Chapter 18: The Smoke

Jenna parked the truck behind the gym and switched off the engine. It wasn't snowing anymore, and everything on the campus was deathly quiet, so I could hear the sound of my heartbeat in my ears.

The door to the hostel was open, and dark prints led from the road right to the building entrance. The tracks looked wet, but the snow was dry. Whatever left them didn't melt the snow – it burned its way through.

"Cross people. They're already here," Dorian stated, leaning closer.

"Let me go," Vance said from the back seat. "I can help you."

"We won't trust you again after what you did to us," Jenna retorted.

"You know the difference between killing and saving?" Vance asked.

I opened the car door and got out. The air smelled wrong.

"To the basement. Cross is waiting there," I told everyone.

"Don't be stupid," Dorian snapped when he got out of the car. "You're not going there with smoke pouring out of your eyes."

"I don't have black smoke in my eyes," I insisted, touching my face. "At least not yet."

\---

The corridors were dark; the electricity was cut off somewhere, so the only illumination we got was from the red lights of the emergency exits. Those lights gave the hallways an illusion of blood stains on the walls.

Passing the first floor, then climbing the stairs of the second floor, I pressed my palm on the rail. It was too cold for my skin to withstand the contact.

"He tries to burn me out of her," Raze muttered in my head. "Painful. Very painful."

I froze, putting my hand on my forehead.

"What's he telling you?" Dorian demanded.

I shook my head.

\---

The basement door was open.

Cross was standing by the body of Zoe, holding a silver rod in his hands. Its end was bright red and covered with smoking vapor. Zoe was sitting in a chair, her arms and legs bound with thick ropes, and her eyes were closed. Black vapor rose with her breath.

He looked up and smirked. "Back so soon? I'm considering whether to kill her or keep her as my pet.”

Dorian moved in front of me. "Release her."

Cross held the rod at Dorian. "You won't be able to defeat me, boy."

Zoe's eyes opened, and they were completely black. She laughed using Raze's voice. "Do you seriously believe you could torture me?"

The ropes snapped and she rose up. The chair crashed onto the floor behind her.

Cross stepped back. "Impossible. I have used silver."

Raze raised his chin. "Demons can't be affected by silver, fool."

He lunged at Cross who dodged. He aimed the rod at Zoe's shoulder; black smoke exploded from there as she screamed.

Jenna yelled, "Arya, grab the grimoire and try to bind him!"

I tried to open the grimoire and read the runes, but I couldn't focus on them – they were swimming in water.

"You cannot bind me." Raze's whisper echoed in my mind. "I am inside you. If you bind me, then you will bind yourself."

I threw the grimoire down.

Her body went slack and the eyes closed. She sank into the knees as black smoke that had previously gone out from her mouth began drifting above and approached me.

Dorian grasped my hand. "Don't!"

It rushed onto me like an ice bucket. Smoke spread from my ribs into my hands, filling my lungs with icy coldness.

I could breathe again, but it all felt wrong.

"It is good of you to have invited me here," he whispered to me. "Every time you cast your spells, you left the way open for me. So I'm home now."

My eyes burned. I blinked and noticed how dark the world around me had become.

"Heh, well. Unexpected twist," Cross laughed, pointing at me.

Dorian was still grabbing my wrist. "Arya, look at your eyes."

I saw myself in the pipe pieces that lay on the floor nearby and stared at my eyes which were completely black without a white part or pupil.

"I still can sense myself here," I said.

Raze laughed again. "Until it stops."

"Now give me the grimoire and I will help you drive the demon out," Cross said.

Jenna snatched the book and hugged it to her chest. "Liar.”

Cross shook his head. "I want Raze out, bound, not just roaming free. He's a dangerous creature in there, and he will incinerate everything within two weeks or so." He glanced back at me. "Let me help."

Zoe was still on her knees, but her eyes were open, brown and human-like. She was crying. "Arya, please, forgive me."

"Then what is the way?" I asked Cross.

"You have to let me cut him out. It will hurt and you will lose your magic. But at least you will survive."

"That sounds worse than being like that!" Jenna exclaimed.

"It's a choice, girl." Cross shrugged. "But at least you'll be free."

My lips parted for another question, but Raze moved my hand, forming a fist and punching Cross right in the face.

The man staggered back with his head jerking backwards and blood flowing from his nose. He slammed against the boiler.

Dorian narrowed his eyes at me. "Was that you?"

"No!" I exclaimed in a trembling voice. "It was him."

"I am here to help," said Raze smugly.

"Oh, fine then. You want to do things the har

d way?" Cross wiped his bleeding face and grinned. "Well, then, we'll do things the hard way."

He rushed at me.