Finale

chant to swear my oath, I catapulted myself inside his head. My greatest confidence came from knowing I’d consumed devilcraft
earlier today. I didn’t trust my own strength, but the devilcraft made me a more powerful version of myself. It heightened my natural talents, including my aptitude for mind-tricks.
    I fled down the dark, twisted corridors of Baruch’s mind, planting one explosion after another. I worked as quickly as I could, knowing that if I made one mistake, if I gave him any reason
to think I was reconstructing his thoughts, if I left any evidence of my presence . . .
    I chose the one thing I knew would alarm Baruch. Nephilim.
    The Black Hand’s army!
I thought explosively at Baruch. I assailed his thoughts with an image of Dante rushing into the room, followed by twenty, thirty, no—
forty
Nephilim. I leaked pictures of their enraged eyes and hard fists into his subconscious. To make the vision even more convincing, I made Baruch think he was watching his own men being dragged away
captive by Nephilim.
    Despite all this, I felt Baruch’s resistance. He stood nailed to the spot, not reacting as he should have at being surrounded by Nephilim. I feared that he suspected something was off, and
plunged ahead.
    Mess with our leader, mess with us—all of us.
I flung Dante’s venomous words into Baruch’s mind.
Nora isn’t going to swear fealty now. Not now, not
ever.
I created a picture of Dante picking up the poker from the fireplace toolkit and plunging it into Baruch’s wing scars. I shoved the vivid image deep inside Baruch’s
brain.
    I heard Baruch fall to his knees before I opened my eyes. He was down on all fours, shoulders hunched. An expression of utter shock seized his features. His eyes glazed, and spittle pooled in
the corners of his mouth. His hands reached for his back, grasping at air. He was trying to remove the poker.
    I exhaled in weary relief. He’d bought it. He’d bought my mind-trick.
    A figure moved near the doorway.
    I shot to my feet and snatched the real poker from the fireplace. I raised it off my shoulder, readying to swing, when Dabria stepped into view. In the semidarkness, her hair glowed glacial
white. Her mouth was a grim line. “You mind-tricked him?” she guessed. “Nice. But we have to get out of here now,” she told me.
    I almost laughed, cold and disbelieving. “What are you doing here?”
    She stepped over Baruch’s unmoving body. “Patch asked me to take you somewhere safe.”
    I shook my head. “You’re lying. Patch didn’t send you. He knows you’re the last person I’d ever go with.” I tightened my grip on the poker. If she came
another step closer, I’d gladly shove it in her wing scars. And like Baruch, she’d be in a near-comatose state until she found a way to dislodge it.
    “He didn’t have much of a choice. Between chasing out the other fallen angels who raided your party, and erasing the minds of your panic-stricken friends who are fleeing down the
street as we speak, I’d say he’s a little preoccupied. Don’t the two of you have a secret code word for situations like this?” Dabria asked without a crack in her icy
composure. “When I was with Patch, we had one. I would have trusted anyone Patch gave it to.”
    I didn’t take my eyes off her. Secret code word? My, my, but she was good at worming under my skin.
    “In fact, we do have a secret code,” I said. “It’s ‘Dabria’s a pathetic leech who doesn’t know when to move on.’” I covered my mouth.
“Oh. I just realized why Patch probably failed to share our
secret code
”—scorn dripped from the words—“with you.”
    Her lips thinned further.
    “Either tell me what you really came here for, or I’m going to shove this thing in your scars so deep, it will be your new permanent appendage,” I told her.
    “I don’t have to put up with this,” Dabria said, turning on her heel.
    I followed her through the vacant house and out to the driveway. “I know you’re blackmailing Pepper Friberg,” I said. If I’d taken her by surprise, she didn’t show
it. Her stride never faltered. “He thinks Patch is blackmailing him, and he’s doing everything he can to put Patch on the fast track to hell. Credit goes to you, Dabria. You claim
you’re still in love with Patch, but you have a funny way of showing it. Because of you, he’s in danger of exile. Is that your plan? If you can’t have him, no one can?”
    Dabria beeped her key chain, and