He looked at me, shaking his head. “I gave you your way on the hill and I can’t get this?”
“Let’s be honest about that—you were touch and go at best. You were a hair away from stepping in and trying to call the shots,” I said. He was going to play the hill card? That was hardly an earth-shattering compromise.
“But I didn’t.” He tilted his head, the way he did when he was convinced of his rightness.
“Is this really the time?” I asked, making a point of looking up ahead and smiling. If the hair on the back of my neck was accurate, it might be the only smiling that would happen for the rest of the night.
We walked the last bit in silence. It was better than yelling as we approached.
“Xazier,” I said.
“Tippi,” he replied, and then, with less enthusiasm, he added, “And Hawk.”
“I’m guessing you’ll realize there’s no further need for meetings.” Please, realize. I had no desire to fight with anyone tonight, least of all Xazier. All I wanted from him was his absence.
“Actually, no, I’m not quite clear on that at all.”
Could he not feel the difference? How was that possible? He had to know. He had too many spies that would’ve told him something had changed. There wasn’t a person in Xest who didn’t feel something, either good or bad, with Dread’s presence around, and now the lack of it.
“We handled the problem,” I said. “It’s over.”
Xazier squinted and then began to shake his head slowly. “No, I don’t think it is. There are a couple of issues with that interpretation of events. If you’ll allow me to expand?”
I didn’t answer. He was going to expand whether I wanted him to or not.
“Please do,” Hawk answered, his words polite but his tone lethal.
“You agreed to eliminate a problem. Well, the first issue with that is you didn’t actually do all of the eliminating, did you? It wasn’t your plan. That had all the hallmarks of Lou. He’s the only one who would’ve known how to utilize that hill.”
“She did it all, and there’s no changing that,” Hawk said.
Xazier put his hands up. “I’ll give you that point if you insist, but there is another problem that is still lingering. That is most likely only a temporary fix.”
“You don’t know that,” I said. No one did. Not even Lou.
“Oh. But I do, or Dread wouldn’t have happened in the first place.”
That was not good news, and not because he’d broken out of it once already. Dread had originated from the hill. It hadn’t only been a cage. It had been its birthplace. If our magic was so similar, what did that mean for me?
“You’re not taking over Xest, and you’re not taking her.” Hawk was bristling in a way I’d never experienced before. There was a strange feel to his energy, as if I were standing beside a bomb about to blow.
“I’ve decided to allow some leeway for partial progress.”
My heart was thumping. I wasn’t sure which was going to be worse: Xazier trying to take Xest or me, and then what would come next.
“I’ll just take you,” Xazier said, smiling.
“She offered up collateral that isn’t hers to give,” Hawk said. “She had a previous binding contract with me. You can’t have her. To be honest, I’m surprised you didn’t already sense it. Must be off your game.”
“You gave me a false pledge?” Xazier was darkening by the second. His eyes filled with awareness as the truth hit him.
“You’re never getting her,” Hawk said. He wanted the fight. Him holding back was the most surprising part. Was this sort of like Rest rules, where he wanted Xazier to swing first so he could kill him?
“He’s not getting her or Xest,” Lou said, appearing out of nowhere.
Great, the gang was all here. The only surprise was that I hadn’t expected it. Maybe we could have a little tea party next.
Lou closed the distance, looking unhappy with everyone but landing his primary focus on Xazier.
“You’ve overstepped, Xazier. Did you think you could do this under my nose? That I don’t have as many eyes and ears in this place as you do? Maybe more? You wouldn’t even exist if it weren’t for me. Xest is neutral territory. You can’t do anything without informing us. Those are the rules.”
Maybe the additional company wasn’t so bad. If Xazier was too busy fighting off Lou, there wouldn’t be much fight left for us.
“I know exactly who I am,” Xazier replied. “I think you holier-than-thou people might have overestimated your place.” He took a few steps toward me. Lou matched him step for step.
Hawk moved closer until his arm brushed mine, the violence vibrating in the air around him.
“What’s going on? What do you both want with me? Let’s cut the bull and put it all out there,” I said, fed up with all the games these people played. It was worse than recess at grammar school.
“Yes,” Hawk said. “Why don’t we all lay our cards on the table.”
Xazier looked at Lou. Lou looked back. I crossed my arms, biting the inside of my cheek so as not to rush them. This might be my only shot at getting some answers. I wouldn’t force it to an early conclusion that might end badly for me.
Hawk was still beside me. He tended to be more patient than I was, but my gut said this was killing him too.
Finally, Xazier shrugged, still looking at Lou. “I’ll tell if you do. Not sure there’s much harm after what happened yesterday anyway. Only a matter of time.”
The hill. Were we going to find out what the hill was? It might be bad news, and my breath faltered as I waited for Lou to respond. Good or bad, at least we’d know, and the answers seemed so close.
Lou took another second, playing hard to get. Being the angel of the two, it was a bit shocking that he seemed to be the bigger jerk. Nah, that wasn’t really fair. They both sucked equally.
Lou took a step away, crushing any hopes.
Then he stopped, back still to us. “Fine. Might as well.”
It was something. I’d be getting some kind of answers. One of the many knots I was tied up in came undone.
Lou turned and waved at Xazier. “Go ahead. Tell them.”
“You do it,” Xazier said.
Lou looked Xazier up and down, sighed, and shook his head. “Are there no depths to the levels I’m supposed to sink to in the name of good?”
“Oh, please. Like you’re good. We both know you aren’t. That’s why you have the job you have. If they didn’t need a necessary evil, you’d be rolling around in the muck with me every single day and lo-ving it.” Xazier leaned forward with a big smile on his face, as if he knew Lou better than he knew himself.
“Not true.” Lou looked away.
Not exactly a convincing argument.
When they both stopped talking, Hawk said, “Can we keep this meeting moving?”
“I always have to do the dirty work,” Xazier said.
Lou laughed. “Yes. And that’s fitting, don’t you think? Why break with what’s working?”
If these two started fighting, no one was ever going to tell us what was going on.
Xazier shook his head before looking at me and Hawk. Was he going to talk?
“This could take a while. I’d prefer somewhere warm and comfortable.” Xazier looked around at the harsh landscape I’d come to love.
Why did he even want this place—or did he?
“We can go back to the broker building,” Hawk said.
Xazier nodded, and then all four of us were in the back room. I wasn’t sure who had moved us here, but my coin was on Xazier.
The place was eerily quiet, but that would be Hawk’s doing. This was not a situation that needed any more company.
Xazier took a seat on one couch. I took a seat on the opposite one. Hawk remained standing beside my couch. Lou looked at Xazier’s couch and rolled his eyes, as if there were no way he’d sit anywhere near him. Lou took a step toward mine. Hawk shook his head.
“Fine,” Lou sai
d, taking a seat in a chair.
Xazier finally began. “A couple of hundred thousand years ago, give or take fifty, right around the time of…” He looked at me and shook his head. “Doesn’t matter. You weren’t around to know any of this. Point is, when you people, humans, started showing up and then talking, there became an increase in workload.
“All you people did was pray for things. Ask for things, barter, promise, blah, blah, blah. In the beginning, we tried to accommodate some of your wishes here and there, if it fit our purposes. But the load became tedious. That’s when Xest was formed. In essence, we needed to contract out some of the work. It was just too much—”
“And too tiring,” Lou said. “We had no time for fun anymore. You people just got needier and needier.”
Xazier nodded as the two found common ground on how irritating people were. “It was ridiculous, wasn’t it? And they wouldn’t stop breeding, either. How many do they really need to have? Take a breather.” He rolled his eyes. “We couldn’t take it anymore. We weren’t in the business of worrying about your everyday wishes and desires. You live your life, and after it’s done, we judge you for it. That’s the way we wanted it.”
Lou cleared his throat, turning to Xazier. “By the way, have you noticed how underrated judging is these days? Everyone wants to have their cake and eat it too. Are we supposed to let just anyone in?”
Xazier tilted his head back. “You don’t like that part? I find that the most entertaining. I love watching as I play back their greatest hits of sin. Best part of my day. I have specific orders that I’m to be alerted when someone really good, or bad if you want to look at it like that, is about to cross over.”
“I’m sure it’s wonderful. Can you get back on track?” I asked. Did witches have the same afterlife? Was I going to end up with one of these two ruling my ever after? Please let me have a different end, even if that was a hole buried in the ground. It might be preferable.
Xazier glanced back at me. “Oh, yes, sure. So we were getting killed by the workload, but neither of our bosses cared. After all, like most businesses, we ran most of the show and carried most of the weight. We decided to call a little meeting, where we agreed that some outsourcing needed to be done to dump some of the work, you know, all the I need and I want and I have to have. We agreed quickly, too, which nearly never happens, that something had to be done or our quality of life would continue to tank.”
Lou kicked his heels up on the coffee table and a brandy appeared in his hand. “We didn’t want it anymore. We’d put our dues in. It was time to relax a bit.”
Xazier pointed to Lou’s glass. “Is that the twenty-four?”
“Yes. Would you care for one?” Lou swirled his glass.
“Of course,” Xazier said.
“Anyone else?” Lou asked.
“No,” Hawk said.
“No, thanks.” Bibbi would kill me if I drank that. That might rank almost as bad as drinking Gillian’s cocoa.
A glass appeared in Xazier’s hand. He took a sip before he continued. “We had one issue. If you think of Xest like a business, it required some startup cash, so to speak. You needed some resources to get it going, which both sides were supposed to invest equally.” Xazier shot a look at Lou, and the apparent truce seemed on shaky ground again.
“I didn’t do more than I was supposed to. You did less than you were supposed to,” Lou said.
“We set an amount agreed upon. I did the right amount,” Xazier said.
“You can say that all you want, but why did our contribution seem heavier?” Lou argued.
“If you were so mad that mine was light, why did you care when I fixed it?” Xazier said.
Lou dropped his feet to the ground so he could lean toward Xazier, pointing. I wasn’t overly concerned. He wasn’t bothering to put his drink down, so he couldn’t be that mad.
“Because I had to add more after you did. You didn’t fix it. You weighted it, which made me have to add on, and you know that’s a problem.” Lou leaned back in his chair again with a huff.
“You wanted it that way so Xest always leaned a little bit to your side,” Xazier said, but the tension had already eased a bit.
It was hard to decide whether I wanted to keep letting the information flow as it was or ask for some explanations. I was getting the gist, but being sure would help out a lot, especially in wondering how I’d ended up with the same magic that was in that hill.
“Can you get back to the story?” Hawk asked, not having the same internal debate.
“I’d love to, but he just never lets it go. Centuries and I’m still hearing about this,” Xazier said.
“Gentleman, please,” I said, wishing I hadn’t declined the drink.
Hawk, who’d been on high alert, took a seat beside me on the couch, as this story was beginning to look like it would drag out.
“We both put in startup magic to get things going,” Xazier said.
“Were your bosses aware of what you were doing?” I asked.
“Of course they were. They know everything,” Lou said.
“But like we said, they don’t want to get involved in the nitty-gritty, everyday stuff so we might’ve glossed over a detail here and there.” Xazier shrugged and then took a large sip of his drink.
“Like how much startup we’d need,” Lou said, a little softer-spoken this time.
“And a couple other little details here and there. Nothing major, you see,” Xazier said.
“How did Dread happen?” I asked.
“On occasion, we both might’ve had to add a little more magic here and there, trying to fix the original imbalance that kept manifesting,” Lou said. “We think the imbalance created it, but we aren’t sure. Just as we aren’t sure how you came to be or how you have so much of the magic we used to start Xest.”
They stared at me, and the room went utterly silent. Was Hawk shocked too? I was afraid to look.
“I didn’t take magic out of that hill,” I said, finally finding my voice.
“But it happened, and we don’t know how to get it back there,” Xazier said.
That was why I was on that hill. It was all so clear now.
“You thought that the hill was going to suck me in too, like it did with Dread, or at least all my magic, didn’t you? That’s why you gave me that plan?”
“I take offense at that. I didn’t know what it would do.” Lou’s chin went up an inch.
Xazier snorted. “For an angel, you lie better than some of my coworkers. Just tell her. That’s exactly what you were trying to do. You figured you’d suck Dread back in the hill and it would take her with it, and the problem would go away.” He looked at me. “I have to say, it would’ve been the easiest solution, but it didn’t work. That in itself is very odd.”
“Very,” Lou added.
They were both staring at me.
“You’re not touching her,” Hawk growled.
“You mean kill her? I’m not sure we can,” Lou admitted.
“So now what?” I might have been holding my breath as I asked the million-dollar question.
“You have too much of our magic, and it doesn’t seem to want to go back where it belongs,” Lou said, shrugging. “We’ve got a problem.”
“A very big problem,” Xazier said.
Hawk stood. “And what exactly do you think you’re going to do about this problem?”
Xazier stood too. “That remains to be seen.” He looked at Lou.
Lou also stood. “We’ll be in touch.”
Lou and Xazier looked at each other before disappearing at the same time.
The room went quiet as I let it all settle in. I stood, wiped my hands on my pants, and walked to the counter. My hands were steady, my breathing even.
“Tippi?” Hawk called after me.
“Yes?”
“What are you doing?”
“Tea.” With the kettle in my hand, I’d thought it was pretty obvious.
“Are you all right?” he a
sked, walking over slowly as if a fast movement might startle me.
I poured a cup and took a couple of sips, trying to figure out the nicest way to explain it.
“I’ve had Marvin abduct me, immigration try to run me out, Raydam, Dread, and a horde of other witches try to kill me, and I’m still here. Let Lou and Xazier do their worst. I’m done running and I’m done being scared.”
Hawk got a gleam in his eye as he leaned closer. “You sure about that?” he asked, smiling.
“I think so,” I said, putting my tea down with a slight shake in my hand. “I’ve got some paperwork to do.”
I could hear him laughing from the back room.
Sign up here to be notified of new releases by Donna Augustine, including Tales of Xest #4.
http://www.donnaaugustine.com
Twitter
Facebook
Facebook Reader Group
Follow me on Bookbub
Acknowledgments
Each book has its own set of hurdles that are unique. Without this group, I’d never make it over the finish line!Donna Z., Lisa A, Camilla J., Lori H. and Ashleigh M., thank you for helping me overcome all the bumps, valleys and hills of this story.
Also by Donna Augustine
Ollie Wit
A Step into the Dark
Walking in the Dark
Kissed by the Dark
The Keepers
The Keepers
Keepers and Killers
Shattered
Redemption
Karma
Karma
Jinxed
Fated
Dead Ink
The Wilds
The Wilds
The Hunt
The Dead
The Magic
Born Wild (Wilds Spinoff)
Wild One
Savage One
Wyrd Blood
Wyrd Blood
Full Blood
The Most Wanted Witch: Tales of Xest Page 22