Chapter 16. Blaise #2
“You are not to tell her any of my business,” Caitlyn continued calmly.
“And I mean that, Creep. No conveniently placed sticky notes with coordinates on them. No laptops left open with booking details, or however the hells you managed it last time. No accidental slips about where I am or what I’m doing, comprende? ”
Creep remained still.
“Be friends with Priscilla if you want,” Caitlyn said.
“That choice is yours. But be loyal to me.” Her voice hardened.
“And if Priscilla comes sniffing around for information again, you find a way to communicate one simple message: Sorry. No can do.” Then, through gritted teeth, she added, “And in return... I’ll try to keep the badmouthing of Priscilla to a minimum. ”
Creep stood eerily still for a long moment before giving the smallest nod of her head in agreement.
“Okay. We have a deal,” Caitlyn said. “But if you don’t stick to your side of the bargain, Creep, I mean it—Blaise and I will move into one of the abandoned houses in the coven and live there, even if it means doing all the housework by hand.
” In a half whisper, she added, “Not that I don’t already have to do that with you. ”
Creep’s little glass eyes fluttered sardonically, as if she deeply resented being compared to one of the other Briar Coven houses—the kind whose strengths lay in domestic bliss rather than demonic doll possession.
With a final glare, Creep stepped aside and let the front door swing slowly open...
... and Caitlyn was forced to eat her words.
Every inch of the house was spotless.
The horrors displayed beneath their glass domes gleamed in the candlelight, fangs and claws polished to a museum sheen.
The eyes of every painting—once dulled by grime—now shone with an oily, watchful gaze.
Even the chandeliers glittered like icicles, swaying faintly overhead and casting fractured light across freshly polished floors.
I wasn’t entirely sure whether spotlessly clean was more or less unsettling than the abandoned state it had been in before.
Still, we stepped inside.
The sharp scent of bleach filled my nostrils, giving the place the air of a covered-up murder scene rather than something lovingly scrubbed clean. But beneath it lingered the comforting aroma of cocoa, and both Caitlyn and I instinctively turned toward the kitchen.
As we followed the promise of something sweet, I found myself relaxing with every step. With the grime gone, the house revealed an almost overwhelming collection of trinkets and memories Creep had gathered over the centuries.
Blackthorn walking sticks rested against the wall, the polish on their handles dulled with use, as if their owner had only stepped into the next room for a moment.
The once algae-slick doors leading into the greenhouse practically glittered, their glass polished clear enough to reveal a riot of shifting greens and bursts of impossible color beyond.
Spotting Caitlyn, Mordi descended slowly from its perch in the rafters, its bulbous form gently pulsing as it still digested the leg she’d thrown it yesterday. Its vines drooped lazily, heavy with a food-coma haze, one tendril lifting in a sleepy little wave.
Caitlyn waved back before blowing it a motherly kiss.
Beneath the stairs, little shoes sat neatly lined up beneath centuries-old woolen coats hanging from hooks beside the basement door.
Before I could steel myself against it, an image flooded my mind.
A pair of witchlings, no more than a year apart.
One with Caitlyn’s feral taste in clothes and my blond hair.
The other with Caitlyn’s brilliant hazel eyes and Ambrose’s dark locs.
Me bouncing them on my knees, winding them up before bed while Ambrose sat nearby, arms folded, mouth set tight—though the softened corners of his eyes betrayed him.
And Caitlyn, standing between us, torn between joining the mischief and knowing she’d be the one cursing us all later when it came time to tuck them in.
Snap.
Pain flared through my already tender wrist.
Fantastic. Not only was I fantasizing about sleeping with my mate and my best friend at the same time—apparently I’d skipped straight to domestic bliss and children.
Stellar job working through it, Blaise.
Maybe walking into the greenhouse and letting the carnivorous plant swallow me whole wasn’t such a terrible idea after all.
“You okay, Blaise?” Caitlyn asked, a deep furrow of concern between her brows.
“Hm? Oh, yeah. Just wondering what it would be like to be eaten alive by Mordi,” I said.
“Awful,” she replied, far too airily. “It has these little thorn-like teeth that hold you in place while it digests you from the outside in, usually over the course of a few days. And if it’s not hungry right away, its saliva suspends you in a catatonic, sleep-like state until it’s ready to eat you.
” She glanced up at the plant with a proud, parental grin, completely missing the look of horror on my face.
“I use its saliva in my Freezing Fudge.”
“And how exactly did you make the leap from carnivorous plant saliva to magic candy?”
Caitlyn shrugged as she headed toward the kitchen.
“It sort of... came to me,” she said. “I was trying to research how to care for Mordi, but all the books did was list the dangers and explain how to destroy it.” She paused, thoughtful.
“The moment I read that its saliva induces a catatonic sleep, everything just clicked. It was like the ingredients lined themselves up in my head, and I could see how their properties would play off one another.” She glanced back at me with a small, almost sheepish smile.
“It took a few tries to get the balance right, but I managed to make a fudge topping that freezes you in place for a minute or two... then lets you go, none the worse for wear.”
I couldn’t help but admire just how much Caitlyn seemed to know.
She had mentioned that her coven had originally been made up of a ragtag group of witches, coming from the many different types of magic that encompassed the figurative witch umbrella. But it didn’t explain how Caitlyn was so adept at two different branches of witch magic.
“How do you know so much about botany and alchemy?” I asked.
Caitlyn scrunched her brows. “I’m not really sure,” she admitted.
“I don’t know much about the coven my family belonged to before Briar Coven.
” She hesitated, then continued, “It’s strange, really.
We’re basically carbon copies of our female ancestors—incubi don’t have DNA, so we don’t get much variation from our dads—but somehow, for my family line, we all ended up with completely different specialties.
My mom’s obsessed with DIY projects,” she said.
“Give her an idea and it’s like the thing just..
. builds itself around her. Her sister—the one who passed away—had an incredible instinct for books.
People would walk into her shop and she’d hand them exactly what they needed without them ever saying a word.
” She smiled faintly. “And my cousin—the one in prison—she just had this way with words. Written words, that is—she still gets word vomit like all the Myers. It was indescribable. She used to spend weekends writing stories for me and my friend Lex, and they were always...” She lifted a hand, miming her mind being blown.
Caitlyn shrugged. “So even though we’re meant to be almost the same, we all turned out completely different. I guess I don’t really know what magic we inherited from that first coven.”
“Maybe it’s passion that you all inherited,” I suggested. “It just shows up differently for each of you.”
Caitlyn blinked at me a few times before her lips curved into a small, surprised smile. “You know what? That actually makes a lot of sense, Blaise.”
I couldn’t help the way my chest lifted at that.
Impressing my mate—even accidentally—felt good.
So what if my sexual rhythm was all over the place?
I’d just have to rely on my mind until we figured the rest out.
All I needed now was another suitably profound observation to pull out at the right moment.
The rich aroma of hot cocoa drew us the rest of the way into the kitchen.
Caitlyn came to an abrupt halt at the threshold, so suddenly I nearly collided with her back. Peering over her shoulder, I immediately saw why.
The kitchen was immaculate.
The tiles gleamed beneath the candlelight, and the pots and pans hanging above the butcher’s block shone with a warm, coppery glow.
Caitlyn’s cauldrons had all been magicked back inside—the ones she’d been working on sat on the counter, stirring rods swirling gently through their contents, while the finished ones were stacked upside down beside the sink, freshly washed.
Her ingredients had been returned to their proper places, the pantry door standing open to reveal rows of spotless jars filled with foodstuffs and potion components.
And overseeing it all—perhaps most unsettling of all—stood Creep.
She balanced atop a chair beside the stove, carefully stirring the pan of cocoa, her gaze fixed on the task with unnerving focus.
“Thank you, Creep,” Caitlyn said, her tone cautious.
There was a soft pop, and two mugs appeared on the table.
Creep’s glassy eyes fluttered as the saucepan lifted itself from the burner and bobbed its way over, pouring steaming cocoa neatly into each mug.
A heartbeat later, a jar in the pantry popped open, and a stream of marshmallows burst free, looping around Caitlyn, then me, before plopping into our drinks like we were princesses trapped in some bizarre, haunted Disney montage.
Wait—no. I’d be the prince. Caitlyn was the princess.
Except... I didn’t exactly fit the classic Disney-prince blueprint. It’s not like I’d rescued her from anything. If anything, when we eventually sat down and had the talk, she’d probably decide I was about as far from Prince Charming as it was possible to get.
“Blaise?” Caitlyn’s voice cut through my thoughts.
“Huh?”
“I asked if you were okay. You were just kind of staring into space there.”
I blinked, realizing Caitlyn had already moved to the cauldrons, her mug of cocoa in hand as she inspected the contents.
“Oh, yeah. Sorry. Just got lost in a thought,” I said, grabbing my own cup.
Caitlyn leaned over one of the cauldrons, sniffing thoughtfully before setting her mug aside.
She cast a careful glance at Creep, then popped open the jar of rue and tipped in a generous amount.
The potion sputtered in protest, but instead of alarm, a wide grin spread across Caitlyn’s face, as if that reaction was exactly what she’d been hoping for.
I sucked in a breath. “I’m going to... uh, explore the house while you brew.” I hesitated, the words catching in my throat before I forced them out. “And maybe—when you’re done—we could have a little chat.”
Then, like the coward I was, I retreated from the kitchen before Caitlyn could answer, fleeing into the depths of the house to collect my thoughts.