2
The man stood there in the entryway, waiting for me to move. The inside of the house was lit, but barely. A weak, yellow glow bled from somewhere deeper in, not enough to fill the space so much as stain it.
Everything about this felt wrong, but I stepped inside anyway. Jacob slipped in behind me, the door clicking shut with a quiet finality that made something in my chest tighten.
The entryway opened into a narrow living room that stretched longer than it should have, the proportions just slightly off.
Furniture sat in deliberate placement—a couch facing a blank wall, a table too centered, nothing out of line.
No clutter. No life. Up close, the stillness wasn’t natural. It felt enforced.
“Follow me.” Leo guided us down the hallway, the walls pressing in just enough to make me aware of every breath.
Closed doors lined one side, no light beneath them.
The other wall held framed pictures, but the glass warped the dim light, turning every glance into a distorted reflection.
Nothing in this place wanted to be clearly seen.
Caspian’s magic stirred low in my gut as the man stopped at a door off to the side and pushed it open.
It was an office, or at least something pretending to be.
A desk sat at the center, too clean, too precise.
Papers were stacked in perfect alignment.
Bookshelves lined the walls, but the titles blurred if I looked too long, like they didn’t want to be read.
A single lamp cast that same sickly glow, leaving the edges of the room to dissolve into shadow.
“Theo …” Jacob whispered from behind me.
His hand grazed my arm, ready to transport us out of there, but I shook my head.
I was too invested in this to leave now.
Rift wardens were a wealth of knowledge, patrolling the streets day in and out.
If anyone had come across a living demon entering the underworld at some point, this guy would know.
I stepped forward and set the pizza box on the desk. Leo opened the bag on top of it, ignoring the warm waft of garlic that assaulted the air, and plucked the amber bottle from within.
“Pure death magic,” the man mused. He was tall, well over average height, but wiry, built in a way that suggested he relied on restraint rather than strength to survive.
There was something unsettling in the way he held himself, a quiet, controlled stillness that didn’t feel practiced so much as instinctive, like violence was simply something he chose not to waste.
His face was scarred beyond easy recognition, old damage cutting through any clear memory of what he might have once looked like. What remained was sharp and lean beneath it all, with cropped brown hair that lay close to his head and brown eyes that watched without softness or hesitation.
And yet …
I had this distinct feeling of déjà vu, like I was walking straight back into an old nightmare.
Something about this man seemed all too familiar to me, but I couldn’t place my finger on it. The harder I tried to focus on him, the more frustratingly slippery the details became.
“Have a seat.” He gestured to the two wide chairs facing his wooden desk.
He sat down in an elegant office chair, casually leaning back and clearly not feeling the same unease that I felt.
“You upheld your end of the deal. Now ask your question. Word on the street is that you’re looking for a particular missing person who shouldn’t be here in the first place? ”
Word on the street? I had thought I had been careful not to draw attention to myself, but I supposed most of the people I ended up speaking to were in the business of selling information.
If a living witch had snuck into the underworld, and lived to tell about it, of course they were going to spread the word.
I risked a glance at Jacob. His eyes were locked onto Leo, his fingers drumming the arm of the chair, ready for action.
Coughing to clear my throat, I spoke. “I’m, uh, looking for someone, yeah.
” I swallowed hard, immediately regretting how dry and strained my voice sounded.
“He’s a demon that shouldn’t be here. He got sucked into a portal by accident.
I’m not here looking for trouble. I just want to bring him back to the living world where he belongs. ”
Leo gave a non-committal hum. He was twirling the amber bottle in his hand, more concerned with the magic inside than my story. “And what does this man of yours look like?”
“He’s … a demon, but he doesn’t have horns. Decently tall. Muscular. Auburn hair and maroon eyes. Has an eyebrow piercing and a lip piercing. Oh, and an octopus tattoo that covers most of his upper body.”
He tucked the bottle into his shirt pocket and opened the cardboard box, breaking off a slice of pizza. “Sounds familiar, actually. I think I’ve come across him before.”
I leaned forward in my chair, my heart racing. “Really? When? Where? Can you take me to him?”
My heart sank when I realized if this rift warden had come across Ren, there was a distinct possibility that he was no longer alive.
“I can take you to where we last met.” He finished the slice and went for the garlic knots. “Care to join me on an adventure?”
“That’s it!” Jacob shot up from his seat. “This guy is obviously messing with you, Theo. Let’s get out of here.”
“Probably not the best idea.” Leo chuckled.
“I’m well aware that this one here is more alive than the mystery ecosystem living in my fridge and you, my friend, are an anomaly.
You’re dead, but you still have magic. You must know what a rift warden can do with that information, what I can do with you. ”
Jacob growled. “I was granted special permission to have my magic. It’s not illegal.”
Leo shrugged, his lip tugging into a smirk. “Illegal or not, there are many people out there who would look the other way to get their hands on it.”
I sat frozen in place, my gaze settled onto Leo.
Jacob was right to be cautious. My instinct was telling me to run far away from this man, but this was the very first lead I found of Ren.
I couldn’t ignore the fact that even if he was trying to manipulate me, this was the first real lead I had that could bring Ren home.
“So is that a yes?” His chair creaked as he stood, walking over to a built in bookcase. He pulled a green book off the shelf. With a distinct click, the bookshelf door gaped open, revealing nothing but a vertical cut of darkness. “Because if you want to go, we leave now.”
Jacob shifted behind me, already tense. “No. No way in hell are we following you through there!”
“I don’t think we have a choice,” I said, my voice unsteady as I spoke. This man had already threatened to expose us. He had no intention of letting us go.
“You have two options.” Leo wiggled his hand, the black ring stark against his pale, scarred skin. “I’m sure you’ve seen what these babies can do. I can either bind you both and drag you through this portal myself, or perhaps you’d like to try your luck fighting him.”
My eyes darted toward the doorway, where a set of glowing red eyes greeted me. They weren’t human. Not fully.
The shape attached to them shifted as it moved forward.
At first it looked like an animal: low to the ground, broad-shouldered, something between a large hound and a wolf pulled out of proportion.
But the longer I looked, the more it refused to stay consistent.
Its limbs lengthened when it stepped into the light, joints bending just slightly out of alignment, furless skin catching the dim glow like wet stone.
“Jacob, don’t mo—” I started, but it was too late.
Jacob lunged, reaching for me and trying to latch onto my arm, to pull us out of there in one clean transport. But the creature was faster.
The moment Jacob’s spell sparked, the surrounding air warped. White light flickering into existence, then immediately destabilized.
The creature hit him mid-cast, slamming into Jacob hard enough to shatter the spell entirely and send him flying across the office. He crashed into a chair, momentum carrying him into the desk, wood scraping loudly as he went down.
“Fuck,” Jacob groaned, dazed—but already pushing himself up. “Not cool, bro!”
The creature didn’t give him time to recover. It lunged at him again, and I flicked out two fingers. The magic imbued in the sign caused the creature to slip, but didn’t stop it from charging forward.
It reached Jacob, sinking its vicious teeth into his arm. He wailed out in pain, and while ghosts didn’t have blood, a stream of deep red smoke seeped out of the wound.
I reacted on instinct, gathering magic into my palm. It was sluggish and heavy, nothing at all like what it would be in the living world. My necrotic energy drew on life, and in a room like this so full of death, I was the only one feeding it.
A wave of dizziness hit me as I released it.
The weak bolt struck the creature’s flank, but it barely reacted.
Silver runes lit across its body—bright, jagged lines of light crawling beneath its skin, illuminating the office in a fractured glow.
Whatever it was, it wasn’t a normal animal. It was bound. Controlled.
What the hell was this thing?
Its jaws parted slightly. Saliva stretched between sharp teeth as it stalked forward. I took a step back. Then another. Until I could hear the sinister chuckle of Leo behind me. Cold air swallowed the back of my legs as I realized how close I was to the black void.
“Alive,” Leo commanded, calm and certain. “Orren, this one remains alive.”
Jacob looked up sharply. “Theo—!” He moved again to reach me, the creature abandoning me to block Jacob from getting any closer.
But at the last second, Jacob flashed in and out of existence, transporting right around the creature.
Jacob was so close, his fingers inches away from mine as I reached out to touch him.
My breath caught instantly as I was yanked backwards. Leo’s slender fingers locked around my neck with effortless precision, holding me just short of the portal’s edge. My vision tightened at the corners, not from pressure alone, but from recognition crawling up my spine like ice.
I realized then I knew those hands. I’d watched them wrap around a blue dagger that pressed against my friend’s throat. I’d shaken that same hand to make a deal to find Caspian and to save Ellie from her brutal fate.
The scars, the icy coldness, it all made sense now. This wasn’t a random person named Leo. It was Leon.
Panic shot through me like a lightning bolt, and I reached one last time for Jacob but I never made it.
“Theo, I’m sorry. She knows something’s wrong. She’s calling me back.”
In a puff of white smoke, Jacob vanished as Ivy picked up on his distress and summoned him away.
Glowing silver chains shot from the ring on Leon’s finger, coiling out of the hand wrapped around my neck. The moment they touched my skin, everything inside me went dead silent. My magic cut off instantly. It wasn’t fading. It was severed, yet I could still feel it fighting to be set free.
A crushing heaviness flooded my limbs, like my body had been encased in concrete. Even Caspian’s magic flared beneath the surface, sharp and furious at being stuffed away, but its attempt was forced down, writhing uselessly beneath the chains like something trapped and choking.
My breath hitched as the world narrowed.
Leon’s grip didn’t loosen. If anything, it steadied.
“I’ve been waiting months for this moment, Theo,” he said, voice low and almost satisfied. “I’ve finally found you.”