Chapter 25
Astorm brews as I make my way back to the house after training with Tomyla, rolling in hard and fast. Rain pours from the sky, and yelps of surprise echo around me.
I’m drenched within seconds, so I’m relieved to find an alley where I can transport myself without being noticed.
Moments later, I stand in the library’s circle, dripping water onto the hardwood floor.
A sneeze followed by a shiver prompts me to hurry to the bathroom.
A quick shower later, I change into loose pants, a baggy shirt, and fluffy socks. After preparing a cup of tea, I head to the living room and open a window to listen to the soothing sound of rain.
Time ticks by in this rainy, slow afternoon filled with my hot beverage.
I’m enjoying it while working on an array of spells, with the earth witch grimoire beside me, a notebook in my lap, and a pen in hand.
If I’m to take over the magical side of the business, I need to start putting in the effort.
Plus, Malakai has subtly left me a pile of books on inhumans—his way of ensuring I don’t get bored, I assume.
It’s only when thunder rumbles overhead and a bolt of lightning splits the sky that my concentration breaks. I close the window and curtains and am halfway to the kitchen with my empty cup when the doorbell rings. Not expecting any visitors, I frown.
The single ring escalates into excessive ringing and loud, rapid knocking.
For a moment, I contemplate pretending not to be home, but eventually, I make my way to the door. I unlock it and yank it open just as another bolt of lightning illuminates the sky.
Slumped against the doorframe is the bounty hunter, soaked through, her wet hair and clothes clinging to her body.
She shivers violently as she looks up at me through the pouring rain, clutching her arm to her side.
Her clothes are torn, and even in the dim light, I can see fresh cuts on her flesh—some still dripping blood.
My eyes catch on the gaping wound in her side, and I’m fairly certain a few ribs are poking out.
“What do you want?” I ask, unimpressed by her sorry state.
“Help a girl out?” she replies, forcing a pained grin that trembles on her lips.
“Why?” I lean against the doorframe, crossing my arms and assessing her.
She grits her teeth, her jaw tensing, revealing her reluctance to be here. “Because the bleeding won’t stop, and I have nowhere else to go.”
The fact that she came here, of all places, likely means she’s telling the truth. Which makes me wonder why she doesn’t go to her fiancé. Surely, he’s a better option?
“You tried to kill me.”
“Yes.”
“Twice.”
“I know,” she says, rolling her eyes at me.
“I killed the last person who tried that one time too many.”
“You’re a tough cookie. Congrats. Are you going to help me or not?”
Silence stretches between us, punctuated only by the continued downpour.
She starts to slip away, and despite her past attempts on my life, I sigh and step aside.
I bite my lip until it bleeds, then run my finger over the cut to gather some blood.
My eyes never leave her as I smear it on my side of the doorframe.
It lights up momentarily, then is absorbed by the wood.
“Please enter.”
A weak smile graces her lips. “Thank you.” She steps over the threshold but collapses to the floor as she passes out.
“Oh, come on.”
I close the door as my magic wraps around her, carrying her upstairs.
I bring her to the guest bedroom, carefully placing her on the bed.
My magic dries her completely with a single touch, sending a sting through my arms in payment.
It’s a foolish use of both my blood and my energy, but I don’t want to risk her catching a cold either. I’ll just get a snack afterward.
I gently undress her upper body to inspect her wounds. My fingers catch on something—a tightly knotted rope of garnet red wrapped around her right wrist, pulsating with a peculiar kind of magic. It makes me frown for a moment, but I shake it off and focus on the task at hand.
Just as I suspected, a couple of ribs are poking out of her side, and the wound looks like a large animal took a bite out of her, with frayed skin edges still oozing blood.
I swiftly clean and dress the wound, then set up a slow-paced healing spell.
Both because slower is better for the body, especially with extensive wounds like these, and also because that will make it more bearable for me.
I can already feel the magic taking its price, and I blink a few times until the lightheadedness fades.
When I sense it working, I tuck her in. My gaze falls on a small black tattoo behind her right ear: a sideways image of a raven with wings spread and a rose clutched in its talons. Seeing it sends a shiver down my spine, as I recognize the Mark Malakai mentioned he could sense on her.
His brother’s Mark. Yblis’s Mark.
I gently brush the bounty hunter’s hair from her face and watch her chest rise and fall, her breathing steady thanks to the healing spell.
To be honest, I don’t know why I’m helping her.
She means nothing to me, and I owe her even less.
Malakai would have left her to bleed out in the front yard. So, why didn’t I?
The heavy rainfall continues through the night and into the next morning.
It doesn’t let up, shrouding the city in shades of gray.
The bounty hunter is still fast asleep when I check on her.
The small wounds have vanished, and the large one heals at a slow but steady pace.
Preferring to stay close when she wakes, I call Tomyla to cancel our training session.
It’s last-minute, but she doesn’t mind, for which I’m grateful.
As I leave the primary bedroom, the guest room door creaks open. The bounty hunter cautiously pokes her head out, flinching when she sees me looking back at her from the hallway.
“What time is it?” she snaps.
“Around seven PM,” I reply, unfazed. “Feeling better?”
She gives me a long, hard look and then nods.
“Good. The bathroom is over there.” I point to the door next to her room. “Feel free to clean up. I’ll be downstairs in the kitchen.”
She joins me in the kitchen not long after, dressed in the clothes I left out for her. She hesitantly takes a seat at the table as I place a plate of avocado toast in front of her. “I hope you eat human food,” I tell her without making eye contact.
I may or may not have been thinking about upping my own cooking game for Malakai.
Even though feeding the woman who tried to kill me feels somehow more invasive than helping her out, she’s the perfect person to try one of these modern-day recipes on—assuming she can eat things like this.
If she can, and my ‘cooking skills’ end up killing her, well, too bad.
Next to the plate, I place her dagger, prompting the bounty hunter to look up at me with raised eyebrows, clearly confused.
“You wanted that back. Here it is.” She blinks at me, so I ask, “Coffee or tea?”
She stares at me for a moment, as if no one has ever asked her this before. “Coffee, half milk, please.”
I set the coffee down and take a seat across from her with a fresh cup of tea in hand.
“It’s not poisoned,” I say after a few minutes of her staring at her food, hands resting in her lap under the table. “If I wanted you dead, you’d be long gone by now. And I most definitely wouldn’t be giving you your dagger back.”
She glares at me for a moment longer, then picks up the cutlery and starts on the toast. She cuts her food into meticulously small pieces, taking sips of her coffee every now and then.
She doesn’t speak, and though I have plenty of questions, I keep them to myself.
While she eats, my attention shifts to the window.
The sky is still a bleak shade of gray, an unending torrent of rain pouring down for the second day in a row. My mind begins to wander.
The scraping of cutlery breaks through my thoughts. I see that the bounty hunter has finished her toast and looks at me just as I look at her. Our gazes lock, my own irritation mirrored in her lilac-gray eyes.
“Thank you.” She breaks the silence between us. “For the food, for helping me, and for returning my dagger.”
“You’re welcome.” I shrug. When I look up, she’s intently staring at me again. “What?”
“Do you not know what this means?”
“It means that I saved the life of my sister-in-law—the wife of the man who imprisoned my husband. And said husband is probably going to be pissed off when he finds out.” My magic hangs heavily in the air between us, and the way she shifts in her seat tells me she can feel it.
“Fiancé,” she mumbles, barely audible.
“What?”
“I’m his fiancé. We’re not married yet.” There’s something indistinguishable in her voice, but it disappears when she continues. “That’s not what I meant, though.”
“Enlighten me, then.” My voice is cold, and I can’t help but wonder where the merciless bounty hunter from before ran off to. Perhaps she isn’t as healed as she wants me to believe.
“It means I’m in your debt,” she snaps. Ah, there she is. “And when Yblis finds out what you did, he might even consider forgiving that monster of a husband of yours.”
I’m at her throat in an instant, my right hand wrapped around her neck, ice-blue claws digging in. My left hand hovers beside me, magic crackling at my fingertips. Her eyes dart from one hand to the other as if she’s considering taking me on, her fingers reaching for the dagger next to her plate.
“Don’t,” I warn, my claws digging deeper, blood welling from the puncture wounds.
Her eyes widen, and she nods. After giving her another squeeze for emphasis, I retract my magic and step back.
“Get out.”
The bounty hunter stands without hesitation, grabbing her dagger and dashing out of the kitchen. I follow her to the front door, where she steps outside into the pouring rain, weapon clamped tightly in hand.