Page 107 of Magic of the Damned

She took another long drink. “I don’t know what the connection is between Luna and the Dark Caster but there definitely is one. I fear that her death will cause irreparable harm,” she disclosed, giving Areleus a pointed look.

The wheels of speculation were turning, and there was a part of me that wanted to give her the answer in hopes that the information would help her come up with a solution. Fear of Areleus’s and Helena’s reactions kept me from doing so. I trusted her and made a plan to get a moment alone to tell her. I’d give her the missing piece to the puzzle.

“That may be so, but her existence has caused just as much harm, including our imprisonment. Either way, we are affected, so I prefer the option that leads to our freedom.” Areleus took a sip from his glass, savoring the amber liquid before his foreboding eyes were cast in my direction. Disgusted by how flippant he was with discussing my life and death, I wished I had taken a glass of wine for no other reason than to have a weapon if he decided to act on it.

Nailah stood up and moved closer to him. Placing her hands over his, her delicate touch showed a familiarity between them that had me questioning whether their relationship had always been professional. What had transpired between them that led to her staying in the guest house during her visits? Perhaps her gentle nature created an unintentional bond and the perception of intimacy.

“Areleus.” Tenderness laced her whisper. At that moment, he didn’t take issue with her dropping his title. “As of late, patience has not been your strength. It is essential that you find it. Make it your best asset because it is crucial that you do.” Her soft melodious voice lulling, Areleus appeared to be taking in her request. The distinct change in his coldness made me question whether there was more to her Seer magic. Did it also possess some form of compulsion? She’d brought me comfort when I first met her. The only off-putting things about her were her glowing violet eyes and the stifling magic that took away the solace that usually accompanied her presence.

“So, what do you propose we do?” he inquired.

“Wait. I’ve spoken with Madeline and she is confident that she can break the spell,” she asserted, renewing hope that had dwindled during the course of her visit.

No one in the room held that same level of confidence and they made it known with their derisive scoffs.

“Madeline?” Areleus drawled with hints of skepticism.

“It was she and her coven who discovered a way to punish Helena,” Dominic pointed out.

Helena’s cool guise dropped momentarily, revealing her disgust that an inferior had punished her. They’d performed a curse to remove Helena’s magic. It took ten years for Dominic to find a way to counter it, and along the way he found a way to keep witches from performing magic on him. It took several minutes for Helena to gain control over her anger and replace it with the mask of indifference. Dominic’s eyes held a deviant spark from her reaction. His pettiness was a little humanizing. A sibling taunt.

“Even more reason for our presence to be known and for us to make displays of ruthlessness for those who wrong us. This is our time to make a statement, and if Dominicus wasn’t so distracted playing with his human toy, he’d see it as I do,” Helena hissed. The glimmer from his taunt was snuffed away and replaced with contention and ire. Her eyes flicked from him to her father. “Break Dominic’s little toy, leave here, and find Peter. Kill him in the most violent and torturous way possible. Make it a spectacle and a statement that we are never to be wronged, captured like animals, or subjected to their petty reprisals. We must be in accord with this. Unified. No faltering nor negotiations. Brother,”—her eyes were fiery slits—“compromise is never the answer. Never.”

I glanced at Areleus, who was clearly on board with her dictum, nodding with a dark regality as if reclaiming a position he’d momentarily deserted. Violence seemed to be his primary strategy for dealing with anything.

“I suspect the few challenges you’ve encountered in your life would have benefited from you demonstrating some skills of negotiation, or at the very least some restraint. Maybe you should consider behaving as an adult sometime,” Dominic said, his tone blistering with disapproval.

“And you need to stop fucking humans!” Helena cut her eyes at him.

“I will if you do.”

“There is clearly a difference in how we view them. I see them for what they are—entertainment. To be used to satisfy a carnal need. Nothing more.” She directed her dissatisfaction in my direction. “They have, and always have been, there for our pleasure.” She frowned. “Just like their existence, our dealings with them should be fleeting. It is foolish to value their lives over even our mildest discomfort.”

I jumped to my feet. “You’re an asshole,” I snapped. “And you can go straight to hell. And I don’t mean whatever this damn place is. I would like you to be engulfed in flames and to feel the sort of pain that only a person like you deserves.” I turned to her father. “And the same goes for you.” Stealing a glance in Dominic’s direction and seeing the disdain from his sister’s comment still on his face was the only reason I wasn’t inviting him to do the same. Fuming, my emotions were difficult to sort out. “I’ve sat here, trying to be empathetic about how it must feel for powerful people to be rendered powerless, but you’re all a horribly clear example of why some people don’t deserve power or authority. I’m not an insect to be squashed under your shoe. I’m a person. With a life, friends, family, dreams, and humanity, and you keep viewing me as inconsequential.”

“But you are. For some reason you’ve been led to believe you aren’t. If it was our will, do you understand how quickly you could be squashed? So yes, you are inconsequential, as is the rest of your ilk,” Helena said.

I swallowed my fear despite her looking as if she wanted to demonstrate my inconsequentiality.

“Along with going to hell, I’m going to invite you to shut the fuck up, too. Great power means you have responsibility to not be the biggest pile of shit in existence. Something you’re demonstrably failing at. I had no choice in any of this, and if I had, believe me, meeting you would be the last thing I’d ever have wanted. You’re all such unrepenting megalomaniacs and you can’t see past your overinflated egos to fix this without resorting to violence.” I gave Areleus a censuring look in case he thought he was excluded.

“I have no idea what Peter’s endgame is, but I’m sure that if he fails, he’s given others a lot of ideas. You’re not an island. Dominic seems to be the only one who understands that. Stop being so casual and dismissive about killing me and work together to prevent this situation happening again. Get the other supernaturals to want to work with you because they see that your aligned interest makes it better for everyone. And stop underestimating humans. We’re far more resilient than you will ever know. And I’m no one’s plaything.” I shot Dominic a look, drilling in the point in case for a fraction of a second he thought otherwise.

Helena was looking smug and Areleus peered at me down his nose as if he’d just watched a child throw a tantrum.

“We’re aware that humans are resilient and that their lives have meaning, Luna,” Dominic offered. I could see the unspoken part in the slight smile he gave me. My life had meaning, a sentiment not shared by his father and sister. At this point, I’d have been happy with anything from Anand. He was definitely the person in a room of chaos whom you could never use as the barometer of how bad the situation was.

“She isn’t wrong,” Nailah provided, taking Areleus’s free hand into hers, redirecting his attention from me to her. My words were lost on him because it seemed he was more disgusted by my chastisement of him and his profoundly terrible daughter than by the criticisms lobbed at them.

I hated this world so much and knew without any doubt that I couldn’t exist in both. The human world was where I needed to be. The smidgen of desire to exist in both was gone.

“We are to place our hopes in Madeline and her coven, without even you there to work on our behalf?” Areleus asked, gearing Helena up for another argument in defense of my death for the greater good and she was just the hero to do it.

“I wouldn’t do such a thing. Glimpses of your captivity came to me, but I couldn’t make much sense of it. But Peter met with the Conventicle, informing them that he’d freed them from your rule. Thanks to him, they’re now able to move throughout the world freely and with impunity. I knew you all were in danger, somehow locked in here. Although he was coy about it, the implication was that Peter”—she rolled her eyes, leading me to believe it was a name he chose and not the name he was usually known as—“or rather, Ansel, was looking for a place in the Conventicle.”

So I was right about his name. I hoped she shared my other reservation, which was that the reason he wanted to be part of the Conventicle was to launch a takeover. Likely a hostile takeover.

“Madeline doesn’t trust him. After all, he and his kind have a history that can’t be ignored. They choose to deal with the devil they know, one they know can be reasoned with.” She gave Areleus a meaningful look to drive in the point before slipping an air of assurance in Dominic’s direction. The acknowledgment brought a sneer to the lord’s face. Contempt for his son or maybe what he represented: a minuscule amount of humanity.

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