Page 91 of The Most Wanted Witch

“What’s going on? What do you both want with me? Let’s cut the bull and put it all out there,” I said, fed up with all the games these people played. It was worse than recess at grammar school.

“Yes,” Hawk said. “Why don’t we all lay our cards on the table.”

Xazier looked at Lou. Lou looked back. I crossed my arms, biting the inside of my cheek so as not to rush them. This might be my only shot at getting some answers. I wouldn’t force it to an early conclusion that might end badly for me.

Hawk was still beside me. He tended to be more patient than I was, but my gut said this was killing him too.

Finally, Xazier shrugged, still looking at Lou. “I’ll tell if you do. Not sure there’s much harm after what happened yesterday anyway. Only a matter of time.”

The hill. Were we going to find out what the hill was? It might be bad news, and my breath faltered as I waited for Lou to respond. Good or bad, at least we’d know, and the answers seemed so close.

Lou took another second, playing hard to get. Being the angel of the two, it was a bit shocking that he seemed to be the bigger jerk. Nah, that wasn’t really fair. They both sucked equally.

Lou took a step away, crushing any hopes.

Then he stopped, back still to us. “Fine. Might as well.”

It was something. I’d be getting some kind of answers. One of the many knots I was tied up in came undone.

Lou turned and waved at Xazier. “Go ahead. Tell them.”

“You do it,” Xazier said.

Lou looked Xazier up and down, sighed, and shook his head. “Are there no depths to the levels I’m supposed to sink to in the name of good?”

“Oh, please. Like you’re good. We both know you aren’t. That’s why you have the job you have. If they didn’t need a necessary evil, you’d be rolling around in the muck with me every single day andlo-vingit.” Xazier leaned forward with a big smile on his face, as if he knew Lou better than he knew himself.

“Not true.” Lou looked away.

Not exactly a convincing argument.

When they both stopped talking, Hawk said, “Can we keep this meeting moving?”

“I always have to do the dirty work,” Xazier said.

Lou laughed. “Yes. And that’s fitting, don’t you think? Why break with what’s working?”

If these two started fighting, no one was ever going to tell us what was going on.

Xazier shook his head before looking at me and Hawk. Was he going to talk?

“This could take a while. I’d prefer somewhere warm and comfortable.” Xazier looked around at the harsh landscape I’d come to love.

Why did he even want this place—or did he?

“We can go back to the broker building,” Hawk said.

Xazier nodded, and then all four of us were in the back room. I wasn’t sure who had moved us here, but my coin was on Xazier.

The place was eerily quiet, but that would be Hawk’s doing. This was not a situation that needed any more company.

Xazier took a seat on one couch. I took a seat on the opposite one. Hawk remained standing beside my couch. Lou looked at Xazier’s couch and rolled his eyes, as if there were no way he’d sit anywhere near him. Lou took a step toward mine. Hawk shook his head.

“Fine,” Lou said, taking a seat in a chair.

Xazier finally began. “A couple of hundred thousand years ago, give or take fifty, right around the time of…” He looked at me and shook his head. “Doesn’t matter. You weren’t around to know any of this. Point is, when you people, humans, started showing up and then talking, there became an increase in workload.

“All you people did was pray for things. Ask for things, barter, promise, blah, blah, blah. In the beginning, we tried to accommodate some of your wishes here and there, if it fit our purposes. But the load became tedious. That’s when Xest was formed. In essence, we needed to contract out some of the work. It was just too much—”

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