Taming Demons for Beginners (The Guild Codex Demonized #1) - Annette Marie Page 0,41

we can’t—”

“I know what it means.”

He leaned close again, pressing me back into the dresser. I’d never felt so small and powerless—exactly what he wanted. I dug my fingernails into the back of his hands, but my nails couldn’t pierce his skin. He didn’t acknowledge my attempt to wound him.

“No attention,” he pondered. “That is a problem.”

“What? Why? Has anyone seen you?”

“Not a hh’ainun.” Abruptly releasing me, he stepped back. “We should leave this place.”

“You did something!” I realized with a gasp. “What did you do?”

He opened his mouth to answer—and magic exploded somewhere outside my window, the detonation shaking the mansion walls.

Chapter Fifteen

“What the hell!” Amalia’s frightened yelp rang out from the stairs.

“Zylas!” I grabbed his arm. “What did you do?”

He shook me off like I was a kitten clinging to his sleeve. “We should leave now.”

“Not until you tell me—”

Feet thudded up the stairs. Someone was coming.

I dove for the bed and grabbed the infernus. “Get back in this thing!”

His face twisted with contempt.

“Hurry! Before she sees you!”

The disgust on his face intensified. The pendant heated on my palm, then red light ignited over his hands and feet. As his body dissolved into luminescence, the swirling glow sucked into the infernus and it vibrated before cooling. That fast, the demon was gone.

“Whoa,” I whispered, holding up the pendant. Zylas was inside this thing? How did that even work?

A second explosion rocked the house. I staggered sideways and caught myself on the dresser. Dropping the infernus around my neck, I tucked it under my sweater with one hand as I threw my door open.

Amalia was picking herself off the floor. White showed all the way around her eyes as she spotted me. Her terror sent mine skyrocketing.

“Amalia, what—”

“The other demon is loose!” she shrieked. “It got out!”

“What?”

Slamming through her bedroom door, she shouted over her shoulder, “It blew the greenhouse sky high and now it’s starting on the house. We have to get out of here!”

I gawked as she disappeared into her room, then I bolted back to mine. I tore my clothes off the hangers, rammed them into my suitcase, threw my books in on top, grabbed my phone, and zipped the bag up. Hauling it by the handle, I launched back into the hallway.

Amalia burst out of her room ahead of me, a backpack over her shoulder, and I chased her down the stairs. Another detonation shuddered the floor and my heart pummeled my ribcage. I remembered the huge winged beast, its magma-like eyes radiating bloodlust. It was out there. It was coming for us.

Amalia tore outside but I skidded to a stop to grab my runners from the closet. I stuffed my feet into them, then extended the handle of my suitcase to pull it. What about my mother’s grimoire? It was probably in the house. I couldn’t leave it behind when—

A fourth blast shook the walls, and I hurtled through the door. Recovering the grimoire would be pointless if I died. I would worry about it later.

Outside, the evening air was crisp and chill, the final beams of the setting sun peeking over the trees at the property’s western edge. My suitcase bounced down the steps as Amalia ran across the drive toward the four-car garage.

Crimson light flashed.

A blazing orb hit the garage like an armor-piercing rocket. The building exploded, the doors rupturing and fire bursting from its interior. Amalia was flung backward and landed painfully on the concrete drive.

“Amalia!” I cried.

With a sweep of dark wings, the demon landed on the burning garage roof. Huge horns rose off its hairless head and its thick tail swung like a mace. Scarlet magic veined its forearms as it raised them. A glowing circle spiraled out of its palms, hovering vertically above the roof. Runes flickered through it, power building. Arctic cold spread out from the beast and the flames licking at its legs shrank and disappeared. Ice frosted the charred wood.

The air throbbed with power. The flowing runes swelled and the demon barked a command.

A red beam launched from the spell and struck the house. The power ripped through the walls, tearing a ten-foot-wide hole. A cacophony of crashes and shattering glass erupted from within, then the alarming creak of breaking wood. With a groan, a section of the roof caved onto the second floor. Flames snaked through the rubble and water sprayed from broken pipes.

The demon’s glaring magma eyes swept over me and it raised its hands again. A semitransparent circle, filled with flickering runes,