Chapter 14
Chapter
Fourteen
“ M iss Nova, can I get something for you? You must be starving,” Mercury said, his shadow falling over me.
I looked up from my position on the floor, blocking the door with my body, feeling like my soul had been pulled out and trampled by a dozen horsemen. “No. I can’t be hungry because I failed so miserably to earn my bread. I should have shot Philip from the beginning. And the demon, too. No, I should have been quietly at your side while you operated your auction house the same way you have for decades, without jumping in and ruining everything.” I frowned at my wrist and the glittering aquamarine that flattered me so well. “On the other hand, Phillip did bid fifteen million for the Daphne set. You could send him a bill for that, couldn’t you?”
Mercury sat down beside me, leaning against the door, his arm brushing mine. “What about ice cream?”
“Ice cream? What about it?”
He leaned over and bumped my head with his. “Ice cream to help soothe your broken heart. Someone as obsessed as he is can’t be easily seduced, however charming you are, and Miss Nova, you are entirely charming.”
I stared at him, just staring at those dark eyes and flickering lightning, like his emotions weren’t entirely stable, but he didn’t feel the need to collapse in front of doors unless he was trying to help his pathetic undead feel better about being crushed by Philip a second time. He honestly thought that I’d been trying to seduce Philip? Callie would probably try. And fail. And he thought that’s who I was. “That makes sense. Everyone’s obsessed with Cassandra Clarence.” I elbowed him. Hard. Like he wasn’t the most obsessed of them all. He’d commissioned a blue diamond statue. You didn’t get more obsessed than that.
He drew his brows together, frowning at me. “Was that you trying to hurt me? You should use your guns instead of your elbows. You’ll bruise them on me if you aren’t careful.”
I sighed heavily. “Would you stop with the precious dead show? I’m not your precious anything. I failed you. But here you are coming down to my level and offering me ice cream like money means nothing to you.”
“Money means nothing to me. Of course not. I’m too old to care about money. Objects that are priceless are far more interesting to me, and I have accumulated such a vast collection that even priceless objects have become next to meaningless. You are not dead, but you are precious, much, much more precious than the gems you wear.” He raised my hand and turned my wrist, until the metal started slithering and wriggling until it slid off me in a cascading clatter against the tile floor, in a heap like they were nothing.
I frowned up at him, hating how I loved his hand on mine, hating how much I wanted to climb into his lap and have him block out the rest of the world. Hating that he was obsessed with who I used to be instead of who I was now. “Why were you obsessed with her?”
He stared at me. “Why was I obsessed with who?”
“Cassandra Clarence! You know, the person you commissioned a statue of. It’s hypocritical for you to criticize Philip for being obsessed when you’re even more obsessed, and far more clever about it.”
“Ah. You are under a misapprehension, Miss Nova. I didn’t commission that statue, or I did, but only as a broker for a client.”
I stared at him, my heart jerking painfully at the news. “Your client wanted it? Why is it in your auction house?”
“It’s very stunning, although if you dislike it there, I can have it moved.”
“You could sell it to Philip.”
“No, I couldn’t.”
“Why not? If you aren’t obsessed…”
“Because if the person, I use the term lightly, who commissioned the statue were to attack Philip in order to attain it, your old friend would not survive.”
“That brings back the point. Why do you have a statue that you didn’t commission? Was the client unable to pay?”
“There was a delay in payment, and in that time, I was able to discern who the actual client was. He hired two other agents to cover for him, but it came out…” He cleared his throat and looked at me with a very concerned frown. “Mr. Good isn’t a person I make deals with. One of his representatives was here earlier, bidding on the Daphne collection. And Mr. Good made a point to have Retta test you.” He caressed my face lightly, making my breath catch from the sweetness of the contact. “I would be very irritated if he shifted his obsession from Cassandra Clarence to you.”
“Oh.” I stared into his eyes while a million questions pounded at me. Was Mr. Good behind the fire? The deaths? My murder? No, you didn’t throw something you were obsessed with into a sewer. Did you? Also, he’d been in prison at the time. And Philip was an enchanter? How did that fit into the puzzle?
Mr. Good was terrifying. If he was going to come for me, Mercury would stand between us to protect me and perhaps be hurt. But the demon had been here, but more like a lure than a threat. Mr. Good was playing a game with me and Mercury, but I had no idea what the rules or stakes were. My mother had testified against him in court. Was this about that? No, he’d taken my blood long before she’d testified against him. I’d actually think that her testimony was a product of his interest in my life.
“What flavor of ice cream?” I finally said.
He smiled slightly. “All of them.”
“All of them? Well, I’m not sure I can accept so many limitations.” I elbowed him again, but this time barely a nudge.
He oomphed anyway, falling over like I’d had daggers attached. “You are an impossible mistress to please, but I will try.”
I sniffed and sat there, still feeling all wobbly and disoriented. “You really aren’t obsessed with Cassandra Clarence? Is it because she was alive?”
He straightened up and said, “It’s because she was a dull, conventional beauty who was far too young and inexperienced to tempt me. She was, however, very sweet. She sincerely tried to fulfill her mission, to protect humans and anyone else who crossed her way. She gave a priceless bracelet to a ghoul once, for no reason I can tell, other than a sense of charity.”
A dull, conventional beauty? Too young and inexperienced? Oh, but sweet. Yes, she was so sweet. Harmless. Helpless. Stupid. Just waiting for someone to murder her and chop off all her fingers, because what would the na?ve idiot possibly do to stop it?
I pushed myself to my feet and looked down at Mercury, angry, humiliated, and hopeless. If I couldn’t tempt him as the perfect Cassandra Clarence, there was absolutely no chance. Not that there had been, but if he’d actually disliked who I was as a person, then that was really, really depressing. “Mercury, as your mistress, I demand that you remove my shoes and holsters so I can go get on something armored. Otherwise, I’m going to die in these shoes.”
He looked down at my foot, then put his hand over the toe, sliding up to my heel and then my ankle, where he hooked his strong fingers lightly. “That does sound serious, but there are worse things than dying in a pair of shoes.”
“Dying naked with your fingers chopped off? Yes, I know that there are far worse things.”
He tugged on me and I landed on his lap, staring into those eyes while his hand held firmly onto my foot and shoe. “I don’t like that you’re unhappy. What would make you feel better? Tell me, and it’s done.”
“Other than taking off my…”
He put my shoe to the side and then wrapped his hand around my bare, sensitive foot. “Tell me, Nova. What can I do to make you happy?”
“Other than a photoshoot at the top of a cliff with your shirt off?”
His eyes narrowed. “I’m not joking. What will make you happy? You were feeling better, but now you’re miserable again. It’s that idiot golden prince, but you don’t want me to kill him. What can I do for you?”
I swallowed hard. “You’ll do anything?”
“Yes. After you’ve eaten.”
“Are you sure you don’t mind?”
He stroked my foot, and I shivered. “I don’t mind.”
An hour later, he didn’t look so certain as we stood on the edge of Singsong City, on the last piece of pavement that hadn’t buckled and broken from the fire’s heat.
“I thought we’d go get you a fake I.D.” he murmured.
I adjusted the pretty holsters over the serious armored vest over the spelled long sleeve shirt before I looked out over the remnants of the enormous convention center. “Finding my murderer has moved up on my priority list.”
He sighed heavily. “I don’t think that seeing the remains will cheer you up, but what do I know about delicate live girls?”
I gave him a frown. “I’m delicate? Do you want me to shoot you?”
He smiled slightly and fingered the butt of my pistol. “Later, when you won’t be disturbed by ashes and memories.”
We walked to the yellow police tapeline and stared at the desolation for a long moment before I ducked under the tape, glad for Retta’s thick combat boots and leather spelled pants, so I’d be able to brush the ashes off after this was over.
Mercury’s clothing was similar to mine, black spelled leather with tall boots that went up to his knees. He wasn’t dressed for a date. Of course not, because this wasn’t a date. If it was a date, well, I had no idea what necromancers liked. Not na?ve delicate live girls whose only redeeming quality was an absolutely imbecilic sweetness.
We walked around for fifteen minutes, examining melted metal beams, and cracked and splintered cement chunks in the midst of all the ash. Which were bodies, and which was the building?
I crouched down in front of a particularly large heap of ashes and took a pinch in my fingers.
A flash of light was my only warning before an enormous serpent burst out of the ash pile, striking at me. Mercury hit me from the side first, sending me flying while he took the snapping jaws on his arm.
I landed hard, but my arm where he’d hit me throbbed the most. I rolled to my feet while Mercury wrestled with the serpent. For a second I stood there, stunned at the absolute weirdness of having a magic snake come out of a pile of ashes, before I shook it off and charged back. As much as my arm hurt, it would reheal quickly. I couldn’t be killed. I couldn’t be killed even more than Murcury. Maybe.
The viper slashed at him with its teeth, leaving long strips of bloody flesh through Mercury’s leather armor. I pulled my guns and shot a dozen bullets before I realized that they weren’t making any dent on the magical creature, although it did damage to my injured arm. That’s what we call ineffective.
I absolutely hated seeing him injured while he fought the beast I’d stumbled upon. How did you handle snakes? I’d been to India once and had a lesson in snake charming. There would be no charming this monster, but I could still get it behind the neck. I moved to the side, every step sending fresh pain through my arm. There was a beam of half-melted iron leaning diagonally across the space. I climbed up it carefully until I was in the right position, or close enough. I took a deep breath and then I leapt at the serpent, hitting it behind the head, knocking it down while I wrapped its throat, holding it right beneath the jaw bone.
White pain went through my arm as it whipped and thrashed, trying to get me off, but I hung on, squeezing as tight as I could in spite of my injury. I wasn’t going to let go if it killed me. Even if I was dead, I wouldn’t let go. I wouldn’t let something that was trying to kill me end up hurting Mercury in my place. Never.
I was dizzy by the time it finally fell down in a spray of black blood that got all over me. I was going to need a bath so badly.
I lay there, still holding onto the head when Mercury came into view, holding a sword with creepy black runes in the pocked and corroded metal. It looked like tetanus waiting to happen, but he just held it out to the side while he loomed over me.
“Miss Nova, you can let go,” he said, soot and blood streaking his face. How was he more handsome looking like he’d been in battle than in his tuxedo? That was just Mercury, always more attractive than he should be.
I blinked at him and then let go of the head, which wasn’t connected to the body anymore. Black blood mixed with ashes for a truly picturesque scene. I shuddered while Mercury picked me up and carried me through the piles of ash and hunks of metal towards the waiting vehicle.
“What was that?” I asked, shaking off the shock to look up at him. “What kind of serpent lives in the ashes of the dead? Is it an infernal demon?”
His lips tightened, but his voice was even. “It’s a dark magic construct. It was waiting for you, Miss Nova.”
I stared at him, guilt and shock warring for dominance. “So it wasn’t actually alive? Does that mean it’s not actually dead?” That was probably the most important thing to know.
“I unraveled the animating spell.”
“You can unravel spells by chopping off their heads?”
“No. If I hadn’t undone the spell first, it would have grown back multiple heads after I chopped off the first.”
“Ah. Even with that creepy sword?”
“Even so. You don’t like my blade? I suppose it’s true, it really has let itself go. It used to gleam and glisten like a lake at sunset, but now it’s just a cankered hunk of metal.”
The sword hissed at him, and Mercury smiled fondly at it. He was still holding his sword while he was carrying me. Why was he carrying me? I wasn’t a helpless, delicate, pathetic, na?ve girl. Except that I’d accidentally stumbled on a spelled monster and gotten him injured. Yes, except for that. Also, my legs were so shaky and my arm throbbed horribly.
“You think whoever killed me knows I’m alive? But I look nothing close to how I did before.”
“Perhaps I’m mistaken, but I walked past that pile of ashes without sensing it or awakening it. You’re the one it reacted to.”
We crossed the police tape line and Bones hurried over to us.
“Master! Mistress! You’re both injured! I didn’t see anything, or I would have come!”
I looked back, and everything was precisely how it had been before we’d gone in, with piles of ashes undisturbed instead of being a cyclone on the inside. “It must be glamoured,” I said absently as I smiled at Bones’s obvious concern for someone he knew could come back to life. We were the indestructible undead together.
“What happened?” he asked as he hurried to open the back door for us.
Mercury carefully placed the sword on the floor and then climbed in with me. I cried out when I bumped my arm.
“Miss Nova? What is it?” Mercury’s frown was terrifying, but I only grabbed his own arm, turning it so I could see the gashes the creature had given him.
“They look infected. We’ll have to clean them out when we get home. I’ll bandage you if you’ll bandage me. I think my arm’s broken.” I made a face at him, because if that wasn’t a delicate, idiotic thing to do, I didn’t know what was.
He frowned as he went over the fight in his head. “I broke it when I pushed you away from the viper.” His face went pale as he stared at me, his eyes growing darker, lightning flashes coiling tighter in those fascinating orbs. “And then instead of sitting out, you shot it and tried to strangle it?”
I shrugged. Ouch. “I’ll heal soon enough. Sooner than if it poisoned me. You look absolutely awful. Are you spelled well enough?”
“I’m a dark sorcerer. My pain isn’t relevant. Why did you leap at the snake with a broken arm? I’d genuinely like to know what you were thinking.” The lightning in his eyes was so fascinating.
I pursed my lips. “Well, when I went to India, I took lessons in snake charming.”
“That was you snake charming?”
“No, I thought I’d try the neck grab. It didn’t seem to be interested in being charmed.”
“You thought you’d try it? Did you notice the difference between a snake you can hold in your hands and one you have to strangle with your whole body?”
“Those are the differences, yes. I did notice them, now that you mention it. I’ll have to take notes for my book.”
“You’re writing a book? On what?”
“The differences between reptiles in captivity versus the wild, naturally. Bones, drive quickly. Master’s face is turning weird shades of purple.”
Mercury grabbed me with his arm, the good one, and pulled me hard against his chest, somehow not hurting my injured arm, but still too tight to be perfectly cozy.
“You are too careless with your life, Miss Nova. What am I supposed to do with you?”
I blinked at him, then slid my good arm around his neck. “You should punish me by giving me a long lecture about how my behavior affects those around me, so I need to safeguard myself in order to ensure their well-being. You should make it very long and boring to really deepen the pain.”
He squeezed me again while he frowned at me. “You’ve had many such lectures?”
“Mm. My bodyguards were the best at giving them.”
“But I am an evil sorcerer, not a bodyguard. I should lock you in a tower.”
“I’m sure I could find something dangerous to do in a tower, particularly yours.”
His scowl turned thoughtful, and then he pulled me close and pressed his lips to mine. It was a shock, literally, a shock of lightning at that contact. And then there was a crack of snapping bone, and he jerked.
I gasped and pulled away to stare into those diabolical eyes. “What did you just do?” I demanded, while my heart raced and my lips buzzed. He wouldn’t kiss me because he liked me, and that sound…
“I don’t give lectures. Perhaps in the future you’ll be more careful with your health and safety. If not, I’ll kiss you again.” He nodded thoughtfully, with a slight smile on his soft mouth. “Yes, I think that will do nicely.”
I grabbed his arm and ran my hand along it until I got to the break. I stared at the gashes and the odd angle of his arm beneath it. “You took my broken arm? Why would you do that?” I still didn’t believe it. Magic couldn’t work that way, could it?
“I hurt you unintentionally. I am too dangerous to make such careless mistakes. You need better body armor designed specifically for you instead of a goblin. It’s good armor, truly well-spelled, but you require more. I’ll have my tailor see to it.”
I sputtered as I shook my head. “No, your tailor won’t. That serpent was after me, but you took the brunt of the attack. And then instead of us both being injured, you took mine too? Why would you do that?”
“You are mine to protect. You know this.”
“I know that you really are a terrible, horrible, evil, wicked, unconscionable sorcerer to make me feel worse about the attack, which was all my fault.”
“Your enemy is mine.”
“No, he’s not! And my pain isn’t yours any more than your business is mine.”
I glared at him while my eyes burned from holding back angry tears.
He peered into my eyes, then nodded. “You’re hungry. Bones, we’re going to stop at the nearest place to get Miss Nova something to help her blood sugar stabilize.”
I gasped at the sheer nerve of him, dismissing my anger as hunger. “I’m not hungry. I’m angry.”
“Perhaps you’re both.”
I hit his shoulder with my fist. “Stop trying to fix me and make me all better. It’s infuriating.”
He studied me intently. “You have empathy and feel my pain worse than I do. I forgot that humans are sometimes miserable about another’s pain. In that case, I’ll contact the Grand Sorcerer. She’s very good at surgery, potions, and will know exactly what I need to expedite the process.”
“You could have asked her to heal me instead.”
“But her husband might not like her kissing you.”
“That wasn’t a kiss. It was theft.”
“I stole a kiss.”
“You stole my broken arm! Why would you do that if you feel no empathy? You have all the empathy for the dead, but I’m not dead anymore, Mercury. I’m a live girl. I can heal all by myself.”
“You’re mine to protect.”
I shook my head and looked out the window while misery crowded around me. “You’re only the master of the dead. I haven’t been dead for a long time. At this rate, you’re going to die before I do, and I’ll come back.”
He rested his hand on my shoulder, but I shrugged him off.
“Bones, drive fast, and make sure you hit every pothole in town,” I snapped.
Mercury’s low rumble of laughter made my skin prickle, and I wanted nothing more than to turn around and wrap myself around him and try to press my worry into his skin.
But I couldn’t take his pain with magic or anything else.