“I’m not turning you down,” I said.

He grinned. “Really?”

“Yeah. No promises about my dancing skills, though.”

Ian stood up. “This is awesome. I’m going to buy our tickets, all right? I’ll see you at lunch?”

I nodded mutely, already wondering if I’d made a mistake. What the hell did I think I was doing? But then I looked over at Laney, who was twirling her hair around her finger while she stared at Malachi.

Then she screamed.

I whipped my head around in the direction she was looking and nearly screamed myself. Evan Crociere, that gangly, disheveled drug dealer, was behind Malachi, whose head was still bowed over his book.

In Evan’s hand was a ballpoint pen.

I was in motion before it descended, but it was too late. With utter ferocity, Evan drove the pen right into the side of Malachi’s neck.

Everything in my world narrowed to a point, and the only thing that mattered was Malachi. I vaulted over the cafeteria table where I’d been sitting and sprinted along an aisle, grabbing a tray from the stacks as I ran.

With a crazy glint in his eye, Evan yanked the pen out of Malachi’s neck, painting the wall beside them with a spray of Malachi’s blood. Despite the wound in his neck, I would have expected Malachi to respond more quickly, but he seemed so caught off guard by the attack that he barely had time to lean away before Evan buried the pen in the junction of his neck and shoulder again.

A sound of pain and rage came from Malachi as the pen was ripped from his flesh again, and he began to rise from the table. Blood was streaming down the back of his shirt, droplets splattering onto the floor. And as I got close, I smelled it: incense.

Malachi didn’t get a chance to strike at his attacker. Because I was already there. I leaped onto the table where Malachi had been sitting and blocked the next stab of the pen with the tray. Evan’s eyes popped with surprise as his blow was deflected. Before he had a chance to recover, I drew the tray back and swung it down with all the force of my fury, hitting him in the throat with the edge of it. He stumbled back, coughing, as I caught a handful of his greasy hair and slammed his face into the painted cinder-block wall.

He crumpled to the floor, blood gushing from his nose, eyelids fluttering. But then he raised his head and looked right at Malachi, who was leaning against the wall with his hand pressed to his neck, blood seeping between his fingers.

“You can’t protect her, Captain,” the Mazikin inside Evan said quietly, mocking. “She has to protect you.”