Chapter 32 Bad At Talking #2
Caelum threw an arm around the back of the couch, not fully acknowledging the possessiveness of the gesture until after he’d done it. He gave Nyx a haughty look that mimed deep offense. “Someone told my witch to leave me? Who?”
Leda looked up at him, her cheeks flushed, and he kissed her, unthinking.
Luc immediately made gagging noises, and Alaric snort-laughed.
“Do you have to do that here?” Mocking complained.
“Yes,” Caelum said coldly.
Nyx burst out in a laugh, and batted playfully at Luc. “You should have heard what L… err, Chloe said about you,” she went on, turning back to Caelum, still laughing as she spoke. “I almost spit my drink all over that wretch’s face––”
“No one wants to hear about that,” Leda cut in, flushing even redder. She gave Nyx a death stare, an unambiguous warning. “It’s really not that interesting, Nyx.”
Alaric quirked an eyebrow, glancing over Leda at Caleum.
“I’m very interested,” he said somberly.
Caelum was pretty fucking interested, too.
“You’re also extremely stoned,” Leda remarked to Alaric, nudging him with a hand. She looked around at the couch, then at Elsbeth and Walker. “All of you seem extremely fucked up, in fact.” She didn’t seem to notice she said it with an audible slur.
“True,” Alaric said carefully. “But I would still like to know what our clawy little sex kitten said to the very not-nice witch lady.”
“I’d like to know that, too,” Caelum commented.
As soon as he said it, it occurred to him he might’ve slurred the tiniest bit, too.
Which might partially explain his insistence on saying it.
He tried to remember just how much wine he’d had at dinner.
He glanced down at the empty glass in his hand, then at the low table by their couch, which Alaric had covered liberally with glasses and bottles.
Leaning forward, Caelum looked through labels until he found the one he wanted.
He waved a hand, using magic to clean the glass, then poured it half full.
He offered it to Leda first.
She surprised him by taking it from his fingers.
“That’s the strong stuff,” he warned her. “The stuff you choke on.”
“I’m getting used to it,” she lied.
He smirked at her, but only nodded. “Okay, but remember I warned you.”
He poured himself a second glass, after cleaning that one, and downed it in one go. He poured himself another.
Fuck it. Apparently they were all getting shitfaced.
Alaric, for no apparent reason, let out a semi-hysterical laugh.
Without meaning too, Caelum overheard thoughts weaving through Leda’s mind.
Gods, just how many of those pot gummies has he eaten?
She stared at Alaric, her thoughts alarmed, even if the effect was heavily muted by alcohol.
He’s completely obliterated. I should’ve taken those damned bags away from him.
He doesn’t even know what he’s taking, much less how it might interact with magic.
I need to do a proper inventory before he ends up in hospital because he literally can’t control himself.
Caelum felt her remembering how big the bag had been.
She tried to remember how full it had been.
Didn’t he say something about having “different kinds” of human narcotics?
she thought to herself next, her mind struggling with more alarm.
Dervish’s uncle gave him all kinds of crap.
What an absolute shite praecurus he must be.
I wonder how many of them do that, smuggle human drugs back here to sell?
Alaric’s probably gotten into all of them by now, and if he’s eaten or smoked or snorted them all, I’ll have no idea what he’s taken.
It could be heroin for all I know. PCP. Cocaine. Or, gods, L.S.D.––
“What is that?” Caelum murmured, leaning back to her ear when he couldn’t control his curiosity any longer. “Those letters you were rattling off?” He stared at her transformed mouth, replacing it with her real one in his head. “What do they do? Those different things?”
“Some make you hallucinate,” she murmured back. “Badly. Some make you super hyper, or give you delusions of invincibility. Regular humans act crazy if they take too much. I have no idea what any of them would do to a Magical.”
“You should probably ask him,” Caelum murmured back. “Do the thing, if you can. The inventory,” he added, even softer.
“She should probably do what thing?” Alaric asked, much more loudly. He tugged on Leda’s coat sleeve. “You should probably do what inventory, my scrumptious snackiness?”
Caelum fought back his annoyance.
He pushed Alec’s hand off her when Greythorne continued to cling to her arm.
Caelum was about to ask Leda something else about those mysterious Earth potions and powders that Alaric apparently had a dangerous collection of, when Leda lurched suddenly to her feet.
She swayed slightly, then reached out, catching ahold of Caelum’s shoulder for balance.
Something about that simple gesture caught in his throat.
His fingers wrapped around her wrist in return, and he looked up at her, trying to sense if she might be about to pass out.
He fully intended to catch her, if so.
“You should sit back down,” he advised.
“I want some cake,” she announced. “I just saw someone with purple cake.”
“I’ll get it for you,” he promised. “Sit down, love. I’ll get it.”
“Blech,” Luc commented in a slur. “You two are insufferable.”
“Fuck off,” Caelum growled, honestly annoyed. He looked up at Leda, and squeezed her wrist gently. “Let me get it for you,” he coaxed.
After a pause, Leda nodded.
She bent her knees, and sank gently back to the couch.
Caelum rose to his feet, blinked a few times to get his own bearings and balance, then looked down at her. He pointed to the right, where he’d seen her looking before she stood up, and she nodded.
Without giving the others so much as a glance, he took off in search of cake.
It didn’t take him long to find the kiosk selling cakes. Or a kiosk selling cakes, at least. He couldn’t be one hundred percent certain the cake Leda had seen came from there, but he did find purple cake, which turned out to be scarab cake.
He bought her a large piece.
Then, after a slight hesitation, he bought a flat of assorted cupcakes for their table. He placed the plate with Leda’s cake on top of the dark blue box, then lifted it up, and turned away from the kiosk to set off across the lawn.
He’d not even taken a full step, when he nearly ran into someone.
He managed to pull himself back just in time, but not before he ended up within a few inches of a witch with shocking blue eyes.
He stared, blinked, sure he was hallucinating at first, then made his face entirely blank.
He stepped back and to the side, giving a slight bow of apology for having almost knocked into her.
A faint sneer crossed her face, but he saw those wide eyes sharp on his.
She was gone an instant later, and Caelum found himself standing there, breathing too hard, his hands and legs shaking just enough to anger him. He shoved his reactions back, as far as he could in his mind, and firmed his jaw before taking off across the lawn.
Even so, as he walked, his heart raced.
Sirena.
Panic fought to take over his breathing, to cloud his mind.
He tried to force his thoughts back along narrower lines. Logic. Think, you fuck, think! Had she recognized you? Would she have felt your magic?
He didn’t think so, but she was damned clever, and she’d been completely inside his aura.
She might’ve been able to hide her reaction better than he had.
He hadn’t been with Leda, so his magic wouldn’t be as invisible as it would’ve been while inside the aura of her mother’s crystal.
Still, Leda was nearby. The crystal was nearby.
He’d been technically alone, but his witch was near, and his magic had been disguised.
He’d been behind shields and immersed in Leda’s magic all day.
Would it be enough? She wouldn’t have felt him, would she?
He felt his breathing start to slow once he’d gotten that far.
No reason to panic. Panic wouldn’t help.
Panic wouldn’t keep Leda safe.
He needed to be logical, at least enough to decide how to act on this information.
Should he try to get Leda out of there now?
They might be safer in the larger group.
It would be better to go back all together, particularly if they could get lost in the crowd of others making their way back home, but that would only be true if no one knew he was there.
Should he risk alarming everyone? Get them to leave now? Or would that only call more attention to them? How obvious would it be if they all got up and walked out of the square, the seven of them, right before the fireworks began?
He decided that might be an option. Given the crowds, it wouldn’t be that obvious, not unless they were already being watched.
His mind slowly focused down to a narrower lens.
As it did, he felt more and more sober.
Sirena was here. Why?
It had to be risky for her. The Praecuri and G.O.R.E.
must have a trace out on her and her husband after Tunis.
Likely British Magical Enforcement had her on a fugitives list somewhere, as well.
While G.O.R.E. hadn’t officially declared Dark Cathedral an existential threat to the government of Magical Britain or Federation Europa, or even declared them “real” in any official sense, most branches of law enforcement had arrest warrants out for the top members of the sect.
They’d want to question her, at the very least, and likely examine her magic.
Caelum himself shared as much information as he could with the Praecuri, and with G.O.R.E.
when they asked, and with B.M.E. He’d spoken to agents in the hospital and after he woke up from what happened in Tunis.
He’d been extremely specific when talking to Forsooth, Valor LaFey, British Magical Enforcement agents, and even that G.O.R.E.
fuck, Gaumont, who seemed to be constantly trying to catch him in a lie, or imply Caelum was feeding him misinformation, working for his father, running some kind of internal coup on Dark Cathedral for himself, or whatever else he preferred to believe.
Caelum told all of them Sirena Calvarias was a dangerous witch, that she and her husband were both members of the inner circle of Dark Cathedral, that both would definitely be in the running to take over with his father in prison, that both were murderers, deeply ideological and religious, black sorcery practitioners, radical imperialists, and followers of what Dark Cathedral called “The True Belief.”
Sirena’s had been the first name he mentioned to Forsooth after Tunis.
Sirena and Sergius must know this. They had spies all over the enforcement agencies. They likely had transcripts of everything he’d said, word for word.
Had she come here looking for him? For Leda?
Or was she here on some other business?
A part of him was tempted to find and follow her, if only to know where she was, and what she was doing.
Under different circumstances, he might’ve done exactly that, if only to draw Sirena away from Leda.
But after everything Forsooth said to him the other night, he could see the danger in that now, too.
He wouldn’t be protecting Leda if he got himself killed.
Not anymore.
He couldn’t delude himself about the reality of the situation, either, or his own abilities. It wasn’t safe for him to go alone.
Bringing Leda with him was completely out of the question.
He really shouldn’t have left her alone even to get cake, even if she had Mocking, Greythorne, Minh, and the others with her. That would’ve been true even if they weren’t all completely smashed. He likely would’ve remembered that if he hadn’t drunk too much himself.
No, their best bet was for him to go back to Leda, use his magic to make them all as inconspicuous as possible, and act normal.
They would stare up at the sky. They would watch the fireworks.
Then they would head back to the castle when everyone else in Bonescastle emptied the square.
That way, if Sirena decided to keep an eye on the crowd, she wouldn’t see them all leave before the entertainment started.
He found the couch and loveseat where Leda and the others sat.
He set down the cake in front of Leda, and the box of cupcakes on the low table in the center.
He grunted when Luc and Alaric opened the box, and ooh’d and ahhh’d at the rows of different-colored frosted tops.
Minh grabbed a green one first, followed by Alaric, who took one with pink frosting and another with orange.
Even Mocking took one of the cakes with blue frosting, and Walker leaned over and grabbed two more for himself and Elsbeth.
Before Caelum had even thought about broaching the topic, Elsbeth said, “We should go back to Malcroix after this.”
They all looked at her, and she shrugged.
“All the kiosks will shut down,” she explained.
“It’ll get cold fast when the chimaeras drop, and I don’t know about the rest of you, but I don’t fancy a pub or a club after being out all day.
” She shivered, snuggling into Walker’s side.
“If we want to continue things, we could go to that place in that enormous castle building. Bunny’s? ”
Walker laughed, kissing her cheek. “Frumpy’s,” he corrected.
“Right. I’m just saying, it might be nice to be closer to our beds.”
Caelum felt his shoulders relax a touch.
Before he could say anything, Mocking spoke up.
“Agreed,” he said, taking a bite out of the top of his cupcake and smearing blue all over his lips. “We’ll head back after. Maybe even a little before, to dodge the crowd.”
Minh was nodding.
Alaric seemed too enamored of his cupcake to even know what they were talking about.
“I’m definitely for that,” Leda said sleepily. She slid closer to Caelum, and he reached for her, wrapping an arm around her and pulling her up against him. “I need to do an inventory,” she mumbled into his shoulder. “Make a list.”
Caelum grunted, but didn’t answer.
He sat there, silently, and gradually reinforced the chimaeras over their two couches. His eyes and magic never stopped scanning faces in the crowd.