“We need to get out of here,” he said, ignoring my question. “Preferably now.”
“You said they can’t track me. What else have you lied about?”
“You just called an immense amount of power for your demon-killing spell,” he growled in my ear. “That is how they tracked you. You might as well have hung a flag announcing your current coordinates.”
“But—”
“I would love to explain all the particulars to you, Andy my dear, but I’m afraid we need to get out of here now so that can happen at a later time.”
“Won’t they follow?” I asked as he took off at a sprint back down the alley, all but dragging me behind him.
“They won’t if you can manage not to attack me with your magic again—that is what they’re tracking. But if they find us…” He let his words trail off, but their meaning was clear. It would be us against a small army of demons, and we would not prevail.
With that thought in my mind, I poured on speed, yanking my arm from his grasp to push my body faster. He kept pace with me, though I knew he slowed to do it. What I couldn’t understand was why he bothered at all. If he was worried about himself, why not just disappear back to his realm with tales of my attack to save his own skin?
Why not act like a…demon?
Before I could romanticize the answer, I remembered that he needed me alive.
Right.
As we wound our way through the bustling Sixth Ward, its streets lined with stores for the average folk, I knew we were approaching one of the many buildings in the city with access to the underground tunnels: an innocuous-looking tea shop, complete with a hidden apothecary in the back room. Inside was a trap door, magically hidden in the floor. That was where I would find my path to safety—and test Zen’s loyalty.
I ground to a halt just around the corner from the store and buckled over, breathing hard.
“Why are you stopping?” he growled, scanning the area. We hadn’t been able to shake the stain of evil that trailed us, and without the tunnels, I wondered if we could.
“I’m going to take a series of tunnels back to the boarding house. You need to do whatever it is that you do when you disappear.”
“No.”
“No?”
“I’m hardly letting my ticket to defeating Xandros face potential death by demon without my aid.”
“How very chivalrous of you—”
“Take me to these tunnels now.”
“You could just go back.”
“Take me to the tunnels now, or prepare to fight by my side, because those are the only options I’m willing to give you,” he said, his face thrust into mine, sharp features contorted with anger. But that anger belied something else—something I almost missed at first. Worry. Concern. Fear. And it only deepened the longer we stood there in the darkness, staring at one another.
Though a fight would have been the perfect way to clear the devolving thoughts in my mind, Zen’s uncertainty inspired my own, and with what had happened the night before—the damage I had sustained by losing half the potion—fatigue was slowly creeping through my body.
It wasn’t time for a fight.
It was time to take my potion.
“Fine.” I bit the word out through clenched teeth. “But wait out here.”
Before he could object, I walked to the back door and threw it open. The young woman sweeping the apothecary stared at me with wide eyes. “Sororcula,” I said, and understanding swept through her. “All is well, little sister. But I must go. Quickly.”
She nodded once and put the broom away. With a whisper and a swipe of her hand, the door appeared, and she hauled it open with a tug on the iron ring.
“You should wait out front,” I said, ushering her through the open door that led to the shop. But the young witch caught my arm and looked at me with the same faraway gaze that Petal shared when attempting to use her powers.
“The man…he is not human. I can see it. He’s a—”
“I know what he is,” I replied in a hushed voice, “and there are others like him that seek to kill me. Once I’m gone, close the tunnel, ward this place, then leave as quickly as you can, understand?” Her curt nod was answer enough. “And you never saw me this evening. If I hear rumor otherwise, I will know who to come for.”
Without another word, I pushed her into the front of the store and closed the door. Zen awaited me right where I’d left him, and I called him in and showed him the trap door. “After you.” Much to my relief, he descended the ladder without comment, and I followed him down, shutting the trap door behind me.
The second my feet hit the ground, Zen was at my back. “That poor girl,” he purred in my ear. “She won’t sleep for days after a threat like that.”
“We need to get going,” I said, looking left and right to get my bearings.
“Warding the property was an excellent idea, save for one thing.”
“What’s that?” I asked, heading down the stone corridor to our right.
“The demons will feel the magic when the witches ward against them.”
I cursed under my breath. “What do we do?”
“Continue running and hope that I am wrong.” Another creative curse fled my mouth. “I must say, Andy my dear, I do find this colorful language intriguing.”
A rush of footsteps overhead spurred me into motion, and I ran down the narrow tunnel with Zen at my heels. We were far enough from the nunnery and the boarding house for concern, especially since I could feel the pain in my heart growing from exertion and lack of potion with every thundering beat. My body couldn’t fail me yet. But as we wove our way through the corridors, a small ball of magical fire lighting the way, my pace slowed and my legs weakened. They gave out twice, nearly dropping me on my face. Were it not for the narrow passageway’s walls stopping me, I would have fallen.
“Andy—”
“We’re almost there,” I called back, my voice fainter than I’d intended.
“Andy, you’re—”
“I’m fine!” I slammed into the wall seconds after my rebuttal left my mouth. Without a word, Zen threw me over his shoulder and kept running, as if unhindered by my weight.
“How far?”
“A few blocks.”
“Is this the result of you not taking your potion again?” The acerbic note to his tone wasn’t lost on me, even in my fading state.
“Maybe—or maybe trying to kill you took more out of me than I expected.”
“If that showing wiped you out, then we have a problem, because killing Xandros will take much more than that.”
My eyes fell closed as exhaustion set in and clouded my mind of logic and reason. All that was left were unfiltered thoughts. “Then I guess you don’t need me anymore,” I said with a laugh, as though anything about that truth was humorous.
“I hope for both of our sakes that that’s not the case.”
“You should be glad to be rid of me,” I argued.
My remark was met with silence for a moment. “And perhaps I will be eventually, but you’re a means to an end—”
“Only if I’m strong enough—”
“—and I shall have that end.”
“Even if it means mine...”
He stopped for a moment and set me on my feet. I wavered before him, his stern face a blur as I fought to stay upright. Finally, his hands clamped down on my shoulders, fixing me in place. I tried to focus on his eyes, but his back was to the light, casting his face in shadow. There was nothing but harsh lines and darkness staring back, but even in my addled state, I knew anger lived there as well. He was, after all, a demon.
“If you would just bind yourself to me, none of this would be a problem.”
At that, I laughed. The high-pitched cackle of it sounded maniacal, even to me. “I’d rather die.”
“Which is precisely what will happen if you don’t.” He brushed my long black hair aside to better see the conviction in my eyes. His narrowed at my determination, and I fo
rced myself to stand straighter, steadying myself with a hand against the stone wall. I leaned in closer to him, our faces only inches apart.
“Are you threatening me?” I asked, my voice like honey but my stare full of fire.
“Yes,” he replied simply, “but not in the way you’re imagining. Now, if you’re quite done with this desperate show of independence and magical virtue, we need to press on.”
“I don’t feel the evil anymore,” I said, looking at the tunnel’s ceiling as though I could see the streets of the city above. “I mean, no more than I always do when you’re around.”
When he didn’t reply, I turned my gaze back to him. Though I couldn’t be certain, it looked as if the corner of his mouth hitched ever so slightly at my words.
“How very curious. Now, if you’d be so kind…” He reached out his arms for me, but I swatted them away. Instead, I continued to walk, with the help of the corridor wall, until we reached the exit. It led to the alley behind the boarding house, next to the outhouses. I looked at the daunting ladder and hauled myself up rung by rung. At the top, I whispered a faint spell to unlock the hatch, then took a deep breath before opening it. The proximity of the magical door to the outhouses was unpleasant at best, an unfortunate side effect of expansion in the city. The witch sisters who’d created the tunnels could not have planned for that.
“Shite,” Zen exclaimed behind me.
“Indeed.”
“It’s like they’ve buried rotting corpses back here—”
“Someone probably has.”
Once he was out, I pressed my hand to the secret door and sealed it shut. To the unsuspecting, it looked like dirt and nothing more.
“Well,” Zen said, taking a handkerchief out to cover his nose, “it seems we’ve outrun them.”
I opened my mouth to respond but nearly keeled over before I could speak. Zen caught me before I took an unfortunate tumble into one of Whittle House’s outhouses and rushed me around to the front entrance of the home. Barely able to put one foot in front of the other, I hoped that Mrs. Whittle wasn’t awake and fussing over something in the house. One look at me and she’d be in such a tizzy.
Unfortunately for me, we weren’t that lucky.
Zen pushed open the door to the foyer, and the grey-haired woman rounded the corner, eyes as wide as her gaping mouth. “Miss Nightshade!”
“She’s quite all right, Mrs. Whittle. No need to fret.”
“What’s happened to her now?” she asked, heading our way to look me over. She pushed my hair from my face to get a better look. “Has she gotten worse?”
“It seems the poor girl can’t hold her drink to save her life.”
The widow tutted under her breath. “She shouldn’t have been drinking at all!”
“I couldn’t agree more, Mrs. Whittle.”
She let loose a sigh that nearly shook the home. “Mr. Henderson, would you please be so kind as to help her up the stairs? I’m afraid I haven’t the strength.”
“Of course,” he said with a tip of his hat.
“I’ll be up shortly to help her into bed.”
“No need for that,” Zen said, dragging me up the stairs. “She’ll be all right.”
“But—”
“I’ll be fine, Mrs. Whittle,” I slurred. “Go to bed. I will see you in the morning.”
I heard her take the first couple of steps, then stop. “I’ll make sure to brew your coffee extra strong,” she called after me, “but don’t think we won’t be having a talk about this. Your behavior is not very becoming of a young lady.”
“I will bring down my copy of The Virtuous Woman for her to read in the morning,” Zen added. I could practically hear him smiling as he spoke. “I’ve already taken the liberty of marking several sections for her.”
Mrs. Whittle gasped with delight. “Bless you, Mr. Henderson. All men should be so gentle and understanding.” She crept back downstairs to finish whatever she’d been doing while Zen escorted me to my door and unlocked it.
“You’ll be the death of that poor woman,” he scolded under his breath. The double meaning of his words, intended or otherwise, weighed heavily on me as I staggered to my bed and collapsed. “I suppose you’ll be needing this.” My head lolled to the side to see him standing by the dresser, holding Hazel’s potion in his hand. The thought of him pouring it onto the floor flashed in my mind for a second before he walked over and sat down. “Let’s try not to spill it this time, shall we?” His hand cupped the back of my head and gently lifted it as he pressed the vial to my lips. “Every drop, Andy my dear. I need you at your best—which would be you bound to me—but this will have to do until you come to your senses.”
I swallowed back the thick liquid and closed my eyes. “I’m afraid coming to my senses isn’t one of my gifts, magical or otherwise.”
A tiny laugh escaped him. “That would be far too easy, wouldn’t it?” I mumbled something incoherent in response and rolled onto my side, leather pants and coat rubbing together with the movement. “Perhaps you’d be more comfortable without all this animal hide on your body.” I didn’t have the strength to argue as he pulled my coat off, but when he reached for my pants, my hand caught his wrist and I whispered the word ‘no’. To my surprise, he took a careful step back. “Do try to get some sleep, Andy. You’ll need it to face Mrs. Whittle in the morning.”
His fading footsteps and the snick of my closing door were the last sounds I heard before sleep took me.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
I shot awake hours later with a sense of impending dread. My body, still not fully recovered and sluggish from the potion, ached, and the void in my chest still gnawed as if my heart were attempting to escape, but I was able to move of my own accord, so that was a small blessing.
Moonlight spilled in through the curtains, and I got up to close them, only to find another vial on my dresser, untouched. I picked it up and spun it between my fingers. “Where did you come from, I wonder?” I asked, as though the glass would answer. Either Reggie or possibly Agnes had made a delivery, but the question that was more important than who was why? I’d had my dose for the evening. Why had another appeared?
I turned in horror toward my unlocked door and the demon on the other side of the hall beyond it. Had he gone to the nunnery? Had he summoned the Lilies somehow? My mind was a jumble of scenarios, none of which were favorable. There was only one way to get answers, but I was loath to wake the one who held them—presuming he was there and asleep. With Zen, one could never be sure.
Since the potion was already there and I was in need, I drank it down and cast the vial onto the dresser, then crept to the door to peek through the keyhole, fearing that Zen might be lurking outside. But I found no shadows blocking my view, narrow though that view was, and I felt no evil. As quietly as possible, I turned the knob to find nothing but darkness and silence awaiting me.
I crossed the hall in two careful steps and pressed my ear to Zen’s door. I thought I felt the crawl of evil against my skin, though it was weak, and I heard the faint sound of the bed frame creaking on the other side. As I reached for the knob, an idea occurred to me. If Zen was in there, then so was the demon claw that he’d stolen. The one he’d claimed I couldn’t use to kill him. His insistence on its ineffectiveness niggled at the back of my mind like a gnat I couldn’t swat away. He’d been far too free with that information, which suited his purposes too well to be ignored. I’d have been a fool not to seize the opportunity to retrieve it—especially if I could do that before getting the answers I sought.
The latch turned softly, and I pushed the door open to find Zen lying on top of the covers, eyes closed and breathing slowly. His naked torso soaked in the moonlight, defining the perfect lines of his muscles in light and shadow. His pants were unfastened and open but still on—thank the heavens for that—and his hair lay tousled around his face, dark curls hanging in his eyes. The sudden desire to brush them aside burned in my stomach, and I pinched myself to clear my head, a
sharp reminder about both whom and what I was dealing with.
But the desire to touch him lingered still.
How long had it been since I’d known a man’s caress? How many years since a male’s body had weighed heavy against mine as our limbs intertwined and our lips pressed together and the heat between us grew to an unbearable fever that only one act could break? Longer than I cared to admit to myself or anyone else. Clearly, that was why the demon was so appealing.
Desperation and lust were dangerous bedfellows.
His room was laid out in similar fashion to mine, which made it easy to navigate in the dark. I spotted his frock coat on the chair near the bed and tiptoed over to it, praying I wouldn’t hit a squeaky floorboard. In my room, I had the advantage of knowing where they laid in wait. In his, I didn’t. Thankfully, I managed to get all the way there without a sound. He stirred only once at my approach, and I smiled to myself in the darkness at my victory. I’d expected more from a demon.
I rummaged through his wool coat’s pockets until my finger caught on something sharp. A prick of pain shot through me, and I withdrew my hand to find the claw sticking out of my finger. I tugged it free and tucked it into my pocket, then stepped back from the chair, my finger grasped in my other hand to staunch the bleeding. I needed to get out of there before I bled all over the floor—and before Hazel’s potion fully kicked in.
As I turned to leave, I ran right into a wall of demon. Zen, who’d stalked up silently behind me, stood there, dark eyes boring holes through mine. Panic pooled in my gut, along with something I wanted desperately to ignore, as he silently pulled my hand free and inspected my bloody finger for a moment. Then he put it to his mouth and licked it clean.
My breath caught in my throat as fire surged in my veins, and it was all I could do to stifle the sound that threatened to escape as his tongue trailed along my finger. Then realization dawned like a spade to the head, and I yanked my hand free. No injury was visible; it was as if nothing had happened. Before my addled mind could make sense of that, the room flew by in a blur of motion as he threw me on the bed and jumped on top of me, pinning me down.
A Curse of Nightshade (Witches of the Gilded Lilies Book 1) Page 11
