I pulled her against me, brushing her hair out of her face. “One of your princesses?”
She pounded her fists against me. “Like you didn’t know!”
I didn’t. I should have checked. The way she loved, that was her greatest vulnerability I needed to protect her from. “I’m sorry.”
“Sorry?”
My skin buzzed where I touched her skin then she melted into shadows and ashes before she reformed, solid, warm and broken in my arms.
She sobbed against my chest while I held her. I ached with my own anger and helplessness.
“Why won’t you heal them?” Her voice was broken, defeated.
“Because I’m a heartless mage and humans mean nothing to me.”
She flinched away from me, staring at me with enormous eyes bright with tears. “You saved them,” she gestured at the very still former inhabitants of Darkside.
“They save themselves. Ask them what happens when you use magic on a human, particularly a child. Ask them what kind of a mage does that. I’ll be in the car when you’re finished.”
I turned and left her with them. Maybe she’d ask Carl to bring the child back to life. Maybe she’d get Missy to blackmail someone to heal the rest of her princesses and keep them away from death. There were so many things worse than death, particularly a nice human death with their bright souls wending towards heaven.
Heaven. My heaven was Penny Lane, and she was also my hell. Holding her while she wept, helpless to stop her pain, that was hell. Hale. I ran a hand through my hair with claws. Ow. How idiotic would it be for me to go visit the Sorcerer and his nice human wife? I curled and uncurled my hand, piercing my flesh with my claws. It would be rude to disappear before Zach’s bachelor party. I leaned against the car, pulled out my phone and started texting like anything in the world mattered.
Chapter 24
Witch
I stood there sobbing until Carl took my hand and carefully led me over to the couch.
“Missy, get Penny a blanket.”
I sobbed harder when Missy carefully put the soft fluffy throw over my shoulders.
“He’s right.” Her soft voice pierced my pain while she put her arm over my shoulders. “You can’t heal humans with magic. It never works right. The only sure way to continue their lives is to feed them Darksider flesh, and even then, it kills some humans, the delicate ones, the sickly ones.”
She called humans ‘they.’ I looked up at her and noticed the human Necromancer behind her, his face expressionless, but eyes reflecting my pain.
“I know. I needed to yell at someone, but he left me.” I put my head down on my knees and cried harder. Why had he left me? How interesting could it be to watch me be sad? Poppy hated it when I cried. She wanted me angry, Pitchy.
I tried to pull myself together, but I couldn’t seem to stop crying. I was marrying Zach on Friday. Three days. I couldn’t do anything else to protect Drake. If I had my magic, horrible deception magic like my father had, maybe I could do something else. Sudden rage had my skin coming apart into ashes before the grief brought me back together.
“What can we do for you?” Carl’s voice was very calm, very soothing, very much like someone who could face madness and desperation with a smile.
I grabbed his hand and gripped it. I blinked at him, trying to stop the stupid tears. My chest hurt and my eyes ached. “How can I defeat my father when he has all of my magic, when he gave me a curse that immobilizes me and my mother?”
“What kind of sorcerer?” That was Missy.
I shrugged. “I don’t know. Benjamin Sooth.”
“Deception sorcerer,” they said in unison.
“You know him?”
Missy gave me a sharp smile. “Narcollo finds for all the worst mages. When are you marrying your tech mage?”
My lips trembled. “Friday.”
“Did he write a good contract?”
I shrugged. “I wrote it. My grandmother checked it.”
“Your grandmother knows something about contracts?”
“Penelope Rose, have you heard of her, too?”
Missy and Carl exchanged glances then Carl smiled at me and patted my head. “She cared a great deal for humans. Yes, we have heard of her.”
Missy sighed before she leaned on her elbows, chin on her fist. “I met her once or twice. Like Sooth.”
“You’ve met my father? Did he hurt you?”
She looked surprised. “Of course not. I mean nothing to him.”
I frowned at her. “He doesn’t hurt everyone?”
“Why would he?” the Necromancer’s pet asked. “It takes effort to harm. Effort indicates interest. Interest indicates emotional attachment.”
“So everyone in Darkside isn’t a raving psychopath? Maybe just my friends.”
“Who are your friends?” Missy sounded so interested as she handed me a tissue.
I blew my nose. Maybe they were just trying to get me to talk so I would stop crying. It was working. “Signore Ludi, the Ruby? Some kind of assassin who ate his brother’s heart in front of me, and then Narcollo are the only Darksiders I know. Unless you count the Devil of Darkside? Have you met him too?”
Missy shuddered. “You know the Devil and the Prince of Darkness?” She stared at me like I’d grown an extra head.
I shrugged. “Signore is my best friend. The Devil is my grandfather. The contract he showed me didn’t help much. Too bad. I paid a lot for it.”
Missy made a sound while she frowned in deep concentration. “I think I need to see Narcollo.”
“Why?”
She looked at me with that one solemn gray eye. “I think he should be my date for the wedding. Aren’t we invited?”
I stared at her then glanced at Carl. “I guess. Do you need a date for a wedding? That seems illogical.”
“Missy would like to date her sorcerer.”
“Mage,” Missy corrected.
Carl sniffed. “If you insist.”
It sounded like an argument they’d had before. “Missy, I think you should stay away from Narcollo. He’s dangerous.”
She laughed, a sound like silver as she patted my knee. “What shall I wear? I ordered clothes online. The mage gives us an allowance to spend. Such a strange mage.”
“The mage. Drake?”
She smiled and smoothed my hair. “You should go see him. You hurt his heart.”
I winced and stood up. “Right. I’m sorry I did this whole thing.” I gestured at my swollen, stuffy nose.
Missy gripped my hand. “I’m human. I don’t mind sadness.”
Carl gripped my other hand and sighed. “Sadness helps us move from one emotional state to another. Mages, witches, they struggle to change, to grow emotionally or psychologically. They don’t understand grief, but we do. So much grief.”
For a moment I tried to smile but the memory of Hannah’s empty bed made me curl up sobbing like I was going to shatter.
Their arms came around me, warmth, empathy, sharing my grief like that would make it lighter. Strangely enough, it did. After a little while I hugged them back, blew my nose again then started on my way down the hall. I wandered around until I found a back door outside then stopped suddenly as a man in a black suit materialized out of nowhere.
Was he TMD?
He stared at me while I stared at him. Finally, he smiled. He was not accustomed to smiling. “You’re behind the hospital. You should go in and come out another exit. I’ll show you.”
He held the door open for me, and since he wasn’t talking me into leaving, I went inside. We walked a maze of corridors until he pushed open a door that came out in the parking lot I recognized. I thanked him then crossed the pavement towards the green SUV and the russet wolf that leaned against it. He watched me come, eyes glinting, mouth curled in a cold smile.
I wanted to walk into him, press my face against his chest and listen to his heart beat. Instead, I gave him a shaky smile.
“So, Szechuan chicken?”
&n
bsp; He shook his head. “I need to get back.”
I nodded and took a step away from him before I spun around and punched him in the stomach. He oomphed then grabbed my wrists and shoved me against the car, eyes burning into me while I glared at him.
“Miss Lane, it’s not considered a good policy to attack a mage.” His voice was barely controlled but still silky smooth.
“I have a policy to never have good policies.” I tried to lunge towards him but he only gripped me harder and leaned his body against mine, holding me in place.
His skin was hot, smoldering beneath his clothes. Smoke curled from his mouth before he pressed his lips together. He stepped away from me, folding his arms and staring at the gray sky instead of me.
I thumped my fists on his chest. He ignored me.
“I love you,” I hissed.
That got his attention, but only for a moment. He shrugged and glanced away.
“I loved her.” My voice was creaky and he closed his eyes for a long time before he reached out and pulled me into his arms.
He pressed his lips against my head while I clung to him. I kept my eyes wide open, staring at his shoulder. Three days. If only I could hold onto that moment forever.
So, how did I end up sitting at a bar between Wit and Viney? The bartender glanced at my escorts and flicked his eyebrows a little bit. He didn’t know either.
So there I sat at a bar between Viney and Wit. Trying not to think about sitting in a bar between Viney and Wit.
“Ginger ale, please,” I told Larry the human Drake had rehabilitated, looking up at him beneath my eyelashes. He was kind of cute, kind of ugly. I probably couldn’t really tell the difference. “Viney, do you think that Drake is pretty?”
She snorted. “Stupid question.” She elbowed me in my missing ribs. She seemed to have an instinctive knowledge of my weakness.
“But is he as pretty as Teddy? What about Ian? And Oscar? I can’t tell. They all look the same to me except different.”
Wit laughed her, ‘oh, Penny is so stupid and we’ll have to humor her because we can’t kill her,’ laugh. “Ian is by far the most aesthetically pleasing with perfect proportions and exquisite physical form.”
Viney shook her head. “Oscar has the best physical form I’ve ever seen. And his black hair, white skin, he’s more interesting with the high contrast that Ian lacks. He’s all gold, gold, gold, and while he’s good at what he is, it’s boring.”
Wit lifted her lips in a snarl. “I suppose if you like the Blackheart type, you’d prefer Oscar, but in that case Teddy is ridiculously beautiful. I could never be with a man more beautiful than me.”
I shook my head while I stared at Wit. “No one is more beautiful than you with your perfect skin, peacock blue eyes, and black hair. It’s not possible.”
Viney elbowed me again. Seriously. “You sound like you’re hitting on her. She’s not that pretty.”
“She is. I mean, those eyes and that hair? She definitely has the best hair I’ve ever seen. Probably your body is better, and maybe my legs, but for the face and hair, she’s definitely the prettiest.”
Wit frowned at me, confused. “So if we were all chopped up and put back together, your legs, Viney’s body, my head, we’d make the perfect woman?”
I giggled. “That would look terrible. So you guys think that Ian and Oscar are more handsome than Drake?”
They both shifted uncomfortably. Viney grabbed her drink and threw it back before she slammed the glass on the bar. “You’re marrying Zach, not Drake. They probably all wear illusions so it’s hard to really know.”
“Ian’s the real thing,” Wit said, prettily, her mouth curving into a wicked smile.
Viney rolled her eyes and sneered past me at Wit. “I know. I’ve seen as much of Ian as the rest of the Rosewood girls have.”
Wit snarled at Viney, her hand clenched around her glass like she was going to shatter it.
I thought I saw the glass crack and put a hand on Wit’s shoulder. “You sound a little bit intense about Ian. Are you guys dating?”
She stared at me with her peacock eyes that seemed to glow before she relaxed her grip on the glass. “Ian doesn’t date. He should have seduced you by now. Maybe he doesn’t think you’re worth the effort. Your legs may be long, but the rest of you is barely passable.”
I felt a wave of humiliation I hadn’t felt for a long time. No one had picked on me for ages. Weird.
Viney made a rude sound and waved at the bartender who hadn’t filled her drink fast enough. “Right, like we didn’t all see the Darkly Sweet ads where Penny looked like a freaking supermodel with Drake eating out of her hand. Yeah, she’s like hideous. All those strawberry blond curls down to her knees, enormous eyes, perfect mouth and incredibly long legs. So gross! Maybe she’s not stacked, but she’d look weird with breasts.”
She gave me a look and I choked on the ginger ale I was drinking. I hadn’t hung out with Viney for too long. I didn’t quite feel the same way about Wit for some reason.
This was my bachelorette party. We were supposed to come here to meet up with all the girls who were invited. Waiting for them was making my skin itch. Maybe that was Witley.
Rhoda showed up in her hot pink unicorn t-shirt. Nine of my other Chem girls flanked her. They were like a gang. Somehow, they didn’t feel like my gang.
Missy came in, slipping through the witches like a shadow. She put her hand on my shoulder and smiled at me.
“Missy, you came.”
She shrugged and ignored the looks Viney and the rest of the witches were giving her. It was easy to see that she was a morsel, a Darksider’s slave. “I’d like a ginger ale,” she told Larry.
He gave her a warm smile and poured her a drink.
“Who’s she?” Viney asked in a low voice that Missy could probably still hear.
“I’m one of her pets,” Missy said with a sweet smile. “I bite very hard so don’t pet me.”
Viney shot her a weird look then leaned closer to me. “Seriously, who is she?”
“We go to church together,” I said lamely. Drake didn’t talk about his humans. Maybe I shouldn’t have invited Missy, but she acted strangely comfortable around the Rosewood girls. She didn’t seem even slightly intimidated by them.
Missy finished her ginger ale in one swallow, slammed the glass down then grabbed my arm and pulled me upright. “Let’s dance.”
Okay then. She led me upstairs while the rest of the witches followed with narrowed eyes.
“Missy, are you okay?” I whispered.
She glanced at me and gave me a sweet smile while her eye twinkled. “Dayside witches are so sweet.”
“Are they?”
We got to the top of the steps and there was Pete, wearing a top hat with Professor Cadaver on the brim. I gasped and covered my mouth with my fingers because I’d missed him so much. I forgot about Missy as I went to Pete and held out my hands for my sweet little darling. Professor Cadaver stood on his hind legs, tipped his hat and then threw it at me.
I laughed as I caught it, and then Pete gave me his arm and led me through the doors into the dance hall. Not the dance hall. It was a carnival. A misty sky filled with stars rose above us and dark tents were in the clearing in the woods. It smelled like sausages and pizza.
The music started, strings and rumbling thunder like one of Drake’s tourneys. Missy and Pete were my escorts, leading me from one ride and game to another. I ate cotton candy and roasted sausages until I was sick, and I won an enormous pink cow stuffed animal from throwing darts at balloons.
I rode on the Ferris wheel with Missy. She clung to my hand while fireworks lit the sky above us.
“This is magic. The mage was right.”
I stared at her. “The mage? Pete?”
She gave me a slight smile. “Your mage heard that you were going to have a stripper. I don’t think he liked that idea.”
“I didn’t like it either. This is better. You mean Drake…”
She
nodded and stared out over the trees at the explosions of gold and green. “He knows the kind of magic you like. Why aren’t you marrying him?”
“He left me at the altar.”
“Why?”
I hesitated. “I think that my father did something to him, destroyed his business, and other stuff I don’t know. Drake doesn’t talk to me about it. Otherwise, he really does hate me because I have no magic.”
She tightened her three fingers on my hand. “Everything about you is magic. You’re made out of magic even if you don’t have any extra. He can see that.” Her eye shone brightly and she bit her bottom lip. “Narcollo is my magic. Have you sent an invitation to him yet?”
“For the wedding? I’m not sure, I mean, it’ll be at church.”
She sighed. “Oh.”
“I’ll send a message tonight. Ian owes me. Are you sure you want him? He’s so…”
She gave me a half smile. “Are you worried that he won’t fight for you if there’s an attack? If I’m there, he will.”
“You seem so certain of someone who ate your eye.”
She pursed her lips. “I don’t mind so much.”
“You should.”
“I spent too long in Darkside to ever be an ordinary human. I’m tied to him. I don’t feel alive without him. Maybe you understand. You must wish I was the mage instead of me.”
I leaned back and banged my head on the bar behind us. “Yeah. This is pretty romantic for friends. It makes me want to do something a little bit stupid.”
I stood up on my seat, kicked off my flats and reached up to pull myself onto the metal bar. I swung, arm over arm, my legs dangling over the world until the cars rotated far enough I ended up on my knees as I rose into the sky.
As it tilted the other way, I slipped along the metal until a hand gripped mine and gravity shifted with it. Pete was doing magic tricks. He raised a hand and the music swelled around us, the song I was working on with Ian. I laughed as I slipped around him, under his arm and then stretching out before swinging out above the empty sky, wind rushing around me, only his hand in mine holding me onto that world. With a rush my feet once more found the spokes.
Deadly Morsel: Rosewood Academy of Witches and Mages (Darkly Sweet Book 5) Page 22