“Officer Down-low?” He fanned himself. “Girl, he’s all kinds of fine, but you watch him, too. Those furry clans protect their own. If it gets hot, and he has to choose between having your back and outing himself, I wouldn’t trust him to do the right thing.”

“I’ll keep it in mind,” I said. “Thanks, Cas.”

The Fabulous Casimir recovered enough of his aplomb to blow me a kiss. “Anytime, Miss Daisy!”

I mulled over his warning on the walk to the station.

Casimir was right about the rumors about the Inviolate Wall not protecting me. In eldritch terminology, the Inviolate Wall is what divides the mortal plane from the divine forces of the apex faiths, the major living faiths: Christianity, Islam, Judaism, Hinduism, Buddhism, etc. In theory, it means that the divine forces of the major living faiths can’t act directly on the mortal plane, only indirectly through their millions of adherents. But in places like Pemkowet, the wall is thinner, not so inviolate. There are cracks, and things slip through them. Kind of like my father slipped into my mother.

And . . . technically, my existence represents one of those chinks. And if I were to supplicate my father, Belphegor, for my demonic birthright, it could cause a full-blown breach and unleash . . . well, hell on earth.

Which in turn could free up the forces of heaven to combat them, unleashing . . . well, Armageddon, basically.

Knowing that, one might wonder why the eldritch community suffers my existence. That’s where it gets tricky. According to Hel—again, that’s the Norse goddess, not the infernal plane—if an immortal deliberately caused my death, it could also bring on Armageddon, because in accordance with ancient laws, my father would have the right to seek vengeance on earth, thus creating a significant breach in the Inviolate Wall.

Like I said, tricky.

In a sensible and orderly world, that would mean no one would ever think it was a good idea to kill me, and it would be in everyone’s interest to keep me happy and complacent, so that I was never tempted to give in to the dark side and invoke my birthright. Alas, we do not live in a sensible and orderly world. Ordinary humans have their sociopaths, terrorists, and anarchists capable of destroying everything around them, and laughing while their worlds fall to pieces.

So do we, and the stakes are considerably higher.

It was good to be reminded of it.

I realized my tail was untucked and lashing in my jeans—I buy them a little loose out of necessity—and wrestled my emotions under control before the tourists on the sidewalk behind me began to wonder why the blond girl’s butt was trying to escape its denim confines.

Officer Down-low was waiting for me at the station. He did indeed look all kinds of fine after a few hours of sleep, a shower, and a shave.