“Took him, yes,” Glissando interrupted me, the slant to her golden eyes becoming angry. “His father would like to talk to you.”

“He’s out there?” I said, voice squeaking, and then I mentally kicked myself. Of course he was out there. Every gargoyle in Cincinnati was in my backyard.

“I’ll take you to him,” Glissando said, and my pulse pounded. Damn it, how was I going to explain this to him? Why I had put Bis in such danger?

“I should’ve tried to get ahold of Bis’s dad right when it happened,” I muttered, and Glissando ruffled her wings in agreement. I slowly turned, wondering which one of the pairs of watching eyes belonged to Bis’s dad. What was I going to say to him? Did he know that I was a demon? That Bis was bonded to me? Bis had said he had talked to his dad just last week, but “Hey, Dad! I’m bonded to a demon!” isn’t the kind of thing that came up in casual conversation.

Glissando’s ears swiveled, catching the sound of Jenks’s wings before I did. The irate pixy dripped a weird mix of blue-and-green glowing dust as he arrowed across the damp graveyard. “Oh God, you stink worse than six-week-old pepper piss, Rache,” he said as he hovered before me, eyeing Glissando suspiciously. “Everything okay?”

I nodded, my hand touching my pocket where the slave rings sat. I was going to trust Trent with my life. I was an idiot. “I need to talk to Bis’s dad,” I said, and the pixy’s dust flashed a surprised gold.

“Ah, you don’t mind if I come along,” Jenks said, daring her to protest.

But the cat-size gargoyle lifted her wings and shrugged.

Muttering half-heard comments about the back of an outhouse, Jenks snuggled in behind my hair just under my ear. It was too cold for him to be out here, but I wasn’t going to insult him by saying so.

We turned back to the waiting gargoyles, and I flinched. It was one thing to tell yourself that the kid you took in is playing with demons to learn the lines, but another to tell his dad.

“You sure you don’t want Ivy?” Jenks asked as Glissando flew past us to land on the next tombstone and blink at us impatiently. “She’s bigger than me.”

“You saw her sharpening her knives,” I said as I picked my way back the same way I came out. “You want that out here in the dark with this?”

There had to be over two dozen pairs of red or yellow eyes turned our way, glowing in the twilight. Glissando shifted nervously as I passed her, hopping to a marker only a few feet ahead. “Can I talk to you?” she asked, and I hesitated, surprised.

“Sure.”