The darkness swallowed me, an empty void grasping me within its cold embrace. For a long moment, the world seemed to freeze, a numbing silence sinking into my flesh. There was an eerie foreign presence, its piercing gaze making my head throb. I couldn’t move, couldn’t shout. Couldn’t breathe. My limbs grew cold, and I could feel the grip of death closing in, my body growing numb as something grew closer.

  Then it all stopped, and once more, I was falling. A broom split in two as I crashed against it and smacked down onto a foreign floor. Several things from a nearby shelf tumbled around me, metal cnging against stone. Groaning, I took several deep breaths, and as my adrenaline plummeted, my injured shoulder throbbed.

  Slowly, I rose up to my feet, eyeing the small broom closet I’d fallen into.

  I’d made it. I escaped.

  My held breath released, taking much of the stress from the st few minutes along with it, and I shakily stood up fully. Using my good arm, I brushed the clumps of dust that I’d gathered from the messy closet off of me. Then I sheathed my sword and eyed the damage that had been done. There were a few tears in my school uniform, but they were minor. The real issue would be the blood soaked into my blouse. It meant I had no chance of hiding this from Lilis. And she was certain to be insufferable once she found out.

  Shifting my aching shoulder, I could tell that it was likely dislocated but didn’t seem broken anywhere. It was possible that it was fractured, but at least I could move it. Taking a deep breath, I let the tension in my muscles fade. Then I carefully reached the arm behind my back and with a wince, popped it back into pce.

  As my tail curled around my leg, I realized that it too was injured. During the fight, I’d completely forgotten about its existence. A mistake that could have cost me greatly. I needed to be more careful. I stared down at the small gash across it about halfway down its length and scowled. At least it had already stopped bleeding. Then my eyes caught something unexpected.

  A thin, near invisible thread of magic circled around one of my boots. My gaze followed its trail upward, into the dark portal that, to my surprise, had yet to fade.

  My breath caught, and in a panicked stumble, I rushed toward the door, smming it open. The loop tightened, pulling my leg from beneath me. With a shout, I lost my bance, head smacking against stone bricks as the world seemed to spin. The magic pulled my leg up through the air, and before I could tell what was happening, I was once again surrounded by that suffocating darkness.

  It sted barely a second, but even that seemed to drag on for half an eternity.

  Then I was once more flying upward through the air, or at least what I assumed was upward. Groaning, my eyes blinked open and closed, the world around me spinning and spinning. I couldn’t make sense of what was up or down, only the painful pull on my leg giving me any clue.

  Both the world and my body spun, until a familiar gray face swayed into view. What I first thought was a scowl was actually a wide grin, as I realized the massive ogre in front of me was upside down. Or perhaps, I was upside down?

  Nausea swelled in my gut, and I was certain that I’d throw up.

  “Welcome back, my little vyxa.”

  I groaned. “P-put me—put me down.”

  The ogre’s heavy hand waved below my feet, or was it above them? Then like a puppet with cut strings, I tumbled to the floor. His rge arm caught me at the st second preventing me from smming my head against the rough stone.

  Groaning once more, I swayed up to my feet and despite my imbance, attempted to run. I barely made it two steps before another arm swooped around my midsection and pulled me up into the air.

  With a yelp, I twisted around, ignoring the hand reaching for my legs as I stomped a boot into the beast’s face. “R-release me!”

  The ogre ughed, even as I kicked and fought against him. “Still such a feral thing, even after I’ve bested you.”

  The spinning in my head finally slowed as I remembered the sword at my side. My hand gripped it, pulling it halfway out before the ogre stopped me.

  “Now now,” he said, snatching it entirely from my grasp and tossing it down the hall. “I believe you’ve injured yourself enough. You won’t be needing that little thing any more.”

  “No—no!” I shouted in a panic, but no matter how much I fought and struggled against him, the fiend refused to let me go.

  ‘Be careful! Don’t antagonize him too much!’ whispered the voice in my head. ‘I know you do not trust me, but I may be your only chance at escape. Try to get him to release you. I do not know if he has some way to disrupt the portal. It’s best to keep him as far from you as you can.’

  Right, the portal; I’d nearly forgotten her dubious offer. Regardless, she was right about one thing; I needed to be calm. My chance to escape would come ter.

  A low rumble rolled through the ogre’s chest as my fighting slowed. Bright red eyes stared down at me.

  “Curious. I swear I just felt something.” The demon tilted his head.

  His arm around me tightened, almost painfully, as his other hand rose to my head. I tried to turn away from him, but couldn’t stop his palm from pressing against my upper face and forehead, his fingers sliding up through my hair and gripping around my horns.

  ‘Oh no.’

  The demon let out another low, rumbling hum as something else pressed against my head, like two worms phasing into my skull. I gasped, and my fingers cwed and dug into his arm.

  “S-stop!”

  But he didn’t. The tendrils of magic continued to bore in, reaching into my mind. A sharp pain spiked through my head, echoing through my skull. I shouted out, kicking and cwing against him. But even as my cws turned wet with blood, he didn’t stop.

  “To think that someone has already tried to cim you,” the fiend rumbled.

  Furi’el tried to hide, the presence that I’d grown so used to fading off to a small corner of my mind, but the ogre’s tendrils of magic were relentless. It filled my head until I could sense almost nothing else.

  ‘I’m sorry—I’m so sorry, Ruby. I didn’t think h—’

  I could feel the genuine grief in her words somehow, and then, like a candle’s fme being snuffed, she was gone. The ogre’s magic retreated, and I felt strangely empty. My arms fell sck to my sides as I took several heavy breaths.

  He’d gotten rid of her. He’d truly gotten rid of her. What did this mean? Without our connection, could she still create the portal? My stomach sunk at the thought. Surely it wasn’t something I’d been truly considering. Jumping from the arms of one demon into another’s? There had to be a better way out of this.

  The ogre tilted my chin up, bringing my gaze to his. “You are mine, no one else's. Whatever connections you have with those of this realm, you’d be best to forget. You won’t be coming back here,” he said with finality, ignoring my futile attempts to slip out from his grip. “But do not fret, I take care of those that belong to me.”

  “Your’s?” a familiar voice sneered, followed by the sound of steady footsteps I’d almost missed. “Do not tell me that you’ve already forgotten our deal, demon.”

  We turned to find Melkar strutting down the hall, arms crossed and a scowl on his face. Behind him was… Thamus? What was he doing here?

  The ogre, who’s name I’d forgotten, smiled. Something about this clearly amused him. “I have not, little human.”

  He pced me on the floor, a surprisingly gentle hand helping me keep my bance. His other hand, however, kept a tight hold on my shoulder. For once, I didn’t attempt to pull away. The fiend had made it clear that my struggles were fruitless; I stood no chance at fighting him off.

  Melkar strode up to me, eyeing me up and down. “Oh how the ‘mighty’ fall. I’m sorry to say that this time you will not be escaping me.”

  I crossed my arms, and gred. Even now, I refused to appear weak in front of this contemptuous snake.

  “Nothing to say?” Melkar grinned, eyebrow raised. “Truly? No harsh retorts? No vows of retribution?” His hand covered his mouth in an exaggerated gasp. “Why, I’m shocked!”

  Despite his goading, I kept quiet. Any such assertion would ring empty, as he well knew. As things were, there was nothing I could do to him, nothing I could threaten. Not so long as the demon was around. But my chance would come. Likely sooner, if he truly believed me beaten and broken.

  What worried me was what sort of deal they’d struck. The ogre clearly regarded me as belonging to him. And yet, I couldn’t imagine Melkar giving me up so easily after all the effort he’d put into obtaining me. Right?

  A chill bit deep into my body, soaking down to my very bones. Or was Melkar satisfied with the mere fact of me being colred and made helpless alone? Had he promised me to this beast, gleeful enough to simply watch my ruin in the hands of this demon?

  A shiver threatened to rush through me, and I barely suppressed it. Luckily, he wasn’t observant enough to spot the terror hidden within my narrowed eyes.

  At my silence, the boy continued. “You know, I would have never imagined that things would turn out this way, just a few weeks ago. When Thamus came to me, asking that I alter the summoning book you were pnning to use, I was quite pleased to. I’d never imagined that a few adjustments could cause such a transformation. All that I’d intended for was to make it fizzle into doing nothing, perhaps exploding the mana crystal if I altered them just right. But this… this was so much better.”

  “So it was you,” I snarled, unable to help myself.

  He scoffed. “Of course it was me! Really, who else would care? You always thought so highly of yourself, Gellin, but we both know that you were never as important as you pretended to be.” I nearly scoffed. What nonsense. I’d rgely kept to the shadows since entering the academy. “Even your little subordinate here was happy to betray you at the first opportunity. He came running, practically begging me to do something about your little attempted summoning.”

  My gaze moved to Thamus, standing off to the side, his back pressed against the wall, as he stared off at nothing. As if he couldn’t even be bothered to look our way. The bastard. I should have expected the betrayal. Rather, I had anticipated it happening eventually, just not through something so minor. The failed summoning would have been a small setback at best, had things not taken such a strange turn. I’d have likely even realized that the book had been tampered with, given time to look it over. If Melkar was being truthful, it was only through mere luck that things had turned out so poorly. I was surprised at his apparent honesty, having expected him to cim it was both intentional and all his idea. But that wasn’t what was important right now.

  It was his fault—both of their fault. My hands balled into fists, anger coursing through me, before I took a deep breath, releasing it all in a huff.

  No, that was what Melkar wanted. He wanted me to get angry, for me to shout and fight against him and the demon. He wanted to prove how just how futile any efforts I made would ultimately be. I couldn’t give him that satisfaction. I wouldn’t. Even if it might benefit me, my pride simply wouldn’t allow it.

  The silence dragged on, and the boy scoffed, annoyed at my apparent ck of reaction. I almost smiled at the small victory.

  “Very well. I have plenty of time to wait for your inevitable defiance and despair.” He stepped closer, gripping my chin. His fingers dug into my skin as he tilted it up and stared into my scowling eyes. “Be assured that no one is coming to save you this time. The provost has told me explicitly that he will not step in, and your new friends won’t be able to rescue you. I look forward to the moment you finally lose hope and give in.”

  I spit into his face, watching in satisfaction as it became covered in a spray of both saliva and blood. It seemed I’d bitten my tongue without even realizing.

  “You—” His expression twisted into pure fury, and he raised his hand. Before I could even twitch, a dark gray fingers wrapped around his lower arm, stopping him from swinging at my face.

  “Release me!” Melkar demanded as he tried and failed to pull his arm away. “What do you think you’re doing, you stupid demon? I said release me, damn it!”

  “You will not harm her,” the ogre growled.

  “Our agreement,” Melkar hissed, “was that I would do nothing to permanently injure her. I will discipline her as I see fit. Besides that, you must do as I command, so long as it does not conflict with the rest of the contract. And I command that you release me at once!”

  The ogre ughed. “Humans. Always so brave, yet so stupid and foolish.”

  There was a brief second where neither of them moved.

  Something was wrong here. I could feel it deep in my gut. Somehow, Melkar had messed up. Rather than simply letting him go, the demon slung the boy away from us. I had to admit some small satisfaction at watching Melkar stumble and fall to the floor.

  Cursing, he stood back up, taking a moment to wipe the spit from his face. “I will make you regret that demon,” he snarled. Despite his words, I could tell that the ogre scared him. Then the boy’s gre centered once again on me. “Now, take her to my room. I believe it's time she learned exactly what it means to be a succubus.”

  Melkar stood waiting, but the ogre didn’t budge an inch. He let out a low rumble. “No. I think not.”

  Melkar looked ready to strangle him. “Well, I think yes. You—you are required to follow my orders!” The words seemed there to assure himself as much as to remind the ogre.

  Before he could continue shouting, the massive demon at my back interrupted. “Yes, I do believe that was our agreement. I would follow your orders until the moment she was within my arms in my realm.”

  The diabolist hesitated. It was clear he’d also realized something had gone wrong in their agreement. “Which she is clearly not,” Melkar insisted. The demon wrapped his arms around me, as though to prove a point. “We are still in the academy. For the next year, she is mine. How—how—”

  The ogre chuckled. “You are right. We are still in the school, at least partially so.” It was then that I realized the mana in the air had risen far higher than was normal. “Unfortunately for you, my realm—the one that I personally formed—sits somewhere within the space between others. It is not a truly physical space, but it exists all the same. And right now, we are as much there as we are here.”

  “You—” Melkar began, only for a web of bck strands to wrap around his mouth and much of his lower face.

  “I believe I’ve heard enough of your prattle.”

  Thamus fell to the floor, seemingly unconscious, and a metal cage appeared around Melkar, trapping him in pce.

  “Do not fret, human. I will keep to the rest of our deal. You will not come to significant harm by my hand, so long as you live. And for the next year, little Ruby here will technically be yours. As, I cannot intentionally separate her from you, so I will simply be bringing you with us.”

  This was why you didn’t make deals with powerful demons. They could make loopholes in even the most straightforward of agreements.

  Beneath us, a circle appeared, full of runes. At a gnce, it looked quite simir to the banishing circle I’d activated earlier, if somewhat more complex.

  I made a final effort to escape his grasp, my foot kicking up between the ogre’s legs as I tried to jerk my arm from his grasp.

  Just as I was about to give up hope, the glint of smooth iron caught my eye.

  FlitterPuff