MY BOOTS DUG INTO the ground before I pushed off on the swing, kicking my legs back and forth.  I knew he was coming.  The sweet, licorice scent lingered in the air.  I shouldn’t be playing around on a swing set.  I should yank the knife from my boot and drive it into his heart the moment he appeared.

“We both know you won’t do that, Koralein.”  Kye was sitting on the other swing next to mine, watching me sway.

“You can read my mind now?”  That was the last thing I needed.

The corners of his lips twitched.  “Are you afraid of what I might find floating around in there?”  He pointed to my head.  “Your darkest secrets?”

“I ran into some of your friends.”  My eyes narrowed.  “Going after injured hunters now, Kye?  That’s a new low for you.”

He scoffed.  “I wasn’t trying to attack anyone.  I only wanted to see if any spurned ferrums wanted to join my new cause.”

My lips curled in contempt.  “Your sick and twisted new world isn’t a cause.  It’s a nightmare.  No ferrum in their right mind would willingly join you.  And using compulsion to influence them doesn’t count.”

He ignored my words as his blue eyes searched my face. “You weren’t hurt, were you?”

“No, but I really wanted to have a go with Smurfette.”  My nostrils flared as a bit of cold demon darkness slithered beneath the surface.  “I’d like to cut her fingers off and make her eat them.”

Kye arched a single blonde brow.  “Well, I’ll be sure to tell Mariska she has a fan.”

My feet touched the ground, and I skidded to a stop.  “What do you want?  Why are you visiting my dreams?”  Yes, I was very aware I was dreaming. 

He’d been worming his way into my consciousness since I almost turned.  At first it was just a presence or only his voice.  Then his image popped up, and this time he was actually in my dream.

I couldn’t even begin to understand how that was possible.  Only caeteras could share dreams or visions of each other.  Kye must be using some super compulsion power.  What other explanation could there be?

Kye shrugged.  “I guess I’m just the man of your dreams.”

I scoffed.  “More like nightmares.”

His face sobered and he wrapped his long fingers around the chain of my swing, drawing me closer.  “Your life will be a nightmare if you don’t let me turn you.”

I met his cold blue eyes dead on.  “I know Lorne wants to drain my life force to become a ferrum again.”

Kye’s jaw clenched, and he released the chains.  “Now you see how much danger you’re in.”

“Who else does Lorne need to complete the trifecta?” I asked.

“I don’t know.”  When I began to protest he continued.  “I really don’t.  I’m not even sure if he knows.  But believe me, he will find out.  It’s only a matter of time.”

Chills radiated down my spine.  Kye was right, even as much as I hated to admit it.  Lorne was bound and determined to do this. 

“How did Lorne find out about this ritual?” I asked. 

“He said a man came to him one night surrounded in darkness.  He told him how to find his light again.”  Kye shook his head.  “He believes it was Nox, the Roman god of night.”

I scoffed.  “Is he even real?”  I’d asked the same question in Roe’s class and received an annoyed answer of no.

Kye shrugged.  “My brother believes so.  He thinks he’s thanking him for creating the demon race in his name.”

“The immortal symbol.”  It was the god of night’s name.

He gave a quick nod.

My eyes traced over Kye’s visible skin, searching for any sign of his immortal tattoo. 

“You can’t see it,” he said, knowing what I was looking for.

“Oh.”  Demons had them anywhere.  As long as it was on their skin, it counted.

“I’ll let you see mine if you give me a kiss.”  The edges of his lips twitched.

I rolled my eyes.  “I’m good.  Not that curious.  You’ve seen one mark, you’ve seen them all.”

His eyes pierced mine, burning into me.  He wasn’t using compulsion, but something about the pools of glacier waters drew me in.  He leaned forward and began unbuttoning his shirt.

I coughed.  “Uh, what are you doing?”

“Relax, Koralein.”  His voice was deep and smooth as butter.  He pulled opened one side, a midnight tattoo stamped on the left side of his chest.

I leaned closer, staring at ƝÖΦ.  It had been carved into his skin millennia ago.  “Why over your heart?” 

His gaze darkened.  “You know why.”

I did.  He’d been hurt by the goddess and branding himself with evil over his heart was like a big screw you to his mother.

Before I realized what I was doing, my hand lifted.  My fingers touched the mark, touched his bare chest.  His skin was soft and warm. 

A sigh drifted from his mouth.

I quickly snatched my hand back, my cheeks flooding with heat.  No words came out.  I had practically felt him up. 

Kye smoothly yanked my swing in his direction until the heat of his breath blew across my lips.  “Don’t feel bad for wanting to touch me.  It’s only natural.”

I swallowed hard.  I wanted to push him off, but his chest was still bare.  Damn.  He was almost as ripped as Rex.

A snarl crossed my face, but it wasn’t as mean as I’d wanted it.  “I prefer broken infinity tattoos.”

Some of the humor drifted from his face.  “If Lorne gets you, you won’t have either.”

My snarl faltered knowing he spoke the truth.  “I’ll find a way to stop him.”

“I have found a way to stop him.  I’ll turn you,” he said.

“I’d rather die than be a demon.”

His eyes darkened.  “That’s just it, Kory.  You won’t die.  Your soul will be shattered.  There will be nothing left of you.”

I swallowed hard, pretending his words weren’t scaring me shitless.  “It would be better than being a demon.”

Kye cursed.  “Stop lying to yourself,” he hissed releasing my seat so I swung away from him.  “You’re better than that, and we both know you don’t want to be obliterated into nothing.”

My jaw clenched, teeth grinding together.  “I won’t become a demon.”

“You don’t have to be evil.”  He twisted toward me again, his voice softening.  “You don’t have to kill to survive.  There are demons that do it.  Not many.”

I shook my head.  “I would kill.  When I was turning, I liked the violence.”

“You like violence now,” he pointed out.

“Not like I did when I was becoming a demon.”  Acid crept up my throat as I remembered reveling in the sounds of bones breaking when I fought those guys at The Dungeon.  Their pain had brought me joy.

And if I became a demon, Rex would follow me.  No questions asked.  He would give up everything.

I shivered.  No.  I couldn’t be a demon. 

“Leave with me then.”  Kye’s voice was almost desperate.  “I won’t turn you.  We can just go somewhere.”

“I’m not running away.”

He cursed, the tendons in his jaw flexing.  “My brother is coming after you.  Don’t you get that?  If you think I’m bad, you haven’t seen anything yet.”

“What happened to you two?” I asked, watching him.  “When he returned as a monster, you followed him.  You gave up your life and your own light to be with your brother.  And now you hate him.”

Kye stood, his eyes staring at the moon.  He didn't see the night sky.  Instead memories played through his mind, each one deepening the frown on his face.  “He just up and disappeared one day.  He didn’t say goodbye.  He didn’t leave a note.  There was no reason behind it, none that I could see anyway.”  He took a deep breath, his shoulders tensing.  “I looked for him for years, decades even.  He was gone without a trace so I thought the worst.”  Kye swallowed hard.  “I thought he’d been killed by hunters.”

I bristled in the swing.  Hearing so much emotion in his voice always made me uneasy.  Demons weren’t supposed to feel anything other than anger and pleasure from pain.  But the more I talked to this demon, the more he shattered that belief. 

He made it too easy to see him as more than a monster.

“And then one day I saw him.  He was just standing in the shadows on a street corner in Rome.”  His fingers curled around one of the metal poles holding up the swing set.  Darkness began to fall over him, coating him in a layer of hatred.  “He told me he was wrong to have ever made me.  He told me I was everything wrong with this world, and if he had the powers of Aurora, he would steal me from existence.”

Pain sliced through my chest, cold, sharp, and unrelenting.  He was abandoned by his brother once again.  Kye was a monster, but to have his own brother—the person who had helped bring about his darkness—tell him he would unmake him, was horrible.

“I’m sorry.”  The words tumbled from my lips before I could stop them.

Kye’s glacier eyes met mine, oily blackness ringing around the edges.  “You feel sympathy for me?”

I shrugged.  “Maybe.”

A line creased his brow.  He turned away, shielding his face.  “Lorne told me he’d been searching for a way to return to the goddess.  He was watching The Council headquarters.”

Cold air slid down my back. 

“I vowed that day to destroy my brother’s chances of restoring his light.  I wanted to make him and his goddess pay.”

Bile coated the back of my throat.  “Did you kill my parents?”  Ian said he hadn’t, but if Kye had seen my mother and had no idea she’d had me, maybe he thought he ended Lorne’s chances ten years ago.  He could have discovered me later.

His eyes shifted back to me, searing into my soul.  “I didn’t kill them.”

A rush of air exited my lungs.  I believed him.

Kye released the pole, leaving behind indents in the metal from his fingers.  “And now I want to stop him from destroying you more than simply making him pay.”

I shook my head.  “Why?  It would be so much easier to just kill me.  There are no other direct descendants, and it would be done.”

He gripped the chains on the swing, looming over me.  “In case you haven’t noticed, I’ve got quite the obsession for you.”

My skin puckered at the intensity flowing off him.

“And I’d much rather enjoy your company even when we’re fighting than snuff your life out.”  The edges of his lips twitched.  “Besides, where’s the challenge in that?”

He wasn’t fooling me.  He wasn’t keeping me alive simply because it was fun.  He wasn’t having fun trying to stop his brother without hurting me.

“Why don’t you just kill him?”  Kye was the second oldest creature in this world.  He had the strength and ability to kill Lorne.

A humorless laugh left his mouth.  “I’ve tried.  It didn’t work.”

I blinked.  “What do you mean?”

He sighed and dropped down on the swing beside me again.  “I shoved a damn iron knife into his heart, and it didn’t kill him.”

Ice slid through my veins, and if my fingers weren’t curled around the chains, I would have fallen back.  I knew Lorne would be hard to kill, but impossible? 

“He’s an immortal in every sense of the word, Kory.  He can’t be killed.”  Kye pulled the chains again, bringing me so close I could smell frozen berries beneath the demon sweetness.  “Once you turn eighteen, my brother will never stop coming after you.”

“I guess we better hurry and find a way to either kill or stop him.”  My voice sounded a hell of a lot more confident than I felt.

Kye’s eyes dipped to my lips.  “Become a demon.  Problem solved.”  He moved forward.

“Do not kiss me,” I hissed.  And yet I didn’t back away.

Before he leaned in to press his mouth against mine, his eyes flickered up, fixing on something behind me.

I whipped around, nothing but nighttime surrounding the park.  “What did you see?”  When I turned back Kye was gone, the swing completely still as if he’d never been there.

The hairs on my arms stood at attention.  The cold blade of death’s scythe was inches from my neck, solid and unforgiving. 

“Kye?” I called out.  “Where are you?”  What the hell was wrong with me?  I was calling out to a demon because I was scared.

I was badass Kory Colt.  I didn’t get scared.

What a freaking lie.

“Kye?” 

“He can’t help you.”  His voice slithered from the shadows, instantly drowning my body in fear.

I spun, coming face to face with those golden eyes like the sun.  And then demon darkness eclipsed the burning orbs.

There was no time to react.  One moment Lorne was in front of me and the next, his razor-sharp teeth tore into my neck.  The attack was so vicious, so damaging, I couldn’t even scream.

Pain exploded through every corner of my body and my vision turned white.  It wasn’t only my life force being sucked out.  I felt my soul tearing from my insides.  I was splitting into a million pieces, each fracture more agonizing than the next.