Chapter 30 To Be Here #3
The stairs groaned like condemned souls as we descended, Ko walking point. For some reason, Lucian’s cologne triggered phantom pains where his switch had split my knuckles when I was nine.
Shaking it off, I jammed the key into the lock on Witch Containment Unit Numero Uno, and the hinges screamed. Koa’s hand latched onto my forearm as we crossed the threshold, one quick squeeze that meant alive and alert. Always watching. Always guarding. Just like Pops taught us.
How’s that for fucking irony?
#
Amabel Harrow looked up from her Hexenf?nger-induced scoliosis posture and smirked like we’d caught her shoplifting.
“The little dhampirs brought a real vampire to play? How predictable.”
Red rivulets ran down her throat from the witchcatcher’s cold iron spikes.
Unintentional art from Ko’s overzealous tightening.
Her left pinky bent at 45 degrees, a souvenir from their little tussle.
I opened my mouth to quip about her makeup game being stronger than her survival instincts when Lucian removed his jacket and draped it over the back of the second chair.
“Secure her head.”
No please, no preamble, but Ko moved like automated machinery, pure muscle memory, a dog trained to attack on command.
I was no better, leaping to palm Amabel’s skull and hold it in place as my brother snapped four chains into the exterior loops of the Hexenf?nger.
They were already anchored into the wall, immobilizing her like a bug under glass.
Lucian rolled up his shirt sleeves, then sat down in the chair across from her.
“Now, Miss Harrow, let’s discuss your mother’s delusions of grandeur, shall we?”
“You think I’d betray—”
“I ran into an old acquaintance the other day.” With a casual calm, Lucian reached into his shirt pocket and withdrew a photo. “As we talked, she reminisced about the summer you spent with her. You would have been, what? Seven, I believe?”
He held up the photo and turned it to face us: Child Amabel curled in filth, eyes hollow. Behind her stood an old woman with a long, hooked nose, her smile displaying iron teeth.
Amabel went rigid.
“Baba Yaga,” she breathed, her eyes wide.
“I see you remember her, too.” Lucian nodded once, his silver eyes never leaving Amabel’s face. “She spoke of how Arabesque paid her to train the wild out of you that summer.”
“Baba kidnapped me!” The girl’s bravado cracked.
“Is that what your mother told you?” Lucian traced the photo’s ragged edge. “Well, whether she was paid or took you, Baba said Arabesque considered letting her keep you.”
“Liar!” Amabel spat onto his mirror-shine oxfords.
“Oh, girl! You done did it now!” I sneered.
For a moment that felt like a year, Lucian simply stared at Amabel. Unblinking. Silver eyes molten.
Finally, he put the photo away, held up one hand, and made sure the dim light glinted off the silver signet ring stamped with House Rosu’s coiled serpent crest.
“This has been in my family since the 13th century. Inherited silver, as you may know, Miss Harrow, is a powerful conduit and amplifier of intentions.”
He reached into his pants pocket and took out what looked like a small gold snuffbox, but I could smell the salt.
“This is not so old. I have it imported directly from the Himalayas.” Using his thumbnail, he flicked the top off, revealing pink granules. “I’ve found that it is highly effective when combined with my venom.”
Holding the ring under his left fang, he caught a pearlescent drop, then dipped the ring into the salt and pressed it under Amabel’s left eye. Her scream merged with the stink of burning rot and the sizzle of salt eating through her corrupted flesh to create quite a sensory symphony.
“Tell me what I want to know, and I’ll keep the salt on the outside of your skin,” Lucian offered in a silky voice.
“Lesson Twelve,” I muttered without thinking.
His head tilted just slightly, a predator approving of its cub being clever.
Amabel remained silent. Another drip. Another dip. Another burn. Her spine arched like a compound bow.
By the time her confession poured out, she looked like a kindergartner had gone crazy with a stamp and a red inkpad.
She didn’t know much, but we learned a few things.
Most interesting was her description of Arabesque’s acquisitions from her new pet mage-smith, although Amabel didn’t know his name or face.
Fucking finally, Lucian moved to Amabel’s side and laid his hand over her sternum.
“Thank you for your cooperation, Miss Harrow.”
The crack echoed like winter branches snapping, and her head lolled.
“Clean work,” I smirked as blood fountained like a geyser from the hole in her chest cavity. “You’ll demo that move at the next family reunion, I hope?”
“Dispose of the remains before sunset.” He dropped the beating heart into the crucible like it was a used tissue. “A Dark witch’s blood becomes toxic after twelve hours.”
“We know, Pops,” I assured him with an eye roll. “Lesson Three Thousand.”
Koa began disassembling Amabel’s corpse while I got the fire going. Lucian wiped his hands on his monogrammed linen hanky.
I wondered if Seri would chase away the nightmares tonight with her moonlight touch. Oh, not because of Amabel. That monster now burned in hell where she belonged. It was the one rolling down his sleeves, casual as you please, who would haunt us tonight.
#
Nothing bonds brothers quite like mopping up torture debris. Ko shoveled Amabel’s organs into our crucible, face blanker than a tax auditor’s personality. I nudged a charred finger bone deeper into the flames with the tip of my boot, making embers swirl upward like pissed-off fireflies.
“Remind me again why we didn’t install that acid bath I blueprinted last year?”
“Because dissolving enemies requires patience.” Lucian didn’t look up from refastening his gold cufflinks. “And patience has never been your strong suit.”
“Patience is for priests and politicians.” I watched Amabel’s eyeballs pop like blister packs in the flames. “When I want someone dead, I want the whole damn world to smell ’em cooking.”
The vampire king’s lips twitched. Not a smile. Never a smile. More like a shark noticing blood in the water.
The crucible gurgled as the silence between the three of us stretched taut enough to hang laundry on. Behind us, the firelight made our shadows dance on the walls, monstrous shapes that looked too much like the things we’d been before Seri.
“Barbecue tonight? I can wear my apron. The one that says, ‘I rub my meat before I stick it in,’ ” I offered, pretending not to notice the faint tremor in my fingers as Lucian’s shoulder brushed mine on his way to the door.
“Domestication hasn’t dulled your vulgarity, I see.”
“Domestication?” I barked out a laugh. “Shit, old man, Seri’s got me housebroken, not declawed.” I jabbed the bone saw toward the last meaty pile. “Pass me that femur, Ko, like a good little Dracula.”
The crucible chose that moment to release a bubble that popped with the distinct pitch of a duck’s quack. Ko’s shoulders shook silently, and I grinned.
“I’ll send contractors to install proper disposal systems tomorrow,” Lucian sighed.
“Tell ’em to make it look like a pizza oven!” I called after his retreating back.
Seconds later, a door clicked at the top of the stairs. Classic vamp exit. Bastard probably went mist and headed straight to the guest room and his spare silk suit.
Ko finally relaxed. Minutely.
When the crucible finished belching, he hefted it up with asbestos gloves, and we headed upstairs, moving almost in perfect sync.
He went one flight; I went two. Our bedroom door stood ajar to show me Casimir and Seri curled together, him out cold again and her hair fanned across the pillows like liquid moonlight.
She stirred, lashes fluttering.
“Zoodle? Where’s Koko?”
“Waiting for me downstairs.” I kissed her brow. “Just wanted to check on you, bluebell, before taking out the trash.”
Her nose wrinkled at the stench of burnt diapers clinging to me, but she asked no questions. Smart girl. Sometimes love means letting your husbands scatter the ashes without commentary.
Koa waited for me at the back door, still holding the crucible, his face turned to the sky.
“Next time, we’re using a fang-rotted woodchipper.”
“Better idea!” I held up my index finger. “Industrial blender! Dark witch margaritas!”
Our laughter was as fragile as moth wings, but it held, same as it always did.
Some nightmares you don’t outgrow. You just learn to laugh louder while they chew on your bones.