Page 91 of Demon’s Snack

“Yes.”

“That should worry me.”

“Later.”

He shifts exactly as I ask, boots scraping over the active runes. The guards behind me murmur, suddenly uncertain. They expected him to lunge, not obey a human woman tapping his chest like she is correcting a bad tempo in a music lesson.

I glance once at the runes beneath his feet, then at the pedestal.

“Burn the circle,” I say.

Corin’s eyes widen. “That sounds incriminating.”

“Burn the hidden lines, not the witnesses.”

“Important distinction.”

“Can you do it?”

His gaze moves past me to the pedestal, then to Vaerith. The hunger rises again, drawn toward the noble behind all of this, and I tap his sternum harder.

“Corin.”

He looks back at me.

“Can you do it?”

His breathing slows beneath my hand. “Yes.”

“Then do it clean.”

For a moment, every sound in the courtyard seems to sharpen: rainwater dripping from canopy edges, the scrape of metal as guards adjust their grip, nobles whispering behind jeweled fans, Vaerith drawing a controlled breath on the dais. Corin lifts one hand slowly, palm angled down toward the runes instead of outward toward the crowd. The excess energy inside him gathers beneath my fingers, terrifying in its force but contained within the rhythm we have built together.

Then he releases it.

Infernal flame spills from his hand in a black-gold stream, low and precise, racing along the carved runes at our feet. It does not leap toward flesh. It follows structure. The fire threads through Vaerith’s circle like oil catching in a groove, igniting each hidden channel in turn. Red lines flare bright, revealing a lattice far more complicated than the public design, with containment marks buried under decorative script and coercive bindings disguised as witness wards.

The crowd sees.

A gasp rolls outward, followed by frantic murmurs.

The flame reaches the pedestal.

The polished black surface cracks from base to rim, and the “safe” ritual device gives a shrill metallic scream as the internal cage burns open. Smoke bursts from the seams, carrying the stench of bound demon residue and forged restraint. The ward lattice around the dais ignites next, lines of red fire crawling up posts, across the floor, and beneath Vaerith’s own position.

Vaerith steps back sharply and without grace.

The sight nearly satisfies me.

Nearly.

I keep my eyes on Corin because the surge is still moving through him, and satisfaction is how fools lose control at the end of a difficult calculation. His arm trembles with the effort of keeping the flame narrow. The glow under his skin burns so bright I can see it through the torn shoulder of his shirt, but his breathing remains tied to mine.

“In,” I murmur.

He breathes.

“Out.”