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belly squirming, as if I’ve eaten something that wasn’t quite dead. I think he’s the one that’s so determined to get there”
    The golden demon who called himself Denas and I had relinquished our separate lives for common purpose, and for the few hours it took us to accomplish that purpose, we had reached an accommodation. But it would have been hard to gauge which one of us had been more reluctant. He had suffered in a frozen wasteland for a thousand years, believing my people had destroyed his own. I had been trained to believe demons devoured human souls in unending lust for evil. Neither intellect nor pragmatism could overcome my sense of violation, of corruption, of certainty that Denas was waiting for one moment of weakness to enslave my will to his.
    I raised the bread and cheese to my mouth and put it down again. I wasn’t all that hungry. “Whatever is causing these episodes, I daren’t let down my guard. If Denas can drive me to do murder now, what would I be if we were fully joined?”
    Blaise handed me a clay cup, and I downed the purple-gray liquid it contained, followed by water to drown the foul taste. “You will be the man you have always been. The rai-kirah will bring you memories and ideas, talents, perhaps new ways of looking at the world. But it can’t be so simple to corrupt a human soul. Not one such as yours.” He smiled and threw a wadded blanket at me. “You’re far too stubborn.”
    I wasn’t so confident. Even if I dared cross into the demon homeland, there was a finality about passing through the enchanted gateway—so I had been told. Once that step was taken, Denas and I would be completely merged, all barriers between us dissolved forever. My visions implied that I was the danger that raged in Tyrrad Nor, threatening to destroy the world. If I could not control my own hand, my own soul ... That could be the very circumstance that caused the danger. Occasional bouts of madness might be better.
    Five minutes and my limbs felt like they belonged to someone else. As my vision blurred and my head spun, Blaise donned his black cloak and a slouched hat and blew out the candle. “Joining with the rai-kirah was the right thing to do. You’ll learn what you need to solve this.”
    â€œOne more thing,” I said drowsily as he opened the door to go. “Tell your sister that we did not lay Evan out to die. I was off fighting demons, and Ysanne ... Ysanne sent him to you. We didn‘t—either one of us—want him dead. Not for a moment. Not ever.”
    â€œI’ll tell her everything, Seyonne. Sleep well.”
    Â 
    As a disturbing result of my condition, most of Blaise’s people—even the few like Blaise with inborn demons of their own—were a bit afraid of me. Certainly everyone respected my privacy. Thus, it was a surprise when someone burst into my room not a quarter of an hour after Blaise had left. When the visitor’s feet accidentally kicked over an empty water jar, my descent into drugged stupor was temporarily suspended. Light flared in my face.
    â€œSpirit’s flesh! Dak was right. You’re still here. I thought you’d gone off with Blaise again.” The intruder, a short, round-faced man with thinning hair, was Farrol, Blaise’s dearest childhood friend and foster brother. Farrol, a man neither subtle in action nor temperate in opinion, had been born as well with his demon nature intact.
    â€œOnly a moment and I’ll be safely out of the way,” I mumbled, letting my eyelids sag. My body felt like river-bottom mud.
    â€œBut it was you the messenger wanted. Said it was urgent.”
    â€œMessenger?” I wedged open the gates of sleep.
    â€œSaid he’d come from Prince Aleksander. Cursed Derzhi bastard—acted like we were some kind of vermin. Blaise had only just left, so I sent the fellow after him ... and after you, I