A smile quirked the corner of his mouth, and he turned a chair so he could sit before me. “Let me get that for you,” he said, reaching for my hand.

I hesitated, then let him pull my wrist onto his lap. He bowed his head over my wrist, and his knees almost touched mine. I really owed him more than a simple thanks. “Nick? I mean it. Thank you. That’s twice you saved my life. This demon thing will be all right. I’m sorry you got a demon mark helping me.”

Nick looked up, his brown eyes searching mine. I was suddenly very conscious of how close he was. My memory went back to feeling his arms around me, carrying me into the church. I wondered if he had held me all the way through the ever-after.

“I’m glad I was there to help,” he said softly. “It was kind of my fault.”

“No, it would have found me no matter where I was,” I said. Finally the last wrap was gone. Swallowing hard, I stared at my wrist. My stomach twisted. It was entirely healed. Even the green stitches were gone. The raised white scar looked old. Mine was in the shape of a full circle with that same line running through it.

“Oh,” Nick murmured, leaning back. “The demon must like you. It didn’t heal me, just stopped the bleeding.”

“Swell.” I rubbed the mark on my wrist. It was better than a bandage—I guess. It wasn’t as if anyone would know what the scar was from; no one had been dealing with demons since the Turn. “So now I just wait until it wants something?”

“Yeah.” Nick’s chair scraped as he stood up and went to the stove.

I propped my elbows up on the table and felt the air slip in and out of my lungs. Nick stood at the stove with his back to me and stirred a stewpot. An uncomfortable silence grew.

“Do you like student food?” Nick said suddenly.

I straightened. “Beg pardon?”

“Student food.” His eyes went to the tomato on the sill. “Whatever’s in the refrigerator over pasta.”

Understandably concerned, I pushed myself upright and tottered over to see what was on the stove. Macaroni spun and rolled in the pot. A wooden spoon sat next to it, and my eyebrows rose. “Have you been using that spoon?”

Nick nodded. “Yeah. Why?”

I reached for the salt and dumped the entire canister into it.

“Whoa!” Nick cried. “I already salted the water. You don’t need that much.”

Ignoring him, I tossed the wooden spoon into my dissolution vat and pulled out a metal one. “Until I get my ceramic spoons back, it’s metal for cooking and wooden for spells. Rinse the macaroni well. It ought to be okay.”

Nick’s eyebrows rose. “I would think you would use metal spoons for spells and wooden for cooking since spells don’t stick to metal.”

I made my slow way to the fridge, feeling my heart pound from even this little exertion. “And why do you suppose spells don’t stick to metal? Unless it’s copper, metal screws everything up. I’ll do the spell crafting if you don’t mind; you do dinner.”