“Ten.”
I ground to a halt. “Ten?”
Her shoulders stiffened. “Yes. Ten.”
My limbs burned with the desire to go back in time and kill the bastard who had profited from the exploitation of those children again, only this time, to deliver my Gilded Lily justice far more slowly. I should have prolonged his suffering; made him pay for what he’d done to those girls.
Men like that deserved nothing less.
“The poor thing was orphaned at a young age and knows nothing of her mother, but flame just seems to be…drawn to her.”
“I see. Well then, I shall meet with her soon. Ten is about the right age for a witch of average strength to begin exhibiting the signs. Is she a danger to anyone around her? Should we be concerned?”
“No, no,” Willow said, grabbing my arm. “She’s sweet and kind, and her mental state is strong. I’m not worried about any of that.”
“If you believe she isn’t a danger, then I will trust your judgment to do what’s best until I get a chance to properly assess her magic. We need to deal with more pressing matters first.”
She nodded again. “Is that why you’re here? Did you learn something about the—”
“Yes. You should join me.”
She looked over her shoulder toward the residential section of the building, where she worked with the wayward females that found themselves taking refuge at the nunnery. “I will. I just need to see to a few things first.” With that, she hastened down the hall, the clack of her boots surprisingly heavy with determination.
I didn’t encounter anyone else until I was shut in behind the secret door to the guild. The other three Lilies were already there, each fussing over a book, a potion, or in Hazel’s case, both at once. Their eyes all jumped to me when I stepped in. “We need to talk,” I said by way of greeting. I saw no point in mincing words. We had demons to stop.
“What is it?” Ivy asked, pulling wire-framed glasses from the tip of her nose. “What’s happened?”
A demon pinned me up against an alley wall and offered to help kill the one who abducted me years ago…
“I remembered something from my time in the demon realm. Something that was said.”
The already quiet room went as silent as a graveyard.
“What is it?”
“The one who kept me there—the one who took my soul—”
“Not all of it,” Ivy quickly added.
“Yes. Him.”
“What about him?” Hazel asked, slowly closing her book.
“He is the one I saw with the judge and police chief.”
A collective gasp echoed through the room.
“Oleander—”
“That is not all, Ivy,” I said, cutting her off. Silence fell upon the room as I weighed my options, knowing that I needed to proceed with caution. The demon—Zen—had been a little too forthcoming with information regarding the Demonheart Opal’s presence in the city and Xandros’ desire to become the demon king, which made me inherently suspicious. He also seemed keen on banding together to keep that from happening. He had not, however, been very free with the details about what would happen if another demon, such as himself, were to obtain the opal; or if it were to be destroyed. Whatever the case, the Lilies needed to find it before Xandros—or Zen—did. But I couldn't tell them all of that.
Cue the well-crafted lie.
“The sight of him jarred my memory. Not long before you pulled me from the demon realm, I overheard him say something about a treasure he needed to find.”
“Is that why they’re here?” Petal asked softly.
I nodded. “I believe that Xandros and his minions have come to find something called the Demonheart Opal. It’s the heart of the former demon king.”
“Why would he want such a thing?” Ivy asked, though it was clear from the pallor of her face that she already knew and that the realization scared her. As well it should.
“Power is my guess.”
Our fearless leader cursed in a most unladylike fashion. “Then he cannot be allowed to get it.”
“Which is why I’m here telling you now. Grisholm must be informed and use his…connections to help hunt it down. If the demon is casting a net of his kind to scour the city for it, then it must be here.”
Ivy whistled a melodic tune, and a gust of wind whipped through the room, though no windows or doors were open. Moments later, a regal raven the color of midnight appeared out of thin air and landed on her shoulder, head dipped toward her face in conspiratorial fashion. Reginald, whom Hazel had dubbed Reggie for short, was Ivy’s familiar and messenger. All of the Lilies had them to summon at will, with the exception of Petal, who was still young in both age and development of her power. Zella and Hagan, my twin black snakes forged of ash and smoke, had come to me upon my escape from the demon realm. They resided around my wrists in the form of iron cuffs, where they stayed until called. I fiddled with those cuffs as I watched Ivy whisper to Reggie. The raven listened intently, his beady eyes darting up and down between her lips and her gaze.
Once she finished, she coaxed him onto her wrist and held him out before her. “See that no one else is around when you relay this message to Grisholm. Is that clear?” Reggie squawked once in agreement, then flapped his wings and took to the air. In a blink, he disappeared into the ether. “Grisholm will soon know of this,” Ivy said, smoothing the sleeve of her blouse where her familiar had just been. “Now, did anything else happen last night that we should know about?”
Willow walked in just as Ivy posed the question to the room, though her eyes were on me alone. I sprinkled a dash more truth onto my lie. “I saw the other demon again—the one I chased before—but I lost him. He didn’t see me this time.”
Except when his eyes bore into mine and his body pressed me against the brick façade so his lips could steal a kiss…
Ivy seemed satisfied with my response. “I think we should hold off on tracking until we hear from Grisholm regarding this Demonheart Opal. In the meantime, I’d like to hear about the girls we recently rescued.”
As Willow began her assessment of them, I sat down in the blue velvet armchair and let my mind wander. I knew I hadn’t seen the last of Zen, or the one who’d stolen my soul, for that matter. Xandros… My gaze slid to the far wall and the shelf full of magical books. The grimoire sat in the middle, its spine calling for me to come pick it up. I needed that translation completed sooner than later if I was going to deal with the demons before their power grew too strong.
I wanted the privilege of killing them all myself.
The day grew long and moonlight began to creep through the windows, casting a blue light on the room. Reggie had yet to return with word from Grisholm, and we were restless; the Lilies were far from idle witches. We craved action, justice, and—speaking for myself—the sweet feeling that came with putting an end to the evils of humanity. The elation I’d felt as blood spilled from the gaping wound in Conroy’s neck and pooled around his charred body had sated my need for vengeance, if only for a while.
Now my veins itched with the desire for more.
And there was only one solution for that.
“I’m going to head out,” I said, standing abruptly. “I need some fresh air.”
“Or whiskey,” Hazel said with a laugh, “but hey, we all have our vices. I’m not judging.”
“As if you had any room to,” I said under my breath as I slipped down the magical back stairwell. I was hardly the only one of us with a sordid way of coping with our pasts.
“No hunting,” Ivy called after me. “Especially not if you’ve been drinking.”
“Yes Mother.” I let a little laugh of my own trail behind me as I stepped out into the alley and sealed the magical door behind me. Though liquor was indeed what I sought, Branigan’s wasn’t an option for several reasons, not the least of which being the damage I had caused escaping the demon. I’d have to pay for that eventually—or have Grisholm do it for me. Luckily, I had a
backup tavern near Five Points. It was seedy and dangerous, the perfect place to go if you wanted to blend in amongst other unsavory sorts; the kind of place where no one bothered you if you didn’t bother them. I’d been there often enough for the owner to know that I didn’t like being questioned—or touched.
His right wrist still didn’t quite straighten as it should after he’d tried that one time.
I was almost certain I’d encounter that familiar sense of evil as I made the long journey to the unnamed establishment, but I didn’t. It wasn’t until my third drink that a blast of it hit me so hard that my breath caught in my throat. I turned to find Zen standing in the doorway, smiling at me.
I quickly swallowed my drink, letting the comforting burn settle in my stomach as he pulled out the stool beside me.
“I assumed twenty-four hours would be long enough for you to see reason.”
“You clearly don’t know me—”
“So, have we come to terms, Andy my dear, or shall we negotiate until I’ve died of boredom and Xandros has succeeded in locating the Demonheart Opal?”
The barkeep gave him a strange look as he poured me another; my dour expression must have screamed for him to keep them coming. He walked away without taking Zen’s order, and I smiled into my glass before I nearly emptied it once again.
“I hope the service at your other saloon is better,” he said, slipping off his deep green frock coat and resting it on his lap. “Now, about the demons—"
“Not. Here,” I growled at him under my breath. If I’d learned anything in my time with the Lilies, it was that supernatural matters were never, ever, ever discussed in public for any reason—especially not talk of demons or witches. It was the quickest way to find one’s head in a noose (or to be burned at the stake, as though the Salem witch trials were still alive and well).
He smiled at my thinly-veiled anger. “All right, then. But if we cannot discuss the matter here, then where? Should we abscond to a nearby dark alley and finish what we started, perhaps?” His brow quirked suggestively as he pulled the cup of whiskey from my hand, his fingertips trailing along my palm just a moment longer than necessary. That magical tingle crept along my skin, toeing the line between pleasure and pain. I quickly pulled my hand away. “You know, I learned the most interesting fact the other day. Were you aware that an unaccompanied woman in a bar is thought to be—”
“Not in the mood for the company of a man?” I suggested as I reached for my drink.
He withdrew it out of range, his dark eyes twinkling with delight as he looked at me over the rim of the pilfered glass. “How lucky for me that I’m not a man. Now, since it’s apparent that you’re not in the mood for casual conversation, Andy my dear, let’s get right to it. Have you considered my offer?”
I scowled at him. “I said not here—”
“This is a simple yes-or-no question, devoid of context or any details you wish to remain unspoken, so I see no point in avoiding it any further.”
“Fine. Yes, I have considered your offer.”
“And?”
I grabbed my glass and tossed back the remainder of my whiskey, then slammed the glass down on the bar. “No.”
“No?”
“No.”
“Andy, I think you fail to see the gravity of this situation.”
I pushed back my seat and threw some money down next to the empty glass. “I think I see it just fine.”
I headed for the front entrance, followed by a string of curses from the demon and, eventually, the demon himself. As I stormed away from the saloon, headed for the library in the hope that I could lose him and take the secret tunnels home, I heard his heavy footfalls pursuing me. It didn’t take long before he reached my side and folded my arm in his. A rush of that evil sensation coursed through me, mixed with something warm and welcome and altogether terrifying, because I shouldn’t have felt it—not with him. When I tried to yank free, he flexed his arm, pinning mine in place with unnerving strength.
“What is it you want in return for your assistance in this matter?” he asked, leaning his lips down to my ear. “If you won’t do it for your own self-preservation, then perhaps I should tell you what will happen to your fellow witches if you do not help me stop him.” Something icy slid down my back at the thought. There was not much that I cared about in this life anymore, but I cared about them. They were my sisters, in a sense—my family. A coven that had welcomed me, unlike the one that had expelled my mother and me when I was a child. The thought of them facing a fate like mine—or my mother’s—was more than I could bear. “Now that I have your attention, where would you like to go to discuss this matter further? Somewhere more private so as not to offend your public sensibilities—”
“We have nothing more to discuss, unless you require a lesson in the meaning of the word ‘no’. It seems that many men struggle with it.”
“As you seem to struggle with the fact that I am not a man.”
Dammit. “But you are male, are you not?”
He glanced at me out of the corner of his eye. “I most certainly am, but if you have doubts, I would be happy to prove it to you.”
“I’d sooner die.”
“And you might, if you don’t accept my offer to help eliminate Xandros.”
I opened my mouth to tell him that there was nothing he could possibly say to convince me to aid him, but then thought better of it. I realized I had a rare opportunity to draw important information from him—information I couldn’t get from just following the demons around town, as Grisholm would have us do. If I played my hand well, I could learn so much about them—possibly even how to kill them.
“All right,” I said, as though he’d worn me down. As though he’d won. “I will discuss this matter further.”
“Excellent,” he said, his smile beaming. “Where shall we go, then? Your place?”
I nearly choked on his suggestion. “I don’t think so.”
That damn smile of his widened. “Why ever not? We are headed in the wrong direction, but we could easily turn back. Or I suppose we could go to that bizarre Catholic home for women that you and your sisters frequent…”
I stopped dead in my tracks, yanking him back a step. He turned to face me, his body too close and his lips again at my ear. A low, sinister whisper echoed through my head. “I know everything one can know about you, Oleander Nightshade, at least everything one can observe from a distance. If you think you can outsmart me, you’re wrong.” He pulled away to pin dark eyes on mine. Then, as quickly as his mood had devolved, his persistent-yet-playful attitude resumed, as though he hadn’t just subtly threatened both the Lilies and me. “Now, shall we go to your boarding house, or would you prefer to parade me into the secret meeting place of the Lilies?”
I tried to force words through my constricted throat, but they wouldn’t come. Fear of the worst kind—fear for those I loved—coursed through my veins, rendering me useless. If he knew so much about me, then I shuddered to think what Xandros might know.
“I’ll take your silence to mean your place, then,” he said before turning us around and leading the way to Whittle House.
CHAPTER SEVEN
My silent prayer to make it to my room without being spotted was answered; we didn’t encounter a soul on our way through the house. I stuffed Zen through the door and quickly shut and locked it behind us, keeping my hand on the latch just in case I needed to escape in a hurry. His amusement at this act was plain, but I didn’t care. I already knew that my fire wasn’t a viable weapon against him, and his strength was greater than my own (Hazel’s potion remained untested on that front). I’d have to rely on speed if it came down to it, though I had little faith that mine would surpass his.
Lost cause or not, I would never succumb to a demon without a fight.
Zen sat down on the edge of my bed and stroked the faded patchwork quilt as if inspecting its quality. “So, where should we begin?” he asked, his tone casual.
“Why do you need my
help?”
His eyes narrowed ever so slightly. “I cannot prevent Xandros from becoming the demon king on my own. I thought I’d made that point—”
“Why not?”
“Because it took a witch of great power—a Daughter of Fire—allied with a demon to overthrow the previous king. It will require no less to keep Xandros from ascending, especially if he gets the Demonheart Opal.”
“And why should this bother me?”
“For a great many reasons, not the least of which being the increased power he will assume, including the ability to be earthbound without limitation. Imagine the havoc he could wreak upon humankind if he were able to stay in this realm indefinitely, with no call to return home, as the rest of us are burdened by. All those souls he could acquire—”
“I’ll kill him before he gets the chance—”
“But how, Andy my dear, when you couldn’t even stand against me? For the third and what I hope will be the final time, you cannot do this alone. You need me, as I need you.”
I tried to ignore his words, but they weighed on me nevertheless. “What does this Demonheart Opal look like?”
He shrugged. “To the human eye, it appears to be a black stone with iridescent veining. To me, and possibly to your kind as well, it looks like what it is: the desiccated heart of my former ruler. It was brought to your world, where it has become a highly coveted jewel among the rich.” His ambivalence gave way to a grave expression. “Xandros will not stop until he finds it.”
The severity of his tone was not comforting. “Do you know who has it?”
“Not as of yet, but that may be in our favor.”
“How so?”
“If its location is easily found, we won’t get to it before Xandros and his throng of minions do. What we need is someone with knowledge—someone connected to the morally grey elite of this city. Someone who can help us find what we must.”
Suddenly, Xandros’ presence with the judge and police chief made sense. As far as morally grey, in-the-know people went, they were high on the list. If someone were trying to import a stolen jewel or relic and sell it on the sly, they would have to be paid off to allow it. Xandros was likely close to achieving his goal.
A Curse of Nightshade (Witches of the Gilded Lilies Book 1) Page 6
