Chapter 24 #2
If this wasn’t an elaborate setup from the two men to test her loyalty, then she was being lured into a game of politics. Velten had once said that the true enemies of inquisitors were other inquisitors, and this one had clearly sniffed blood in the water.
Inquisitor Callum waited patiently. Now that she knew to look for it, the serene smile on his lips and the slow blinking of his eyes reeked of manipulation.
Eyes blazing with restrained fury, Semras forced herself to smile. “He said he was worried about finding a culprit.” A half-truth—she was becoming skilled at them.
The inquisitor hummed. “He should not be. I may not agree with his methods, but I graciously recognize Estevan is a skilled investigator. He will find one.”
Callum’s kind mask repulsed her. It felt too sweet, too calculated.
“Oh, I’m sure he will,” she replied, plastering politeness over her bitterness.
She was acutely aware of just where the monster would find the scapegoat he wanted—in her. She’d never let him use one of her witch sisters, and once he’d caught on to that, he’d turn on her.
“But it’s clear I’m a … a distraction,” Semras continued. “He told me a lot of things he shouldn’t have.”
If this was a trap from the two men, she wouldn’t fall for it. And if it was a political game, then he’d pay for her collaboration first, or else he’d have no incentive to help free her.
Until she could be certain of which it was, she needed to stay cautious. Then, she’d bargain for the key to her shackles and weave a way out of her gilded cage, while Callum would stop the monster before he could pursue her.
If this wasn’t a trap.
“And I …” Semras cleared her throat, pondering on how to convey the underlying meaning of her words. “I don’t belong here. This city is … it’s an abomination to me. I’d be deeply grateful to anyone who could help me get back home.”
Inquisitor Callum kept his impassive smile. Semras couldn’t tell if he didn’t understand what she meant or if she had just misjudged the situation.
“How about this …” he began. “Stay with him for a moment, just …”—he hushed her upcoming protest with a single raised finger—“… a moment. Let me know how he does. As his senior, I worry about him. I would be grateful if you could inform me of his progress. Once this is over, I will return you to your forest. What do you say, Miss Witch?”
So this was a power play between inquisitors, after all. Not a trap, but not much better.
Semras knew little of politics, but she knew that all that mattered in a negotiation was keeping the upper hand; showing him the witch-shackles would only betray the weakness of her position.
At best, it’d force her to agree to being his pawn, to be discarded as soon as she became useless.
At worst, Inquisitor Callum might think she didn’t have the trust of the monster, and thus nothing of value to sell.
After today, that would be true: her captor would make sure she’d never escape from her next cell.
She needed to play it safe. She had only one chance at this gamble. “I … believe I have been here long enough,” Semras said cautiously. Old Crone witness her; she hated this indirect speech. “I could tell you all about it on the way to my home? I really shouldn’t be here …”
Inquisitor Callum sighed. “I agree.”
Pure, blinding glee swelled in her heart. He agreed! He agreed, and now she’d be—
“You really do not belong here.”
Her heart heaved with pain. What a cruel game he was playing with her. “Then, please—!”
“This city is a testament to modernity, while witches barely belong in the current era. There are so few of you that remain now.” His mouth opened in a mockery of a kind smile.
“Think of your sisters, Miss Witch, and decide where your best interests lie. If you choose wrong, there may soon be no Coven to return to.”
Semras paled. “You are threatening me.”
Even now, the inquisitor kept his flippant mask on. “Am I?”
“Speak plainly, snake. Enough with your dancing words!”
His smile became almost genuine. “What venom. And yet, I am the one you call a snake. I see why you have caught Estevan’s attention.
Now, you have mine.” Callum’s mask of affability faded into a blank expression.
“I will be plain as you requested, then. Stay by his side and report to me everything you know—his movements, his meetings, his thoughts. Even what seems to be of little value. Write it down and hide your messages in your laundry; one of my people will get them back to me. If you do this, I will take you under my protection and return you to your Coven unharmed.”
“I have heard similar words from an inquisitor before. They were lies,” Semras hissed.
“I do not lie. My word is as true as the law.” Inquisitor Callum clicked his tongue at her glare. “My intentions are not entirely mercenary. I can tell just how uncomfortable you are here. I do not approve of Estevan’s actions toward you and, in time, I will see them rectified. You have my word.”
“I have no use for your word.” Semras stood and pulled one of her gloves off with her teeth. “Rectify them now, if this is what you truly believe. Because that is the extent of the ‘comfort’ I’m given here!” Eyes blazing, she rattled her shackles under his nose.
Surprised, Inquisitor Callum grabbed her wrists to push them back. Cold iron grazed against his forearms.
Hissing, he staggered back and let go of her.
With feigned nonchalance, the inquisitor rolled his sleeves down.
“In due time, Miss Witch. Be useful to me, and I will make it worth your while.” Gloved hands cautiously worked to cover his bare, freckled skin, now smeared with a painful-looking red blotch where the shackles had grazed it.
“Think it through. You seem in dire need of an ally.”
Semras stayed silent, eyes stuck to his gloves.
The leather had a red palm and a black backside, the same as the monster’s. He, too, wore the gloves of a sanctified murderer, but they weren’t what made her freeze in place.
It was something much, much worse.
Inquisitor Callum, with his uncanny stillness, his practiced expressions, and his ethereal elegance, had hissed at the cold iron and hidden too well in a hallway flooded by sunlight—like an unsettling, ethereal predator who didn’t belong to this world.
Because he was one.
Sweat ran down Semras’ spine. Now she knew why her instincts had shrieked at her to get away. That man was a changeling—a half-fey. She knew it from the darkest recesses of her soul, like prey would know to flee before the jaws of an unknown predator.
That meant Callum’s offer of freedom was a cursed Fey Bargain. She couldn’t take it, not even out of desperation. Not even to escape her cage.
The Fey always abused their word. They took their price, and then still found a way to bleed their victims dry before discarding the bones where no one would ever find them. Her old weirwitch mentor had warned her that this wasn’t a metaphor.
Dread crawled through each of her veins and seized her throat, rooting her in place. The changeling walked past her, unaware—or more likely uncaring—that she knew of his true nature.
Changeling. The word alone shook her to the core. The worst of the Fey and the worst of humans, mixed into a being held back by neither of their weaknesses.
He had presented to her a Bargain they both knew she couldn’t take. Oh, how he must have relished in her anguish, in the taste of her despair, in trapping her in the illusion of choice. He had dangled freedom before her eyes, then snatched it away with a mask of smiles.
“You are just like him,” she murmured.
Behind her, the inquisitor’s steps echoed to the door.
“More than a mentor …” she continued in a breath, “you share the same mind. The same cruelty.”
Only the soft click of the door closing one second too late told her he had heard her.