'Ink It Over: A Touch Of Ink Novel

by Rachel Rawlings

  Namely, our survival and putting as much distance between ourselves and Winslow to ensure that happened.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  "WE CAN'T STAY HERE." Lars talked around a mouthful of peanut butter and jelly sandwich.

  Nicholas refilled my coffee cup for the third time, a move which skyrocketed him to the position of favorite person on Earth. "My security system held. There were no breaks in the wards." He put the coffeepot back on the warmer and leaned against the portion of the counter operating as his makeshift kitchen. "Or in the illusion. This is still the safest place we can be."

  Lars stuffed the last bite of his sandwich in his mouth and grabbed another off the plate. "For now."

  Nicholas shrugged, as if to concede agreement that we may need an alternative location. He’d proven to be an excellent getaway driver, making it from Narraganset to his hidden workshop in Providence in record time. Triage, showers, and clean clothes were the first order of business after making it safely inside. We sat in the kitchenette, Lars and I in our borrowed clothes. Like a twisted version of Goldilocks, the sweats and T-shirt Lars wore were too small, mine were too big, and Nicholas's obviously were just right. Under normal circumstances, the scene would have been hilarious.

  Unfortunately, things were still far from normal.

  I held my coffee mug in my hand, reveling in its warmth and savoring the aroma. A luxury afforded to me because of someone else's sacrifice. "We're only safe because of Karen." The reality of what she'd done slammed into me with the force of a wrecking ball. In the chaos of fleeing for our lives, I’d shoved those feelings into the box inside my mind where I kept all my emotional trauma. A mental safeguard until I could process them some other time. Or never, if I had my way. Apparently, my brain decided sitting in Nicholas's safe house was the perfect time. "We wouldn't have made it out of there if it wasn't for her."

  "Don't do that." Lars set his sandwich down and reached for my hand. "Don't put this on yourself. I'm grateful for what she did and I'll carry that with me, always, but nothing we did would have changed her decision."

  "That's just it. I'm going over and over it in my head, you know. I kept telling myself I was just stalling, just going through the motions of reversing the ward until we figured a way out. But there wasn't a way out. Not without you dying, and I would have finished it. I would have given Winslow what he wanted to keep you alive." I turned to look at Nicholas, meeting his eyes. "The both of you."

  I’d had my doubts about him along the way. Plenty of them—and yet he continued to prove me wrong at every opportunity. He had his own reasons for wanting to bring his uncle and the Magistrate down, but we were on the same side and that counted for something.

  It counted for a hell of a lot.

  "And when you finished the reversal?" Nicholas's question was both jarring and unexpected. "Do you think her decision would have been any different? Under someone else's control? As their slave? Her mind was set, Adeline, and we didn't create the circumstances that put her there. Winslow did. He made the choice for her, not you. And he will pay for it."

  I wanted to argue that she would have still been alive. An opportunity to escape would have presented itself eventually. She could have gotten away from Winslow. But I couldn't. It was easy for me to think those things surrounded by my friends in the safety of Nicholas's wards and the knowledge that had I succeeded in doing what Winslow wanted, I had a way out.

  Death would have come for me eventually.

  But an Angel of Mercy's gifts would have been a curse under Winslow's control, and Karen would have been denied even the release of death—as unwelcome as it would have been for a young witch like Karen.

  "Someone needs to tell her mother." I knew that someone should have been me, but every time I closed my eyes, I saw Karen engulfed in witch fire. She would haunt my dreams for the rest of my life. I didn't want to add Ms. Brown's pain to my nightmares. No matter how selfish it made me.

  "I'll call her." Lars laced his fingers through mine, his hand encapsulating mine. Having had time to recover, he slipped into his role of being my protector with ease, taking up a burden that should have been mine without question.

  Nicholas looked at our entwined hands. His face was awash with disappointment as he pushed off the counter and crossed the kitchenette to the worktable. He picked up a small Mason jar. It was barely an eighth of the way full with some sort of soot. "If you don't mind, I think I'd like to tell her in person. She should have this."

  "Are those..." I struggled to find the words. "Is that Karen?"

  Nicholas nodded. "It would have been wrong to leave what was left of her behind." He held the jar by the lid, examining its contents. "For a number of reasons."

  Lars released my hand, his head tilted to one side as he stared at the jar of Karen's remains. He cleared his throat and blinked back what looked like a tear, affirming my suspicions he’d developed a little crush on Karen the night I’d warded her. Feelings that could have deepened if not for the sacrifice she’d made the night before. A small flame of Karen's witch fire might burn in his heart forever.

  Nicholas had used residual magic stored within her ashes to help us escape. His knowledge and skill were superior to mine, but what really impressed me was the fact that in the midst of the shit storm we were in, he’d had the forethought to collect her remains.

  Not only for her mother but for the rest of us and for Karen—to make sure she was truly free from Winslow and his plan to abuse her magic.

  “I’ll go with you.” Lars scooted his chair back from the table and stood. “Someone’s got to keep an eye on you, and Del will be safe enough while we’re gone.” He gave me his best ‘I dare you to argue with me’ look.

  “You needn’t worry. For once, I’m happy to stay behind.” I wasn’t one to run from a challenge, but facing Ms. Brown with her daughter’s remains after she’d come to me seeking help was something I was more than willing to avoid.

  Lars's shoulders relaxed as he let out the breath he’d been holding, apparently expecting an argument from me about being left behind.

  He wouldn’t get one. Not this time.

  It was the coward’s way out, using my safety and the danger of Winslow and the Magistrate as an excuse for not coming face-to-face with Ms. Brown and my failure to protect her daughter. But I took it. One day I would have to look her in the eye and own up to my part in her death, but this wasn’t it. She deserved the time to mourn and come to terms with what happened without the additional burden of my guilt and desire for her forgiveness.

  I shook my head, clearing away the negative thoughts swirling around in my mind, and got up from the table. “You won’t get far looking like that. Not in broad daylight.”

  Since I was going to be at Nicholas’s for the foreseeable future, I decided to make myself at home and made a beeline for his spelling supplies. After rooting through the jars and various clay pots on the shelves above his workstation, I pinched a few sprigs from the dried herbs hanging on the wall and added them to the pile of ingredients. I grabbed the mortar and pestle from the end of the counter and set to work making two charms.

  Lars and Nicholas joined me, both curious to see what I was cooking up. The area was adequately sized for one person to perform spell work. Three people, one of them built like a Mack truck, and I could barely move.

  “If you’re trying to make me nervous by hovering, it won’t work.” I stuck my elbows out, jabbing each of them in the side. “What it will do is make the process of creating these charms harder than it has to be.”

  “I didn’t know you were a kitchen witch as well.” Nicholas peered over my shoulder, examining my ingredients.

  “I’m not, which is why this is going to be difficult enough without the two of you hovering over me.” I took a deep breath and counted to ten. Intention was everything with charms. Each herb contained multiple purposes. Because I didn’t possess hearth magic, I couldn’t afford the distraction.

  “Let’s
give her some room to work.” Lars took the glass jar containing Karen’s remains from Nicholas and left the spelling area. “I’ll see if my clothes are dry and get changed.”

  “Monkshood, amaranth, edelweiss, and China berry.” Nicholas ran through my ingredients like a grocery list. “Tripling down on the invisibility, huh? Why not dill instead of the China berry?”

  “Because dill is also used for lust, and as you pointed out, I’m not a kitchen witch.” I pinched off a piece of edelweiss and dropped it in the white marble mortar. “So, unless you want to run the risk of humping Ms. Brown’s leg like a dog in heat...”

  “China berry it is,” Nicholas said. “You know, I could just cast a Now You See Me, Now You Don’t.”

  “You could but you’d probably trip every ward within a five-mile radius that Winslow had set around the Brown residence.” I added another pinch of monkshood and used the pestle to grind the mixture. “We need to go old school. Charms are underrated and therefore not on the Winslow security team radar. Odds are they didn’t tune their ward for them.”

  Lars shuffled past with an armful of clothes and headed for the bathroom to change. “I’ll take those odds.” He backed into the tiny bathroom with barely any room left on either side. “You’re thinking things through. I must be rubbing off on you.” He closed the door before I had a chance to respond.

  “If he doesn’t end up with a foot in the toilet while changing, it’ll be a miracle. He pretty much fills the room.” The image of Lars contorting himself to change out of the sweats and into his clothes was enough to set me into a fit of giggles.

  Nicholas, however, didn’t share my amusement. He was quick to steer the conversation from Lars back to me. “So, where did you learn how to make this charm anyway?”

  "Hmm?” I laughed again at the sound of what I assumed was Lars banging an elbow against the wall. “Oh, a couple years ago, I had this kitchen witch for a client. She needed a ward of protection and strength of will but couldn’t afford both.” After plucking off a little more of the amaranth, I went back to grinding the herbs. “Turns out her husband was a real piece of shit and she was trying to get away from him, so I traded.”

  “That was kind of you.” Nicholas’s attention shifted from watching me craft the charms to the bathroom and back again.

  “Don’t sound so surprised.” I shook my head. “I’m not that bad.”

  “I’ve seen you threaten a customer with a billy-bat, been personally marked by you, and stuffed in your trunk.” He shrugged his shoulders. “I’m not supposed to be surprised you take trade as a form of payment?” Another bang coming from the bathroom momentarily drew Nicholas’s attention away from me. When he turned back, he seemed almost anxious. “Listen, uh, there’s something I wanted to ask you.” A bump against the bathroom door, followed by a string of curse words from Lars, had him rushing the question. “You and Lars?”

  “Me and Lars what?” The question was so out of left field it took a second to register, but when it did, another fit of laughter took over. “Me and Lars? Seriously?” I shuddered, shaking off the thought of the two of us as a couple. “Gross.”

  “I just... I mean...” Nicholas took the pestle from me and set it down on the counter beside the mortar. In one swift movement, his hand was on my cheek, turning my face toward his as his lips found mine.

  His magic resonated with mine in a way I’d only experienced once before—when he’d healed me on the side of the road. Lost in the moment as our energy recognized each other’s, I found myself kissing him back. Encouraged, Nicholas leaned in, backing me up against the counter. With both palms flattened on the countertop on either side of me, he pressed his body against mine and deepened the kiss.

  My hands trembled as they roamed the chiseled planes of his chest. It had been so long since I’d been on a date, never mind kissed someone, that I almost forgot what to do. After Grim died, I closed myself from anything and everything that wasn’t work or warding.

  With one exception—Lars.

  Right on cue, the doorknob rattled as it turned, and the bathroom door opened. Nicholas and I separated like two teenagers about to be caught making out in a school hallway. He ended up at the opposite end of the counter while I went back to finishing the charm as if nothing had happened.

  “It’s a good thing I didn’t use the dill,” I muttered, grinding away at the ingredients in the mortar.

  Lars’s brow furrowed, and a frown settled on his face. “Almost done?”

  It was obvious he knew something was going on. He wasn’t an idiot, and the workspace reeked of a mixture of mine and Nicholas’s magic that had nothing to do with crafting a charm.

  “Yup, just need to mold it and cook it down.” I spared a glance at Nicholas, who in contrast to my mortification at almost being caught lost in the throes of a passion I didn’t expect or understand, seemed happy. After giving him a withering look that knocked the smile right off his face, I turned my attention back to my ingredients and the final steps for making the charms.

  If we were lucky, that kiss hadn't completely ruined the intent for the spell. There was only one way to test it, and that involved Nicholas and Lars being outside the safety of the workshop walls.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  “DO YOU HAVE ANY OF the Halloween stash left?” Lars grabbed my backpack and rooted though its contents. “Not that I don’t trust your hearth spell work. It’s just that I don’t trust your hearth spell work.”

  Any smartass replies on my part had the potential to turn into an exchange of barbs that would eventually lead to Lars needling me for details on what had actually happened while he was in the bathroom. Rather than risk it, I ignored the comment and handed him his charm.

  Of course, that was just as suspicious.

  He looked up from his search, eyebrows raised, with a puzzled look on his face. Lars could read me better than anyone. He always knew when something was up. He returned to rooting through the contents of my pack, but I caught him peering at Nicholas from the corner of his eye. Lars suspected something and didn’t bother to hide it

  At least from me.

  Staying behind and killing time on Nicholas’s couch until they got back from taking Karen Brown’s remains to her mother looked more and more appealing with each passing minute.

  “Here, let me see.” I held out my hand, opening and closing it in a grabby motion. “I used some before we got on the ferry. There wasn’t much left, but it’s got to be in my bag.”

  Lars tossed the backpack over to me, which I caught in the chest before plopping down with it on the sofa. I unzipped the inside pocket and pulled out the jar of Halloween glamour.

  “Found it.” Eyeballing its contents, I guesstimated there was enough for two more illusions. “There’s barely enough for the both of you, so nothing complex.”

  “Tithe collectors.”

  Nicholas’s suggestion had Lars and me both turning our heads.

  “Tithe collectors?” we parroted back in unison.

  “It’s a simple construction, and nobody wants to draw the attention of a collector. They all look away and avoid eye contact.” Seeming satisfied with himself and his idea, Nicholas folded his arms over his chest. “If Del’s charms fail, this is the best backup disguise.” He offered a meager smile, having the courtesy to appear chagrined at even thinking that.

  “Hiding in plain sight?” Lars didn’t seem convinced. “And if another Footman comes to talk to us, what then? You think Ms. Brown is going to open her door to a couple of Footmen after her daughter’s gone missing?”

  “Actually, yeah, I do.” Nicholas waited, arms still crossed, for Lars and I to catch on. After a few beats, he must’ve realized that wasn’t going to happen and decided to elaborate. “The fact her daughter is missing is exactly why she’d open the door. She’ll be desperate for information.”

  And that fun fact was yet another reason why I’d agreed to stay behind.

  Lars eventually conceded, and I began yet a
nother spell to disguise the two of them. At least the backup didn’t require any cooking on my part. My kitchen skills were all but spent. Using a premade glamour spell to create a disguise was something either of them could have done. It required very little energy to activate, but out of the three of us, I was the only one with energy to spare. Safe within the confines of Nicholas’s hidden apartment, my magical stores would regenerate faster than theirs. It only made sense for me to apply the glamour and use my magic to turn it on.

  I stuck my index finger in the jar and swiped at the salve inside. Cursing my miscalculation, I came away with just enough for one glamour. Without hesitation, I grabbed Lars’s arm and used the tip of my finger to draw the symbol necessary to shift him from my beloved best friend into one of the hated symbols of the Magistrate’s stronghold on the witch community—a Footman.

  “If you have an orange wood stick I can scrape the sides and bottom of the jar, I might be able to get enough for one more.” I hadn’t thought about it in the moment. I’d acted on instinct or maybe impulse. Either way, Lars was the obvious choice. The only choice.

  So why did I feel so guilty?

  “It’s fine.” Nicholas offered a reassuring smile. “I told you I can cast a Now You See Me, Now You Don’t. Besides, I’ve got your charm, right?”

  I wished I had the same confidence in my spell work as he did. “Yeah, sure. Absolutely.” I wasn’t sure who I was trying to convince—him or me.

  Nicholas clapped Lars on the shoulder. “Ready when you are.” After grabbing a messenger bag off the hook on the wall by the door, he slung the strap over his shoulder. “Try not to burn the place down while we’re gone.”

  “I managed to cook up those charms without having to call the fire department. I think I’ll be fine.” I found myself smiling. Something that occurred more frequently around him.