by Lan Chan
The reason I was upset in the first place let out a groan. My muscles relaxed a little. Before I could turn my head and see whether Andrei was alright, a stunning being in golden Fae armour appeared in front of me.
Uh oh. The last time I’d seen him, Angus had been a speck above the soul gate. My eyes cast downwards out of sheer disbelief that someone so graceful could tear into a demon with such vengeful hate.
“Sophie,” he said in that brooding voice that somehow managed to be lyrical at the same time. For sure he had been Fae royalty at one stage or another. Lex and I were certain of it. Though he fought with the battle-hardened conviction of a warrior, that kind of rage could only come from someone who had lost everything. Speaking of lost things, he held a blood blade up to my line of sight. “We’re going to need to talk about this.”
There was no need to respond. The shifter relinquished me into Angus’s jurisdiction. “Wait, what about Andrei?”
Though his hold was no less firm than that of the shifter, he didn’t stop me from turning. “He will be patched up.” How could such a plain sentence be filled with so much foreboding?
I wasn’t sure what Angus’s version of patched up meant, because when Andrei and I were marched before the Council, he was still limping. The cut on his brow wasn’t healed. By contrast, I’d been taken hostage by the Iron Court guards in a makeshift camp on the outskirts of the shifter tundra. While a pair of Fae guards made sure I didn’t try to escape, I’d been given a mug of ambrosia and a chocolate muffin.
“Do you feel like passing out?” the stunning blue-haired Fae medic asked me.
Shoving half the muffin top into my mouth, I shook my head.
“And your arms and legs seem attached.”
I couldn’t dispute that. She patted me on top of my head. It wasn’t until she held up a handful of red berries right up to my nose that I noticed what was happening. Pet. She thought of me as some kind of lower being like a pet. Grimacing, I swiped the dew berries from her hand and swallowed them whole. The sweet nectar slid down my throat and was the only reason why I didn’t say something snide.
Andrei looked like he could use a whole basketful of dew berries. Though I wasn’t sure the medicinal fruit from the Fae realm would have much effect on him. Still, he seemed to rally as we were deposited in front of the Council in one of the shifter conference rooms.
From what I’d heard, after Raphael lost consciousness, Seraphina had been annexed from the rest of supernatural society. Over half of the Nephilim resources were now directed to keeping him safe. That meant no more Council meetings in their chambers. In fact, it seemed to mean fewer Nephilim council members, period. Megan was the only one of the Nephilim present. I was glad of it. Only one missing Nephilim gave me pause.
I swallowed hard at the spot Kai would have occupied had he been here. Staring at the ground at their feet, I made myself take a sobering breath to stop from giving into fear. No matter how accomplished I got at summoning, no matter how long I sat there calling his name into the veil, he’d never turned up.
In his place was a woman with thin, birdlike features wearing a black cloak and a leather necklace adorned at even intervals with inch-long teeth. A sickly sweet but also bitter aftertaste filled my mouth the longer I looked at her. It was the same tell that they would scent on me at first sniff. Necromantic magic.
After what happened with Jonah, the elite guard had decreed that whichever mage was in charge of the Dominion Prison couldn’t also sit on the Council. Not that Basil had any interest in the latter. In response to my scrutiny, the sorceress raised her left hand to scratch at her ear. The gesture caused the sleeve of her cloak to fall loose, revealing a tattoo on her wrist. The number three inside a thorny pentagram. The symbol of the Dark Trinity, keepers of sinister magic. Suppressing a hiss, I turned my attention elsewhere.
Griff sat next to her but on the edge of his seat, as far away as possible. Though they possessed no high magic of their own, like their hides, the para-humans had iron-clad natural mental shields. It made them somewhat impervious to the suggestions of the malachim. In a role reversal that must have grated heavily on the other supernatural species, the para-humans were now some of the only guards effective at handling the protection of all their cities. Griff seemed to take no pleasure in it. His posture was weary with fatigue.
The room was filled to the brim with elite guards now. Out of the corner of my left eye, I saw Dorian leaning against the wall. As head of the Sentinels, the shifter arm of the elite guards, and a former Zambian wolf pack member, we had always shared a silent connection. Today, his eyes had glazed over when the Blonde Shifter, a leopard from what I’d seen, had shoved me into the room in front of her.
Beside me, Andrei was boring holes into Victoria Amos with his gaze. Ever since he’d found out that the Council had covered up what truly happened to his family, Andrei’s antagonism towards his great-aunt had ratcheted up a notch. Sometimes, when we were on a hunt together, I swear he muttered to himself in his sleep about murdering her.
Biting the inside of my cheek, I laced my hands behind my back and tried not to appear too interested in everything around me. That became impossible when the mating link became a taut grip around my heart. The door opened and Max stalked in from the adjoining rope ladder.
6
My mouth turned dry as I did everything I could not to directly glance at him. My gaze landed instead on the Blonde Shifter. The familiar appreciation in her greedy eyes sucked the wind from my lungs. Perhaps I hissed aloud because her head turned in my direction.
The smile she shot me was so full of malice, I broke eye contact immediately. Scraping my front teeth over my tongue, I sank into a silent, ten-second meditation. It was meant to snap me out of unpleasant emotions. Instead, what my mind did was throw me images of the blonde’s ample chest and legs that went up to her armpits. The breath in my lungs heated. What did you expect, Soph?
Max took his place where Durin would have once sat. Despite my better judgement, my attention flicked over him and hissed at where his hair had been cut much shorter than he usually wore it. I almost shattered the bones in my right hand to stop myself from reaching out as though to run my fingers through it.
Max’s head turned to the right as Orin Harcourt cleared his throat. The reason for the close-shaved hair slammed me in the chest. Earlier, I had been too far and he was too leonine for me to make out the necrotic scars of claw marks that now permanently decorated the left side of his face. All the way from the top of his ear to halfway down the back of his neck. The curved line of the scarring said that something, probably a malachim, had grabbed hold of him by the hair and perhaps almost won the fight.
For all of my determination not to give in to the mating link, I was so busy ogling that I didn’t even notice the person who followed Max into the room until the click of heels cut through the fog in my brain.
“Really, Jacqueline?” the Trinity sorceress smirked.
“Yes, Agatha. Really,” Jacqueline shot back as she circled the edge of the room and ended up leaning back on the top of a desk. No matter what room she occupied, Jacqueline had a way of commanding attention.
The thing was, she made no indication that she was here for me specifically. Or how she felt about me given the circumstances. I swallowed hard, reminding myself that I was a criminal in their eyes and that I shouldn’t expect sympathy.
Andrei groaned. “Can we get this over with? I’m getting sick of standing.”
“You don’t get to decide when you’re sick of anything,” Victoria admonished. Her tone was so chilly I felt goose bumps raise on my arms. The snort that came out of Andrei’s mouth was anything but affected.
“Guess again, you withered old hag. Unless you want the whole supernatural community to know what you did to my family–”
“Our family,” Victoria grated.
“My family,” Andrei pushed forward, “you gave up that right when you agreed to this farce.”
One
of these days, I wouldn’t be at all surprised if somebody shot Andrei a dirty look and he just dropped dead on the spot. The vehemence in Orin’s eyes when he spoke was nothing short of damning. “You dare threaten us?”
Andrei was unfazed. “I thought Fae had better hearing? Does it sound like I dare?”
Before Orin could continue their bickering, Angus threw out a hand and quieted him. That too seemed to incense Orin to the point where his face turned a shade of puce. I wondered which of the two of them had been higher ranking in the Fae dimension. It didn’t matter anymore, because Angus commanded the floor and there was no arguing with him when he took off his charming mask. I became the focus of absolute scrutiny.
“The blade,” Angus said. “Despite being under guard, it has disappeared.” Ah, that. Part of the hex on the blades required that they return to connect with my magic. If they were removed for too long, they broke down. Call it a supernatural burglar safety net. Good to know that it worked.
All eyes settled on me. Willing my face not to twitch, I picked a spot over Angus’s shoulder to stare at so I wouldn’t chicken out and clam up. It didn’t have anything to do with trying to avoid the gaze of a certain somebody at all.
The silence stretched out. Andrei opened his mouth. “Nobody asked you,” Ivan said before Andrei could say a word. He spoke anyway, as if Ivan wasn’t giving him a death glare.
“Nobody’s asking her either,” Andrei said.
Ivan’s left eye spasmed. “Somebody get him out.”
Instinct had me moving closer to Andrei. So close I almost stepped on his toes. The action was involuntary. I had to believe the same explanation when Andrei’s arm settled over my shoulder. We’d spent so long watching each other’s backs that separation was out of the question. It wasn’t because I liked him or anything. Surely not!
Everywhere around the room, quivering lips peeled back over teeth gone shifter sharp. I totally understood. A year ago, if somebody had told me Andrei Popescu would be the person I trusted most in a room chock full of shifters, I would have laughed myself to death. Victoria smacked her cane into the legs of the table. “Is she under your compulsion?”
I glanced at Andrei out of the corner of my eye. The amused look he gave me made me smile for some reason. It was a bit rich to accuse Andrei of compelling me when the reason I was in this situation was because they had given an order to wipe my mind in the first place.
Angus must have realised that because he pressed forward. “The blade, Sophie. That kind of advanced blood magic could only have been performed by a high mage or sorceress. You must know why we’re concerned.”
For the first time, I turned my attention to him. “I know exactly why you’re concerned. You should be.”
Over the top of the general muttering that erupted in the room, a high-pitched cackle soared. Agatha coughed to contain her mirth. “I’m going to assume it was Basil Dumont’s handiwork. Not bad for a lowbrow First Order mage. It’s almost a shame he absconded.”
I smiled sweetly back at her, lifting my chin in answer to her indirect question. Yes, I knew where he was. No, I would not be telling them. Not now. Not ever. As soon as he caught wind of what the Council intended, Basil had grabbed Betty and disappeared. She’d spent years in the thrall of a demon who warped her mind. He wouldn’t allow her to be tampered with again. He’d have taken my parents too if they weren’t already in Council custody. That, of course, left the Dominion in a big pile of shit. From what I’d heard, they’d had to pull Professor Mortimer from Bloodline to look after it temporarily. I’d have liked to report back that Basil gave a damn, but I wasn’t particularly fond of lying.
When she saw that I wasn’t going to budge, Agatha’s mouth stretched into a wide smile. “The blade allows you to strike the malachim and hold them in this dimension.” A statement. “Pardon my ignorance but your kitchen magic doesn’t encompass that kind of skill and your alchemy, though strong, shouldn’t be able to do it either. So the question is…what have you been doing to harness that kind of power?”
More than one pair of eyes in the room narrowed. The Blonde Shifter’s blue eyes became flecked with yellow.
“What do you think I’ve been doing?”
Andrei tapped my shoulder lightly. I stepped on his foot for real. If they wanted to believe the worst of me, I wasn’t going to correct them. At this point, it wasn’t even worth it.
“I don’t think you quite grasp the enormity of what you’re doing,” Orin said, his knuckles turning blue as he gripped the edge of the table.
I tapped at the side of my nose. “I think the gist of it is that your community is grappling with an extinction event and you’re terrified and looking for a scapegoat.”
“Our community?” Megan raised a brow. “Last time I checked, you’ve spent your whole life as part of our community.”
I matched her tone. “Yes, your community. I’ve been a prisoner in a shifter compound and then an outcast and now a fugitive. I belong with the humans. Lex saved us, remember? If I wanted to, I could teleport back to the human population and live out my life under the guise of Lucifer’s promise.”
“Then why haven’t you?”
Crossing my arms, I tried to mimic the incredulous looks they gave me. “Maybe I enjoy messing with supernaturals. After all, it only seems fair.”
“So, you admit to following your great-grandfather’s footsteps?” Agatha asked. A shadow crawled over her features like a shroud that sucked in all light. Brimstone and metal hit the back of my throat again. Something ominous dragged a chill finger down my spine. Despair snagged at my gut for a moment before something Professor Suleiman had taught me in Magic Resistance kicked in.
Roses, I thought. Coconut and lime ice cream on a hot day. Marshmallows on top of a steaming mug of hot chocolate. The funny stink from the billabong that we put up with because the bunyip needed it and the yowies were cute. That second before Lex and I burst out laughing when we couldn’t contain our mirth any longer. The crinkling of light grey eyes when they caught me staring and my face burned from a blush.
The pink of my blood alchemy flared, scraping away the traces of black that had tried to infiltrate my thoughts. Bit by bit, the sludge of misery Agatha had tried to instil in my brain dissipated. I took in a shuddering breath and shot her a filthy look. “Stay out of my head!”
There wasn’t even a hint of apology in her contemplative smile. “Very good. There are some high-magic mages who would have found that exhausting.”
“I don’t think we’re here to test dangerous hypotheses on Sophie,” Jacqueline said.
Agatha’s lips pursed. “If you had done your job properly, there wouldn’t have been two low-magic witches with questionable powers at large.”
“Or,” Jacqueline countered, “I’ve done my job perfectly well and that’s why we have two low-magic witches at large and not a population of dead or enslaved supernaturals.”
“Tell that to your grandson.”
Jacqueline didn’t have time to lose her temper because Max’s arm snaked out and cinched around Agatha’s throat.
“What have I said about running your mouth off?” Max said. Were it not for the claustrophobic dominance radiating off him, you wouldn’t be able to tell that he’d just lost his temper. Aside from where the veins popped in his arm as he gripped Agatha’s throat, everything else about him was bland. Like he would think nothing of crushing her skull and then going back to reading boring duty reports in the same breath.
“Maximus...” Griff started to say. A swirl of indigo purple threaded with brown streaks whipped about Agatha’s fingers. It formed a dense cloud that shrouded her in mist. Everyone on the Council table pushed their seats backwards as Max raised himself to his feet, hauling Agatha up with him. She was tall, maybe five-foot-ten, but compared to his six-foot-four, her feet were dangling in no time.
White lines bracketed Agatha’s mouth where she was having trouble sucking in a breath. It didn’t lessen the disdain in her voice
a fraction. “My, my,” she hacked. “Did I poke the beast? Well, in for a penny...”
Max’s lips pulled into a vicious grin. “Go ahead. See how far your little spell gets–”
Agatha balled her fist, and a fireball of volatile high magic came hurtling towards me. Max snarled and tossed her sideways. She shot out of eyeline. I heard a bang and thought she had probably hit the wall. He made to pounce over the table when I shouted, “Don’t!” He paused, every muscle in his body straining.
One of my simple protection circles would have been like tissue paper against a fireball. Throwing up my hands, alchemic magic shot from my palms, turning the circle into a red infused barrier that ate up the high-magic as it connected. My stomach lurched as my magic began to transmute the core of Agatha’s intent. It was laced with amusement and experimentation. She’d known that I would counteract her powers with my own. She was testing me. Bit by bit, I dispersed the high magic and turned it into steam. It boiled and bubbled, but in the end, all it did was fog up the windows and make my sleeves damp.
“Well, well,” Agatha said, coming back into view. She straightened the pointed teeth on her necklace. “You’ve learned a lot while you were away.” She cast Jacqueline a long stare. “And a great deal more useful lessons than the drivel they fill your heads with at Bloodline.”
Jacqueline simply rolled her eyes. Max’s top lip curled as she sat back down in her chair. She gave him a serpentine smile, lines cracking around her mouth that said she was probably a lot older than she appeared.
“And you’ve done so well until now, boy king,” Agatha taunted. “I suppose the beast females can stop following you around like bitches in heat now.”
“What the hell did you say?” the Blonde Shifter snapped. She took a single step forward before Dorian caught hold of her. For some reason, instead of directing her antagonism towards Agatha, Blonde Shifter threw me a withering death glare.
“Her gift needs to be cultivated,” Agatha announced, dismissing the shifters completely. “That kind of power against the malachim cannot be wasted.”