The Cursed Fae (Accessory to Magic Book 2)

by Kathrin Hutson

  The climb up the staircase seemed to take forever, and she tripped more times than she could count when her feet wouldn’t lift as high as she wanted. But she finally got to the top landing and stumbled against the closed door to her bedroom.

  A pulse of green light flared around the Gateway’s dungeon door on her left.

  ‘Don’t even think about it.’

  Trust me, bank. I don’t want anything to do with it.

  Not now, at least. Jessica didn’t have it in her to try dealing with the source of all her problems. But at least she had everything in one place, under lock and key. The Gateway, that stupid golden coin, and Leandras the fae. Or Laen’aroth. Or whoever he was.

  She struggled to make it across her circular bedroom to the bed, her eyelids drooping, her head and back and chest aching with all the abuse she’d endured in the last twenty-four hours. And now she had a massive cut on her hand as the bloody little cherry on top of the magical pain-in-her-ass sundae.

  She’d probably left blood all over the walls and the banister, now that she thought about it.

  ‘Probably not…’

  Crawling like a sloth onto her bed, Jessica rolled over on her back and lifted her hand.

  Definitely not.

  Because whatever fae magic Leandras had sealed in the binding with his oozing black blood, apparently it had a way with sealing up ritual cuts too. The cut had healed just as completely as it had on his hand, and all that remained was a thin, dried crust of smeared blood.

  “Convenient.”

  ‘Curious.’ The bank hummed in thought. ‘Not impossible coming from someone who seems like he’s been around the block a few times. In more ways than one.’

  Jessica closed her eyes and let herself sink deeper into her own exhaustion.

  ‘But I wouldn’t say you’re out of the woods just yet, witch.’

  We’re not even close. I know.

  ‘There’s no we in this one. A fae that bleeds like that but healed you both right up? Smells fishy.’

  Yeah, it was weird. But she had to shove that little mystery aside too, because there was nothing to stop her now from dropping into unconsciousness.

  ‘Oh, come on. I’ve been telling you to check out that burn on your chest all damn day. What are you… Jessica! You can’t…’

  She couldn’t hear anything anymore as she slipped away. Not even the bank shouting in her mind.

  She dreamed of Leandras this time—of the day he’d crashed into the bank like a raging storm had carried him there, looking disheveled and desperate and terrified. Or as terrified as he could get, at least. She dreamed of him removing that huge golden coin from its plain white box, of the bank freaking out, of the battle they’d fought in the lobby without Jessica knowing who she was fighting or why. Only that she was responsible for keeping those magicals away from the bank. Away from the Gateway.

  Then she heard that name again. Laen’aroth. It repeated over and over in her mind—in Leandras’ voice, in Mickey’s, in the voices of the Requiem members and Jensen’s little rogue army. Their faces crowded around Jessica, drawing closer, pinning her in on every side. All but two of them were dead, she knew, but the sight of them closing in on her made her panic in the dream.

  “Laen’aroth.”

  “Laen’aroth.”

  “Laen’aroth.”

  “Open it.”

  “Take us home.”

  “Bring us here.”

  The faces pressed in on her, looming over her, forcing Jessica to the ground before mutating together into the same amorphous mass of shifting faces within the silver cloud of mist.

  “I will find you.”

  “Laen’aroth.”

  “Wherever you go, whoever you seek to help you, you can never outrun your fate.”

  “Bring him through.”

  “I will—”

  “Do it, Guardian!”

  The silver mist disappeared, and then it was just Leandras standing there in front of her. No, not just the fae. A dark, featureless figure stood behind him—nothing more than a blurred shadow.

  “It’s not unusual for someone to go by multiple names,” he said with a smirk, his hands clasped behind his back. Silver eyes flashed. “Though I must admit I don’t know any Lilith.”

  Jessica woke up screaming. The sound ripped her fully awake again, and she stopped, gasping for breath.

  What the fuck?

  ‘Yeah, you’re tellin’ me! Who’s Lilith?’

  “What?” She rolled over and glanced at the clock on her bedside table. It was already 3:11 p.m. At least she’d gotten a few hours of sleep, and it was way better than passing out all day only to wake up in the middle of the night with a fae locked up in the office downstairs.

  ‘Lilith.’

  Slowly, she pushed herself up to sit on the mattress and gingerly rubbed her head. The massive migraine had died down into a low pressure behind her eyes. And her back didn’t burn so much anymore as it just throbbed dully like a constant reminder of everything she still had to do. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

  ‘Yeah, neither do I. It was your dream, though. Pretty messed up, if you ask me. Maybe the fae knows.’

  “We are not asking Leandras about something in my dream.”

  ‘Well no. You’d be doing all the asking. I just get to watch.’

  With a grunt, Jessica slid toward the edge of the bed and pushed herself cautiously to her feet, just to test the waters. Her legs felt surprisingly stronger after having passed out for the last four hours. Good.

  ‘Told you you needed rest. Now how about you finally take a look at that burn, huh? I get this feeling it’s important.’

  She pulled the collar of her shirt away and looked down. Sure enough, the raw red streaks were still there, blooming across her skin and reaching out toward her shoulders. “Important for what?”

  ‘To heal. How hard is that to understand?’

  “Fine.” She whipped off her shirt, hissing at the ache in her back, and took it with her to the bathroom for a good look in the mirror.

  Yeah, okay. It was kind of bad.

  ‘Kind of bad?’ The bank snorted. ‘Look, I know you’ve been through the wringer a few times, but a few stab wounds and asphyxiation and a glob of concussions and whatever that thing was with the energy bomb ain’t nothin’ compared to— Hey, what’s an energy bomb, anyway?’

  Jessica gently trailed her fingers along the snaking red lines where the orc’s green fire had exploded against her chest. “You mean you can’t just look through my head and figure that one out on your own?”

  ‘Not when you don’t even know what it is.’ A heavy sigh filled Jessica’s head. ‘Yeah, I know. Why am I even asking?’

  “Took the words right out of my head.”

  ‘So. How ’bout that healing spell now?’

  Jessica closed her eyes and focused on the slightly raised feeling of all those streaks beneath her fingers. It was worth a shot.

  She summoned the heavy hitter in her arsenal of healing incantations and let the words flow through her mind. Her fingertips tingled at the energy, and the response she got was a flash of heat beneath her hand and the bright blue pulse of the bank’s pendant.

  The bank giggled. ‘Okay, okay, stop.’

  “Healing spell isn’t good enough for you?”

  ‘It tickles. Try something else.’

  Jessica dropped her hand to her side and shook her head at her reflection in the mirror. “There is nothing else. That’s the best I’ve got.”

  ‘Not the first time it turned out to be a dud, though, huh?’

  “Hey, if you know exactly what I know about healing spells and what has or hasn’t been successful, why the hell are you pestering me to get it done?”

  ‘There’s plenty in your head I can’t see. Like Lilith. And that first dream with all the faces or whatever. I don’t know, maybe you’re hiding some Council-level magic under all your missing memories too.’

  “Ye
ah, right.” Jessica snorted and turned around to get a good look at her back.

  Mickey had a done a number on her too, all right. His magic hadn’t split the skin—it never did—but he’d left a huge bruise down the length of her spine. It was dark, swollen, spreading out over the muscles of her back in hues of blue and purple and a hint of brown at the edges. Great.

  ‘He’s never gone that far before.’

  “I know.”

  ‘He was actually trying to kill you this time.’

  “I didn’t think he ever would… And quit talking about the asshole like you actually know him.”

  ‘I know what you know, Jessica. Didn’t you know?’

  Shaking her head, she turned to inspect the lines racing across her chest one more time, then tugged on her shirt and pulled her hair out from beneath the collar. “Doesn’t matter. He’s gone, and we have a seriously infuriating fae to deal with downstairs.”

  ‘Plus whatever clients feel like it’s worth it anymore to step inside looking for handouts.’

  “You mean withdrawals.”

  ‘I mean what I said.’

  Jessica left the bathroom and headed toward the door into the hall. The customers. That was the worst and best part of this whole thing. Sure, she’d get a hell of a lot more done if she wasn’t constantly interrupted by entitled magicals demanding she handle their things in exactly the way they wanted. But she knew the value of having something to do when shit got messy. A distraction. Something that offered a semblance of normalcy when nothing else made sense.

  ‘Like you and Mel and Rufus, huh? Listen, I like you and everything, but I just don’t have what it takes to go that far. Literally. Which is funny, ’cause I just can’t see any of our clients going out on a limb to—’

  “Stop talking.”

  ‘Come on. At least laugh a little.’

  There was nothing funny about it. That was what the bank just didn’t understand. Jessica had had Mel and Rufus, sure. When they were all part of Corpus and under Mickey’s thumb. But that was what had gotten Rufus killed. And Jessica was supposed to be moving on from all of it.

  ‘I do get it, by the way. And I won’t bring it up again.’

  “Thanks.” She swallowed and paused at the bedroom door, staring at the top drawer of her dresser.

  ‘No time like the present, right?’

  “I’m not grabbing that box.”

  ‘He almost killed you.’

  “Yeah, and now Mickey’s gone. It stays there.” Jessica jerked open the bedroom door and purposefully ignored the Gateway before heading down the stairs.

  ‘Are. You. Serious?’ The bank groaned. ‘Four hours ago, you were scrambling like roadkill to get up the stairs for the rest of your magic. And now you’re just walking away again?’

  “I’m pretty sure the definition of roadkill is that it’s already dead.”

  ‘Not if it hasn’t died yet. Jessica, we can’t do any of this if you’re not at full power. Remember what I said about you being my battery. I need you to be on top of it!’

  She ignored the voice and moved slowly down the hall toward the lobby. That box and the rest of her magic was a last resort. And now that a last resort wasn’t needed anymore, her magic would stay locked upstairs beneath her underwear. Hopefully forever, if she had her way.

  ‘Yeah, well you won’t get your way if you die because you were too stupid to listen to me. Again.’

  “But I’m smart enough to—” Jessica cleared her throat as she approached the desk, realizing Leandras was on the other side of the closed office door, probably listening to every word she said. No talking out loud to the bank in her head for the next five days.

  I’m smart enough to get that fae to swear a binding. We’ll get our answers that way.

  ‘Answers don’t fight back when a Matahg’s about to rip you in half.’

  True. Maybe there was a better place to keep that box, just in case.

  ‘Oh, finally! The witch sees reason!’

  No, I’m seeing a way out. Still a last resort. And you can’t change my mind on that.

  ‘Whatever.’

  Jessica pulled the rolling office chair toward the desk and sat with a sigh. Hopefully, no one else would be stepping up to that front door to give her any more issues with the witching vault and whatever pent-up rage these magicals were saving specifically for the new witch running Winthrop & Dirledge Security Banking.

  But she could hope all she wanted, and that didn’t make things real. Jessica still had a job to do.

  She pointed at the front door, and the yellow light of her animation spell flared at her fingertip. The lock on the front door flashed with the same light but didn’t open. “What?”

  The second try didn’t give her any different results, and she dropped her hand at her side.

  Great. So either she’d literally locked herself up in here again through some loophole in the binding, or her magic had been fucked with on a completely new level—by Mickey or Leandras or even the fae’s oozy blood mixed with hers on paper—

  The bank cracked up laughing. ‘Wrong!’

  Jessica glared at the front door and forced her mind to go blank.

  ‘Oh, come on. I took care of it, witch. Listen, I want another nutjob to step through that door just as much as you do, okay? Focus on the real issue right now.’

  “And what’s that supposed to be, exactly?”

  ‘Flashing lights at four o’clock.’

  She turned slowly in the chair toward the narrow hall outside the small, cramped office. Leandras’ five-day sanctuary.

  Black and silver light strobed around the outline of the office’s closed door, the flashes growing faster and closer together. And a high-pitched whine filled the air.

  ‘Yup.’ The bank grunted. ‘That issue.’

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Jessica stood quickly and took one step toward the magically sputtering office.

  Great. Now she had a faulty fae locked up in here with her. Whatever Leandras was dealing with right now was his problem. Not hers.

  ‘Unless he starts breaking me.’

  Please. He doesn’t have enough—

  Something crashed violently inside the office, followed by a guttural roar.

  Shit.

  “Leandras?” Her voice was lost beneath the growing whine that sounded way more like some kind of sci-fi laser gun powering up than any kind of magic she knew. The strobing lights pulsed with a brilliant flash, and the fae screamed.

  “Hey!” Jessica darted toward the door and grabbed the handle. “Fuck!”

  The thing had almost burned right through her flesh. Or at least it felt that way; she checked just in case and found nothing but a red palm. No burns.

  But now there were thin tendrils of white smoke sifting up through the bottom of the door.

  “Leandras! Open up!” She pounded on the door. “Seriously. This isn’t part of the—”

  Something large and heavy thumped against the door and made her stagger backward. What the hell was he doing in there?

  ‘Sounds like somebody started playing with the wrong bank.’

  “Did you do this?” she hissed over the growing whine in the air.

  ‘No. I just don’t trust him.’

  “Leandras!” Jessica gritted her teeth and scanned the outline of the door. She could break through it if she had to.

  ‘Aw, come on. If anyone’s gonna break this place, it should be me.’

  “Then do it already!”

  ‘Hey, chill out. Maybe he deserves it.’

  She lifted one fist and spread her fingers wide, summoning a burst of black, flickering tendrils in her palm. “Either way, one of us is breaking down the door.”

  ‘And hitting the fae in the process? Sure. Put that thing away before you embarrass us again.’

  Jessica didn’t have a chance to reply to that smartass remark. The walls of the narrow hallway flashed with blue light before thin, crackling lines of the bank’s magic s
naked toward the flashing, smoking door of the office. They crawled impossibly slowly, like the bank didn’t actually want to do any of this.

  Then a low growl came from the back hall on the other side of the lobby, joined by a flash of green light that had to be from the Gateway.

  “Oh, so that thing can growl now too, huh?”

  The blue lines crackling toward the door slowed. ‘Maybe that means we shouldn’t get involved…’

  With a snarl, Jessica pulled her arm back, meaning to toss the nest of black, slithering magic in her hand. Before she could throw, the flashing black and silver stopped abruptly with a sharp pop. The last few tendrils of smoke curled away from the door and disappeared, the whine was gone, and the door shuddered in its frame.

  She stared at it and waited.

  It must have been the fae’s back sliding against the other side of the door before he thumped to the ground, but that was it.

  “Leandras?”

  He took in a sharp breath and weakly muttered, “Jessica.”

  “What are you doing?”

  “Discovering the full extent of my predicament, if you must know.” He cleared his throat, then the doorknob jiggled and slowly turned. “And I…I regret to inform you that I may require more of your assistance than originally expected.”

  ‘Oh, good. Call off the emergency rescue. He’s fine.’

  He didn’t sound fine.

  The door creaked slowly open at first, then Leandras’ hand slipped from the doorknob. His full weight shoved the door quickly open, and he toppled sideways onto the floor with a weak grunt.

  Jessica raised her eyebrows but couldn’t think of anything to say or do. There was still a chance this was all part of the fae’s attempts to run her in circles with whatever mind games he pulled out of his sleeve next. Or he could be seriously hurt. Either way, she wasn’t taking another step toward that office, because now she had a full view of the inside.

  The tiny computer desk had been split down the middle in a jagged, charred crack, both sides leaning precariously against each other. The old computer had fallen to the ground and broken into huge, bulky pieces, though the cords were still plugged in and kept half the thing dangling beside the desk. A crater the size of the diner-style table in the kitchen marred the far wall of the office, surrounded in charred plaster and snaking cracks up and down the wall. Those black cracks still pulsed with silver light, there but slowly fading.