Chapter 33

Zagan

IYLA’S BARELY CONTAINED PAIN PIERCED me deeper than any arrow ever could. The dark anguish of her heart practically strangled me where I stood, watching her sit on the small stool of the piano I’d conjured. Tears continued their relentless journey down her face as she stared at the piano keys, too lost to the grief to move.

She desperately wanted to take away the death moving in on her sister, and likewise, I wanted to take this pain from her. But not at the cost of killing her. She’d asked the impossible of me, because while she couldn’t lose her sister, I couldn’t lose her . Not like that.

So instead, I stood uselessly to the side.

Iyla finally looked up at her sister. “What would you like to hear?”

Gemma rested among the many blankets and gave Iyla a dreamy sort of grin. “I want to hear that song Dad always played and sang to us and Mom. That Justin Bieber song that Tommee Proffitt made a version of.”

Iyla’s eyes briefly shut like the mere suggestion was already too much. But with a nod, she looked down at the keys, brought her fingers up to them, took a small breath, and started to play. I recognized the song Gemma had requested as “Anyone” as the first notes twinkled into the air, and my heart lurched when Iyla’s sweet voice began to sing. I held my breath, enraptured by her with every sweep of her fingers and every word she sang.

She always told me that when I sang, it did something to her. She said my voice was beautiful , a description I’d never been given. Now I knew how wrong she was, because she … she was beautiful. For a moment, I thought I’d lost touch with reality and somehow stumbled into Heaven to hear an angel singing.

But it was just her.

Just my sparrow.

Her voice cracked on the lyrics about a loved one moving on. Tears stole her voice, and her body hunched forward in an effort to keep singing and playing through the hurt. With her quickly losing the ability to keep going, I moved toward her and began to sing, too. She looked up at me through swollen eyes as I picked up where she couldn’t, though her fingers never stopped their playing.

I sat beside her on the bench and wrapped my arm around the small of her back as the chorus started. She took a deep breath and started singing again, our voices mixing and blending in a harmony unlike any other. Demon and angel—voices filling the room in a song about love and about needing more time.

And as Iyla sang and played for her sister, my own eyes never left Iyla. They were glued to her profile as I sang with her and without her when the tears prevented it. I sang, realizing that every line was for her. Every word was for her.

Even if she didn’t know it.

The song finished, and the room would’ve been silent if not for Iyla’s hiccups and the beeping of Gemma’s machine. We both looked at Gemma, whose eyes had drifted closed at some point. She laid motionless.

I saw the instant fear swarm Iyla’s eyes, but I quickly placed my hand on her back and reassured, “She’s just sleeping.”

Relief washed over her, and it seemed only after I’d pointed it out that Gemma’s minute rise and fall of her chest became clear. Iyla ran her fingers over her wet cheeks and stared hopelessly at her sister. “Do you think it will happen today?” Her voice caught on the last word, and the sound damn near ruined me.

“No,” I answered, and I meant it. I didn’t actually know, but I’d make it true. “It won’t happen today.”

She closed her eyes and took a deep breath. “Then we should let her rest. We can come back tomorrow. Maybe we can bring her that new dragon book that just released. You know, the one the two of you talked about?”

Tomorrow.

I cursed inwardly. If only things had turned out differently.

I cleared my throat of the tightness there and nodded. “Yeah. Yeah, we can do that.”

She got up and slowly went back to the bed. I waved my hand at the piano, making it disappear. When I looked back at Iyla, she had her lips pressed to Gemma’s forehead and her hands clutching Gemma’s slender fingers.

“I love you,” Iyla whispered against Gemma’s temple. “So, so much.”

I wanted to take Iyla’s pain away. I wanted her endless stream of tears to vanish. I wanted to give her what she wanted and save her sister for her.

I could never truly understand what she was feeling. I didn’t have siblings, and I viewed death as a necessary part of life for humans. I’d seen thousands of deaths over the millenia I’d been here, and none of them had fazed me. I’d even go so far as to say that I’d always found it annoying when humans made such a big deal over a very natural thing that they knew had to happen.

This was different.

Seeing Iyla cling to her sister. Hearing the sobs still spew from her lips as we drove home. Practically tasting the heartache in the air around her.

Nothing else seemed to matter. The only thing that did was taking Iyla’s anguish away, no matter what it took or what it meant.

The moment we stepped through the front door of our house, Iyla ran a shaky hand through her hair and looked at me. “There’s got to be something I can do. I-I can’t let this happen. It’s all my fault that she’s like this.”

“Iyla, slow down,” I soothed, holding my hands out to her. “You didn’t cause this.”

“I did,” she sobbed. “The blood. It was my idea. I—”

There was no convincing her otherwise when she was so distraught, so I snapped my fingers. In the same instant, her eyes rolled back into her head, and her body went limp. I caught her in my arms and stared down at her sleeping face.

“Just rest,” I whispered to her. “I’ll make this right. You won’t lose your sister.”

I carried her up the stairs to her bedroom and tucked her in. She would be out for a while, so after shutting her door behind me, I trudged downstairs to my music studio. I dropped onto the couch and stared at the finished song I’d left there that morning—the song I’d written for her.

Every line and every note was crafted with Iyla in mind, and it had easily been my best song yet. But what did I expect when writing a song for the girl who made my existence mean something?

I leaned my head against the back of the couch and stared blankly at the ceiling as I called out, “Dante.”

I waited in silence as the call traveled to wherever Dante was. It was roughly a minute before the demon appeared in a plume of shadows.

“This better be important,” Dante grumbled, holding a naked hardback book in his hand. He shook it at me and hissed, “I was just about to find out who the killer is.”

I smirked, despite knowing the rather bleak conversation we were about to have. “Sorry to interrupt.”

He flopped down on the couch cushion adjacent to mine and dropped the book next to him. He stared at me for a second like he was trying to solve his own mystery of why I’d randomly called him here through shadow speak. We didn’t really call out to each other like that anymore, not since phones were invented. We only did it when it was about something urgent, which no doubt left him puzzled now.

“What’s up?” Dante asked with only a hint of caution to his voice.

“Starting today, I’ll need you to take Coldin with you.”

Alarm furrowed his brow. “Why? He stays with the leader of the group, which is you. I don’t know if I want the responsibility of making sure he stays under control.”

I didn’t answer right away. I pressed my lips together as I mulled over what I wanted to say. Talking, especially about feelings , was fucking weird for us. Not only did we not really have a variety of them, but we didn’t get deep like that. Just the thought of opening up to others made my skin scrawl.

So, I finally decided on, “You know, I don’t think I’ve ever done anything for the sake of someone else. Even when I did things that others perceived as kindness or as selflessness, I always had my own motives. I always saw it as benefiting me, one way or another.”

Dante frowned, clearly confused by my sudden change in topic. “Glad to hear it.”

I chuckled and looked down at my tattooed hands, running my thumb along the design. “Iyla changed that. I’ve grown to … like doing things. Not for me, but for her. And not even for my own satisfaction but because I actually want to see her happy.”

“Are you trying to make me puke?” Dante asked with a roll of his eyes. “I can’t believe you called me here just to spew your delusional nonsense.”

I sucked one of my lip piercings into my mouth, toying with the ring in an effort to brace myself for my next words. “Iyla’s sister is dying. My blood didn’t work.”

Dante shrugged his large shoulders. “Big deal. Humans die every day. What do we care?”

“It’s Iyla’s sister.”

He raised an indifferent brow. “So?”

“It’s breaking Iyla. She can’t lose her sister.” I met and held Dante’s gaze as my voice hardened. “I won’t let her lose Gemma.”

I’d been wracking my brain for some way to save Gemma ever since I saw the devastation it caused Iyla. Plus, I had to admit, the little girl had grown on me. We did bond over dragons. I’d considered trying more blood to save her but worried that would only make things worse. Then I realized the solution was obvious.

A Bargainer demon, one who made trades and deals. Their abilities were limitless, so long as they received a payment for their deals.

Gemma’s life saved in exchange for something else.

It sounded simple in theory.

But what most didn’t realize when going into a deal with a Bargainer demon was that they never asked for things easily given, even from their own kind—hell, especially from their own kind. It didn’t matter the cost, though. Not if it meant saving Iyla’s sister.

Now I understood why humans threw caution to the wind and made deals with demons.

Dante seemed to piece together what I was suggesting, and his dark eyes narrowed into thin slits. “Are you fucking insane? You know what she’s going to demand in exchange.”

I nodded. “I do, which is why I’ll go to her. She’ll ask for something I can easily give, whereas I don’t know what others would require. I won’t risk them demanding something impossible, not with so little time left.”

Dante leaned forward to brace his forearms on his legs, and desperation creased his brow tighter. “Easily given? Dude! You’ve lost it! Why would you do that? How could you even consider doing something so stupid for some human girl?”

“Because I love her.”

I’d never said the words out loud, and I didn’t even know I was going to say it until they were out there. Honestly, I’d never even let myself think them. Yet the moment they were given life, I realized nothing had ever been more true. That warm, bubbling emotion that had been swirling around inside me all this time made so much sense now.

Love.

I loved my sparrow.

Dante stared at me, completely speechless for once. His lips were open, but no words came out. He didn’t even blink. Just when I feared I’d officially broken him, he snarled, “We’re demons. We can’t love.”

“Says who?” I shot back, suddenly determined to defend what I knew to be true. “Look, all I know is that Iyla makes me better. She makes existing better. When she smiles, the sun shines down on me. When she walks into a room, I can breathe in a way I never could before. With her, I feel … at home. If what I feel for her isn’t love, I don’t think such a thing exists.”

He shook his head slowly. “So you’re really going to do it? You’re going to throw away everything?”

Despite the gravity of what I was about to do, I actually smiled. “For her? I’d do anything.”

“I don’t understand you,” Dante huffed disbelievingly.

I clapped him on the shoulder. “Maybe you will someday.”