His voice, everything about him gave me the serious creepy crawlies. This wasn’t some mage, it was a sorcerer, probably hundreds of years old who wouldn’t hesitate to slaughter my mages at his slightest whim. Why in the world had Jasper agreed to this?
“Excellent question. I’m going to have to review the contracts to be certain we aren’t taking advantage of your excellent wages.”
He laughed again and leaned forward, close enough I could smell the faintest trace of lilacs on his breath. More to the point, he could smell me, and he did, inhaling deeply while his bright black, beady eyes bore into me.
Something flickered in his eyes and he straightened then studied me with a momentary gravity. “You aren’t very adept at deception, or you wouldn’t reek of her. Shall we get to the point?”
I blinked at him. “By all means.”
“Sit.” He gestured to the table set with fine lace and china. The wine when I inhaled, was of flowers, lilacs mixed with grapes. Were lilacs edible? I couldn’t remember, but it would be rude to refuse a glass of wine even if it were laced with something mildly toxic.
I held the glass in my fingers while I studied the sorcerer in front of me. When I finally recognized him, I almost dropped my wineglass. I put it on the table, smoothing the lace underneath. It was the exact same pattern Penny had used in our first tea party.
“So, you are her grandfather. It’s a pleasure to make your acquaintance.”
He bowed to me courteously. “And you are the Huntsman heir. I understand business is doing very well, particularly in summers when you personally join the ranks.”
He’d done his research. I smiled grimly. “And you smell of Penny’s grandmother. I take it that she isn’t dead, simply in your care.”
His eyebrows rose for a scant moment before he laughed, threw back his glass of wine and poured another. “It’s all very precarious, you understand.”
I nodded because while I had no idea what he was talking about, chatting with the Devil of Darkside in his private war tent was an extremely precarious proposal. I sipped my wine. It was delicious. Not too sweet, but almost.
“Sabine has kept the child from me, insists that it’s all for the best, but what could be better than my own flesh in my care?”
Sabine must be Penny’s mother. Interesting. “I completely agree, but it seems that there’s a curse that would prevent her.”
His dark brows drew together. “A curse, you say?”
I shrugged. I shouldn’t have revealed that, but how could he not know that there was a curse? He was so subtle, slipping me little tidbits that made me let down my guard so I revealed slightly bigger ones. “That’s the rumor, but I don’t know firsthand. You seem to know much more than I do, which is as it should be. I’m only a lowly mage working my way through my last year at Rosewood.”
He sniffed his narrow nostrils. “So suspicious. You’d think I have a dreadful reputation or something. Have another glass of wine.”
“I would, but I actually need to look over the contract before I let myself enjoy the pleasures of Darkside.”
He gestured to the table and the papers appeared. I went through them meticulously. He had all the proper lines filled out and as collateral for my three companies, he had on offer the entire Devil’s City. It was extremely good faith. Also, Jasper must have arranged this just so that I’d have the opportunity to finish my hunt for the elusive Devil of Darkside. Jasper could have warned me or at least looked dreadfully concerned.
“It looks very good. Too good.” I put the contract down and studied the creature. “If you don’t mind my probing, what exactly are you getting out of the fulfillment of this contract?”
He shrugged. “Nothing. I expect at some point you will notice the final clause, mark the contract null, and be on your way, thoroughly put out for all the bother.”
I smiled at him. “Yes, well, I saw that clause, but I was certain that you would alter it since the first step after a manipulation like you would never do, is offering my armies to your opposing forces, including my dragon riders.”
He raised his eyebrows. “Indeed? You would challenge me?”
I smiled at him while a slight shimmer of green tinged the edges of the world. “It isn’t a challenge. It’s business. Our methods are consistent overall. I could be persuaded to remain neutral in this skirmish if you guaranteed your approval of your granddaughter’s alliance with me.”
He laughed and slapped my shoulder ebulliently. “Well-played, youngster. Honor and cleverness, a dangerous combination. I approve of you, and I’ll keep your men on to fight this battle. I’d hate to inconvenience you for nothing.”
I gave him a small smile. “No inconvenience worth mentioning. If everything is in order, after you sign here to nullify that clause…” He did so, scrawling ‘the devil’ in messy slashes. “I’ll notify my men that they are at your command, within reason. You’ve seen the contract.”
He nodded. “Very strict, but armies need that sort of thing or they break down in civil war. How often do you personally come to oversee your men?”
I studied him. “As often as necessary. What are you intentions towards the girl?”
He smiled at me wickedly. “Oh, but that’s what her good patriarch is supposed to say. Don’t worry young man. I have no intention of doing anything unnecessary. I have, however learned from my past mistake. There will be no marriage with the sort of man Sabine chose.”
Ah. Penny’s father, the one who didn’t want her. Was that even possible? I opened my mouth to ask then held back. This conversation was going to get me into trouble. I could tell. I smiled blandly, we wrapped up the contract in record time then I was heading back to find out what I could about Signore Ludi.
I was almost out of the tent when I hesitated. I turned and studied the Devil where he sat, relaxed, glass of red wine in his hand. “How did you find out about me?”
He smiled broadly. “Do you think I don’t notice when a little Daysider mage comes touristing into my city? Your friend wasn’t very inconspicuous either. That one has a bit of dark and dreadful in him. You should beware.”
“I should,” I agreed. I should leave. “What do you know about him?”
He laughed, that horrible, awful sound. “A little. Enough to know that it’s safer to interview you rather than him.”
“Does he reside in Darkside?”
His eyebrows rose. “But of course. Where in your world would so much darkness curl up to sleep at night? Yes, he’s a Darksider to be certain. A very, very, serious Darksider. I hope that my granddaughter isn’t relying on him for any sort of comic relief.”
I studied him and that bloody smile. “I don’t believe she does. It’s hard to tell. Her sense of humor can be slightly distorted.”
He nodded as if that was all well and good. I turned and left before I said anything else about her. I’d said enough to the Devil of Darkside.
Chapter 37
Witch
I woke up when Signore Ludi came to a stop, rolling over the familiar ruts and bumps of my old family home. I sat up, ran a hand through my hair and again wondered what had become of the hat. It was such a fun hat. I really should have a pirate tea party some time. Tea party. Drake would come tomorrow and I wouldn’t have any time to set up for the tea party. Maybe I’d have to miss it.
I chewed on my bottom lip while I fished my phone out of my bag. I texted him to ask if the tea party could be at his room and waited for a response, but I didn’t get anything. He must be busy organizing the entire school for the Winter Extravaganza.
He was so cute, taking care of and helping so many mages. He thought he was so bad and dangerous, but he didn’t seem to remember that half the time when he was actually dealing with people. Like the halfway house in the hospital. I’d have to make a point to visit it sometime. It sounded like a fascinating experiment. Or maybe I just wanted to know more about Darkside. Or Drake.
I walked out of the bar-like room, pushed open the door
and came up short when Signore’s looming form blocked the way out. I smiled at him and wrapped my arms around his body. “Thank you so much for bringing me home. I can always rely on you.”
He put his hand on my hair, pressing his palm down, heavy. “Not at all. That is, you shouldn’t have to rely on anyone. You’re a perfectly competent creature. You simply need to learn to control your circumstances with a little more tenacity.”
I pulled away and wrinkled my nose at him. “Maybe so. This time was extremely unpleasant.” I patted his cheek and pulled away before I took any of his pain. He had pain that I needed to address, but later. Pulling his pain wouldn’t help me deal with Pitch’s. That was the thing I had to do, to focus on with all my energy and effort, healing so that I could make it to the tea party tomorrow afternoon without looking like a pirate.
He lifted me up without my asking, which was unnecessary as my broken leg felt much better no doubt from his magic couch, but I just leaned my head on his shoulder and enjoyed the experience of not having to walk on it. “I am very heavy,” I said as he carried me through another compartment full of interesting looking packages and objects without wrapping. Hm. Maybe he was carrying me to keep me from getting too curious about his work. I turned my head to peer over his shoulder as he left that room and took me into the front.
“Cara Mia, you weight at least a ton,” he said with his heavy accent before winking at me. I beamed at him because he was the first person I’d ever seen wink, and it was still the most fascinating thing when Signore did it. Drake made it look charming and flirtatious, but on Signore it was the epitome of conflicting and contrasting emotions that he communicated. There was nothing soft and flirty about him and yet, there was. People were complex with layers of light and dark, good and bad that you had to unravel until you got to know who the real person was beneath.
Except for mages. They were all evil and dangerous.
He set me down on the ground and I hobbled over to the house, hesitating as I looked over my shoulder. “Can you take me back? I suppose if you’re busy…”
“I think it’s best if your step-father takes you. Don’t you?”
I sighed. I wouldn’t get another chance to peek into his truck in a more whole frame of mind and body. “Yes, of course. Thank you Signore. I owe you.”
He smiled broadly. “You will draw my pain like poison out of me, and not because you owe me, but because you’re my Cara Mia.” He gave me a bow that was strange on the gnarled man then turned and leapt into the truck, pulling out in a great cloud of dust while I stared at his red receding taillights, feeling all these things. How many times had I run after him, choking on dust while I tried to keep up, to race him down the drive? He was part of my life, as entangled as Poppy.
I turned and went up the steps that sagged beneath my weight. The longer I was away from the couch, the more my body ached. The bruising would be horrible, and the swelling, the most uncomfortable stage, really. I opened the door and stepped inside. I hesitated a moment to let whatever defensive surprises Revere had left see me and gauge me as family instead of enemy, although sometimes family could be both.
“Mom, Revere, I’m home. Yay. Let’s play cards. I know this really great game called…” I stopped short when I saw the bronze statue. I’d been trying to forget that he still stood just past the entryway, beneath the elevated ceiling and the high windows three stories up that shed light on the broad hall that led up the stairs to my attic. It looked rustier than usual, and the expression on his face seemed amused by my injuries. ‘You fought Pitch?’ it seemed to say. ‘You are an idiot!’ which was probably true.
I stuck my tongue out at him. “And you have nothing better to do than stand around and insult the wounded? What kind of a soldier are you? Where’s your sense of fate, of ‘better man than I, Gungadin,’ or whatever? No, you’re a sneering, sadistic, murderous statue, and you deserve to be smelted into hurters. I’d chop you up one piece at a time if I didn’t think your cankering rust would make everything backfire.”
“Dear, you mustn’t argue with inanimate objects,” my mother said in her delicate, sweet voice as she entered through the door that led to the dungeon. Not really a dungeon. Dungeon connoted something much more grand and usable than the small space below ground that she used for her crafting. I’d learned my excellent hurter skills from her. She was still better than me, probably, but mine were much more interesting. And pink.
“You make it sound like standing up straight. ‘Don’t talk to the statues, don’t slouch, Penny, don’t make that face or it will stick that way, don’t dress up like a can-can girl and put on a show for the help.’ Speaking of, is there anyone here who can cook for me? I’m starving. I called Revere, but he didn’t pick up.”
She took a deep breath and smiled sweetly at me. “You look a sight. Have you been playing with Pitch again?” She tutted. “Surely you realize that’s not the best notion.” She frowned. “But Revere’s spell was to keep Pitch under control while you were at school. That and protect you from the other witches.” Her expression brightened. “Have you met anyone?”
I sighed. “Can we discuss my marital future while you fix me? I have a tea party with a mage tomorrow afternoon and I’d prefer if I didn’t have an eye patch.”
She turned and walked into the other room, her movements serene, graceful, utterly beguiling. It wasn’t too hard to see why Revere found her irresistible. She was lovely. And evil. And crazy. But if Witley was an example of what mages liked, my mother was right there. Except that my mother hated people too much to manipulate them the way Wit did.
We went into the parlor that my grandmother had loved to sit in with her daily correspondence. She loved to write letters to various witches and mages all over the place. She would sometimes read me the contents of the letters she’d get back, of experiments a mage was performing for the betterment of humanity, or some new political treaty someone was trying to have her critique to better their argument. She didn’t teach me about that sort of thing. Called it boring. For me, she gave me stories, tales of wonder and enchantment, but always with a moral. She’d raised me to be good. Why, I wasn’t certain when my mother found the entire concept of ‘good’ beyond her. Revere at least understood the theory.
At any rate, when we walked into the room filled with the old upright piano, which someone had painted roses and vines all over, green velvet wingback chairs on either side of the fireplace, roses carved into every available surface, and the heavy drapes blocking out the sun, I smelled her, and then I felt her, and then I wanted to cry.
I went to the drapes and threw them open, just like she would, then coughed at the dust that rose in the room. When was the last time the parlor got aired out? Was my mother trying to keep her scent alive in this place? My mother wasn’t sentimental, not really, but in spite of their differences, there was something like respect or awe in my mother’s eyes when she mentioned my grandmama.
“Lie on the floor, on the ugly rug with all the decapitated heads.”
It was a green and pink rug where the bucolic scenes of happy peasants was one of the French civil war where the happy peasants were relieving the heads from the bodies of their nobility. I lay down on it while my nose itched from the dust floating through the air, captured by the rays of golden light. It must be late afternoon. Signore had taken his time bringing me here. He probably had to schedule a delivery so mother was expecting him and he was allowed onto the property through the various protection layers she was so meticulous about keeping, or making Revere keep anyway. She couldn’t leave the house.
“Tell me all about this mage you’re seeing tomorrow afternoon. What are his interests? Does he have connections? Is he a very wealthy mage? Oh, it’s Rosewood so that goes without saying.”
Her voice was sweet, but there were layers to her tone that I couldn’t pretend not to notice. She held this little mage in contempt without knowing a single thing about him other than that he had the misfortune of attending Rose
wood Academy, where she’d sent me.
I glared at her. “He’s interested in mustaches, he’s connected to a guitar, and he’s wealthy enough not to mind terribly when one of his shirts gets marred, or maybe that’s because he’s extremely adept at laundry. He’s extremely talented at laundry. I would say that’s his most interesting feature.”
Her smile slipped. I shouldn’t push her, not when she was going to put me back in one piece, but it was an old habit.
“Sorry, mother.” I tried to sound sheepish, but it came out annoyed. “He’s the greatest mage there. Not very good at spellwork, but he has people who do that for him. Spellwork is actually what brought us to this whole impasse. You see, this other mage messed up my protection spell, and then I was attacked by four Creagh, and then Pitch came and…”
She slapped her hand against my mouth, making a sharp sound only slightly dampened by the layers of tapestry lining the walls. “Four Creagh? What did they want?”
I stared at her with my one good eye until she lifted her fingers. “Pitch. That’s what everyone wants. Anyway, after that, a mage fixed my spell, but he didn’t include locking up Pitch. He doesn’t know about her, at least he didn’t until last night when apparently she put on quite a show…”
Her face was interesting. Half angry, half amused. “Did she? Doesn’t like being locked up, does she?”
Scowling at her hurt my face, so I settled for an annoyed sigh. “She doesn’t care. Anyway, this mage is the one I’m having a tea party with.”
She smoothed her hands over my head, her skin smelling faintly of mint and sage. Not a bad scent considering what it could have been. “That sounds like it has potential.”
“Right.”
“When will you marry?”
“I’m still working on it. He’s not certain he wants to marry at all.”
She gave me a look, the one that said I shouldn’t be so stupid. “You don’t wish to simply take him?”
Dread Delight: Rosewood Academy for Witches and Mages (Darkly Sweet Book 2) Page 34
