If I didn’t get these rings fixed, nothing was going to happen. I really didn’t give a flying flip about the ever-after, but I wanted Ceri and Lucy back. “I’ll take the smut,” I said, and he grandly took his cap off to dust the nearest circle.

Two demons across the plaza had noticed me. Damn. One of them was Dali. I gave him a bunny-eared kiss-kiss, and he vanished, leaving his friend to eye me in speculation. Great, this was going just great. “Can we make this fast?” I said as I stepped into the circle. It was taking too long.

Grunting, he gestured and the line iced through me, dissolving me to a thought and back to substance again. The line felt sour, but it was still even in flow. The gargoyle assist made the materialization smooth without the barest hint of unequal air pressures or misstep. I misted back into existence . . . in my kitchen.

“Hey!” I shouted, turning to him, but the jump was complete and I was yelling at my old refrigerator. My eyes narrowed. It was my old refrigerator, the one you could put a goat into, not that Ivy and I ever had. I’d blown it up almost two years ago on the solstice.

“I vowed if you ever put her image on your twisted bones again, I would not stay my hand, you foul carrion!”

I spun. “Pierce!” I shrieked as he came at me from across the kitchen, grabbing a knife from the counter as he ran. “Pierce, it’s me!” My breath exploded out of me as I hit the wall, his arm under my chin and a knife at my middle. This wasn’t my kitchen. The fridge was old. The light was wrong. The copper pots were too tarnished. “It’s me,” I choked, blood pounding. “Get off!”

But he only snarled, the scent of coal dust and shoe polish filling my senses.

“Hey!” I yelped when the knife pricked me, and I kneed him, getting my arms up and between his when his grip eased. “Get off!”

Clutching himself, he fell back. Pissed, I tugged my clothes straight and kicked the knife away. A wave of ever-after coated him, and I touched my side, my fingers coming away wet with blood. Damn it, he’d cut right through my shirt.

Pierce knelt on the floor before me in wool trousers and a colorful vest, looking like an actor from an early movie. His expression pained, he leaned back on his heels, his arms spread wide and his neck bared to me. “Go ahead!” he screamed, eyes shut as if daring me to strike him with lightning. “Rip my heart out, you foul beast! I could use the time off to plan your demise!”