Chapter 8
Reva
“You want to know one of my favourite things about you?” Kit drawls at me right before we reach his house. “Your adaptability. Wrong customer, you find a new one. Someone suggests visiting a creepy, old abandoned house? You don’t even consider saying no. Whatever the situation is, you pivot.”
“Am I?” I snort. “I feel like I’ve had to learn to be, springing from place to place, never stopping anywhere for too long.”
Maybe that’s why I’m not losing my mind over the whole mate situation. You learn after a while that there’s no point in fighting the current when it’s got you in its clutches. Things happen around you, and they knock you off course, but it’s up to you to work out how to handle that.
My current technique seems to be distracting myself. If I keep my brain busy enough right now, I can worry about the mate bonds and their consequences later when I’m alone and I’ve got gallons of tea to help me work things through.
Or maybe I’ll go for a swim. Noush’s thoughts always help to ground me in the moment. And I can’t see her being afraid of a couple of mate bonds.
I can imagine the sort of thing she’ll come out with as soon as I slip on my skin. We need a couple of adoring males around to fetch us snacks and tell us our hair looks nice.
By this point, we’re stepping inside Kit’s home once again and there isn’t time for a retort. Even after our brisk walk back, I still haven’t quite shaken the strange sense of unease from being inside the old coven house. Still, I paste on a smile and try to shake it off.
My smile is almost immediately replaced by a confused frown when I catch the scent of cinnamon and bread in the air.
“Frannie? Aster?” We step through the empty living area into the kitchen, where Frannie is sitting and nursing a cup of tea and Aster is at the counter, plucking a fresh loaf of bread from a tray onto a wire rack.
“Your man here’s been busy,” Frannie says with a weary sigh that I don’t think comes from Aster’s decision to bake. “So have I. Up and down I’ve been, like my legs are on a loop to the front door. Seems people don’t know how to read the sign Kit left.”
I can hear Kit speaking softly in the next room and wander further into the kitchen, eyeing Aster’s work.
“Did you sleep enough?” I ask him.
Frannie snorts. “He managed about ten minutes before the influx of idiots at the door.” She takes a long swig of tea and slumps in her chair. “You were gone a while. Did you find anything?”
I meet Aster’s eye as I shake my head, responding in Valmorian. “Nothing. Do you remember anything from the place you were held? Smells or any sounds if you didn’t get a good look of how the place looked?”
He shakes his head in return, holding out one of the cinnamon rolls and waiting for me to take it before reaching for my other hand. We both take a seat at the table, and my teeth sink into the crispy shell of bread and my mouth fills with sweetness and spice.
“All I remember is the damp and the sweat, not much else. I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be.” I squeeze his hand. “We didn’t find anything obvious to suggest they were holding you at the coven house, but we didn’t have time to look in every room.”
“I don’t know if I’d recognise it, even if you took me back there.” He gives a visible shudder at the thought and I get to my feet, intent on fetching the blanket from the sofa next door.
“We also had a visit from a guy from the firehouse,” Frannie says. “He stayed for a little while for a chat and offered to show me around.” Her eyes sparkle as she takes a bun for herself. “He even offered to show me his hose.”
I snort, leaning against the doorway. “I bet he did. What happened to being a one-ogre kind of gal?”
“He might not be one of my kind,” she replies without missing a beat. “But I’d be willing to make an exception.” She chews for a moment. “Can you tell your man here that these are delicious?”
I relay the message to Aster, who gives a slight nod, a small smile revealing two dimples as his eyes dart down to rest on the smudge of flour on his sleeve.
“Did your new friend from the firehouse say anything else?” I recall Hilde mentioning something about him knowing whether a complaint had been lodged against the coven house. Although I’m not sure what difference it would make.
“He just said that they hadn’t had any official complaints recently.”
I nod, still unsure how that fits in. Right now, we don’t know if Aster escaped from anywhere close by, or how far he’d travelled before we found him in that alleyway. I don’t know exactly what I was expecting to find at the old coven house.
... or I do know exactly what I was hoping for. Evidence of the sorcerers having been there and having gone far, far away.
Aster’s drawn in on himself again, arms wrapped around his overly thin body, and I’m filled with the urge to fetch that blanket. I can’t exactly erase whatever horrors happened to him in the past, but at least I can make sure he’s warm enough.
Slinking into the living room, I pad across the carpeted floor toward the sofa, trying to avoid disturbing Kit and his conversation with his brother.
“We might be in the slightest pickle,” a familiar voice is speaking on the other side of the scrying glass, the magic-fueled screen lit up just in front of where Kit’s standing by the window.
“Mhm. Did you go for the wrong type of ship again?” Kit replies drily.
“No, nothing like that. You know me. It’s the king’s ships or nothing.”
“Finch,” Kit says his name like a warning.
“Calm down, brother dearest. I don’t think you’re important enough to have your scry tapped. And unless we have a spy onboard, I don’t have one either. We can speak freely.”
Kit’s shoulders relax infinitesimally, and he glances over his shoulder at me, like he senses my presence despite not having made a sound.
“Fine. Tell me about this pickle and why you’re calling me.”
“I’m afraid we might have accidentally picked up a teeny tiny curse.
One that’s preventing the crew from leaving the ship,” Finch replies.
“Jack and Tor managed to avoid it since they were otherwise occupied at the time it took hold. But everyone else is... stuck. And you know how much fun it is having a restless, sea-bound crew on your hands.”
Kit lets out a little grunt and rolls his eyes at me, and I stifle a chuckle before I remember who he’s talking to.
The notorious Captain Finch. Fearless pirate captain.
The stories say that he took over his current ship following a mutiny where every single crew member got slaughtered. They say he hung the entrails of the previous captain from the flagpole. He’s wanted all over the kingdom and in the four neighbouring regions.
“How far are you from here?” Kit asks.
“Arriving tomorrow.”
Kit’s gaze remains on me, his expression speculative. “Well, isn’t that fortuitous? I could do with some time at sea. Things on land have become complicated. I’ll be bringing a few people along with me”
“Is that right?” Finch replies. “That wouldn’t happen to have anything to do with whoever’s with you that you can’t keep your eyes off, would it? Got company, have you?”
With a little smile, Kit jerks his head, gesturing for me to come closer. As if my feet are drawn to him without conscious effort, I step toward him until I’m right at his side.
“Well, if it isn’t my favourite lion-haired thief. Hello, love, it’s been a while.”
As usual, a shiver goes through me at the captain’s raspy voice. I’ve never seen the man in person, and today’s no exception. His scrying glass is turned toward the wall, and all I can see of him is a knee.
... or at least I’m hoping it’s a knee.
“Hello, Captain. I hear you’ve been busy,” I say.
“Well, you know me, love. I have to fill the hole in my heart somehow.”
I don’t really know what to say. That’s the thing about Captain Finch. His actions should terrify any sensible person, but whenever I speak to him, I find him oddly disarming.
Maybe it’s because he’s Kit’s brother and I’ve never felt anything other than safe in his presence. Finch seems wilder than Kit, although they both share the same eccentric air that’s charming rather than simply being odd.
“Are you one of Kit’s tagalongs, love? Going to treat us with your presence in person?”
I meet Kit’s eye for a moment, an involuntary smile appearing on my lips. “I will be.”
“Well then, I’ll be happy to have you onboard. We shall see you in the morning.”
Before the scrying glass goes dark, there’s a pained squeal and a shadowy shape, like a giant, thick arm, travels across the screen. It pushes the scrying glass until all I can see is the floor.
The screen is then jostled, and a handsome, bearded face with the brightest sea-green eyes appears. The face morphs into a scowl, and I can just make out what looks like a body being flung across the room.
“Cap’s indisposed right now.“
Then the scrying glass goes dark.
I step back, my heart pounding in my throat as I shoot Kit a horrified glance. I’m pretty sure I just saw the captain roughing someone up while he was chatting away like nothing out of the ordinary was happening.
Kit didn’t mention Aster or anything about the mate bond, something I think both of us are aware of.
“So... your brother’s pirate ship, eh?”
Kit gives an uncomfortable shrug. “We don’t have to stay for long, but at least it’ll get us out of the town in case there are still sorcerers in the vicinity.
I should have asked before I suggested it, but it hit me as Finch was asking.
This would be perfect. And I wouldn’t want to leave you here alone.
Not that you haven’t been taking care of yourself for a long time, but—”
I lean forward to bump his shoulder with mine. “It’s all right.”
It’s a good plan, really. Especially considering the possible stink I’ve left over in Ambleby. It feels like forever ago that Frannie and I left, but there’s every chance that the fishy guy and his threats will be there right now, causing trouble.
“Well, it’s certainly one way to get to know your family.”