Chapter 12
Callum
Myron’s office is designed with an eye for intimidation.
A wide wooden desk, rich carpets and furnishings, dark paneled walls lined with expensive art. Every inch of the place exudes wealth and power, though for me it’s lost its luster over the years.
In my youth, he seemed to be near to a god, untouchable, strutting up and down the city streets in fine clothing, often flanked by some of the fiercest mercenaries I’d ever seen.
Now, things are different.
“What work do you have for me?”
There’s no need for pleasantries or small talk when I’m in this office.
Standing in the middle of the room, a respectful distance back from his desk, I keep my hands clasped behind my back as I wait for my marching orders.
He shuffles through a few of the papers on his desk, brow furrowed.
“The jewel thief from the frost realm we were hired to apprehend, how did that—”
“It’s done. Payment and report left with your secretary.”
He hums, unimpressed. “And the missing vials of drakonbane you were seeking in the northern provinces? What updates can you give—”
“Retrieved and returned to their rightful owner. Payment filed.”
He hums again, with a distinctly irritated edge to it this time.
I’m pushing my luck.
Myron doesn’t care for insolence or insubordination.
He likes to believe he can command a room, that he’ll speak and people will listen, that he has the respect of everyone within earshot simply because of his own natural gravitas and authority.
Most days, I have no interest in divesting him of those notions.
I’m more than able to bite my tongue and stomach it, to stand here and receive my orders and keep the disdain off my face until I turn and leave and am free to stew in my bitterness privately.
Today, though, my usual control has slipped.
Today, I’ve got more pressing matters.
It’s been nearly a week since I’ve seen Seren. It’s been a week since the hunt began, and I’m no closer to discovering any clues about either the whereabouts of the fae queen’s heart, or where my mate might be in her quest for it.
But sometimes I feel her.
Just behind my sternum, I feel the bright, vibrant pull of my mate. Even across realms, she’s there, and the essence of her tugs at me unexpectedly, seemingly with no cause or purpose.
I felt it earlier today—a bright spark of my star. A heady pulse, with an edge of purpose to it, though I’ll be damned if I have any idea at all what that purpose is.
What I know it’s not is me standing here, listening to Myron, waiting to be ordered to some corner of some realm far away from my mate.
“Well, then,” he says, hands laced indolently behind his head as he reclines in his chair. “You’ll have to find some way to occupy yourself on my behalf. What news from the realms? Anything lucrative?”
“I’ve heard no recent news.”
The lie slips easily from my tongue, easily enough that for a moment I want to believe Myron hasn’t heard it.
But for all his faults, he’s adept at reading people, and his brow lowers as the falsehood lands.
“Nothing at all?”
“Nothing at all.”
He pauses, astute gaze raking across my face for a few taut moments before he turns back to the papers in front of him.
Parry won, my desperation overtakes my caution.
“If it’s alright with you, I’d like to request a brief leave.”
Myron’s eyes snap up, hard and inscrutable. “A leave? For what? Are you ill?”
I suppose I could lie. Claim to have caught something in one of the many realms I’ve traveled over the last weeks, but I simply shrug.
“For rest. I’ve found myself a bit run-down after the last few jobs.”
Myron snorts. “You look healthy enough to me.”
I grind my molars together, chewing on everything I’d like to say. Better sense wins out, and I wait for him to render his judgment.
“No,” he says after a long pause. “I can’t spare you. Things have been tight around here, and I can’t have my best hunter out of the field.”
Things are tight because your arrogance and pigheadedness have driven away our best paying customers. They’re tight because those same fine qualities have made every hunter worth their salt who’s not debt-bound to you flee to better masters.
Again, I hold my tongue.
Saying it will do no good.
Since I’m neither a customer free to take my business elsewhere, nor in control of my own fate and free to find a better employer, it wouldn’t change a damned thing.
“So,” Myron continues, “find some work. I’m sure you can dig something worthwhile up.”
I’m sure I could.
There’s always a job to be found somewhere. A criminal who’s run afoul of a lord willing to pay for his capture, a stolen treasure to be returned.
It’s the specialty of Myron’s operation. In his younger years, I’ve heard he was as good a hunter as any, claiming some of the realms’ biggest bounties and making a name for himself. Setting himself up with enough success and fortune to hire or compel others to do the work for him.
“Fine,” I say. “I’ll be on my way, then. I’ll send word as soon as I’ve found something.”
Before he can say anything further, I turn to go, reaching the heavy office door and closing my fingers around its handle.
“Callum,” Myron calls.
I turn to face him, and my blood drops by several degrees in my veins.
Though he may no longer be in his prime, Myron is still a demon with keen instincts. Keen enough to have him pin me in place with a hard crimson stare, as if he could lay bare everything I’ve hidden from him.
“The amount you owe for the sum I settled on your father’s debts is nowhere near paid, and your mother’s home is still held as collateral. And, as you know, I have no issue collecting if the occasion arises.”
As if I needed a reminder.
It’s always there, that threat, hovering between us.
My great mistake, the tether keeping me bound to this life.
Myron knows it, and I know it, and still the bastard feels the need to periodically remind me, as if I weren’t keenly aware of it at all times. Aware of what it requires of me, aware of the way it clips my wings and curtails my freedom, a debt that will likely take me half a lifetime to repay.
“I’m aware.”
The heavy pall of that reminder follows me out of his office, down a set of stairs to his building’s main floor and through the front door. It settles in my gut, fills my lungs, cloying, nearly choking the breath from me.
At least until I step out into the bright afternoon sunshine and am immediately assailed by a pulse of overwhelming instinct.
Quick as lightning, it thunders through me, viciously sharp with urgency and dread.
I nearly double over from the impact of it.
All the air’s forced from my lungs. My head spins. My stomach drops to somewhere near my feet.
And there, in the center of my chest, it feels like my heart might break in two.
I don’t know why, don’t know where, but somewhere down to my very marrow I know my witch is in trouble.
Unlike what I felt earlier, this urgency is tinged with fear, with danger, with a cry for help. It burns any thought of the office I just left or the responsibilities waiting for me to ash.
By the time I recover enough to have my wits about me again, I’m already moving.
Through a portal, then another, one more, until I’m standing at the threshold of the Veil. Hand laid to stone, I close my eyes and beseech the Goddess.
“Take me to her.”