Page 141 of Magic of the Damned

Dominic inhaled a deep breath and with effort, returned to his seat. He steepled his fingers, settling into his disapproval but seemingly accepting that his mother was going to inform me about the discussion he clearly wanted me excluded from.

“The Garon will do to the Dark Caster what was done to your Luna. Quite fitting, don’t you think? It will pull his magic from him and transfer it to Luna, leaving him a shell and her with insurmountable magic.”

“He won’t die, will he?” I asked.

She shook her head. “But he’d be magicless.”

“You’d have to be close enough to use it against him. Essentially have to bait him to you.”

I wasn’t a fan of this plan, but a magicless Peter would destabilize things enough to give us the advantage. How was this not a good idea? We had been gone for five days and had no idea how things were.

“Tell her the rest of your plan,” he urged.

“Then you perform.” She pushed the paper to me. I read the unfamiliar language on the paper. I had no idea what the words meant, but they looked easy enough to sound out.

My eyes bounced between the two. “What will this do?”

“Return the shades to the underworld,” Dominic offered.

“Good.”

“Without me suffering a loss of magic. But you will.”

“She didn’t have magic in the first place but with help of the Garon, she will possess a great deal of magic. It’s not a great sacrifice for Luna. But the future Lord of the Underworld can not have vulnerabilities. My son can not have vulnerabilities.” Her eyes slid in my direction, clearly seeing the dilemma as an acceptable vulnerability with conditions. I’d keep her son from losing his magic.

I agreed with her.

He ruminated, his gaze moving between the two of us. “I know it’s the right thing to do, but Luna holds the most risk.”

“I’m willing to do it. I want me alive as much as you do. I don’t care about my magic being diminished or losing it all together.” I placed a hand on his arm. “This is bigger than me and it needs to be done. I appreciate you being selfless and wanting to protect me, but I want to do this. I need to do this,” I whispered, wanting the conversation to be for his ears only, but under his mother’s intense scrutiny it was doubtful she missed any of it.

He grunted a mirthless sound. “Actually, it’s not selfless. It is quite selfish. I don’t want to risk you.”

The understanding made me smile. “I’m okay with doing this.”

Dominic’s agreement was reluctant and with the dark, calculating look I caught on his face I was confident that he was doing a risk assessment of Ileana’s previous suggestion of dealing with the situation. As I neared the Garon, I expected to feel something. A whirr of ominous energy or diablerie or something. But there wasn’t anything. A bland object with a powerful use. It was heavier than I expected.

“What do I do with it?” I directed my question to Ileana as Dominic didn’t seem fully on board. She recited the spell and I repeated it and the object came to life. I was startled by the Garon pricking my fingers. When the blood swelled, my hands illuminated. Fingerlike tendrils looped and extended from the object in search of similar magic. The glow died when it didn’t find any.

“That wasn’t difficult,” I admitted in surprise.

“The spell is easy, but what will be Peter’s response? He will try to reverse it or make you pay,” Dominic said.

“You won’t let that happen,” Ileana asserted. We all knew that.

“I guess this is the plan,” he said.

I slipped the Garon in my pocket, and he took the spell to recapture the shades. We both turned our gazes on it. It was a plan. But I was convinced it wasn’t the plan he intended. I’d never get the chance to use it because he’d get to Peter first. I caught his eye and held it. We just stared at each other, seemingly making a tacit agreement for this to be the last resort.

CHAPTER 25

Iwished we had the luxury of more time to practice my magic. But we stayed in Vita long enough for me to be able to recite the spell for the Garon efficiently. Before returning to my world, we made a detour to the underworld.

We stood in their garden with the morbid black flowers of his sister’s making. Dominic’s fingers ran over the leaves of bat orchids before a flame erupted over them. He did the same to a few more before he whisked me away to the apartment he shared with Helena.

“Your act of arson, was there a point or were you being petty?” I asked as he knelt on the floor, his claws gouging markings in the floor similar to the ones I saw on the rug at his mother’s. With a wave of his fingers over each sigil they disappeared.

“I wanted to get her attention,” he said. “I need to talk to her.”

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