Free Damnation's Door: A Cursed Book by Amy Braun

houses safe?”
     
    The kid blinked slowly, letting my words sink in. I’d never thought Max would be able to brood. Shows what I knew about him.
     
    He took another deep breath and closed his eyes. After a long minute, he opened them again and turned around. He pointed to a grim, pale grey stucco house with a dark grey roof.
     
    “Yeah. We’ll be good there,” he announced, already walking for it.
     
    We followed him off the road and up the concrete path. He stood in front of the screen door and carefully wrapped his hand around the doorknob. Sephiel moved past me to stand by Max, his hands reaching in his coat for the hilts of his short swords. Max pushed the door open and tried to walk inside, but Sephiel got in front of him.
     
    “You know I wouldn’t have opened the door if there were monsters or murderers inside, right?” Max told the ex-angel impatiently.
     
    Sephiel didn’t turn, his head moving from side to side as he did his own assessment.
     
    “I do not doubt your gifts, Max, but I would prefer to err on the side of caution. Warrick, will you assist me in confirming the security of his location?”
     
    “Sure,” was Warrick’s simple reply. He didn’t look at me, but his presence when he brushed past me was impossible to ignore. I was tempted to follow them, but changed my mind when I realized that would leave Dro alone with Max, something I wasn’t sure either of them was ready to be yet.
     
    It doesn’t matter what you think, my brain told me in a rare, rational moment. They need to work it out themselves.
     
    “I’ll check the left side,” I said, already moving into the foyer. I didn’t plan on going far, but I was going to give the two kids some space.
     
    The house was a mess. Dirty newspapers and crumpled heaps of clothing were strewn over broken plates in the kitchen. Pictures were knocked off the walls and chairs were tossed over the upturned table. All the destruction looked recent, a raid or a fight gone wrong. When I saw the blood splatter on the tile floor, I was guessing which was more likely.
     
    But there were no screeches or clicking claws of a demon. There were no hooting or hollering sinners. It was eerily quiet, and that made me even tenser. Certain that nothing would jump out of the shadows at me, I stepped back toward the foyer. I stopped when I heard the edges of Dro and Max’s conversation beyond the doorframe.
     
    “I wasn’t thinking,” he said. “I was trying to wake you up.”
     
    “You should have run,” she told him. “I’m too dangerous when I’m like that.”
     
    Max sighed. “I know, and I’m sorry I freaked out after, but... Dro, when I touched you, I saw what you were dreaming.”
     
    The silence following that statement was a weight. I edged closer to the corner of the wall.
     
    “I didn’t know what I was going to see,” Max went on. “I just wanted to know you were okay.”
     
    “Well, I’m not,” Dro replied. She sounded bitter, but also a little scared.
     
    There were some footsteps. I was betting they were Max’s.
     
    “You have to tell Constance. Lucifer must have given you that dream. He must have been manipulating your mind until–”
     
    “Lucifer wasn’t doing anything,” Dro interrupted. Her voice was sharp, but when she spoke again, the anger was dialed back. “Or if he was, I couldn’t tell. I was in control in that nightmare, Max. I was the one standing back while the rest of you were murdered. I was the one who... I was the one who went after Constance. It was all me. Lucifer was never even there.”
     
    She took a shuddering breath, the way she did when she was about to cry.
     
    “And the worst part was that I knew it wasn’t a dream. Not really. It felt too real. I can still taste the smoke. And I just didn’t care. I loved how powerful I felt. Like I was actually free, and didn’t need to hide anymore. It wasn’t a nightmare, Max. It was a premonition.”
     
    Max must have moved closer to