Ivy's phone started ringing early Sunday morning, waking up her and Azara. "Hello?" she asked groggily.

"Hi, Ivy. It's Penelope."

"Yeah, I saw the caller ID. What's up?"

"Can you and Azara be out of the house by noon? We don't want your ambient demonic magic to mess up anything."

"Yeah, sure. No problem. What are you going to do?"

"We're going to strip them of their magic, like I said we might. It'll be easier without another kind of magic in the mix, which is why we want you out."

"Got it. We'll be gone."

"Do you have a place to stay for awhile, afterwards? I'm sure they'll be extremely unhappy and we can't stick around all day after everything is done."

"I guess we could stay with my sister? I'll check with her."

"If you need to, we have partially-furnished apartment in our building without any tenants. The coven would love for a chance to converse casually with a demon. That kind of opportunity doesn't occur very often."

"We'll see. I'll check with Claire and Azara first then get back to you on what we're doing."

"Okay. Talk to you later. Bye!"

"Bye!"

"What's up?" Azara asked, also sleepy.

"The witches from the coven are coming this afternoon so we'll have to be gone so your ambient magic won't mess up whatever they're doing."

"'Kay."

"And she said we should find a place to stay for awhile because our neighbors will probably be really unhappy, the implication being they might do something dangerous."

"I'll keep you safe."

"I know you will, but I'd rather you didn't have to. I'm texting Claire to see if we can stay there. She also said the coven would love to talk with you and that we could stay there if needed."

"Let's not. I don't feel like answering a bunch of questions."

"Well, that depends on Claire's answer first, but I'm sure she'll say 'yes'."

"Alright. I'm going back to sleep. It's too early."

"Yeah, me too," Ivy said, stifling a yawn. She laid back down with Azara.

Two hours passed before Claire responded saying that they were free to stay at her place for a few days, which Ivy decided meant it was time to get up. She let Penelope know she would be staying with Claire, then headed to the kitchen and started cooking some eggs. Azara came up from behind and hugged her. They stayed like that for a couple minutes before Ivy said, "This is nice but you need to let me go."

"Mmm, no."

"Do you want burnt eggs?"

"No."

"Then you need to let me go."

"...Fine," Azara pouted as she released Ivy.

"Claire said we can stay at her place," Ivy began as she finished up the eggs. "So we'll need to pack for a few days."

"What do we pack?"

"Clothes, laptops and phones and their chargers, some bathroom stuff. It should all fit in one or two bags."

"We aren't bringing everything with?"

"No, we don't need to. We also don't have the room for it, and anything else we forget or need Claire will have, or we can just buy. We would only bring everything if we were moving to a new permanent location."

"Okay, I see."

After an egg-filled breakfast they each packed one bag filled with their things. Neither of them had very much. The most expensive things in the apartment were probably the collections of clothes or the TV. The furniture had been bought used so even that had been pretty cheap. Azara made sure to pack the clothes Claire bought for her to show her appreciation.

After arriving at Claire's, she introduced Azara to one of her roommates, Emma. Ivy already knew her. There was also another roommate, Jade, but she worked on Sundays and was out right now. Claire showed them the couch they would have to sleep on, which was a fold out. They all hung out in the living room just talking when at about three in the afternoon Penelope called again. "Ivy? I'm so sorry."

"What? Why are you sorry? What happened?"

"We- We went in as planned and thought we disabled everything but they were desperate and-"

"Penelope, are you okay?"

"I-I'm fine, but..."

"What happened?"

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.

"I'm so sorry, Ivy. Your home burned down."

"What!? Are you okay? Is everyone okay?"

"Yes. Yes, we all made it out fine, but we weren't prepared for that."

"Can you explain to me what happened?"

"Yeah. You deserve an explanation. So we surrounded the building and cast a barrier which prevents anyone inside from casting any magic. We carried pre-made spells on us that we just had to attach to the building and activate that would siphon off the magic energy from anyone inside, and if they crossed the spell circle they would automatically lose everything, so they became desperate. We didn't count on them to have powerful magic items, though. We really had no idea.

They realized what was happening and activated the items in a desperate attempt to stop the spell, but the opposing energies conflicted and a powerful heat started building up until everything was on fire. They stayed as long as they could but eventually ran out of the building to escape, which broke the circle, so they lost their magic, and right now they're being questioned about the fire."

"Oh my god. I'm glad everyone's safe."

"Me too. Again, I am so, so sorry about your house."

"It's okay. I'm not blaming you for what happened. If anything, it sounds like they were the cause."

"You're free to stay in that apartment I told you about if you don't have a place to stay. We won't charge you rent until you get back on your feet."

"Oh wow. Thank you for that. I'm going to go now. Everyone in the room wants to know what happened. I'll talk to you later."

"Okay. Talk to you later. Bye."

"Bye."

Ivy spent the next few minutes explaining that her and Azara's place had burned down. She had to avoid the details about magic because Emma was there. She also mentioned they had a place to stay, which was at Penelope's building. Claire and Emma offered to let them stay but Azara turned them down. "I don't want to be a burden on you, and there's already a place for us to stay, so I think we should go with that. What do you think, Ivy?"

"I agree. I really appreciate the offer, but we were really lucky. Because we were planning on being here for a few days we didn't lose everything. We still have the necessities, our jobs and each other. And I think the place Penelope was talking about will probably be just fine. I'll keep you posted on what's going on, and if we end up not wanting to stay there for whatever reason we'll come back." They were also thinking about if they had anymore demonic visitors, which would be a lot easier to explain to witches.

"Okay. If you're sure that's what you want to do," Claire replied.

"We should get going right away then to see what we'll need at this new place."

They arrived at the coven's building again and Penelope let them in after hugging them both and apologizing again. She showed them to the apartment they would be staying in. It was about the same size as the place they had just lost, only older, but still much nicer in quality. There was a large couch and some footrests that could be arranged into a bed if they needed, which they would. There were also a few chairs and a small table, but that was it for the furnishings.

Ivy asked how Penelope was able to arrange all this for them to which she responded that she was the landlord and was actually much older than she looked. The other members of the coven all came and introduced themselves, and brought food, utensils, blankets and other supplies they could use. One of them even got rid of an old dresser she was no longer using. Another was kind enough to give out her wifi password. They also set up a barrier in the apartment to contain Azara's magic so it wouldn't interfere with theirs. Also, some of the witches were men, which surprised Ivy as she previously thought the term "witch" automatically meant they were a woman.

When everybody had come by and were done introducing themselves, Penelope asked if they would be okay with having a little welcome/apology dinner with everyone. Ivy thought it felt a little surreal to go to a party the same day their house burned down, but agreed to go.

The dinner was held in another vacant apartment, this one having had some of the interior walls torn down to make more space. It was for when the coven did things together, and Ivy and Azara were now unofficially a part of it. The dinner was a potluck, so there was a large table set up with peoples' dishes, and Azara was having fun trying everything. Some people were asking her various questions related to demons, but held off on asking too many for now considering what transpired today.

After the long dinner the two collapsed into their new couch. Azara was more tired from answering questions than anything else. They received a message from Claire saying she put $200 in Ivy's bank account, and to not worry about paying it back. She also said don't bother paying her back for clothes she bought for Azara, either. They both thanked her and decided it was time for sleep. They were still planning on working tomorrow, especially now that they needed the money.

The next few months would pass by rather uneventfully. They received more help from the witches, Claire and even some of their coworkers. The witches did ask Azara more questions but those died down eventually. When the rent payments started back up again is when things had pretty much returned to normal. The most shocking thing that happened is they found out Lily and Kathy were arrested for arson. That is, until Azara's father suddenly appeared in the living room one day.

"Azara. Ivy."

"Hello, father!"

"Nice to see you again."

"I came to see you," Azara's father said. "And to tell Ivy my name."

"Oh, really?" Ivy replied. "You don't have to do that."

"It's normal for demons to know each other's names. And I consider you an honorary demon at this point."

"Oh wow. Thank you."

"Japhrim. That is my name."

"Nice to meet you, Japhrim!" Ivy smiled.

Japhrim returned the smile. "I've come to bring a gift for my daughter and her mate." He set down a small chest he was holding. Azara opened it and inside was some expensive-looking jewelry.

"Where did this come from?" Azara asked.

"Many years ago a human formed a contract with me and was unable to handle the consequences of it. I ended up on possession of the baubles he asked for. I understand they should be worth quite something, no?"

"Ivy! Restaurant! Can we do it with this?" Azara exclaimed, eyes gleaming.

"You're still thinking about that, too?"

"Of course! I haven't stopped thinking about it!"

"We'll have to sell these for capital, and if anything that should be a good start. Is it okay to sell these, Japhrim?"

"Of course," Japhrim replied. "These are worthless to me. You can do anything you wish with them."

"Thank you so much for these. Will you be staying for dinner?"

"I will accept your offer." Japhrim shifted into a human form.

"Father!" Azara yelled in surprise. "You have a human form?!" He had the same dark skin and red hair that Azara had.

Japhrim chuckled. "I've lived a long life, Azara. And humans... They sometimes ask for strange things."

"That must have been quite some time ago," said Ivy. "Those clothes look hundreds of years old." He was wearing what appeared to be an ancient aristocratic suit.

"That sounds about right."

"Wouldn't want to get something that nice-looking dirty."

"It's fine. I don't care about these clothes either."

Ivy let out a small sigh at that. "If you say so."

They spent the next few hours chatting. Ivy and Azara told Japhrim about what was going on in their lives, including what happened three months ago, which explained why they had moved places. The mentioned their wedding that they still had to plan, and they also talked a bit more about the restaurant idea they had. Japhrim talked about some of the wishes he had granted and their effects, and after hearing some of the things people went through, Ivy became so glad that it was Azara of all demons who showed up suddenly in her life. If she had made some ill-advised wish without thinking of the consequences... She shuddered thinking about it. They had dinner, which Japhrim complimented, seeming to understand a new aspect of his daughter, then he left for the night.