by Michele Hauf
“No, but I do know his woman, Dasha. I see her on occasion because I provide her with—er...”
“Essentials you have purveyed?”
“Exactly. But it’s to keep her alive when Ian is not around. Trust me. Dasha mentioned something about Grim venturing through Russia for the summer.”
“There are warlocks all over the place. You just have to know where to look.”
“And you do?” He bowed his forehead to hers and kissed her nose.
“A lot of answers can be found in books. Sounds like I’ll be perusing the pages again this afternoon.”
“I wish I could help you, but I suspect the Archives are off-limits to anyone who does not work there. And even more so to one who heads a demon mafia.”
“You have to have a badge to get past security,” she said and then hugged him. “You’re not an evil person. I think Certainly has some bad information. But it doesn’t matter.”
“It matters to me what you think of me.”
“Then you’re good, because I adore you. So what are your plans for today? What does an evil overlord do all day?”
He chuckled and picked up his suit coat, and they strolled down to the kitchen, where Tamatha collected her shoulder bag. She intended to go straight to the Archives.
“I’ve got scouts at the cemetery, keeping an eye out for the witches. And I’ve a little snafu I’m tidying up over in the Bois de Boulogne. Has to do with humans and Ouija boards and some particularly mischievous incorporeal demons. Sometimes those damned boards really work.”
“Oh, I know that. You need any help?”
“No, got it covered. But you’ll keep me updated on your list making?”
“I will. And you’ll call me after you talk to your mother?”
“Right. So here are the names of the two demons who have died.” Ed pulled a notepad from a kitchen drawer and scribbled on it. “I don’t know if they are the first two the witches have killed. I could have missed others.” He tore off the page and handed it to her. “I’ll be thinking of you all day.”
“Me, too.” Tamatha kissed him, then placed her palm over his chest. “And remember—stay open to the possibilities.”
“With you I believe all things are possible.”
Chapter 16
Tamatha looked over the list of twelve witches who had been burned alive on August 25, 1753. Lysia Bellerose was the third on the list. It was not alphabetical, nor could it possibly be in order of rank. Or so she assumed. She’d called her mother again and left a message, hoping Petrina could shed some light on her grandmother’s life. And death.
But with the list she could trace offspring and perhaps even lovers. Whoever had raised the coven from the dead could be anyone associated with Les Douze. Though they must possess powerful magic.
“The most powerful witch in Paris,” she whispered as she sat back in the velvet chair, kicked off her heels to let them straighten on the floor below the table and pulled up her legs. “Certainly not me. But who? A warlock? How many warlocks currently live in Paris?”
She had heard of Ian Grim. And Zoe Guillebeaux’s father was a warlock. She couldn’t recall his name. That could be an excellent next step. Narrow it down to warlocks and then match that list to the list of relations and friends associated with Les Douze.
She glanced to the maplewood cuckoo clock that CJ kept wound and dusted. The woodwork was stained black and two ravens carved above the timepiece cawed over their shoulders. One looked directly at her. Which reminded her of Ed and his ravens. His feather sigils on his skin had moved as if real under her touch. And when he’d been fully demon she could only admire him. She’d thought that first night she’d run into Ed that a full moon would bring family and challenge. And had it ever.
Tapping her lip, she sighed and then remembered... She pulled the list of the two dead demons he’d given her from her purse. More names to help in her research quest.
“It’s only been two hours,” she muttered. “I’m going to need lots more tea.”
But first, she texted Ed that she was researching warlocks. She wondered how he was faring, and then her mind drifted again to last night. How trusting for him to have shifted before her. And fascinating. Truly, she found Ed in demon shape sexy. And not at all frightening. Save for those thorns he always warned her about. The ones on his toes must completely recede when in human form because he’d not been worried about hurting her with those when they had sex.
“An antidote,” she said suddenly and got up to head into the demon room. “A foray into something else,” she decided, knowing when she focused on something too intensely it never came to her. Distraction was always the best cure for finding anything. As well, having an antidote to Ed’s thorns could be something she would like to keep handy.
On the way to the demon room CJ waylaid her. He carried a metal bat and wore a catcher’s glove. “Want to help?” he asked.
“What’s up?”
“Something got out in the demon room last night. An imp.”
“Yes, I want to help. Do I need something like a baseball cap?”
“This will do.” He tugged a long steel shaker of salt from his back pocket and slapped it into her hand. “I’ll distract and attempt to catch the critter. You salt and exorcise. Can you do that?”
“Depends on where I’m sending it. I’ve not the skill to expel to Daemonia.”
“Nothing so demanding. Just back in the book from which it escaped.”
A half hour later, CJ closed the book Lesser Imps and called teatime. Tamatha sat on the floor near a scatter of books that had been disheveled when CJ had leaped to catch the naked and giggling teddy bear–sized imp. The books on the floor snapped to attention and found positions on their respective shelves.
Blowing away a strand of hair and setting the saltshaker aside, she let her eyes wander over the book spines and gasped when she saw the title Demonic Breeds and Their Attributes. Perfect.
Ten minutes later, she had found the section that detailed the corax demon. The text had been written in the sixteenth century and used f’s for the s’s and had a lot of thynes and thees. Ancient texts gave her a giggle. A very detailed drawing looked only a little like Ed’s demon form. But it did get his ribbed penis and thorns right.
And it included an antidote to counteract the poison from the demon’s thorns.
She tugged out her phone and typed in the list of ingredients. There were only three, but one of them would prove difficult to obtain.
“Oh, I can’t make that.” She slumped back against the bookshelves.
The main ingredient in the antidote? A ground corax demon’s thorn.
* * *
This time the frenzied call from Inego led Ed to the rue Clotilde behind the Pantheon. Not in a cemetery. And too damn close to public houses and streets. Even set back from the boulevard Saint-Michel, the mausoleum attracted lines of tourists, who filed in and out to peer at the lackluster tombs of famous past Parisians. Ed avoided the crowds and tracked the scent of dead witch down a narrow alley that wended into a courtyard lined on both sides by tall hornbeam.
A calico cat mewled and scampered out of his way. Cats never did seem to like him much. He hissed at the retreating feline and then sniffed the air. The scent of death had suddenly vanished.
Ed spun and tracked the retreating cat. Could it have been...?
“A familiar?”
He rushed after the cat, but it dodged under the hornbeam. Making a leap, Ed landed the side of the shrub, grabbing the end of the cat’s tail. Wild hisses and claws went at him as he pulled the critter out from under the scratchy shrubbery. Claws cut into his skin, drawing blood.
“You mangy beast!” He let the thing go and it scrambled under the hedge.
Ed turned and sat against the wall of thick,
glossy hornbeam, inspecting the cuts that had gone through his shirt. The white linen was stained black with his blood. Never a drop of red. He’d always been cautious not to fight or do anything that might result in his own bloodshed when near humans.
He sensed the skin healing, but nothing would save this shirt.
“They’re damned dead witches!” came a hiss from the other side of the hedge.
“What?” Ed turned but couldn’t see through the thick shrubbery. “Who’s that?”
“I’m the cat, you asshole. You gotta watch it. Almost broke my tail with your grabby hands. Idiot demon.”
“Are you a familiar?”
“Well, duh. Ouch. This hedge is scratchy.”
“Come to this side and we’ll talk.”
“Really? ’Cause you know the only reason I’ve a human voice is because I’ve shifted from cat form.”
“Right, but— Oh.” Which meant the guy was naked. Familiars shifted much differently than he did. They never retained their clothing because, well, cats didn’t wear clothing. One demonic bonus he should be thankful for. “You stay on that side. I’m Edamite Thrash.”
“I know who you are, asshole. I’ve tracked you through the city before. It’s what I do. Prowl and observe. Name is Thomas. And you are after dead witches, right?”
“Right. Do you work for them?”
“Hell no. I don’t allow witches to use me for the demon-summoning thing. That’s crass. And messy. But I can smell those damned witches a league away. Nasty!”
“Were you following one? Until now I’ve assumed they were contained in the Montparnasse cemetery.”
“Yeah? Well, one got out. But I lost her. One minute she was there, the next...poof.”
“She just disappeared?”
“Like Houdini. Why are you after those smelly witches?”
“They’re killing demons.”
“Nothing wrong with that.”
If demons hated witches, familiars hated demons on an equal level.
“If they are able to escape what I had assumed were the bounds of the cemetery, that can’t be good for anyone. You know what will happen when humans see a zombie witch?”
“Chaos,” the cat said. “I’d offer help, but I don’t have a clue, man. You need to talk to Ian Grim.”
“He’s out of town. You know any other warlocks in the area?”
“Pierre Guillebeaux, but he’s off-kilter in the head most of the time. Working on some whacked time-travel nonsense. There’s Arius, but that warlock is one nasty case. Walks around in one of those stupid frock coats from another time.”
A warlock wearing clothing from another time period? Generally that was the case if they had hailed from such a time. Which would make the warlock old enough to have worn frock coats. Perhaps around the eighteenth century, when the witches had been burned. That could be his witch. “Who is it?”
“What’s in it for me?”
Ed couldn’t imagine what to offer a cat shifter. “I’m fresh out of catnip. Sorry.”
“Asshole.” The shrub shuffled and Thomas huffed in resignation. “Name’s Arius Pumpelché. But I don’t know where to find that one. Rather, I do, but I value my fur. Talk later, asshole.”
And with a disturbance in the hornbeam, and an abrupt meow, the cat scampered off.
Ed pulled out his phone and saw the text from Tamatha. She was researching warlocks and an antidote. In reply, he texted the warlock’s name.
* * *
“‘Arius Pumpelché’?” Tamatha read Ed’s text. “Never heard of him. Or her. With a pompous name like that, must be a man.”
The scent of cinnamon tea preceded CJ’s entrance into the witch room, where Tamatha had returned to her desk neatly covered with her notes. He set down the tray and poured two cups. She looked up to see he was eyeing her fiercely.
“No,” she said in reply to his unspoken but duly felt question. “I have not broken it off with Ed.”
“Didn’t ask.”
“I felt your burning question,” she said, sipping the perfect brew. If the man hadn’t such a talent with tea, she would—well, she would nothing. He was her boss and she did like CJ. And chasing down imps? It did not get cooler than that. “Sit down, will you?”
CJ landed in the chair opposite her. He poured his own tea and sipped, waiting for her to speak. The man had once been possessed by a war demon, as well as other hideous sorts, including grief, pain and chaos. But one would never guess he was so strong as to endure such a trial from his gentle demeanor. Though she knew he could take out a tribe of vampires with a simple tap of his left finger against one of the powerful spell tattoos on his body.
Tamatha pushed her phone aside, on which she’d been taking down notes, and leaned her elbows onto the table. “Did you know there is a coven of dead witches roaming the streets of Paris?”
“Dead witches?” The man’s dark brow arched.
“Zombie witches, to be exact. At least that’s what Ed calls them. He’s been following them and is determined to ensure they don’t harm any more demons.”
“Any more? That would imply— What’s going on, Tamatha? And do I need to bring this before the Council?”
“Oh, no, CJ, you can’t. This is something Ed is handling.” He being the mafia king or evil overlord, which was a moniker she felt sure he used for street cred. “I don’t think he’d like it if I brought in the Council. Besides, you know them. They never get involved.”
“Yes, they observe.” He sipped his tea. “Is this dangerous?”
“The tea or the witches?”
He smirked.
“I suspect so. They are Les Douze.”
The dark witch placed both hands, palms down, on the table. His look was so serious, again, Tamatha felt his question.
“I have to help him,” she replied. “My grandmother was one of The Twelve. It’s a weird coincidence that when Ed was looking for a witch to help him, it happened to be me, someone related to one of the dead witches.”
“Coincidence? Not with Thrash.”
“CJ, you’re going to have to put aside your obvious distrust for the man so I can discuss this with you. He’s not like most demons.”
“And what are most demons like?”
Her shoulders dropped and she blew out a breath. “I don’t know. My studies are so new. I know very few. Cinder is the only other demon I know, and he’s not even demon anymore. He transformed to vampire years ago, thanks to Parish. But I do believe demons have gotten a bad rap. Not all are evil.”
“I know that. But do allow me my prejudices against demons after having had a dozen trapped within me for months after returning from Daemonia.”
He’d been on a spell-collecting adventure and shouldn’t have been there in the first place. “Yes, well, you did go there of your free will. Not like Daemonia is a recommended travel destination.”
“Sometimes a man’s gotta do—” he waved a dismissive hand between them “—whatever. I’d never try to justify my stupid acts of indiscretion.”
“Did a witch tell you things about Ed? Is that why you’ve such a bad opinion of him?”
“You mean Paisley Burns?”
She nodded. Ed hadn’t given her a name, but she could assume that was the witch who had tortured him.
“She was a victim, Tamatha. Thrash had almost killed her.”
“Really?” Tamatha placed her hand on his. “Was that before or after she enslaved and tortured him for three days?”
“Oh?”
“She didn’t tell you that part?”
The dark witch shook his head and took a sip of tea. She couldn’t blame him for forming an opinion based on the witch’s story. Which, apparently, had been a story altered to make her appear the victim when really Ed could have
died at her hands.
“Doesn’t matter,” Tamatha offered. “I trust him. Your opinion, while I value it, isn’t necessary.”
“I had only Paisley’s story on which to base my opinion. You believe she really did try to enslave him? Then I will reserve my judgment on the man.” CJ stretched his hand across the table and tapped her phone. “What’s that name?”
“Arius Pumpelché. Warlock. You know of him?”
“I do. Do you want to hear my opinion on her, or would you prefer to ignore that, as well?”
Certainly was certainly laying it on thick. But she could handle him. “Her?”
“You’ve heard of Ian Grim, I’m sure.”
She nodded. “That warlock has been around since the seventeenth century. But he didn’t go warlock until he decided to keep his current girlfriend, Dasha, alive after she’d been beheaded by the guillotine during the French Revolution.”
“Yes. Keeping dead things alive is a grave crime against both the Light and the Dark. Arius Pumpelché puts Grim to shame on the scale of Bad Things Warlocks Do. She was banished from the mortal realm after an altercation with demons and witches. Necromancy, actually. She’d tried to bring dead witches back to life.”
Tamatha straightened. That sounded like the warlock in question.
“Fortunately, she failed and was exiled to Daemonia. I didn’t realize she was back in Paris. How did she get out of Daemonia? Is she in the city?”
“I don’t know. It’s a name Ed sent me. I don’t know how he got it, but we both suspect it must be a warlock who summoned Les Douze. Who else could summon a dozen witches who were burned at the stake three centuries ago? And if she’s attempted it once before?”
“Yes.” He rapped his fingers on the table. “But if someone had summoned dead witches, the warlock would need to be in the city, near the place where he or she summoned the witches. And if Arius is in town, the Council needs to be made aware. You’re sure I can’t help you with this?”
“I’m not even sure what this is yet. I’m still researching. I know that the demons Les Douze once enslaved were the ones who accused them, and now it seems those witches are going after those demons’ family. Which might explain how Arius fits in. I just got his—er, her—name, so I’m going to do some more research.”
