by Bella Klaus
My brows drew together. Coral never used to fidget so much. “Sorry.”
With a snort, she ran a hand through her hair and paused to scratch her scalp. “I used to think this place was a holiday camp. It looks like we just paid the check.”
Swallowing back a surge of emotion, I bit down hard on my lip. That was the most accurate portrayal of our situation I’d heard since Kresnik handed me to Valentine as a reward.
“What happened to your face?” Her eyes narrowed.
My hand drifted up to the bridge of my nose, but I forced it down. “I fell.”
“Did you?” She drew out the last syllable.
My heart jumped into the back of my throat. I know what she was implying. She thought Valentine had hurt me, the way that those vampires had hurt her. If I insisted on the truth, it would sound like I was covering up for him. If I told her things were different with Valentine, it would sound like I was lying to myself.
I exhaled a long sigh. “That’s what happens when you try to roll out of bed under the influence of thrall.”
Her features softened. “Do I know that feeling.”
“Is there an antidote to thrall?” I asked, my chest tightening with dread. If she said no, I wasn’t sure how I would react.
“Apart from finding a stronger vampire to tell him to back off?” She shook her head and scratched the back of her neck. “Nothing else ever worked.”
My breath hitched, and a surge of nausea rose to the back of my throat. I pressed my lips together, tamping down the disappointment, and let my gaze drift around the bare room. “What are you doing here, anyway?”
“We still feel like shit since that ritual,” she said. “Without our magic, it’s been constant butterflies in the stomach and ants crawling under my skin. I’ve thrown up twice.”
“Oh.” I placed a hand on my belly. At least that explained her scratching. “That’s what it is? I thought it was general anxiety.”
“Nope.” She rose to her feet. “Want to see the others?”
I stepped off the examination table and followed Coral out of the treatment room. Racon and the twins sat on a bench on the left side of the door, while Gail sat with Clarence on the right. Healer Calla frowned over a leather tome she’d placed on the counter and leafed through its pages.
Most of my teammates rubbed their arms, and some of them scratched, looking like they were infested with parasites.
I leaned into Coral and whispered, “When did these symptoms start?”
“The morning after,” she muttered.
Coral didn’t need to elaborate. The only reason I wasn’t itching alongside my teammates was because I’d been injected with enough thrall to numb the pain of a broken nose. My gaze skimmed over the crystals Healer Calla kept on the shelves and landed on a set of Tibetan singing bowls complete with wooden mallets.
I turned to the healer and pointed at the shelf. “Is it alright if I borrow some of your things and take my teammates to the other room?”
She raised her head from her leather-bound book, giving me an absent stare. “Help yourself.”
After gathering all the onyx, obsidian, and black tourmaline I could find, I carried the crystals and the singing bowls to the center of the same ritual room Healer Calla had taken me into the first time I had visited her. Today, the treatment table stood flush against the wall. I arranged the five bowls in order of size, balancing them on flat stones that wouldn’t hamper their vibrations when struck.
After placing some mallets on the floor, I returned to the main room to invite the others to join me for sound healing. It took a while to convince everyone that sound healing was a harmless healing technique used by humans, but eventually, I convinced my teammates to come with me.
Everyone gathered around me in a semicircle, staring at me as though they’d lost part of their soul. Dark circles rimmed Racon’s eyes, and Gail looked like she hadn’t stopped crying for days.
My throat dried and the lining of my stomach fluttered with the onset of nerves. Tugging at the collar of my reaper cloak, I said, “I can’t promise anything, but a sound bath always helps smooth rough edges within the energy body following a nasty shock.”
Roman rubbed his neck. He and Leman slumped onto the floor with identical frowns between Clarence, who couldn’t meet my eyes. “Is that why we can’t stop scratching?”
“Everywhere you’re all touching is either on your chakras or meridians,” I murmured. “It looks like they were unsettled from the—”
“From the rape of our powers?” Leman spat.
My gaze dropped to the singing bowls. “That’s right.”
“What about the stones?” asked Clarence.
I picked up a round piece of black tourmaline and weighed it in my hand. Its magic drew me toward Gail, who was scratching behind her ear. “They’re going to absorb negative energy and dislodge attachments.”
After handing her the stone, I worked through the pile I had collected, letting each crystal guide me to the teammate who needed it the most. Everyone ended up with two or three except Coral, who only needed one. Two of the crystals wanted to stay with me, so I placed them in the space between my crossed legs, so I could keep my hands free for the healing.
I picked up a mallet and struck the outside of the largest singing bowl. It made a bass note that resounded for nearly a minute. When that sound faded, I tapped the second-largest bowl, which made a higher-pitched sound. Before that faded, I hit the third. Everyone’s eyes fluttered shut, giving me the encouragement to continue.
For the next round, I didn’t wait for the sounds to fade, instead striking one bowl after another, overlapping the notes. The sound echoed against the walls, adding to the atmosphere of healing. Everything faded, and there was no Valentine, Aurora, or Kresnik. For that moment, it was just me and a group of friends who needed my help.
After the introductory notes, I balanced the smallest bowl on the palm of my hand and tapped its side. A high-pitched sound rang out that resounded down my left arm and into my heart chakra. Focussing on its healing notes, I rotated the mallet around the bowl’s exterior, prolonging the sound.
My gaze wandered around the semi-circle. Now, everyone’s features were relaxed, and warm satisfaction filled my chest. Apart from Jonathan, this was the first time I had performed healing on supernaturals, and it seemed to be going well.
I continued the session until the butterflies in my stomach calmed and everyone else looked like they’d fallen asleep. After returning to the introduction notes and playing them backward, I let the sounds fade into silence and basked in the atmosphere of calm.
Roman stretched and yawned. “How did you know about the bowls?”
I raised a shoulder. “After leaving Logris, I spent three years apprenticing with a Master of Crystals. She taught me a lot about healing.”
The others murmured their thanks, and we agreed to meet up again the next day for another healing session.
Leman rose to his feet and offered Clarence a hand. “At least now I might be able to keep down my food.” He picked up his smaller friend, and they headed to the door. “Are you coming, Rac?”
Racon stared at Gail from across the circle, but the smaller woman dipped her head, avoiding eye contact. An ache formed in the back of my throat as I remembered that they were also half-siblings, and nobody bothered to stop them from falling in love. That had to be the worst betrayal of all.
Exhaling a long sigh, I gathered up the spare crystals for cleansing. The man I loved was dead and under the control of an evil Light Lord, but at least there was an inkling of hope that we could break free of Kresnik’s control, steal back my magic, and return Valentine to life. There was no solution for Racon and Gail.
Racon trudged across the room, casting a glance at Gail over his shoulder as he reached the door. When she didn’t meet his gaze, he sighed and left with the other boys, leaving me alone with the girls.
Healer Calla stepped into the room, wringing her hands. “How
did it go?”
“Fine, thanks.” I glanced down at her pale knuckles. “Is there anything wrong?”
She shook her head from side to side. “I’ll pack up. Just hurry and leave.”
Since my blood stabilizers were already safe in the pocket of my cloak, I left Healer Calla’s infirmary with Coral and Gail, who dabbed her eyes with a handkerchief.
“Did you notice that?” I whispered.
“The hopping from foot to foot or the clenched fists?” Coral muttered. “Maybe she thinks you’re after her job.”
Unease settled in my belly, but I swallowed back the urge to disagree. At least not in public. A few of the people in the hallway slowed to gape at us, and one or two of them smiled and waved.
I wasn’t sure what they were putting in the water, but it looked like everyone thought we had actively volunteered to resurrect their lord. As if bound by an unspoken sense of distrust, we continued in silence to the nearest stairwell and stepped out into the crisp morning.
A blast of cold wind stirred around us, making me raise the head of my cloak. By now, the sun had risen within a sky obscured by a thick covering of clouds. We stepped out onto the lawn, walking toward the trees.
I placed an arm around Gail’s shoulders and pulled her into my side. “Are you alright?”
“It’s like he’s dead,” she said.
My gaze met Coral’s, who grimaced. This wasn’t anything like the situation with Beatrice and Christian, or even Beatrice and Lazarus. What on earth did you say to a girl whose lover turned out to be a close relative?
“Has anyone offered you some help?” I asked.
“Aurora won’t talk about it, even though she knew what we were for years.” Gail’s shoulders shook with rage.
I clenched my teeth. All this time, I thought Aurora reserved her coldness for the children she discarded and might have felt something for those she had raised. I’d been wrong. Maybe Aurora was brainwashed. Maybe she was just deluded, but she’d been brought up better. People weren’t allowed to marry close relatives in Logris, and we certainly didn’t practice that sort of thing among witches.
The leaves rustled in a breeze, bringing with it the scent of autumn. In the time I’d been stuck in that room under the influence of thrall, half the trees had lost their leaves. There was no sign of the fire damage from before, but it looked like not even Kresnik could restore the landscape to its former splendor.
“Do you know what Our Lord said?” she asked.
Lord? My head snapped up, and I met Coral’s stricken features. The older woman offered me a slow nod, which seemed to say that she’d been coping with Gail’s referring to him as her lord for days.
“Um…” I cleared my throat. “What did he say?”
“That our close relationship gave us the best chance of producing fire-wielding offspring for the new regime.”
I rubbed my temple, feeling the onset of a headache. Every word of comfort I could offer dried in the back of my throat. They weren’t going to force her, were they?
A soft meow carried in the wind, and I glanced from side to side, looking for its source. Up by the trees, right at the end of the wards, a cat jumped down and landed on his feet—a perfectly spotted Bengal cat with a leopard skin coat.
Excitement rippled up my insides.
“Macavity?”
Chapter Six
I hurried across the lawn, still clinging to Gail, who stared up at me as though I’d lost my mind. Coral jogged at my side in silence, tapping my arm to see if I was alright, but I continued toward the leopard skin cat.
“Who’s Macavity?” Gail asked.
“A cat who used to live with me in London.” I glanced over my shoulder, looking for signs of the men who usually guarded the perimeter. A couple watched us from beneath the trees nearest to the building, but they didn’t step forward to make us stay away from the ward.
“He tracked you down to the Flame?” asked Coral. “Are you sure he’s not a cat shifter?”
My steps faltered. I’d heard of lion shifters, wolf shifters, even a gorilla shifter, but I’d never heard of a supernatural who could turn into a cat. Even Macavity, who was a domestic cat most of the time, turned into a leopard. “I thought all shifters were large animals.”
“That’s what they want you to think,” she muttered. “Most shifters who don’t achieve an impressive animal get cast out.”
“Really?” Gail asked between sniffles.
Coral made a low hum in the back of her throat. “You think Neutrals have it bad. When I lived beneath Logris among the dregs, I met guys who shifted into rodents. That’s why I was asking about the cat.”
“Trust me.” I gazed up into the tree and caught the black eyes of a robin with a breast the color of crimson flames. “Macavity doesn’t turn into a man.”
My foot caught on a root. I stumbled forward, my hands circling in the air for balance.
Coral grabbed me by the back of my cloak. “Easy,” she murmured. “You’re still under the influence.”
Gulping hard, I slowed my steps. Even though Healer Calla’s stabilizers had diluted the thrall in my blood, that still didn’t mean I was a hundred percent.
“Thanks,” I murmured.
Something flickered across Coral’s face, and her gaze darted toward Gail, who had rushed ahead and now knelt in front of Macavity. Her lips parted to say something, but she clamped them together and shook her head. “Later.”
“Is anything the matter?” I asked.
“The Vampire King,” she murmured. “Why is he Kresnik’s right hand?”
“You saw him?”
“He’s at every meeting,” Coral replied with a shrug.
I bit down on my lip. “My magic animated him, and guess who has control of it now?”
“I thought it was something like that,” Coral muttered. “I was never any good at magical theory.”
Before I could say anything else, Macavity lifted his head and yowled. He’d made that noise a few times before, when I’d return from work late and he wanted his salmon, or one time when I said I would be away at Beatrice’s for a day but she’d convinced me to stay another night.
Guilt clutched at my chest. Valentine and I had ditched him in that demon coffee place. I wasn’t surprised he’d tracked me down. How would I like it if I went to a club with Beatrice and she buggered off with some guy?
At the edge of the wards, I dropped down on my knees beside Gail. “Sorry, Macavity. Things got a bit crazy and we—”
He cut me off with a plaintive yowl.
My brows furrowed. “Didn’t they treat you well in that place?”
“Mrrow!”
I narrowed my eyes, taking in Macavity’s emerald-green irises, glossy coat, and shiny new collar. Even his claws looked freshly manicured. Something in his tone of voice didn’t sound so genuine.
Valentine would never have left the cat with a demon who would mistreat him. Macavity was probably exaggerating to make me feel bad for leaving him alone for so long.
I had to change the subject before I let him work himself into a full-blown rant. “Can you see me?”
Macavity shook his head and batted at the invisible barrier.
“I thought you said he wasn’t a shifter?” asked Gail.
“He’s magical.” I placed my fingers a foot over the ground, and Macavity reached up with his front paws, placing them level with my hand. My heart tightened. His toe beans were pink and plump with a little black spot on the pad. I shook off his cuteness and pushed some power into the ward.
Nothing happened.
“What are you doing?” Gail whispered.
“Seeing if I can find a way to sneak him in,” I replied. Macavity could be my greatest ally… if only I could get him through the wards.
His green eyes widened, and he flicked his head to a point over my shoulder before darting away and galloping across the heath. I turned toward the trees closest to the house to see what had spooked the cat. The men standin
g beneath them were gone, replaced by a dark figure who stood as still as death.
My insides twisted into knots, and a drum rolled through my heart.
“Valentine,” I murmured.
He stalked toward me with the gait of a feline, his darkening eyes fixed on mine.
“Will you be alright?” Coral scrambled to her feet.
“He won’t hurt me,” I replied.
Coral wrapped a hand around Gail’s arm and pulled her up to stand. “If we don’t see you tomorrow—”
“See if you can get Healer Calla to do the sound healing session,” I replied, not taking my gaze off Valentine. “Keep your crystals close. They’ll continue healing you from the inside.”
They hurried across the lawn, dipping into awkward curtseys as they passed Valentine, who didn’t acknowledge their presence. My mind rolled back to what Coral had said about him being Kresnik’s right hand. Neither of the people I was now considering my team had ever shown him deference before the Light Lord’s arrival.
Valentine wore a slim-fitting black shirt that looked like regular cotton at first, but as he came closer, the slight fading over its collars and cuff indicated that it was denim. This was the first time I’d seen him wear jeans, and they were a slim fit that emphasized his muscular thighs.
If he hadn’t drowned me in thrall and glutted himself with my blood, I might have salivated. Right now, he made my pulse pound harder than a war drum.
“I told you to stay in your room,” he said in a voice stern enough to make my nerve endings tingle.
My heart stopped beating for a full second before it thudded against my breastbone, and an avalanche of dread tumbled into my stomach. This was a completely new Valentine—one who actually believed I was his property.
He grabbed my arm and hauled me to my feet. Warmth seeped through my reaper cloak, indicating that he had fed. Tamping down my emotions, I tilted my head up to meet his sharpening eyes.
