Chapter 9 #2
“No. I stopped you because the last time we parted, you left me paralyzed by your magick.”
“You survived.”
“Aye. I did.” The corner of his mouth quirks up into a wry smile. “Any more binding spells I should know about? Or perhaps one that would knock me senseless so you could make another bold escape?”
My hand twitches toward my pocket, and Callum’s keen eyes take notice immediately.
He tenses.
I drop my hand.
I’m not going to incapacitate him again. Probably. As long as he doesn’t do something idiotic like try to convince me the Goddess has fated us to be together.
“Don’t do anything stupid and you won’t have to find out.”
He smiles. “I’ll try not to.”
Even his voice has a smile in it. A deep, wry humor and an even deeper rumble that has me taking a step back.
Damn this demon and his rumbly voice.
Damn this magick curling between us.
Callum’s brow furrows. “Will you not even give us a chance to talk?”
“About what?”
“About whatever you’d like, witch. The queen’s bounty. Why in the Goddess’ name you came to Faerie alone. Or perhaps the fact you refuse to acknowledge we’re m—”
“None of the above,” I cut in, taking another step. “And if that’s all you’re interested in talking about, then I should probably—”
“Work with me.”
I halt in my tracks. “What?”
“Work with me. To find the heart. If you’re so set on entering this cursed contest, then surely you can see the benefit in—”
“No thanks,” I say breezily. “I work best alone.”
I do everything best alone. At least since leaving the coven. It’s been me, myself, and I since the day those imperious doors swung shut behind me for the last time, and there’s no reason to change that now.
“Besides,” I continue, watching all those furrows deepen on his brow. Goddess. Why does even a scrunched-up forehead look sexy as hell on this demon Viking? “Couldn’t you say the same? I heard Pytri trying to recruit you, and you didn’t seem interested in working with a partner.”
Callum snorts. “Have you ever actually met Pytri?”
“No.”
“Well, then. If you had, you’d understand why he’s the last bastard in any of the thirteen realms I’d want to work with.”
“And you would want to work with me? Why?”
He doesn’t answer right away, and something about his hesitation makes my hackles rise.
“Because I’ll have you know, I’m fully capable of finding that damned heart on my own. Probably more capable than most of the idiots who came here today, given what my magick can—”
I swallow the rest of that sentence.
I really didn’t need to go there.
Callum doesn’t need to know what kind of magick I wield.
“What does your magick do, witch? Can it keep you safe from a fae determined to put you under their thrall? Or from a troll with a club as big as you are and no compunction about using it to take you out of the hunt? Or—”
“Or from a demon who seems determined to chase me down across realms?”
Callum’s red eyes darken. He steps closer. I step back.
“I’m the least of your worries,” he says, low and serious. “These hunters? These mercenaries? I’ve run in their circles for years, and with a prize this big on the line, they’ll not hesitate to use violence to claim it.”
A slither of dread tightens my throat, but I ignore it. I straighten, pull myself up to my full height and paste on my cockiest smile.
“Then I’ll just have to make sure they don’t catch me.”
A low rumble breaks in Callum’s chest.
“Don’t growl at me,” I snap, cutting that rumble off before it even really gets started.
A flash of surprise on his face, followed by a budding smile that he scrubs a hand over, as if he doesn’t want me to see it.
“You don’t like the growl?”
“Of course I don’t like the growl! Why would I? Why would anyone want to be—”
“Noted. I’ll refrain from growling at you in the future.”
“There won’t be any ‘future’. Goddess. Why do you have to be so—”
“If you won’t work with me, will you at least tell me your name?”
My head spins from the whiplash of this conversation. Without giving him the satisfaction of an answer, I turn and start tromping back through the leaf-littered ground toward the Veil.
Most of the other hunters are long gone. It leaves me and Callum alone in the middle of the waste. I fight back a shiver and the urge to reactivate the invisibility spell.
This place is wrong. The whole feel of it, the air, the sky, the dead plants beneath my feet. Magick that tastes like rot in my mouth.
I need to get out of here. And I especially need to get away from this pushy, irritating, handsome demon before I do something stupid like entertain his very good points about what I’ll be up against in this hunt, and that maybe it makes sense for the two of us to…
No.
Not going there.
At least not until I get out of this realm and start planning, start searching, until I have a better grip on my magick and can—
In a flash, Callum is in front of me.
I look at him, then behind me, then at him again, head whipping so fast I’m sure I look like a cartoon character.
It takes a second for what just happened to make sense.
Portals.
Right.
Demons can open portals.
Callum clocks the realization on my face and chuckles. “Tell me your name, witch.”
It’s not an order, the way he says it. Low and soft, the words curl around that strange, shaky energy in the center of my chest like a gentle plea.
I meet his eyes, crimson and burning in the light of the rust-colored sky.
“Seren. My name is Seren.”
The energy curls tighter, squeezes gently, and Callum lifts a hand to rub at his sternum.
“Seren.” My name is different, in his voice. Still so low and soft, a caress against my ears as he murmurs it back to me. “It’s a beautiful name. I don’t believe I’ve ever met anyone with it. Does it mean something, in your realm?”
“It means star.”
I don’t know why I offer the explanation. I don’t owe it to him. I don’t owe him anything, in fact, even if he’s so insistent.
“Star,” Callum breathes. “Of course it does.”
How am I supposed to respond to something like that?
Surely not with another warm pull of magick, and an instinctual lean into the deep, satisfied rumble of his voice.
I huff a breath and start walking toward the Veil again.
“You can always change your mind, you know.” He falls into step beside me. With how much taller he is, he barely has to lengthen his stride to keep up. The tip of his wing brushes my shoulder, and I pretend not to notice.
“About working with you? Fat chance. I doubt we’ll even cross paths again after today.”
“You could change your mind about that, too.”
Something in the low murmur of his voice makes me slow my step, makes me look up at him.
So otherworldly, that face. Rough-hewn angles and rubies in his eyes. Those huge, curling horns that make my fingers itch with wondering what they’d feel like to touch.
“What do you mean?”
He lays a hand on his chest. “If you wanted to cross paths with me, I think you could.”
I want to pretend I don’t know what he means.
I want to pretend I don’t feel it, too.
If I closed my eyes, if I really focused, I could find it there. The tether. The magick I don’t want to admit I feel.
The magick I could use to lead me right to him.
So easy, with the way my powers already orient themselves around seeking, around finding. Easy as breathing.
Forcing a scoff and rolling my eyes, I keep it moving. “For all I know, you just want to use my magick to get closer to the prize so you can claim it yourself.”
“With a bounty this rich? It’s a reasonable suspicion.”
I cut him a glance and try not to notice the sparkle in his eyes, the excitement. Try not to recognize the same spark in my chest.
“Maybe I’m not even going to bother with it,” I say flippantly, almost at the Veil now. “It’s probably just some kind of sick game to her. Some kind of trap.”
“Maybe,” Callum allows. “But you’re going to go after it, anyway.”
“What makes you think that?”
He doesn’t know me. Not at all. We’ve spoken for all of ten minutes, and he thinks he’s got me all figured out?
“Because I see that gleam in your eyes, Seren, and I know what it means. I know the lure of the fae queen’s bounty and know it’s not one you’ll be able to pass up.”