Page 138 of Mud

I looked down at the floor. “I’ll cross that bridge when I get to it.”

The body came first, and if I focused on this one step at a time, I could do it. I’d figure it out.

“You can’t cross any bridge without magic, I’m afraid,”the asshole said. “MagicIhave. Magic I could help you with—to complete this and the other two challenges, if you so choose.”

“Yes, you’ve told me that before. But I’m not going to take your magic, Taland. We don’t know what happens when you give magic to a M?—”

“Thatis my decision to make, and I’ve made it. It doesn’t concern you,” he cut me off. “You will take my magic because you have no other choice.”

“You—”

Again, he refused to let me speak.

“You are not allowed to think about what happens after. You will just take it.”

Fucking hell, this guy.What the hell was it about him that made me so damn submissive?

I crossed my arms in front of my chest.

He wanted me to use his magic? Fine, I would, but, “I won’t help you get in the vault.” As if he still needed the reminder.

“Why not?”

“Do you seriously need to ask me that question?”

“Well, yes. By now I would assume that you well know who the IDD is. They’re not the saints they paint themselves to be, Rosabel. They’re the villains in our world, even if they don’t look the part.”

Oh, no, they didn’t.

He,on the other hand, absolutely did. (And he nailed it, unfortunately for me.)

“I know who the IDD is,” I said, even if it sucked. To admit that I was part of something that was more rotten than I’d ever realized was definitely not something I did proudly. I’d been an agent. I would have given my life in the missions they sent me to. So many before me already had—and then my own team leader had tried to kill me because he’d hadorders.Then the people I’d worked with so many times had locked me in an interrogation room and had left my leg bleeding and infected, not bothering to put a fucking healing spell on me that would cost them nothing at all.

“So, then why do you insist on protecting them, sweetness?” Taland said as he stopped in front of me, way too close, but his hands were in his pockets and he wasn’t smiling at the moment. He looked at me earnestly and expected an answer.

I gave him one.

“I am not protecting them. They’re all I know, and despite what you believe, Ican’tget you in the main vault if I tried. Too much security and cameras and spells.” I shook my head. “But I wouldn’t, even if I knew I could. I know what you want to steal, Taland, and I can’t just let youhavethat.”

The artifact he’d been at the school to steal. The same thing he went to prison for. It was taken to the main IDD vault after his arrest, and it had remained there since.

For a moment, Taland closed his eyes and breathed deeply. “Do you have any idea…” His voice trailed off, and when he looked at me again, I could have sworn it was the Taland from before.MyTaland.

And it ruined my heart all over again.

“Do you have any idea why?” he finally whispered. “You never asked me. All that time you knew, yet you never asked mewhy.”

My mouth opened and closed and opened and closed…

“I know why.” I knew what they told me. With a powerful artifact like that, it was pretty obvious, wasn’t it?

Except Taland smiled like he knew secrets I didn’t. Hesmiled like his heart was broken, like he was disappointed, like he expected better from me and was sad because of my words.

Which made me want to get out of my own fucking skin.

“No, sweetness—youdon’t.” He stepped back and cleared his throat. “Very well—you don’t need to promise to take me to the vault, but I will still need a promise before I help you, and that’s for you tonotstop me.”

“I-I-I…” I couldn’t speak.

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