scaled creature, like a Pterodactyl. Loxe. A winged demon, tamed on the other side of the planar wall and trained to carry the more intelligent demons. Alone, they aren't particularly dangerous – but anything with a cambion on its back should be feared.


Drake's limp body is thrown onto the loxe's back. The other cambions climb on board, settling on either side of Drake to keep him from slipping off. I can't watch. I can't watch.


“Drake! Drake!” I've fallen silent, but Trent is still yelling Drake's name over and over, like the sound of it can turn back time. He struggles up from the ground and keeps screaming. He's gone absolutely crazy. Me – I feel filled with lead. Cold.


Lucas stabs the last demon on the ground. With a final, hellish scream, it evaporates. He bends over Jolene's still form, placing his hands to her lips. I watch, sickened. Is she dead, too? No – Lucas mutters something I can't hear and hoists her up from the ground, leaning her against his knee while he stanches the flow of blood from her neck with both hands.


Above us, the swooping loxe disappears into the rainy night sky – taking Drake with it.