The Evil We Love (Tales from the Shadowhunter Academy, #5)

Jon Cartwright snickered. “Simmer down, Mom. You heard her.”


Simon looked around the lounge at his friends (and Jon). Over the past year, he’d come to know them inside and out, or at least, he thought that he did. Julie bit her nails bloody when she was nervous. Marisol slept with a sword under her pillow, just in case. George talked in his sleep, usually about sheep-shearing techniques. Sunil had four pet rabbits that he talked about constantly, always worried that little Ringo was getting picked on by his bigger, fluffier brothers. Jon had covered one wall of his room with his little cousin’s finger paintings, and wrote her a letter every week. They’d all pledged themselves to the Shadowhunter cause; they’d gone through hell to prove themselves to their instructors and one another. They’d almost finished out the year without a single fatal injury or vampire bite . . . and now this?

“Ha-ha, very funny,” Simon said, hoping he was doing an acceptable job of keeping the desperation out of his tone. “Nice joke on me, get me back for wussing out last night. Utterly hilarious. What’s next? You want to convince me they’re making another crap Last Airbender movie? You want to see me freak out, there are easier ways.”

Isabelle rolled her eyes. “No one wants to see you freak out, Simon. Frankly, I could take or leave seeing you at all.”

“So this is serious,” Simon said. “You’re seriously, not at all jokingly, actually, for real planning to summon a demon? Here, in the middle of the Shadowhunter Academy? In the middle of the end-of-year party? Because you think it will be . . . fun?”

“We’re obviously not going to summon it in the middle of the party,” Isabelle said. “That would be rather foolish.”

“Oh, of course,” Simon drawled. “That would be foolish.”

“We’re going to summon it here in the lounge,” Isabelle clarified. “Then bring it to the party.”

“Then kill it, of course,” Julie put in.

“Of course,” Simon echoed. He wondered if maybe he was having a stroke.

“You’re making it sound like a bigger deal than it is,” George said.

“Yeah, it’s just an imp demon,” Sunil said. “No biggie.”

“Uh-huh.” Simon groaned. “Totally. No biggie.”

“Imagine the look on everyone’s faces when they see what we can do!” Marisol was nearly glowing at the thought of it.

Beatriz wasn’t there. If she had been, maybe she could have talked some reason into them. Or helped Simon tie them up and stuff them in the closet until the end of the semester had safely passed and Isabelle was back in New York where she belonged.

“What if something goes wrong?” Simon pointed out. “You’ve never faced off against a demon in combat conditions, not without the teachers watching your back. You don’t know—”

“Neither do you,” Isabelle snapped. “At least, you don’t remember, isn’t that right?”

Simon said nothing.

“Whereas I took down my first imp when I was six years old,” Isabelle said. “Like I told your friends, it’s no big deal. And they trust me.”

I trust you—that’s what he was meant to say. He knew she was waiting for it. They all were.

He couldn’t.

“I can’t talk you out of this?” he asked instead.

Isabelle shrugged. “You can keep trying, but you’d be wasting all our time.”

“Then I’ll have to find another way to stop you,” Simon said.

“You gonna tell on us?” Jon sneered. “You gonna go be a crybaby and tattle to your favorite warlock?” He snorted. “Once a teacher’s pet, always a teacher’s pet.”

“Shut up, Jon.” Isabelle whacked him softly on the arm. Simon probably should have been pleased, but whacking still required touching, and he preferred that Isabelle and Jon never come into physical contact of any sort. “You could try to tell on us, Simon. But I’ll deny it. And then who will they believe—someone like me, or someone like you? Some mundane.”