Chapter 22
Chapter Twenty-Two
“Skarde?” Serish pushed into the room, barefoot in a new outfit. His maroon and lavender kurta had golden stitching that shimmered in the light and gave him an otherworldly quality. “Where’s Gemma?”
“Go away. Tell Petra to fuck off. I’m not in the mood.” He didn’t move from his position on the floor where’d he been for endless minutes.
Serish walked to the mirror and touched it.
“You let her go back? Damn it.” He fisted his hand but seemed to stop himself before punching the mirror.
“She doesn’t belong over there. That place is sucking her soul dry.
There are predators like the human you brought back and others far more dangerous.
She’s no safer there than she is here. In fact, she’s worse off there since she’s alone. ”
“I’m going to bite her if she stays here.”
“Why is that so bad? She’d make a beautiful vampire. It’d make her stronger. Then you wouldn’t have to worry about her safety all the time. Besides, she seems to do okay for herself based on how she handled Cade.”
He pushed up to a stand, everything achy and tired. “She said you knew more about this. It’s true, isn’t it? Are you or your friends playing games with my life?”
“This is so much bigger than you.” Serish balled up his fists and cursed in three languages.
“This is all my fault. It figures your head would be all twisted up about Magdalene’s words.
She’s a powerful witch who should be freed, but that’s a discussion for another day.
You got one big chance to have something good and you blew it.
The one girl you should sleep with, and you refuse.
” He emitted a strangled cry of frustration.
“Who I take to bed is my business. In what way is her staying here important?”
Serish digressed to muttering to himself and walking in circles.
He waved his hand at the mirror a few times, cursed and resumed his circling.
“You couldn’t live up to your reputation, but then again that’s why you were chosen.
You know the difference. You recognized it.
Mess, mess… Too little too late. Maybe not enough. ”
“Serish! Stop talking gibberish. What’s going on?”
The man paused his pacing to glare like a dog about to attack. Skarde didn’t know if the wily old mage was about to curse him or bite.
Defensively, he snapped, “I can’t turn her. There’s that whole soul burning part of the prophecy and her becoming evil.”
“How’s your soul doing right now?”
Hurting.
“Feeling the burn yet?” Serish scowled. “The moment you recognize the pain that’s now only a small hole in your heart for what it really is, you’ll feel the burn.
It’ll eat at you like nothing you’ve ever felt.
You’ll feel it regardless of whether you turned her or not.
” His eyelids closed and he breathed out a long hiss of air.
“Skarde, you miserable, foolish blood drinker and your damned decency… You wrangle with dark magic all the time. Have you paused to think about its relationship to her? It wants her. It wants to take her so badly. She’s alone over there.
Do you think she’s the only one who can cross between worlds?
There are assassins who would do it for a price, one I’m sure Petra would be willing to pay. ”
Fuck.
* * *
“Your Majesty. To what do I owe the honor of a visit?” Skarde hoped he came off less acerbic than he felt. He executed a half bow, which was as much as he could manage while dressed in his leathers and armed to the teeth. He trusted this witch as much as a mouse could trust a starved snake.
Petra’s lip curled into a sneer. The few steps she took toward Skarde rustled the stiff fabric of her voluminous purple gown. “I hate waiting.”
“I was indisposed.”
“Who was she?” Asked like a jealous harpy.
“How about you tell me why you’re here.”
She clasped her hands together, which must hurt with those ostentatious rings on every single finger.
“I’m going to offer you the chance to do this civilly.
It has come to my attention your father collected the pink demon crystal.
I’ll pay you six times your normal commission to simply hand it over. No fighting. An easy exchange.”
He held his empty hands out to his sides. “Although the money sounds good, I don’t have it.”
“My sources indicate you inherited it, not Cade.”
“Sources as in you scried for the details? Or did you summon my father’s dead spirit?” He chuckled when her face registered surprise. “I bet he was a fun source to consult with.”
The cantankerous asshole who’d raised him had probably tried to attack her or kill her, even as a dead spirit.
“He was a pisser in life. He hated witches and anything not human. The one thing he despised more than them were his own sons for allowing ourselves to be turned into what we are now. He’d rather we suicided ourselves. ”
As if they’d had a choice. He and Cade had been captured and turned. Forced into eternal death.
“Enough.” Petra’s face flushed red. “Give me the crystal or I’ll get nasty.”
“It’s not here.” The sense this was preordained left him chilled.
He shouldn’t have let Gemma keep the crystal, but he hadn’t considered that one of the crystals Petra sought might be his.
Serish was right, damn it. Gemma was as much at risk in her world as his.
At least here he could try to mitigate the threats to her.
There? She was alone. No magic. No weapons.
He despised making severe strategic errors.
The need to rant and kill something thrummed through him.
Keeping emotion off his face he asked, “What does you getting nasty entail? Do you plan to try to kill me? Cast a spell on me? Or try to seduce me?”
“Where is it?”
“I don’t know. I gave it away. It wasn’t important to me.”
Her eyelids drifted closed. Her hands clenched as if reining in her frustration before it overwhelmed her. “To whom did you give it?”
He shrugged. “Some girl who thought it was pretty. I don’t even remember her name.”
She sucked in her cheeks, which made her look like a fish. “That’s a lie. You knew I wanted it and gave it away to keep it from me. Where did it go?”
“Is this the summation of your visit? No attempt to seduce me or stab me with a knife this time? You want a crystal.” He sighed. “How boring. I thought you might provide more entertainment.”
“I’ll find it.” She stormed past him but paused for dramatic effect before leaving. “Even if it’s not in this realm, I’ll get it. If I have to pry some woman’s dead fingers off it, it will be mine.”