"So you want to know which demon stole it?”
Which demon. Not “if” a demon took it—which one. He’d just told us everything we needed to know without meaning to.
For once Balthazar was in the dark. I couldn’t help but smile. It wasn’t often that he didn’t have the upper hand. “Do you even know?”
He flicked his hand—a casual, almost lazy gesture—and I sailed across the room. My shoulder slammed into the wall. Pain burst inside me, searing and blinding.
The memory slammed into me — not the images this time, but the feeling. The helplessness. Being trapped inside my own body while something else drove it, screaming behind my own eyes with no one able to hear me.
"I'll kill the prince now if you don't do as I say."
“Rocco!” Selena screamed.
Her voice yanked me back to the present. I wasn’t in hell. I wasn’t chained. But the demon who had broken me was standing in this room, and the terror was just as real.
I looked up to see Selena launching herself at Balthazar, her fangs bared, her eyes blazing with fury. “How dare you hurt him!”
Balthazar caught her by the throat with one hand, lifting her off the ground like she weighed nothing. Her feet dangled, her hands clawing at his wrist.
“Selena!” I scrambled to my feet, ignoring the agony in my shoulder. “Leave her alone!”
“Or you’ll what, Prince?” He squeezed slightly, and Selena gasped. “If she attacks me again, I’ll crush her windpipe.”
“Please.” I hated myself for begging, but I’d beg on my knees if it meant keeping her safe. Her face was turning red, her fingers clawing uselessly at his grip. One twist of his wrist and she’d be gone. Everything we’d just found—everything we’d just become—over in a heartbeat. “Please. She has nothing to do with this. Hurt me, not her.”
Balthazar’s gaze sharpened—amusement, maybe, or something darker. “Ah, so you’ve claimed her. How quaint.”
He released Selena, and she crumpled to the floor, coughing and gasping for air. I was at her side in an instant, pulling her into my arms, checking her throat for damage. She wasbreathing. Ragged and raw, but breathing. The relief nearly buckled my knees.
“I’m okay,” she rasped, her hand finding my cheek. “I’m okay.”
I forced myself to look away from her and back at the demon. Balthazar didn’t even glance at her. His burning eyes stayed fixed on me, his lip curled in disgust.
“Don’t be presumptuous with me, boy.”
I climbed back onto my feet, helping Selena up with me. My shoulder throbbed, but I’d be damned if I’d show weakness in front of him. Not again. Never again. I gritted my teeth so hard I thought they might shatter. “Then who is it?”
He strolled around the room, taking his time, seeming to savor our desperation. “The same demon who wants Noelle. The same demon who tried to sacrifice her.”
Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.
I shoved my fingers through my hair. “Vex, the demon Vex.”
Balthazar stopped and turned, a slow, mocking smile spreading across his face. He clapped his hands together—once, twice, three times—the sound echoing through the room like gunshots. “Very good, Prince.”
Rose stepped forward, her voice tight with urgency. “Do you know where he went?”
“To Transylvania.”
The birthplace of Dracula? “What the hell for?”
Balthazar leaned against the wall and folded his arms, looking almost bored. “Because he needs to perform a spell on the Summer Solstice at midnight at Dracula’s castle to destroy the last remaining shard of theLapis Umbrae.”
Shit, the Summer Solstice. Dracula’s castle?
“But the Summer Solstice is tomorrow night,” Rose said. “Can you stop him?”
“No,” Balthazar said. Final. “I’m going to remain by Noelle’s side. If I go after Vex, Lucifer will mount my ass on his wall.”
