Chapter Thirty-Nine
CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
Theo
F amily poker night isn’t the same with only three of us around the table. For starters, Nic, Mother, and I aren’t playing poker because my baby sister insisted we wait until Val is here once she discovered my mate has never played.
We shouldn’t have allowed Nic to pick the game. Here’s hoping the giant handful of cards she’s holding will remind her of her bad choice next time.
If we all make it past the battle with Gilly to have a next time.
Thinking of my other sister makes me even grumpier than my already foul mood.
“Your mate will kill herself if she keeps using her magic,” Mother says. “If she invokes it again, you might not be able to heal her.”
I study the cards in my hand, swapping them to find matches easily without giving away what I hold. “Val swore she won’t use magic until we figure out how to protect her from its adverse effects.”
“There is no way to manage it.” Mother fans a full set of Queens face-up on the table in front of her. “That’s precisely why I hid it in a human.” She glances to her left. “Your turn, Nic.”
My sister toys with her cards. “Theo, you have any Fours?”
“No.” I heap sarcasm onto my words to remind her she picked this dreadful game. “Go Cthulhu.”
She reaches to the top card in the draw pile. Tentacles wrap around her wrist, snagging her in their hold and delivering whatever psychic nastiness the Cthulhu has in store for her. Her eyes flash violet before settling into their normal scarlet.
“This had better be a Four,” she mutters, “with the awfulness of that vision.” She looks at the card. “Damn it.”
Mother hacks a laugh. “Serves you right for picking a game that gives nightmares in exchange for a card. Now, hand over those Threes you’re holding onto,” she tells Nic before looking back to me. “Where is your human anyway?”
“Sword lessons with Ora.” I lift a claw before she can say what I’m already thinking. “Wasn’t my idea. In my opinion, my mate has more than enough experience playing with blades.”
“Really, darling, talking about your bedroom knife play is vulgar.” Mother takes away the cards Nic had obviously been hoarding. “You won’t let Val travel to the human realm tomorrow night, will you? Not that I care about her, but you can’t simply ask the Fates for a new mate because this one didn’t have the good sense to look out for herself. It’s not safe for her when she doesn’t have magic.”
Yep. Mother has become a reluctant champion of Val since learning my mate’s mother felt zero guilt in selling her for a Brimstone Bell. It could have something to do with Val’s arguing to protect my parents during whatever showdown is coming. Or maybe Mother likes the idea of a new daughter now she has discovered Gilly planted an assassin in the kitchen who has been slowly poisoning Father for months, explaining his mysterious mental slips.
“It isn’t safe for any of us,” Nic reminds her.
I intervene before the two of them can argue about Gilly’s betrayal…again. “Val is convinced Gilly will find someone to use as collateral so she refuses to be left behind.”
“Didn’t you send guards to watch after her horrible family?” Mother asks, and it’s all I can do to remind her that our own family is much more vicious. Thus, Gilly’s deceit and all the empty chairs since Father’s competition for the crown turned us against each other. The rest of our family is dead. We’re all who remain other than Father who’s recovering under a healer’s care and my parents’ mating magic that I don’t want to think about. “Did you at least get back the Brimstone Bell before her mother or grandmother ran off to be captured?”
“None of Val’s family will be captured,” I insist. “They’re still under guard. Although the suppliers for their company have suddenly become unable to keep their contracts and the show’s crew has been hired onto better productions. Also, her mother’s favorite spa closed down, and her grandmother’s Bridge club kicked her out.”
“Excellent scheming, my son.” Mother studies her cards. “There’s no convincing Val to stay in Shadowvale? Or here in the Infernal Palace with your Father and I?”
“I wish, but no.” Gods know I’ve tried. “I’ll load her up with as many of Ora’s explosives as she can carry, make sure she stays in the back, and send her home as soon as she sees Gilly’s threats were no more than Dupree’s last ramblings.”
Nic sorts her ever growing hand of cards. “I don’t understand why Gilly could possibly want Val there.”
I don’t mention we’ve been over this at least a dozen times, not when we’re all struggling. “She’s convinced Val stole the magic meant for her. She said as much before she faked her abduction.”
“Which still makes no sense,” Nic insists.
“It was clearly another of Gilly’s mind games.” Mother doesn’t sound accusing or even angry. No, it’s as close to sad as I’ve ever heard her. “If she’ll poison her own father and betray us all, what wouldn’t she do? How did I not see it?”
I have no answers for her. For any of us. Changing the subject is the best I can offer. “I’ve spent hours strategizing with the Infernal Army for whatever showdown Gilly has planned. Without magic other than teleportation, she’ll be relying on any monsters she brings or alliances she has made.” I look to Nic. “Got any Eights?”
She flashes a grin with a hint of fangs. “Go Cthulhu, brother.”
“Brat.” I take the card from the top of the center stack, almost convinced I’d escaped the punishment when tentacles suction to my wrist.
Visions fill my head, a flood of images bursting through the dam of my control and rushing over me. The house I’d bought, the one where I’d met Val—it stands beneath a full moon with fog wrapped around it, the crash of waves coming from below and the howl of something terrible coming from within. Gilly laughs, Nic screams, and Val rushes forward. I reach for my mate, and my hand passes through her as though she was a ghost.
There’s something in the darkness, something I can’t see. A chill pricks at me in icy needles of fear.
Fear for Val.
I struggle against the tentacles, trying to break the game’s spell, but it won’t let me go. I can’t breathe, can’t move, can’t escape.
“Theo?” Nic’s voice sounds far away.
“Release hi,” Mother calls.
Nothing happens.
Snarling and fighting, I yank my hand upward, scattering the cards yet remaining trapped by the tentacles. Only when the game decides it’s done torturing me does the Cthulhu release me. Yet the vision remains, haunting me with cold dread wrapped around my heart.
The Cthulhu brings nightmares, but only ones edged in reality.
I can’t lose Val. I can live without the crown, without my family even. I can’t lose her because…
I love her.
I love my mate.
Which is why I leave her behind when I head to the house the next night.
Walking toward the portal at the head of the Infernal Army, I don’t stop when Nic asks, “Where’s Val?”
“I convinced her to stay here for her safety.”
Nic narrows her eyes. “ How did you convince her?”
“I reminded her of a more binding commitment.” I’m almost through the portal when Val yells my name, her rage audible to any supernatural in the hell dimensions despite the groans and stomps of the Infernal Army.
“What did you do?” Nic calls out.
“I made sure she stays safe, chained to my bed.” With that parting shot, I’m in the human realm, standing at the driveway in front of the house that stands at a vortex of power unparalleled in this dimension.
The moon looms above it, shrouded in clouds and fog. The sea below churns in thunderous crashes against the cliffside. A vast stillness hangs heavy in the air, and a trickle of foreboding creeps along my spine, making my wings shudder.
Val will forgive me. But first, I need to end this.