The Crone picked up what I now realized was a small glass decanter, no bigger than the length of her hand. “I had this cooked up for you today, you know, just in case today was the day,” she said with a wink, and I shivered. “So, it’s still fresh, but it must be used tonight.” She handed it to me.

I carefully took it, turning the narrow, oval-shaped glass in my hand. There was deep gold liquid inside and...and smoke? Golden smoke? “What is in this?”

“This and that and probably a whole lot of what you wouldn’t want to know,” she answered, and the look she gave me warned I would be wise to not pursue her comment. “All you need to know is that it won’t harm him. You need to take that to where you first saw him as a Fallen.”

“Rock Creek Park,” I told her, and of course it would have to be somewhere superpublic.

She nodded. “You will open it tonight, when the sun retires.”

“That would be approximately 8:32 p.m., just in case you are wondering,” Tony supplied.

“You must bring with you a personal item of his and place it on the earth. The item must be freshly marked with your blood,” she instructed, and I couldn’t help but hope all nearby demons were nicely hidden so they didn’t catch the scent of my blood.

Apparently Tony was thinking the same, because his head swiveled toward the Crone.

“Then you will need to open the vial, emptying all the contents onto the item you have brought with you. You will briefly see a circle form,” she went on. “Once he is inside the circle, his grace will be cut off to him and he will be brought to his knees. Make sure you step out of it before it disappears, or you, too, will be trapped inside without your grace or strength. You do not want that.”

No. I did not.

“This will only hold for a few minutes,” she continued. “Angels, Fallen or not, Trueborn or not, are too powerful to contain for any lengthy period of time. You must act fast and you must not hesitate.”

“I won’t.” Closing my fingers around the vial, I inhaled deeply. The vial warmed to my touch. Some of the panic and hopelessness that had been weighing on me since I woke up to find that Zayne was gone abated. “Thank you.”

She nodded.

I lifted my gaze to hers. “And what do you want in exchange?”

The Crone’s answering smile was tight-lipped. “Do you not think that I give you this out of the kindness of my old heart?”

Holding her stare, I smiled in return. “I don’t know a whole lot about witches, but I know enough about humans in general to know that nearly nothing of importance is given without strings attached. What are those strings?”

“Smart girl,” murmured Tony.