Cast in Hellfire: An Urban Fantasy Romance (The Mage Craft Series Book 2)

by SM Reine

  Marion frowned. “Three?” The triadists couldn’t know too much, then. The only gods were Elise and James.

  “Yeah. Three. And yeah, we’ve got access to unseelie magic,” Dana said. “This one triadist, Brother Marshall, had friends among the old Winter Court. He shares with anyone who can find his church.”

  “So you didn’t have anything to do with the recent attempts on Marion’s life?” Seth asked.

  “I’ve got better shit to do than that. A city to run. Vampire asses to kick.” Dana finally took the drawings. “I can pass these around to some triadist friends of mine. See if anyone knows who they are.” She spotted the photo that Marion was holding. She ripped it out of Marion’s hand. “Don’t touch my shit.”

  “We’re cousins or something, aren’t we?” Marion asked. “That’s why you’re a triadist. You believe in the gods because you’re related to me.”

  “Your mom raised me after my parents died,” Dana said. “We don’t have one gods-damned drop of blood in common.”

  “But we did grow up together.”

  Dana scowled, shoving the photo into her pocket. “Yeah.”

  And here Marion had been thinking she only had one sister, who was a god. She really had two. This one seemed to hate her even though they’d looked so happy in the photograph.

  Now that Marion realized they had a relationship, she knew why some of Dana’s enchanted armor resonated with her so strongly. There was ethereal magic woven in with the gaean, unseelie, and infernal stuff. “I made that helmet,” Marion said. “Didn’t I?”

  “Penny made the helmet, you enchanted it. It’s not like I even wear it most of the time.”

  But when Marion stretched out her senses, she felt her magic coming from the gauntlets too. Those fireballs that Dana had been throwing—those were Marion’s design. “Why don’t you like me?”

  “That’s cute, that’s really cute,” Dana said. “Don’t tell me I’ve hurt poor Marion’s feelings.”

  “Hey,” Seth said sharply.

  Dana jabbed her finger at the map he was holding. “That’s everything you need to find Arawn and the Canope, if you’re smart about it. You’ll have to find your own way into Sheol. I’m not giving you my contacts to get into the Nether Worlds.”

  “I think we’ve gotten enough from you,” Seth said. “Come on, Marion.”

  She didn’t follow him to the door. She gazed in hopeless confusion at Dana.

  That look of anger, annoyance, hatred—it wasn’t unlike the looks that Marion got from various members of the Autumn Court, the angels, and almost everyone else who had known her before she’d lost her memory. “I can’t make things right between us if you don’t give me the opportunity.”

  “Tell you what,” Dana said. “You get the Canope, you get your memories back, and you remember it all on your own. If you’re still feeling all butt-hurt about this, we’ll talk. But I think you’ll get it, and you’ll feel like shit for having the nerve to show up in my city once that happens. Now go away.”

  Seth’s hand slipped into Marion’s, holding her firmly as he guided her out of the condo.

  Everyone who knew Marion hated her. Even someone who had been raised as her sister.

  Maybe she was better off without the Canope.

  * * *

  “You look like you could use a drink,” Seth said once they hit the street. The Las Vegas night was warm and busy, illuminated by so many brilliant witchlights that it nearly seemed like daytime.

  “I’m only nineteen and you called me a kid earlier,” Marion said.

  “Yeah, well, I didn’t know how bad a day you were having earlier. Come on, I know a place you’ll love. It’s fancy. Big crystal chandeliers, classy wait staff, very clean.”

  Marion’s smile was still a little too hesitant. “That sounds wonderful.”

  They walked all the way down the Strip and through a labyrinthine casino in silence. Seth had a hard time remembering where to go. Lots had changed since he’d lived in Las Vegas after Genesis. Magic and technology had fused. There were as many witches at the blackjack tables as mundane dealers, and the air was thick with spells, flying decks of cards, and even sparkling chips.

  Many things hadn’t changed, though. That included the cocktail waitresses, most of whom wore skirts so skimpy that they verged on illegal. They were happy to give Seth directions in exchange for tips. Marion didn’t look surprised by the way that the cocktail waitresses dressed. They must not have impressed her after all the debauchery she’d seen in the Middle Worlds. Sidhe were far worse than Las Vegas.

  “Here we go,” Seth said, getting off at the top of an escalator. “It’s right down here—wait.”

  The bar he’d expected to find around the corner was a Cheesecake Factory now. A chain restaurant. Clean, yes, but not the bar he remembered. Not the one he’d gone to with Brianna Dimaria so many times, along with the other preternatural investigators in their company.

  “Can I help you?” asked the hostess with a too-bright smile.

  “How long has this been here?” Seth asked. “What happened to the bar?”

  Her cheer cracked. “I’ve only been working here for two years, but…I think this restaurant has been in this spot since like ’22?” Eight years earlier, during the time when Seth had been firmly entrenched at Mercy Hospital.

  “It’s fine,” Marion said, glancing uneasily at the crowd surrounding them. “I should get back to the Winter Court and address a few things before we go to Sheol.”

  Seth backed out of the restaurant, trying to shake the malaise that had settled over him. “No. No way. We’re getting drinks.”

  “My pick this time,” Marion said. “I promise to choose nothing called the Salty Anything.”

  They didn’t have to go too far to find something more palatable than a Cheesecake Factory. The next casino over was brand new, something called Valhalla, and it was nothing but dark décor and sparkling chandeliers that glimmered with pixie light.

  Marion was as good as her word. She selected a bar that was called the Endless Battle. It was packed that time of night by beautiful young people—all very fashionable, happy, and drunk. None of them held a candle to Marion. Even in jeans and a blouse, she managed to look like she was walking the runway on the way to the bartender.

  Seth slipped in between a couple and took the stools they’d vacated. He wiped off the one to his left with his sleeve. “There you go.”

  “Such a gentleman,” Marion said.

  “It had overpriced cocktail on it. Knowing you, those jeans are worth a few hundred dollars. Can’t get them wet.”

  He was rewarded with one of those dimpled smiles. “You’re still teasing me. Have you forgotten what a dreadful day I’m having?”

  “You don’t get out of anything that easily,” Seth said.

  “A demon has my memories in a jar. If that’s not an excuse for you to take it easy on me, then nothing is.” She perched on the stool, tucking her boots behind the footrest.

  “What can I get you guys?” the bartender asked. She was a busty vampire with a tiny waist and lips red as blood.

  Seth barely glanced at her. “Long Island Iced Tea for my friend. For me, whiskey straight up.”

  The bartender left to get their drinks.

  “Whiskey?” A smile flitted across Marion’s lips. “You’re having that kind of week too?”

  “That kind of lifetime,” Seth said.

  It only took a moment for the vampire to serve them. Seth paid and tipped her.

  Marion was giving him a funny smile when the bartender finally left.

  “What?” he asked.

  “Most women who see you are immensely attracted to you. She was no exception.”

  Seth hadn’t noticed. “So what?”

  “You aren’t attracted to her.”

  “You’re reading my mind?”

  “I often don’t need to. Some emotions are strong enough that I have no choice but to read them,” Marion said. “I’m gett
ing a lot of strong feelings from the men in the bar about the vampire. Some of the women are having strong feelings, too. Not you.”

  “Hate to repeat myself, but…so what?”

  She stared at his forehead as though trying to get into his brain. Her skin was tinted blue-green in the pixie light, making her eyes glow even more brightly. Her hair seemed black where it curled against her cheek. “I thought that you were going to leave for good. Why did you come back for me?”

  “I told you,” Seth said. “I need your help.”

  “The help you need resembles helping me rather strongly.”

  “Would it be a problem if that was the reason?” he asked.

  Marion bit the inside of her cheek. She sipped her Long Island Tea, but he thought she was hiding a smile. “Rylie said that you and I don’t have a history. We’ve never met.”

  “Nope. That’s what I told you before, wasn’t it?”

  “It destroyed my theory as to why we have a connection,” Marion said. “I’ve formulated a new one about you. Would you like to hear it?”

  “I’m not sure I do,” Seth said.

  “You’re a hero, and I need help, and you’re incapable of going about your business until you’ve saved me.” She’d stopped smiling by the time she finished speaking.

  Seth took a long drink of whiskey. It was much more tolerable than the wine from her house.

  “I voted to give the Winter Court to the angels,” Marion said suddenly.

  He swirled the whiskey in his glass. The ice glittered like gemstones. “That’s not what the gods told you to do.”

  “Where are they?” she asked softly, quietly enough that nobody else in the bar would be able to hear. “How much can they care if they’ve left me like…this? They deserve no better than my defiance.”

  “You’re probably the only person who could get away with trying to piss them off like that. Elise never let anyone else get away with anything, aside from her husband, whom she let get away with everything.”

  “You didn’t like them.”

  “It’s complicated,” Seth said.

  “That seems to be your favorite word for the gods.”

  It was the only word he could use.

  “It’s not about thumbing my nose at them,” Marion said. “There are people suffering in the aftermath of the civil war between sidhe. Survivors. If we can appease the angels, thereby preventing further fighting, I’ll be able to keep the refugees safe. Yet almost everyone voted against me in the United Nations.”

  “You’re steward of the Winter Court now,” Seth said. “You don’t need UN permission to give Niflheimr to the angels.”

  “But then I don’t have backing from the other preternatural factions. Where do I put the refugees if nobody will help me? They’re all afraid of defying the gods.”

  “Konig won’t take them?” Seth asked.

  “He hasn’t offered. I assume he would if he could. Regardless, this is all academic. I can’t make a deal with the angels if Leliel won’t meet with me.” She propped her forehead on the heel of her hand, glaring into the dregs of her Long Island Iced Tea. “There are so many nuances to pleasing all of the factions, protecting the refugees, and preventing war.”

  “You can handle it.”

  “That’s what people keep telling me.” She tipped her head to gaze up at him. A curl tumbled over the bridge of her nose. “What would you do?”

  He rubbed a hand over his upper lip. “I’d take it sideways. Figure out what Leliel wants. Find her weaknesses. What do you know about her and her allies?”

  “She had Oliver Machado,” Marion said.

  “I’m not sure he was directly involved with the angels.” Not that they could ask, since Charity had ripped his head off. “That doesn’t mean they aren’t linked. Like you said—nuances. What connected Ollie to the angels?” Seth snagged a dry napkin. “Got a pen?”

  Marion gave one to him. Like everything else she owned, it was an expensive brand, made of silver and platinum, with a nib that made it look like a quill.

  Seth wrote Ollie’s name in one corner and “the angels” in the other. The Autumn Court went in between them.

  He drew a line between the angels and the court. “We know these two have an alliance. Right? Oliver was a triadist, and the church has friends among the Winter Court.” He added those to his diagram. “What else?”

  “The only connection there is between the Autumn and Winter Courts. They’re both unseelie. But Konig said that they went to the grave hating each other.”

  “What could motivate collusion then? Money? Everyone likes money,” Seth said, drumming the end of the pen on the bar. “Or it could be something like revenge.”

  “Or love.” Marion was watching Seth even as she continued stirring her remaining ice in ongoing loops. “Nothing motivates people to commit more evil than love.”

  “That’s funny coming from you. You’re the one who said love and loss are integral to the human experience. I’d think you were more sentimental about it.”

  “I’m having quite the week,” she said softly.

  The conversation clearly wasn’t improving anything. He hadn’t taken her out for drinks to make her more miserable.

  Seth stuffed the napkin in his pocket. “Hopefully Dana McIntyre finds something. Help us draw a few more lines.”

  “I don’t see how it will help me with the angels.”

  “Nuances,” he said again. “The angels, they’re shameless. They won’t care what we find about them. They won’t care if we know what they’re doing or why. If they’ve got friends supporting them, though… They might care more about their reputations. If we remove the angels’ support, we mitigate the amount of trouble they make. Rather than appeasing or fighting the angels, you can cripple them.”

  “Take it sideways,” Marion mused. “That sounds like the subtle tactics I used, back when I was still myself.”

  “You are yourself,” Seth said. “Everything you are right now, this is you.”

  “Is it?”

  Her hand was resting on the table between them. Seth thought about taking it. Offering comfort.

  Her pulse was fluttering in her wrist.

  Seth finished his whiskey and set the glass down hard. “Wherever this goes, whatever rabbit holes we end up diving down in the investigation… Don’t give the Winter Court to the angels. Appeasement never stops the greedy. They just take and take and keep on taking.”

  “I appreciate the advice. However, speaking of Niflheimr—duty calls. I have to go back for at least a few minutes to sort things out.” Marion pushed the rest of her drink away.

  Seth stood when she did. “I can take you.”

  “That won’t be necessary.” She took a small white statuette from her pocket. It looked like a key made of marble. “This gets me in touch with Nori. She’ll pick me up.” Marion gave a small smile. “It doesn’t make me sick when she pulls me between planes.”

  Seth understood. He had things to do anyway—things with Charity that he needed to address before they could journey to Sheol. “I’ll go to Sheol soon. I’ll get your memories back from Arawn. I promise.”

  Her eyes widened with alarm. She reached for his hand. “You’re going to get my memories? But Seth—”

  He vanished from the bar before she could finish.

  7

  Marion returned to a Niflheimr that had been changed. Someone had activated the wards on the exterior of the castle, making the interior temperature a balmy five degrees Celsius. She was still chilly in the clothes she’d been wearing in Las Vegas, but not so chilly that she ran for the furs.

  Better still, Konig’s knights had rearranged the inner courtyard to serve as a refugee camp. There were more than enough bedrooms in Niflheimr to give one to each family, but they were in various states of disrepair; each room would need to be inspected before moving anyone in.

  For now, everyone had beds and tents in the cavernous courtyard, and it was so populous that it was st
arting to look like a village.

  “How wonderful!” Marion said, unable to keep from beaming at the sight of it. “This is much better.”

  “Thanks,” Nori said. “Uh, not that I had much to do with it. It was the knights, mostly.”

  Marion leaped back when a gaggle of sidhe children ran past, nearly knocking her over. Ymir tagged along at the back of the crowd, along with Cyprian and his daughters. It was funny to see the boy—the supposed frost giant—playing with two little unseelie girls. Marion almost believed he would one day grow into a giant by the clumsy way he chased after them. His hands and feet were so big for his body that he kept tumbling all over himself.

  He wasn’t laughing, but there was a little bit of a smile lingering around his haunted eyes.

  “We’ll need to get everyone into private rooms as quickly as possible,” Marion said. “On that note, have you prepared my bedroom?”

  “Yes, of course. I’ve moved the clothes from your second walk-in closet in your Earth home, as well as your bow and quiver, as you asked,” Nori said.

  The bow and quiver were the entire reason that Marion had decided to return to Niflheimr. “Excellent. Thank you again.”

  Marion headed for the hallway that led toward the rooms.

  “There you are, princess.” Konig swept out of the door before she could reach it, followed closely by a pair of his knights. Konig’s violet eyes were usually warm with a mixture of love and lust when he looked at Marion. But right now he was all business. “Where have you been?”

  “I’ve gotten a lead on restoring my memories. I had to follow through.” Marion kissed him in greeting, as the sidhe usually did, and clutched both of his hands.

  “What did you find?” Konig asked.

  She shrugged. “Not the memories—yet. But I’ve a better idea of where to look for them. Have you ever heard of an infernal artifact called the Canope?”

  “Never. I can ask my parents to look into it.”

  “No need. We’ve already found that it’s been bought by a Lord of Sheol. How or why it happened, we really don’t know, but—”