Chapter 23
Ireally hate these fucking things.
As Rane finishes snapping his head back into place, he doesn’t spare me a single glance. His eyes lock directly onto Amarah.
“You’ll have to excuse my accusation, but when he grabbed you, it didn’t look like you two were together.”
I’m pretty sure she squeaks.
“W-We aren’t together. He’s just… he’s like a bodyguard.”
I look down at Amarah—covered in dark blood—and lift a brow.
“A bodyguard, huh? You’d worry like that over a bodyguard?”
“Shut the fuck up, asshole.”
Before I can throw something back at her, I spot Atlas sprinting across the bridge, a swarm of authorities right behind him.
Perfect. Just what we need—half the city showing up to stare at a blood-soaked outlaw Witch with a bounty’s worth of shit on her head.
Atlas has been watching the channels, and while she isn’t Kairhyse-level infamous, her face is circulating.
“You’re impressive with your Aetherforge,” my little slayer says softly, eyeing the Hexborn. “A whip. I’ve never thought to try one of those.”
Yesenia laughs lightly. “You’re one to talk. I have to stay connected to my conjure or it vanishes. A bow and arrow? Can you fire a bullet? Conjure a gun?”
I look at Amarah, and although I can’t see it, I imagine she’s blushing under all that blood.
“Yeah but I prefer the arrow—far stronger. Bullets are too small to take down anything that matters.”
Atlas finally reaches us, breathing hard, eyes bouncing between the four of us.
“Seems I’ve missed the action yet again.”
“Probably for the best.” I step closer to Amarah and sling my arm over her shoulder. “We’ll be on our way.”
She stiffens instantly and tries to pull away, but I keep her tucked firmly against my side.
“Stop fighting. You’re embarrassing me.”
“Let me go! Why are you holding me?”
“Wait!” Rane practically shouts. “You’re hexed.”
She goes completely still in my arms. The hand that was lightly pushing at my side suddenly fists into my shirt instead. Her heartbeat slows—not calm, but constricting—and I can feel the panic rising in the way each breath shudders out of her chest.
“You just noticed, brother? You’re losing your touch.”
I turn toward Atlas. He keeps his eyes locked on Yesenia, but I see the subtle shift of his hand sliding behind him toward his gun.
That would be stupid, but I love that he wants to protect her. However, if either of those siblings makes a wrong move toward Amarah, they’ll be dead before Atlas even brushes the damn holster.
“Don’t worry,” Yesenia continues with a careless hum, flicking her gaze between us. “Those things are so last century. Kind of bullshit they still do that to us. Sorry you’ve got one.” Her smile widens. “Stay for a bit. I’d love to pick your brain.”
She can’t be older than twenty—twenty-five at most—but she talks like she’s been around for centuries.
“Sorry.” Amarah’s voice is quiet now, steady in a way that screams she’s forcing it. “We’ve got to get going, but… thanks for the help.”
That’s the cue I need. I’m prepared to steer her away when the siblings step directly in front of us, blocking her path.
“Vendra doesn’t talk to us,” Yesenia says, folding her arms as if she has every right to stand in our way. “But I don’t need her predictions to tell me you didn’t stop in this town for nothing.”
She smiles, and I hate it. Maybe because she tried to behead me. Maybe because her brother is looking at my girl like she’s something to study. Or maybe because—
Wait.
My girl?
No. Nope. Rewind that shit back. She’s not my girl.
She’s not my anything. I call her my little slayer because… alright, I have no good justification for it, but still. Not my girl.
“I know my direction,” Amarah says firmly.
“Are you sure?” Rane asks, posture softening, voice dipping into something uncomfortably gentle. “I’m older than my sister, and I’ve been working magic for a long time. I might be able to help.”
“You can fuck right off,” I bite out. The only thing I’d let him help with is dying.
“Alright, alright—down, dog,” Yesenia mutters through gritted teeth.
Atlas jumps in before I decide to test how hard a Necroth’s skull really is. “Hey now, we’re all friends here. Name’s Atlas. We can be civil. We don’t want to draw any more attention to ourselves.”
He’s right. When I look around, the authorities are busy tending to the injured. The Pyrehounds have already dissolved into ash, leaving behind those four-pointed star markings that stain the ground like scorched runes. No one’s giving us more than a passing glance… yet.
But the newscasters are coming. Crawling toward the wreck like vultures with microphones.
“Let’s walk,” Yesenia says, and while every instinct I have wants to go in the opposite direction, Atlas falls into step beside her.
Rane offers his hand to Amarah.
I take a slow, deliberate breath. Now that I know what he is, I will not hesitate to rip his head clean off his shoulders if he touches her.
Amarah doesn’t take his hand—no surprise there. But when she jerks away from me, that does catch me off guard. I don’t stop her, though, because she moves to my other side, deliberately placing herself closer to me and farther from the creature.
Good.
We move, putting distance between ourselves and the smoke, the sirens, the chaos. Atlas keeps talking with Yesenia, their conversation nothing but static in my ears.
Then Rane and Amarah stop.
I turn, crossing my arms and watching him like he’s one wrong breath away from giving me an excuse.
Go on, idiot. Make the move that lets me kill you.
“What hex are you under?”
Her indigo eyes shift to look up at me, before drifting back to him. “Nocthariel.”
I have no idea what that means but by Rane’s shock, I can’t imagine it’s good. “I’m terribly sorry.”
She just shrugs her shoulders.
“Is there an ending to the sentence?”
I can tell she’s becoming even more uncomfortable. Her shoulders slightly hunch, her fingers fumbling with one another and eyes closing to half-mast as she tilts her chin down.
“No.”
“I see.”
“What did you say your name was?” I think Yesenia is talking to me, but I’m not taking my eyes off my little slayer.
“That’s Butcher,” Atlas answers in my absence of care. “Are you from around here, Yesenia?”
“We just moved here a little bit ago. You guys just passing through?”
“Usually those that are cursed don’t roam free,” Rane says, but it isn’t with any spite behind it. “Our kind isn’t meant to be locked up. Especially not a Yldarwright.”
I could’ve sworn the two Witch races didn’t get along. Maybe this is the exception—because technically, Necroth aren’t supposed to exist. His sister clearly was the one who created him, dragging him back from death as one of those abominations. It’s possible it wasn’t what he wanted.
I don’t know the full list of laws, but the way Amarah reacted when she realized what he was told me everything: whatever Yesenia did is very, very bad.
“Yeah,” Amarah replies, nothing more.
“Butcher?” Atlas calls, and I glance over my shoulder at him. “I think we should get going.”
“Can I get your number?” My nose twitches. Of course the Necroth isn’t talking to Atlas. “My sister and I would love to see you again. It isn’t every day we come across a Yldarwright.”
“You can have mine,” Atlas jumps in—because he knows he’s preventing another corpse from hitting the ground.
I jerk my attention back to Amarah who surprisingly has her attention on me.
“You’re pretty cute for a Mundane.” Yesenia lets out a stupid giggle.
When my little slayer looks back at Rane, she gives him the best fake smile I’ve ever seen. It better be fake.
“I don’t have a phone,” she says. “And I don’t plan on coming back this way any time soon, but I can give you my name.”
I don’t know why my heartbeat kicks up, but when he smiles at her, my vision blurs.
“That’ll work,” he says with a growing grin.
“Little slayer…”
He digs a napkin out of his back pocket. “Sis, do you have a pen?”
“I don’t just carry around a pen, Rane.”
“It’s fine.”
She takes the napkin, smoothing it against her palm before dragging her nail across the scabbed-over wound on her thumb from earlier.
Watching her draw blood from a distance had been intoxicating; now, this close—seeing the red well up and bead—I can barely restrain myself from grabbing her hand and tasting it straight from the source.
Wait. She’s going to write her name with her blood?!
“Amarah Holloway, don’t you dare.”
She ignores me entirely. Her thumb presses to the napkin, and the moment she drags the first stroke I reach for her wrist. But she’s already moving, quick.
I. V. Y.
“What a beautiful name,” he says as she hands it back.
“Don’t tell anyone. You know the drill.”
She licks her lips and brings her thumb to her mouth, sucking gently.
“Brat.”
“Brute.”
“Well, I do hope we cross paths again…” Rane’s gaze lifts to me first, lingering far too long. I don’t like the empty look in his eyes—no pupils, just an endless, unnatural blue. I can’t remember if other Necroth looked like that, but it’s unnerving. “Yesenia, let’s go.”
“Call me if you’re in town, Atlas,” Yesenia chimes, flashing him a bright smile. “Make sure you bring your friends. We can make it a double date.”
We watch them walk away, and Atlas steps up beside me wearing a shit-eating grin. “When you’re around, Butcher, I never get the ladies. I was beginning to think you were a cock-block, but ahhh, I’ve still got it.”
I groan and roll my eyes.
“Don’t call her, Atlas,” Amarah says quietly, stepping closer to us. There’s a seriousness in her expression that even makes me keep my mouth shut. “You can get your dick wet elsewhere.”
He groans. “But… she’s fucking hot! Take away the Witch thing, and what’s the problem?”
As she’s talking, I look down and notice her thumb still bleeding from writing her name.
“Just trust me. I don’t get a good feeling about them.”
She glances up at me as I grab her hand gently and press my shirt against the wound to stop the bleeding. She doesn’t pull away, surprising both of us, apparently.