“So, what?” Emma said. “Hellions are allergic to fur?”

Harmony laughed and stroked the small creature in my hands, which had begun to sniff my fingers with a tiny, wet nose. “No. These little guys are Netherworld guard dogs. If they sense a hellion anywhere near you, on the other side of the world barrier, of course, they’ll start yipping up a storm. So…if you sleep with him in your room, he’ll wake you up before you can possibly be possessed.”

“So…the cure for hellion possession is a pet?” I asked, running one finger down the creature’s thin, trembling spine.

“Well, it’s more preventative than actual cure, but it’s the best I could come up with.”

“My mom won’t let me have a dog,” Emma said, looking worried as she cradled hers to her chest.

Harmony was unconcerned. “Tod can talk her into it, can’t you, Tod?” The reaper nodded. “And, Sabine, I’m sure Nash can talk to your foster mother for you.” Their Influence should pave the way toward pet ownership before the poor mothers even knew what hit them.

“But I don’t want a dog,” Sabine said, still staring at hers like it might bite her. Or vice versa. “I didn’t even want a bracelet.”

Harmony frowned. “Do you want Avari in your body?”

“No.”

“Then you want this bracelet, and you definitely want this dog. Name him. Feed him. Bond with him. He’s the only thing standing between you and serial possession. Got it?”

Sabine nodded hesitantly, and I laughed out loud. I couldn’t help it. She couldn’t have looked less comfortable if Harmony had demanded she cha-cha in a pair of three-inch heels.

“What about Alec?” I asked, pushing my new bracelet upmy arm, to keep the pup from chewing on it.

“I dropped his off at his new place. Sophie’s getting one, too, though I don’t know how her dad’s going to explain it.”

“So…this is it?” Nash asked. “We’re using jewelry and puppies to ward off evil?”

Harmony nodded. “Right now, guys, these puppies and bracelets are all you have standing between you and the Netherworld. Well, these little guys, and one another. For whatever reason, the dominant hellion of this area has literally moved into your high school, just across the world barrier from where you spend most of your waking hours. And he’s not alone. Such a concentration of power is like a lighthouse in the dark. It’s going to attract others, and your school is going to be at the heart of whatever trouble moves into the neighborhood. “If you’re going to take on the entire Netherworld population, as some of you seem determined to do, you need to at least know what you have going for you. So take a look around this room. This is it. These are the people in your corner. So I suggest you all find a way to get along. I have a feeling someday your lives are going to depend on it.”

I glanced around my living room, one face at a time, thinking of everything we’d been through together. Everything we’d fought and survived. Hellions. Possession. Toxic vines. Demon’s Breath. Walking nightmares. Was Harmony saying it would get worse from there?

A chill shot through me at the very thought.

But as I watched Sabine watching Nash watch me, I realized something I should have understood much sooner—as horrifying a threat as the Netherworld represented, learning to trust again in my own world might just be the scariest thing I’d ever had to do.