Rising, Varen brought Isobel to her feet.
“W-wait,” Isobel murmured through numb lips, but Reynolds had already turned toward Lilith.
Taking Isobel’s hand, Varen tugged her in the opposite direction.
“Wait,” Isobel repeated, louder this time, and she wondered why neither of them seemed to have heard her. Or were they choosing not to listen?
Before Varen could drag her any farther away, Isobel snagged Reynolds’s sleeve.
“Come with us,” she managed to blurt when his head snapped toward her.
Reynolds glared sternly at Varen, ignoring Isobel altogether. “Keep her safe,” he said. “I have bought us only time. And precious little at that.”
“I said,” Isobel snapped, pulling harder on his sleeve, her anger at being snubbed helping to jolt her back to her senses, “come with us.”
Reynolds scowled, but when he glanced to where Isobel gripped him, the knit in his brow softened.
“I’ll not be far behind,” he assured her, this time meeting her gaze full on.
Isobel hesitated. Then, deciding to believe him, to trust him . . . she let go.
“GOOORRRRDOOOOOON,” Isobel heard the demon howl.
Isobel looked to where Lilith lay like a spider in tar, all limbs and joints. Her body, reduced to bones, crackled as she moved, her sword-pierced rib cage dripping sludge.
“Gordon is dead,” Isobel heard Reynolds say in a monotone, his words echoing through the corridor as he placed the tip of his other sword beneath Lilith’s putrefied chin, drawing her hollow eyes to his. “As I shall continue to wager you very soon shall be.”
Isobel kept her gaze on the two figures as Varen drew her toward the blue double doors Reynolds had told them to take.
CLUNK came the sound of the push bar, loud in Isobel’s ears as Varen collided with it.
He pulled her with him beyond its boundaries, and as they shot through to the other side, Isobel’s eyes flickered up. Countless figures now populated the endless crisscrossing network of stairs—most of them cloaked, all of them men.
Lost Souls, Isobel thought, meeting the stare of one who, unlike the others, had channeled his focus on her instead of Lilith’s writhing form.
Then the door swung shut, blocking the sight.
Music boomed, bass thumping the floor beneath the soles of their shoes like a thundering heartbeat.
Colored lights blazed. Streamers and balloons—red and pink. People everywhere.
As Isobel’s vision adjusted, she slowly began to register the faces surrounding them as . . . familiar.
Boots squealing on glossed hardwood, Varen skidded to a stop, halting Isobel with him.
Though the music pounded on, those dancing nearest to them lowered their raised arms.
“Oh my God,” said someone nearby, inciting the unanimous withdrawal that came next.
Bumping and jostling into one another as they retreated, Isobel and Varen’s classmates formed a wide circle around the two of them.
Smiles fell. Faces paled.
And as the shock of their sudden presence rippled its way through the gymnasium, through the attendees of Trenton High’s annual Valentine’s Day dance, it dawned on Isobel what had just happened.
They were back.
37