The creature Lana had morphed into opened its mouth and out of it came a loud cry, like the deepest growl from the throat of a lion.

Come and fight me! the Devil cried. The voice barely sounded like Lana; it was distorted and rumbling, and made my eardrums pulse in pain.

I took a terrified step back, realizing with horror what I'd done. "I don't want to fight!" I said desperately.

She laughed—a cruel sound. Oh, so now you want to act nice? The monster swiped at me and I had to take several steps backwards to avoid her claws. I'm done being nice.

"Lana, please! If I get hurt, I'll die. I'll be trapped here forever."

Lana hesitated, and for a moment I thought she was considering my request. And then, in a voice that made the hairs on my neck stand on end, she said: Maybe I want you to get hurt. Maybe I want you to know what it's like to be a prisoner in your own hell.

And she lunged.

I screamed and started to run, sneakers pounding on the wood floors. My gut reaction was to make a beeline for the elevator, but then I heard a banging from behind one of the closed doors in the apartment.

Billy.

I altered my course, lunging at the door, which was shaking from the force of Billy's fists. "Billy!" I cried, my arm catching against the lock. I heard a muffled "Jessa!" in response from behind the wood.

Get away from there! Lana cried, swinging a monstrous arm at me. I dropped to the ground, trying to dodge her blow, but her swing glanced against my shoulder, flooding my arm with white, hot pain. I was lucky that I didn't get the full force of her blow; the rest of her arm slammed into the door behind me, so hard that the wood immediately turned to splinters.

"Gah!" I screamed, covering my head as shrapnel rained down on me. But then I felt a tug on my arm, and when I looked up, Billy was standing over me, having climbed out through the rubble of the doorway. There were cuts on his face, and his eyes were wide with terror, but otherwise he looked unharmed.

"Come on!" he said, dragging me to my feet.

Not wasting another moment, Billy and I raced towards the front door of the apartment. Billy yanked it open and we nearly tumbled into the hallway, fingers outstretched for the elevator button. However, the elevator was no longer there. It was as if we had been yanked out of Hell and dropped into a M.C. Escher painting. We were surrounded by an infinite number of hallways, staircases snaking out ahead of us, leading to an infinite number of doors and mirrors, none of it quite making sense.

My reflections stared back at me, showing a frightened girl with a bleeding arm and a boy with wood chips in his blond hair.

You can't leave, Lana's voice came rippling through my head. This is my world.

I set my jaw and looked at Billy. "We can still try," I said. And, choosing a hallway at random, we started running again.

Each doorway we passed through led to just another hallway, another flight of stairs, another room full of mirrors. And yet I kept running, dragging Billy behind me as I opened door after door after door.

"There has to be a way out of here!" I said, my hand throbbing from the number of doorknobs I reached for. But we didn't seem to be getting anywhere.

I don't know how long I kept this up. Blood was pounding so loudly in my ears that it was only after Billy gave me a particularly forceful yank on my arm that I realized he had been trying to say something.

"What?" I said, my voice coming out in a gasp. My feet were still moving, albeit slowly.

"Jessa," he said, his brown eyes watering. "We have to stop."

I shook my head. "No. We have to get out of here."

"How?" Billy asked, yanking me to a stop. "You heard her. This is her realm. She controls everything."

"There must be a way out though," I said. "A crack in her system! And... and I have this!" I pulled the crumpled ticket out of my pocket. "It's a round trip ticket. It was part of my deal with her. If we get to the river, we can get out."

Billy looked at it, a mildly hopeful glint in his eye, but the spark died almost immediately. "There's only one."

"I—" I started, trying to come up with a solution, but Billy cut me off.

"And after everything that's happened, I highly doubt she'd honor that." He slouched down to the ground, leaning his head against a mirror.

For the first time, I paused to really look at Billy. Although he appeared physically unharmed, I could see the haunted look in his eyes and the redness that hinted at tears.

I knelt down beside him, taking a breath and trying to slow down my racing heart. "How has it been... being here? Are you... is she..."

"She hasn't tortured me, if that's what you're getting at," he said. "When I first arrived, she materialized this insane five-course dinner and poured us glasses of champagne and had a ton of presents wrapped up waiting for me... But she didn't understand why I was so upset, why I wouldn't eat the food or touch anything she had gotten for me. Getting yanked down here with no warning, knowing that my body is in an ICU somewhere and my parents are probably debating on whether they should pull the plug..." His eyes were watering. "I never got the chance to say goodbye."

"Billy..."

Billy shook his head. "I'm starting to accept it, though. I'm here and that's how it's going to be." He looked me in the eyes. "But Jessa, if you apologize, maybe she'll let you go."

I shook my head, eyes watering. "Billy, I'm not leaving here without you."

"Then you'll be stuck here forever too."

"No, Billy, you don't understand. This is bigger than us. Lana went too far this time and God is angry. If you stay, a war will break out between Heaven and Hell. Everything will be destroyed... including Earth and everyone we know."

"Then let the war begin."

I whipped around and saw that Lana was standing only a few feet away, still as stone. She was no longer a monstrous beast, but she did look slightly worse for wear. Pieces of her hair had come down from its neat chiffon, black wisps framing her face like smoke. Her eyes were dark and cold.

I scrambled to my feet. "Lana," I said, taking a step forward, "please listen to me. If Billy isn't returned to Earth—"

"I heard you the first time. Let them come. I've lived through a great Battle before. I'm not afraid."

"But this is different! You're one person up against the legions of Heaven. Everything will be destroyed. Even you."

"Do you think I care if they destroy everything?" Lana spat. "If they destroy me? I have nothing to live for. I live in a world of my own creation. Everything around me is a lie. And for years I've tried everything to make the emptiness go away. I've made deals with brilliant, interesting people and have created a stunning, shifting world where we can all live together and be happy. But it doesn't work—it never does." She shook her head, tears welling up in her eyes. "When people first come here, everything is fine. But the longer they stay, the more of their humanity vanishes and they turn... they turn into monsters." She shook her head. "It's the curse of the Underworld, the curse of being so far away from God. And there is nothing I can do to stop it."

She rubbed her hands on her dress. "But I thought this time it'd be different. When I was on Earth, I opened up in a way I never had before. I tried to change. And eventually I started to believe that maybe I was worthy of love. I thought that maybe the reason I've always felt so alone, why everyone always turns into monsters, was because no one in the Underworld is here for me; they're here because of someone or something they had loved on Earth. So I thought Billy..." A tear fell down her cheek. "I thought that since Billy actually liked me, it'd be different. He'd be happy here. With me. And for once, I'd be happy too."

She shook her head. "But no. I can't be happy. I'm forever damned from a choice I made millennia ago. So maybe this is what I need." Her eyes were so dark, like wide black diamonds, glittering with tears. "A war so brutal and so brilliant that it will shatter my soul into a million pieces. I will cease to exist."

I was startled by the dark longing in her voice. "Lana—" I said.

She interrupted me with a shake of her head. "I'll be nothing... but I'll be free of this hell."

As her words faded into silence, I stared at her: her thin, fragile body, hair matted and curled, eyes so full of tears... And I realized, with the same clarity I had had seeing Taylor in the lake, that I'd been wrong. Lana hadn't been trying to deceive me all this time. She had truly been longing for a friend. And when she made a mistake, I had assumed the worse.

"I didn't know you felt this way," I said after a moment of silence.

The Devil clenched her jaw tight and said nothing.

I hesitated, running my hands over my arms. I looked at Billy, who was still sitting on the ground in stunned silence. And then I took a deep breath. "I can't imagine how it feels to long for death," I said. "And... I'm sorry. I'm sorry for what I said before."

Lana looked up at me, a hint of confusion flashing in her eyes.

"I should have believed you," I said. "I haven't been a great friend to you. But..." I took a breath. "What you did with Billy was wrong. Deep down, you know that."

She didn't say anything. She just stood there, eyes trailing over to one of the many mirrors.

"You said you've changed, and believe me, I know you have. I've seen it. But being 'good' isn't a one-time thing. Everyone—myself included—has to work at it all the time. Otherwise it's all for nothing." I looked at her. "I know this is hard, but you need to do the right thing. Let Billy go. Save the world instead of dooming it to destruction."

I watched Lana's eyes fill with tears, her body trembling with suppressed sobs. She shook her head. "I don't think you understand, Jessa. I... honestly I don't think I can do that... I don't think I can be alone anymore..."

My heart sunk. Despite everything, I couldn't convince her. The world would end.

And then, in another moment of clarity, I realized what I needed to do.

"Lana," I said, the words rushing out before I could stop myself. "Let Billy go and I will stay here in his place."