you are: because I was lured here.”
“It does feel like we were lured here,” Damiel agreed.
Nice to see them bonding over their shared paranoia. Not that they were wrong. I too had the feeling that we’d been lured here.
“Or, to be more precise, our immortal daggers were lured here,” Jiro said.
“You have an immortal dagger?” I asked him, surprised.
“Yes.”
“Which one?”
Jiro’s response was a cryptic smile. And Damiel’s response to that was to wrap his fingers around the hilt of his sword.
“Who lured us here?” I asked, before they did more than glare at each other.
“The Demon Princess.”
“Demon Princess.” Damiel bit out the two words. “That can only be Asteria, the daughter of Alessandro, the demon who leads the demon council. Alessandro is known as the King Demon. And his daughter Asteria as the Demon Princess.”
“That’s the one.”
“So anyone with an immortal dagger is being lured here.” I worked through my thoughts aloud. “My father. Jiro. Damiel and I. Even the Guardians sent Eva and Idris Starfire, who also has a dagger, to retrieve the others…” I stopped when a tangential realization slammed into me. “The Guardians. They do have magic. Null magic. One of the sixteen powers. A power we witnessed while fighting the monsters earlier. The Guardians were not cursed to have no magic. They just have a different kind of magic, a magic that nullifies all other kinds of magic.”
“Yes, they have magic, though they don’t see their magic as real magic,” said Jiro. “But the Guardians are not the true threat here, Cadence. They’re after the immortal daggers for selfish reasons, but the real threat is far, far worse. Even if the Guardians got their hands on the daggers, they couldn’t use them. The moment they touched them, they’d neutralize their magic.”
Right. The Guardians’ magic nullified all potions they drank and all artifacts they touched. So they couldn’t use the daggers, much as they wanted to.
“All the wishful thinking in the universe won’t rearrange the laws of magic,” Jiro declared.
“The Guardians’ agents, Eva and Starfire, were lured here, just like the rest of us,” I said, working through the situation once more. “Their immortal dagger was lured here.”
“Asteria is drawing us all into her web.” Damiel’s eyes were as hard as granite. “So she can collect all sixteen daggers.”
“Can a demon use the daggers’ power?” I asked. “I thought only someone with Immortal blood can wield them.”
“Which gods and demons have,” said Jiro. “The Immortals used their magic to create gods and demons. Which means both can wield the daggers.”
“What will Asteria do with that power?” I wondered. “Overthrow her father? Help the other demons to turn the balance in the war between gods and demons?”
“It doesn’t matter. Neither gods nor demons can be allowed to possess all sixteen daggers. Nor anyone, for that matter,” said Jiro. “It’s too much power. And power corrupts the best of intentions.”
I looked at him. “You know about how the daggers drive people mad with power.”
“Yes. They are dangerous in the hands of deities or mortals. And for that reason, they must be destroyed.”
“How do we even destroy an immortal artifact?” I glanced at Jiro.
“Why are you looking at me like I know the answer to that?”
“Because you seem to know about everything else.” Damiel’s eyes narrowed with suspicion. “I wonder why that is.”
A faint smile hovered on Jiro’s lips. “Not everything. But I do know that the answer is here on this world. “That’s why I came to the Interchange.”
“I thought the demons lured you here.” Magic crackled off Damiel’s every word. “Just like the rest of us.”
“Well, there is that too. But there are also other reasons I came here.”
“For the games? For the knowledge? For us?”
“Yes.”
Damiel glared at him.
Jiro was unfazed. “You can’t compel me.”
“Do you want to bet?”
I stepped between them. This would get us nowhere.
“Jiro, during your travels here, have you happened to see my father?” I asked him.
“No, but I’ve been trying to find General Silverstar ever since some of the locals I met recounted seeing him. I figured if Silverstar and I combined forces, we’d have a better chance of destroying the daggers before the entire collection falls into the wrong hands. But then something…unexpected happened.”
“Which was?” I asked him.
“This world became cursed.”
“What kind of curse?”
“A very bad one.”
I waited for him to continue, and this time, he did.
“I told you how the magical polarity of this world shifts about every hour. What I didn’t tell you was that until shortly after the demons