Tod handed her the yellow balloon and she repeated the process without a word or a glance at any of us. When the second balloon had joined the red one on the floor, I couldn’t help but smile as I stared at them, the room silent but for Addy’s forceful exhaling into a third, purple, one.

The balloons on the floor looked festive, in a cheesy, child’s-birthday-party kind of way. They seemed to mock their own dangerous content. But then, maybe that was appropriate, considering the origins of that content: a world where the residents would gladly eat us alive. If the plant life didn’t get us first.

When Addy had finished the third balloon, Nash decided we had enough. Not because we were sure we actually did have enough, but because we were running out of time. Why hadn’t I asked for two hours?

Not that it mattered. Addy’s life-clock was ticking toward its last tock even without the fiend’s deadline. According to the digital numbers on her DVD player, it was just after one o’clock on Thursday morning. Addy would die sometime in the next twenty-three hours—probably sooner, rather than later—and every moment we wasted brought that unknown time closer.

“We’ll come back for you as soon as we can,” Tod said as I gathered the filled balloons. “Get Regan up and moving.” If she’d already been conscious, we could have just taken both Page sisters with us. “We’ll call when we’re on the way, but I can’t promise much notice.”

Because we had no idea where this hellion was going to be, or how long it would take to get there. And to find him.

“I’ll try.” Addy frowned, glancing toward the kitchen. “She won’t touch coffee, but I think we have some Jolt in the fridge.”

“Good. I’ll call you when we know more,” Tod promised, and left a kiss on her cheek on his way out the door.

Addison watched us from the front porch as we backed down the dark driveway, her arms crossed over the front of a thin, long-sleeved T-shirt, apparently oblivious to the middle-of-the-night November cold. My guess was that it was nothing compared to the chill inside her.

Nash drove again, and I spent the first part of the ride to the stadium applying antibiotic cream to my ankle, and the second part desperately wishing I hadn’t. I’d barely wiped the thick white cream from my fingers when the puncture wounds began to bubble and hiss softly, as if I’d poured on hydrogen peroxide instead. The annoying ache/burn I’d been trying to ignore for the past forty minutes roared into a full-blown bonfire in my ankle.

I wiped off all the cream I could with more of Emma’s tissues, wishing she had something wet so I could get all of it. The little bit that remained in the holes in my flesh bubbled softly, leaking tiny drops of white-tinged liquid now. By the time we pulled into the stadium parking lot, thin, red, weblike lines had begun to snake out from the double ring of punctures in all directions. The webbing extended less than an inchso far, but I had no doubt it would keep spreading.

Nash glanced at my ankle twice, his frown deepening each time, and I seriously considered his offer to take me to the hospital. To end the pain creeping up my leg and get our confession over with. But that would effectively end our night, leaving Addy to die without her soul. Damning her to an eternity of torture. And I couldn’t do that. Not knowing what had happened to the souls my aunt had bargained with. How could I let Addy suffer the same fate?

Besides, there would be time to treat my injury after we’d reclaimed the Page souls, right? Because according to Tod, no matter how bad my ankle got, I wouldn’t die until my name showed up on some reaper’s list, and if that happened, no amount of Netherworldly cream or pills could save me. I refused to think about the fact that Tod’s list couldn’t predict the loss of my leg or foot. So I pressed on, in spite of the pain.

We negotiated the parking lot on the human plane—brightly colored balloons tucked under both of my arms and one of Nash’s—to avoid stepping on any more crimson creeper, and we didn’t stop to cross over until I judged that we were approximately where we’d stood when we’d bargained with the fiend. Then we moved several feet to the left, to avoid that stupid vine. I was pretty sure my estimate of the distance was good enough, because as far as I could tell, we hadn’t lost any time crossing over earlier. The anchor at the stadium was very strong.

Tod crossed over first, to make sure all was clear, and that the fiend was waiting for us, because I wasn’t going to make the effort if the little monster had ditched us, or if it wasn’t safe to be in the Netherworld at that particular place and time. Only once he’d returned with the all clear did I summon my wail—with less effort than ever now—and haul Nash into the Netherworld with me.

The fiend stood very close to where we’d left him, running the tip of his tail through one small, loosely clenched fist over and over. His gaze jumped from place to place. His twitches had grown stronger, and he clearly could not stand still. And suddenly it occurred to me with an indescribable jolt of horror that I’d become a Netherworld drug dealer.

After several deep breaths, I decided I could live with that, so long as the ends justified the means. I hadn’t gotten the little monster hooked on Demon’s Breath in the first place, and I was only enabling him for one hit. Right?

The fiend’s eyes widened at one glimpse of the balloons we carried, and I noticed for the first time that his bright yellow eyes were drastically dilated and shiny.

“Give!” he panted, reaching up with both short, stubby hands for the red balloon, the first to capture his attention. I wondered briefly if he were color-blind, and I was relieved to notice that he had no fingernails. At least I wouldn’t have to worry about him clawing me in a rush for his fix.