The Wayward Deed (Vacancy Book 2)

by A. K. Caggiano

  Lorelei shrugged. “It’s probably because you never use contractions.”

  Lorelei thought on their conversation all day, the idea finally coming to her in the late afternoon. She told Aly to keep Mr. Ecknees company, and took herself across the long yard of Moonlit Shores Manor once again until she was standing outside the Rognvaldson house, this time alone.

  She looked up at the house’s face, a chill biting at her, but she flexed her fingers after pulling off her gloves and settled down onto the ground with her sketchpad. It did not come out perfect on that trip, so the next day she tried again, changing her spot, waited for different lighting on the third day, brought pastels and a canvas with her on the fourth, and nearing the end of the week and cutting it quite close to Christmas itself, she decided she had nearly gotten all of it right, the real parts and the imagined ones too.

  She decided she could finish the piece in her room when she finally got it close to correct, so she slipped her things back into her bag and stood on that last day, but this time she did not return to the manor with the same quickness as every day before. She wanted to be away from the empty house that harbored memories of near-death, but knowing she wouldn’t be back tomorrow gave her pause.

  Lorelei wandered up between the overgrown brambles of the dead garden, only one plant left alive. It smelled woody like cedar, but sweet like vanilla, just like those enchanted component coins Byron had given her and Grier at the harvest festival, and in a second she was taken back to the scry Bridgette had done for her and the haunted way Conrad had looked during it.

  She turned away from the herb to the porch. A breeze blew across it and swept her hair into her face, but she was able to see through the strands that the door was not completely latched. It creaked open. Without thinking, she was headed up the steps and pushing it, afternoon sunlight flooding in behind her and lighting the entry, the narrow hall beside the stairs, and all the way to the back door. She stood on the threshold, seeing herself take that long walk with a stake at her throat all over again, and then stepped inside.

  Conrad’s satchel and his things were still scattered on the floor, broken shards of glass catching the light, but not everything was damaged. She collected his bag and began to pick up what was salvageable, including both pieces of a long, tapered candle, a drawstring bag of stones, a tin of candy, and a glass jar that had survived the fall with something dried and leafy inside. She collected the bits of broken glass too, and placed them carefully on a side table.

  The light from the front door reflected off something on the landing above, and she remembered how his bag had hit just about everything it could on its way down when Byron threw it over the railing, so she took a breath and climbed the stairs to find a metal tool of some sort that had clearly been Conrad’s, placing it in the satchel too.

  On the landing, she looked back down and then up. It was darker upstairs where the bedrooms were, but not as dark as it had been that night. She shivered, even without the winter breeze, but she had to go up there if she was going to get the last thing she wanted.

  Lorelei climbed the stairs far from silently, each footstep louder than the last. If anyone was in there—and there wasn’t, she told herself, because that was impossible—they were going to know she was there too. This also let magic know she was coming, which, frankly, was never a bad thing.

  She came to the second floor, light from the window at the hall’s end enough to find both bedroom doors. She went to the one she knew was Conrad’s and swept her eyes over it quickly, grabbing the plastic dinosaurs from the shelf beside the door. Into the bag they went, easy enough, and she was free to go.

  Lorelei turned for the stairs, but across from her stood Byron’s door, half open, darkness beyond it. Everything in her body wanted her to back up and away from the room even as she had to go toward it to get to the stairs, but then she was passing the stairs and standing right there, a hand pushing the door the rest of the way open.

  The room was dark with the curtains drawn even with a cloudless day outside. There were many shadows, many places for something to be hiding, to jump out and grab her, but the coldness that took her then was different. It was empty and sad, and as she ran her hand down the door and let it fall at her side, she tried to imagine the boy who had slept in that bed and sat at that desk and had thoughts dark enough to do the things Byron had done.

  Her eyes fell to the floor, the things half packed away, a life left in limbo. A box sat by the door that likely Arista or Seamus had begun putting together but could not bear to finish after everything had happened.

  Then she gasped, loud in the silence of the house. It couldn’t be, time wouldn’t allow for that to be here now, and even in a world where magic was real, it had to be a coincidence.

  Lorelei knelt beside the box and lifted out an amber bottle. It was starkly out of place, even amongst a warlock’s things, hundreds of years old, and etched with crude markings.

  She ran a finger over the symbols. They thought it had been obliterated by the time stream, but of course it had survived—it had a god in it, after all—and she knew it was the same amber bottle that Bridgette had used to trap Zyr. And now it was uncorked and empty.

  Lorelei shot up with a frustrated exclamation, looking around. There was no one to show it to, especially with Conrad having run off to gods knew where, but then what would she even say? Your brother’s possessed by an ancient, evil elf-faery-god thing?

  She gripped the bottle with both hands and glared at it. “You bastard,” she growled, the fear leaving her, replaced with white hot anger. She stuffed it into the satchel before it broke in her hands and stomped back down the stairs and out of the house.

  CHAPTER 19

  PEACE OFFERING

  It’s hard to avoid a person when both are confined to a single room, but Conrad was doing a pretty good job. He had come back a day or two earlier, Lorelei wasn’t sure which as he hadn’t spoken to her, but he also hadn’t gone out of his way to tell her he was still angry, so she insisted to herself that things could be much worse.

  Things could always be worse, this was a colloquially popular statement and happened to be one of the guidelines of magic which wasn’t a rule, per se, but always good to keep in mind just in case one wanted to avoid tempting fate and asking magic, hypothetically, “Can things get any worse?” Magic doesn’t really do hypotheticals, so one can imagine how the answer typically goes.

  Ziah wasn’t letting any of them leave the sitting room until they’d experienced the correct amount of holiday cheer, the extent of which she refused to clarify. It was okay she’d gotten Christmas Eve confused with Christmas day, parties were better in the evening anyway, she said, and she demanded all of their presences—and their presents—on the evening of the 24th of December, a call to which Conrad had obliged.

  Mr. Ecknees was also in attendance, if passively, and a number of the manor guests came and went. Arista, Seamus, and Ando were even convinced to stop by and eat the cultural delicacies of pigs in blankets and a figgy pudding Hana slaved over for two weeks and looked, well—it certainly looked two weeks old. Ziah had also ordered some vinyl records, which were scratchy and somber when played on the turntable she’d dusted off in the room’s corner, but with the fire burning and the hearth sprites hopping about rhythmically, even the tension Lorelei felt of being trapped together and not speaking was eased a bit.

  “How are things?” Ziah asked, sauntering up to her and taking her hands to sway with the music. She was a little tipsy.

  “Great,” she lied.

  Ziah hummed as if she didn’t agree and made her do an awkward twirl. “You know I can feel that’s not true, right?” She wore a red cocktail dress and a slouchy Santa hat with a soft, white pompom at its end, so long it trailed down over her shoulder and kept falling into her cleavage. She’d been having the time of her life up until that point, pushing drinks into hands and dancing with whoever was available, study books and clients forgotten, but just touching L
orelei was visibly bringing her down. “What’s wrong?”

  “I was just thinking about my mom,” she said, more convincing than she expected. “This is the first Christmas I haven’t seen her. I just hope she’s having fun on the beach with her new boyfriend.”

  Ziah raised her eyebrows. “Oh, way to go, Mama Fischer.” When she saw that made Lorelei laugh, she handed her a candy cane. “There, look you’re already cheering up.” Then she pointed out Grier who’d been outfitted with a pair of fuzzy antlers but was supplying his own grimace. “Maybe try cheering him up too while you’re at it.”

  Lorelei gave Aly a pat as she passed by, the alalynx making the most of all the attention. She’d been given a special bell to wear and Ren brought the fox pup inside so the two could wrestle before the fire at Mr. Ecknees’s steadily rocking feet.

  Grier was standing before a boxy, old TV in the room’s corner when she walked up to him. She’d never seen it on before, and the picture was grainy. He gestured to the screen. “I don’t understand. Why doesn’t she just break up with her workaholic fiance and move back home?” It appeared they had somehow intercepted non-charmed cable and gotten made-for-TV holiday movies of the emotional persuasion to play.

  “It’s harder than you think,” Lorelei mumbled.

  Grier grinned. “Oh, shit, that’s right, that’s kinda like you! Look, she’s even really clumsy—that’s the seventh time she’s tripped. Thank god that buff dude’s always around or she’d definitely have some broken bones.”

  “Quiet,” she said. “I didn’t come over here to be mocked, I’m here so you quit pouting—it’s bringing Ziah down.”

  At that moment, Ziah’s high laughter filled the room along with Seamus’s full-bellied guffaw as they watched Ren taste and spit back out something red and boozy. Grier groaned sarcastically, “Oh, yeah, I’m really wrecking stuff, huh?”

  “You might not care for Christmas, but at least there’s food, and I know you love that.” She hung her candy cane from the antlers he’d been forced to don. “How about we pretend to decorate cookies and get sick on frosting?”

  “Eh.” Grier made a face at the coffee table where Hana was set up with bowls of colored icing and a huge stack of gingerbread men. Beside her, Collier Coyote was being taught the proper technique to apply candy eyes and buttons. Grier didn’t budge when Lorelei nudged him until Collier checked his phone and then got up to leave. Hana followed him to the door, but just missed him under the mistletoe as he went. Grier relented once the room was pop star free, sitting with Hana and making her show him what to do, though he did seem to mess up on purpose quite a few times, forcing Hana to correct him over and over and leaving a lot of ugly gingerbread men to eat.

  Mr. Carr made an appearance later, during which Lorelei engaged him but only to covertly watch Conrad. The warlock looked over as she pretended to listen to Mr. Carr, and when they made eye contact, she quickly looked away, laughing at whatever Mr. Carr had been telling her. The look on his face, however, said it probably wasn’t supposed to be funny.

  “Sorry, er, have you had the eggnog?”

  He shook his head. “Lactose intolerant.” Then he held up a cookie Hana had given him earlier. “This, though, is amazing.”

  “Yeah, there’s definitely magic in those.”

  Lines formed on his forehead as he shrewdly cast his gaze over her.

  “That’s allowed, right?” When he squinted even tighter, she swallowed hard. “What I mean is, they feel like there’s magic in them, like they’re baked with love and stuff. Oh, gosh, sorry, I’ve had a little too much to drink.” She fanned at her face and fluttered her lashes even though she’d actually avoided the very stiff punch Ziah had made. He gave her another dubious glare, placed the cookie on the side table just by the entry and bid her goodnight.

  Lorelei rubbed her temple when he was gone, eyes falling on Conrad again who took a turn at being caught staring and quickly stuck his nose down into a book. Of course, he was sitting there, reading, at a party.

  Ziah told them their gift exchange would happen at the end of the night when they were the only six left, and the number of bodies in the room was dwindling. If she was going to avoid an incredibly awkward moment in front of everyone—and if recent history taught her anything, that was absolutely necessary—she needed to act now.

  With a deep breath, Lorelei went over to the makeshift bar and put together two cups of hot chocolate. She tasted one and when she was happy with her tweaks, headed to where she’d seen Conrad last.

  But apparently Conrad had the same idea and was already walking toward her, his book abandoned back on the chair. They met just by the entryway at the edge of the room. There was a commotion around the seating area as a hyped-up-on-sugar Hana got the alalynx and the fox to chase a shapeshifted Grier. Arista reminded them to be careful from where she stood beside the fire with the others, just tipsy enough to chuckle when Grier’s wolf form face planted into the couch and transformed back into a boy.

  “Um, here,” said Lorelei, holding out the drink. “I know Hana probably made you eat a hundred cookies by now, but this is sort of my specialty. I used to be a barista, not that I was very good at it, but I did figure out the secret to good hot chocolate.” He looked down at the cup, his jaw tight, not taking it. God, was he really still that mad? She swallowed, trying to grin. “It’s supposed to be a peace offering.”

  “Do you really think I should be taking drinks from women anymore?”

  “Oh, my god.” Lorelei’s eyes went wide. “I didn’t even, here, wait,”—she stopped Grier who was running by again—“taste this.”

  The boy looked down at the cup and stuck out his tongue. “Chocolate makes my stomach hurt.”

  “Oh, of course it does,” she grumbled, Grier running off as soon as Hana tried to pounce on him, the alalynx and the fox right behind. “I’m so sorry.” She turned back, staring down at the liquid and feeling like it had somehow betrayed her. “I didn’t even think about that, I just wanted to do something nice, and—”

  “I’m kidding.” Conrad reached for the cup, and when she looked up at him, he was smirking in that familiar albeit slightly frustrating way again. “Well, mostly kidding. You wouldn’t spike this with anything, right?”

  “I don’t even know how,” she admitted, “except with nutmeg, which is what I did.”

  He raised a brow, and her stomach twisted—that probably had fatal properties she didn’t even know about—but then he took a sip. “Well, it definitely doesn’t taste like poison.”

  They stood in silence for a few minutes while Ziah changed the record to a jazzy medley of carols that filled the room with a mellow piano and soft saxophone.

  “I’m sorry about what happened.” Lorelei put her cup down on the side table with Mr. Carr’s discarded cookie. “And I’m especially sorry about how it happened,” she said a little softer. “I didn’t think that through.”

  “Well, I didn’t react great.” He hid partially behind his mug. “Not in the moment or the last couple weeks, I just needed to clear my head. I got the things you left, by the way. You really didn’t have to go inside, but thanks.”

  She had placed Conrad’s satchel and the things she’d collected from the house at his bedroom door the night before but kept the amber bottle—that would take some explaining. “I hope it wasn’t too much of an invasion or anything, but I know you didn’t really like being in there, and I just wanted to do something to make things better.”

  He put his drink down too and stuck his hands in his pockets, standing rigidly. “I shouldn’t have yelled at you, Lorelei. My anger was…sophomoric and misplaced.” His eyes swept across the room to where Ren stood, then his shoulders fell, and he sighed. “I’m sorry. I was just embarrassed about everything that was said. Mostly the stuff about me being a miserable—”

  “Yeah, I remember.” She cut him off, not wanting to relive it, then asked coyly, “Have you talked to her?”

  “Gods, no.” He ran a h
and through his light hair, mussing it up and glancing out at the room. “If I ever see her again, it will be too soon. You know, we were together on and off for almost three years, and I’ve been trying really hard, but I can’t remember it ever being very good for longer than a day or two at a time. I mean, it makes sense now, but I don’t know what I was thinking.”

  Lorelei’s eyes passed over the television where a set of actors she vaguely recognized from childhood appeared to be confessing something romantic to one another on an ice-skating rink. “Well, you weren’t thinking, but you wouldn’t be the first person to pick something bad over being alone.”

  This time when he smiled back at her it wasn’t that stupid smirk but something a little softer.

  “Hey, I have one more thing to give you. Wait here.” She hurried over to the Christmas tree and grabbed her secret Santa gift, noting that Ziah looked too tipsy to remember what she’d planned for the evening. When she sprinted back to him, she pressed the package into his hands. “I ended up with you.”

  He pointed to the doodles of Aly wearing a Santa hat all over the brown paper she used to wrap it. “You did this? It’s too cute to open.”

  “That’s not the important part, just rip it off.”

  Conrad unwrapped the canvas more carefully than she’d instructed, and she held her breath as he flipped it over to see the piece she’d completed in pastels. His face told her nothing as his eyes took in the painting, and for a long moment Lorelei was sure he hated it. It didn’t matter how hard she tried to replicate the curves in the transom over the front door, the shadow of the railing on the porch steps, the exact color yellow the exterior used to be before weather and age took its toll—she’d never be able to capture the Rognvaldson House, and even if she did, he didn’t want to remember.

  Then Conrad looked up at her, green eyes finding hers and full of none of the anger or embarrassment or disappointment she’d seen in them before. Now there was something totally new there. Something like happiness. “This is just like how it was.”