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No. Something in my shadow demon magic reacted to her presence and aura. But it was like looking through a foggy mirror at something far away. Magic, I realized, was obfuscating parts of Quinn.
“Are you hurt?” I asked her.
Her lips pressed together into a thin line. She shook her head. Quinn couldn’t have been more than a few years younger than Leif. But that meant she had beensoyoung, younger than I had been, when she was taken.
“Where are you two being kept?” I asked of them both.
“Separate,” Will answered quickly. “Elsewhere in the castle. I look worse than I feel.” Willa trailed off as she studied me closely, a look of shock on her face. “You’re… one of them?”
I nodded softly. “Yes, newly so. It was to help Mrak and because I was in danger here as a human.”
Willa shook her head as if in disbelief, but Quinn grabbed my hand. The action drew both Willa’s attention and mine. “Where is Leif?”
It was only then, with our bodies touching, that I realized what that magic was wrapped around Quinn.
“He’s back on Earth,” I whispered as my eyes widened. Quinn was a shadow demon. Sylas had turned her at some point. By force, most likely. Why hide it, then? What did Sylas have to gain by keeping Quinn’s new existence hidden?
Maybe he didn’t think I’d realize. That I wasn’t strong enough to sense the change and all we now had in common.
Another gut-wrenching realization slammed into me at that moment. Quinn had been captured by Sylas years ago… years Karn had spent with Sylas.
Karn had known. Not just that Quinn was here or now a shadow demon—he likely didn’t care about that, although maybe that was why he’d been confident I could handle the change.
No, Karn was hiding from Mrak the fact thatSylascould still transform humans and other supernaturals into shadow demons. Karn had said specifically that the Shadow Sanctum hadn’t been used in decades. That it wasn’t common anymore, that changing ritual.
I chewed the inside of my cheek as pieces fell in around me. Sylas was making an army and making the one he already had stronger. Then he’d arm them all with nightsteel weapons and march on the rest of Kithonia. On the world beyond. On Earth, all in this dead god’s name.
“Is he alive?” Quinn asked in my silence.
“Yes.” Barely, no thanks to me. I left that part out. “He’s worried about you. I promised to bring you back to him.”
“You can’t.” Tears built in her eyes. I squeezed her hand. “He won’t want me. Not like this, as one ofthem.” Then it hit her, too. Sadness turned to fear in her eyes. “One ofyou. Get away from me.”
I raised my hands. “I’m on your side.”
Quinn pushed her chair back and tried to stand, but there wasn’t much slack on the chains binding her wrists to the table. “Your friend is a shadow demon now. We can’t trust her.”
“I know,” Willa said. “But I’d trust her with my life, Quinn. Especially after everything we’ve endured together.” But then Willa’s face became an unreadable mask. “Lazarus had been so afraid of demons.”
“Lazarus is dead.” There was no point dwelling on him anymore.
Willa nodded slowly. “So what’s the plan?”
I glanced between her and Quinn and the feast awaiting us that I had completely forgotten about. “I think that’s rather obvious.” Willa knew where my allegiances were, but the suspicion in her eyes worried me. “What is it?”
Willa leaned back in her seat. “Is it really you?”
“What?” I glanced down at myself as if I, too, had to double check. “Yes, Willa. It’s me.”
“Sylas has turned his paranoia on both of us,” Quinn said. “I’ve just had longer to build up defenses against it.”
No doubt aided by her being a shadow demon now. Leif would kill me when I brought her back—no matter whose fault it was Quinn had been turned.
I dropped my voice into a whisper. “Sylas needed forgers, and he needs a queen. So when I offered myself up to him, he took it without question. He truly believes this Dakta god is going to save him if he raises it from whatever beyond exists. I intend to forge the weapon Leif wanted me to make for use against Mrak.”
“The what?” Quinn questioned as she leaned in closer.
“It’s how your brother and I met,” I answered. “He came to my workshop because he wanted me to forge him a weapon from nightsteel. To get you back.”
