Mochas and Minotaurs (Possessive Monsters #8)

Chapter 23

Griselda

Penny and Lily had taken the news that there was a ghost girl stuck to a compact living inside my home exceptionally well. It was Saturday night, and instead of heading to our usual house, we decided to stay and have a girls' night in. I’d sworn them both, and Prax, into secrecy before breaking the news to them.

Then we’d declared it a girls-only night so we could get to know our new friend a little more. She was still hiding something from me, and if I was going to protect her, I needed to know everything.

Prax had been a little disappointed that he had to leave, but he understood. And to be honest, he couldn’t be stuck to Penny 24/7. But then again, Marcus had stayed over for days after we found out we were neighbors, so I wasn’t one to talk.

“So you’re not married to the minotaur?” Bella asked.

Realizing that we couldn’t just call her “compact girl” the whole time, we’d asked her to pick a name, one that wasn’t “child” unless she really insisted we called her that.

“Because we would,” Lily had threatened. “And it’ll stick.”

She’d picked Bella because it was the name of a heroine in a romance novel she’d read in more recent years. I didn’t need to ask which one it was.

“No,” I answered. “Marcus and I aren’t married. He’s my neighbor.”

“You were together unchaperoned! And he cooked you dinner!”

I grinned at the thought that the idea of him making me food was as miraculous as us finding her.

“He cooked you dinner?” This time, it was Lily who posed the question.

She was already on her second glass of wine. Just because we were staying in didn’t mean she planned on being sober. Neither did I, though I decided to cap it at one glass since it felt like I had to keep my wits about me, what with everything that had happened in the past week.

“He said he was meal prepping and made enough for both of us.”

“Girl, what are you doing? Tie this one down now!” Lily said.

That had a body-less giggle sounding in my living room, followed by Triscuit’s impression of Bella’s laugh.

“A man who can cook is a keeper,” Penny said. “I can vouch for that.”

“Penny woke up the day after she met Prax to him making breakfast in her kitchen in nothing but a maid’s apron,” I explained to Bella. “That’s even better than topless vacuuming.”

Bella was back to giggling. “I think I’d actually like being a woman in this time.”

“Can you do that? Be alive again?” I asked, wondering if this was what she was keeping from me.

There was no answer for a bit. “Maybe. But it probably won’t happen, ever. I wouldn’t even know how to survive anyway. The world is so different. And I wasn’t exactly raised to be independent like you. I’ve read about it in books, but it’s different.”

“Maybe” wasn’t a no. But I wasn’t sure that was what she was hiding.

“Neither was I,” Penny said. “I was raised to be reliant on my family’s money. Sitting and rolling over at their command. But I learned how to make it on my own. It’s easier with friends.”

“It would be so nice to be able to go somewhere on my own and not have to ask someone to bring me. Or worry that some brat is going to bury me underground for decades.”

“If it makes you feel any better,” I said, “the brat’s dead. Marcus looked it up last night.”

“Is it bad that it does make me feel better?”

“Nope. He buried you!” Lily said. “You’re allowed to curse his name until the end of time. Heck, I’d do it on your behalf. I hope his spirit gets punted to hell, and he lands on an extra-large pinecone, butt-first. Sideways.”

And that had Bella in a fit of giggles again. “I was never found by a young witch before. This is fun.”

“When you were alive, did you have magic?” I asked, still digging for the missing piece.

She didn’t reply, and Penny said, “If you did, you can join a coven. We’re a coven. A small one, but it counts. And now that magic and monsters have been exposed, we don’t even need to hide it.”

“I…I don’t really have magic…like that.”

But she did have magic of some sort. Something told me we were onto something; call it a gut feeling.

But before we could continue the conversation, there was a loud shouting from outside.

“Gigi! Gigi!”

That sounded like Declan. I went to the window, and Declan stood outside, his face red like he’d run here on foot. “You have to come now. It’s Marcus!”

Icy fingers of dread reached into my chest to grasp at my heart. Marcus! “What happened?”

“You have to help him!”

“Okay! I’m coming!” A million scenarios ran through my head. What if the dragon had found him? What if it was Arcane? They’d sent people to break the windows, but what if they sent someone for him this time?

My feet moved of their own volition, and it wasn’t until I was already out my door and in the middle of the parking lot that I realized something was horribly wrong.

First, Declan was nowhere to be seen. And second, the air was too still, too quiet. My friends, who had followed me out, realized our mistake at the same time.

“Gigi!” Penny cried even as I turned to run back toward the door and the safety of my warded home.

But it was too late. Out of nowhere, a massive form swooped down from the sky. A vise clamped down around my middle, and there was a sudden whoosh of vertigo as the ground dropped beneath my feet. I was being lifted up into the air in the claws of a dragon.

I didn’t need to look to know that this wasn’t Desmon. This was Marcus’s dragon, the one who was hunting him.

A loud voice thundered in my ear, “You for the girl, minotaur.”

I realized that Marcus was at his door now, the real Declan next to him.

“You’ve evaded me long enough, and for what? This witch?” the dragon scoffed. “She isn’t even particularly strong or beautiful. I should crush her.”

The claw tightened around me, and I struggled, gasping for air.

“No!” Marcus yelled, stepping out of the building. “Don’t hurt her.”

I waved desperately for him to get back to safety. But did the valorous minotaur do it? No. He just stood there, ripe for the dragon’s picking, as Declan scrambled to pull him back inside. At least one of them was thinking clearly.

“Why should I let her live?” the dragon asked. “As long as she’s alive, you’ll be tempted to shirk your duties.”

I felt something else latch onto me, trying to tug me out of the dragon’s claws. Penny and Lily weren’t at the door anymore and instead were at the window in my apartment, their hands dancing and lips moving as they tried to free me.

The dragon roared. “Who dares direct spells at me?” he thundered. “It won’t work.”

He squeezed again, and I wheezed as I tried to inhale, the world around me darkening.

“Stop! Stop! Please.” Marcus stumbled forward like it was he who couldn’t breathe. “Let her go. I’ll go with you. Just let her go. Please.”

It happened fast. One second I was dangling in the air, and the next I was crumpled on the ground, the snowbank breaking my fall. My friends rushed out and gathered around me even as Marcus disappeared into the distance in the claws of a dragon.

It took an eternity to convince Penny and Lily to leave so I could be alone. They’d stayed even after Declan and I had explained everything. Declan hadn’t helped since he was in angry-go mode and was swearing to raise an army to free his best friend.

His anger and Lily’s need to “do something” had fed off each other, and they were even now on a joint mission to contact everyone they knew and leverage every person for help. Penny had joined Lily with the look that promised she’d keep an eye out on our friend lest she caused more trouble than she solved.

As for me, I needed to be alone. I needed to think. And I needed to scream into my pillow in frustration.

“Argh! That stupid minotaur! Why did he have to do the valiant thing and give himself up for me? Why?”

“Aaaargh!” Triscuit yelled in solidarity.

I wasn’t sure he understood what was going on, but he knew I was upset. He’d tried to preen my hair in an attempt to cheer me up.

Bella cleared her throat. Oh shit. I’d completely forgotten that she was still in my pocket and technically had been up in the dragon’s claws with me earlier.

“Griselda?”

I wiped the tears from my eyes. “Yeah?”

“I need to tell you something important. I haven’t been completely honest with you about why the wizards are still after me.”

Oh great. Of course just losing Marcus wasn’t enough. Arcane was still after Bella and, consequently, my home. Marcus’s home. With him gone, the building itself seemed so insignificant, but I knew that it was just the too-fresh loss making my brain irrational.

“Tell me,” I said.

It turned out Bella had a magical talent. I’d heard of people like that before. Unlike witches who could use magic by casting spells or brewing potions, she had only one magical talent. It was a strong one: she could grant “wishes.” Kind of.

But there was a catch. Actually, there were two catches.

That first catch was that it was less like granting a wish like a genie would but more like providing step-by-step solutions so the wish makers could do it themselves. There was work involved, often a lot of it.

“It wasn’t until I was ten that my father actually took one of my answers seriously. That counted as his first wish. He became very rich.”

“Let me guess,” I said. “That wasn’t enough for him?”

“No. He made another wish, and I gave him another solution. We didn’t know much about my talent yet at this point, so I told him how to be famous. It worked, but not the way he wanted. He became famous for losing his fortune overnight.” Bella’s voice got small. “He blamed it on me.”

“So subsequent wishes are like the monkey’s paw.” That must be the second catch.

“What’s that?” Bella asked.

“It’s a story about a monkey paw that grants wishes but with disastrous consequences as a punishment for daring to toy with fate.”

“Yes. That’s about right. But we didn’t know at that time. I tried to explain that I didn’t know how my magic worked. He tried again anyway, wishing to have his fortune back. He struck gold in a location I told him to dig in. But then he lost both his brothers and his best friend to a cave-in at the mine. I didn’t do it on purpose, really. I didn’t know!” She ended her statement on a desperate sob.

“I believe you. Magic is like that sometimes.”

“That’s when he realized only the first wish was good. The moment my mother suggested it, I knew it was true. I was only good for one wish per person. By then, my father couldn’t stand the sight of me. He auctioned me off to his friends, and an old wizard won. Mama was so angry. She wished to keep me safe from these men.

“I tried to warn her that she’d already used her wish. It happened when I was little. Papa had a mistress, and Mama was crying, and she wished Papa would just be loyal. I didn’t know at the time, but I’d granted her the solution, and she’d followed it. My father lost interest in his mistress, and we were happy.

“But when she found out who Papa promised me to, she made the wish anyway. I gave her the solution, and she made up a potion, and I drank it. It turned me into this compact, easy to hide from the men because the last place they’d look was her vanity.”

“So that’s why Arcane wants you. Every wizard there could have one wish.”

“Yes. But don’t you see? I can help you. You can wish for a way to get Marcus back. I can’t do it myself.”

Hope flared in my chest, but it was quickly dampened. “Then I won’t be any better than they are by using your talent for myself.”

“No. It’s not the same. I want to grant this wish. I want to thank you both for digging me out of that prison and introducing me to your friends. I like them. Especially Lily. She’s funny. Please let me help.”

I still hesitated; there were always negatives attached to wishes.

It was like she read my mind. “The first wish always comes true. And in exactly the way you want it.”

“Do I have to word it the right way?”

“No. It just knows what you want.”

“It sounds too good to be true.’”

“It’s not a wish like that. You don’t even need to word it as a wish. But you do have to put in the effort and follow the solution for it to work.”

“So, it’s more like offering good advice than a wish.”

“Yes! Maybe that’s a better way to describe it. But Papa always called it a wish. So it stuck.”

I nodded. “Okay. I’ll take it. Tell me how to get Marcus back safely and get the dragon to leave him alone.”