12. Chapter 12 #3
He took out the silver tin from his pocket, bringing a cigarette to his lips. “I apologise,” he said, lighting it and blowing a cloud of smoke above us. “As long as you stay out of my bed, we have an agreement.”
Another thought crawled over and under the gyri and the sulci, and I had the urge to dig into my cranium and itch it away. Was I that repulsive to him? “You lock your room. How would I get into your bed?”
“I’m sure you’d find a way. And I don’t think I would stop you.”
The fabric of my dress has scrunched up in my tight fists shaking in my lap. “Why not?”
“Because you’re a beautiful woman, Willow. But I don’t fuck witches.”
My teeth dug hard on the corner of my bottom lip, drawing blood. “Heard you don’t feed on us either.”
There was a small pause, his cigarette burning in his hand before he took a long drag from it. “I will kill him the next time he opens his mouth around you. If you don’t want his blood on your hands, I’d stop asking him questions.”
“Why is it a secret?”
“It is not a secret. Just none of your business.”
“You’re my husband. That makes your business my business.”
“And you’re my wife. Yet…if I asked you about the burial plot and the funeral reception you have paid, would you tell me?”
I was sure colour had drained from my face entirely.
He reached for my necklace, taking the pendant between his fingers and turning it to read the inscription behind. “We all have things we don’t want other people to know about. I enjoy my privacy. And from what I remember, so do you.”
I swallowed. “I’ll tell you whatever you want to know.
I have nothing to hide.” He needed the right question to find out about my curse, and I knew he would never find it.
He was free to know anything else about my wretched life.
I’d embarrassed myself enough times in front of him. I’d kind of grown to enjoy the shame.
His thumb remained on top of the whitelock as he met my eyes. “Why so many paid mourners?”
“I have no family and I’ve never been good at making friends.
Ethel was pure cosmic coincidence. Maybe chaos didn’t want for me to be alone.
I never had the chance to find out why she even loved me.
” I breathed out a slow exhale. “I also never planned on marrying, so I wanted to do something nice for myself anyway.”
He stood. “Write to the agency and get your money back.”
“What?”
“You will be buried in the Duncan family plot, right next to me. And you have a family.” He put another cigarette to his lips, lighting it and leveling a glare at Arthur, who stood at the church doors.
“You also seem to be making friends just fine.” He shook his head.
“You have him thinking he can stop me from hurting you if I’d wanted to hurt you. ”
“You didn’t force this marriage on me,” I confessed. “I did it to protect Ethel.”
“From what?”
“Agnes.”
He lowered back on the seat, leaning on his knees. “Why would she want to harm your friend?”
“It’s not that she’d hurt her. As the biggest, most highly-regarded and ruling coven in Meridian, the Crimson Weaver stands behind a few…
standards. They will excommunicate any witch that falls below those standards.
Ethel was able to stay in the Crimson Coven because of me—because of a deal I made with Agnes when I was a kid.
No other coven will take in an excommunicated witch—especially not Ethel who refuses to use magic.
She’d probably have to travel to the Fair Isles to find any kind of work and do only Goddess knows what for survival. ”
“Why did you tell me now?”
“I need you to know why I’d risk myself for what I came to do here. And I need you to understand that you shouldn’t stop me. Ethel is everything I have. I’ll do anything for her.”
We sat there quietly for a few heartbeats.
“You’re not as alone as you think you are,” he said, standing and leaving me there with his unbearable God.
“What?” I whispered at the stony giants staring at me. “If you have anything to say, say it.” Shaking my head, I stood. “That’s what I thought.”
I brought my gloved hand to my nose when the heavy scent of spoiled sugar hit my throat the moment I stepped out into the garden.
In the summer heat, it had fermented into some sort of choking hot putrescine fetor.
Alas, there was no corpse anywhere in sight.
Only parched shrubs and dreaded flowers hovering with flies and filled with crawling maggots.
What on this earthly realm was happening?
Logan was standing face-to-face with the exarch a few feet away from us. The latter seemed to be displeased at the words that were being exchanged because a foul sneer was his only reply to my husband.
I swallowed, trying not to choke on the nausea. “What is this smell?”
Arthur looked around. “What smell?”
The sound of watering cans pouring water over the dried shrubs grew near deafening, pounding against my ears. My vision grew heavy, filling with steam.
Arthur put a hand on my shoulder. “Are you alright?”
I tried straightening his skewed tie, but my hands kept slipping off. “I’m fine, vampire-man.”
And then the world tipped on its axis. Before my vision went all black, Arthur grabbed me. “Witch-woman!”