Page 89 of Midnight Witch

“She’s had enough rest.” Mrs. Son-Ha stopped by the bed and put her hands on her hips with the expression of a drill sergeant about to tear into a soldier. “Get up.”

“Don’t wanna,” Mae said sullenly.

The old woman yanked the sheets off her. Mae sucked in air and backpedaled until she was sitting against the headboard, Brimstone and Hellreaver clutched defensively to her chest.

Mrs. Son-Ha pointed imperiously at the bathroom. “You stink. Go shower. Now!”

Mae scowled.

“Don’t make me take you in there and scrub you down,” Mrs. Son-Ha threatened.

Mae glared at her before climbing off the bed and storming into the bathroom. She slammed the door shut. It opened again.

Mrs. Son-Ha dumped Brimstone and Hellreaver unceremoniously inside. “They need a wash too.” She directed a narrow-eyed look at Vlad over her shoulder. “You, go make breakfast.”

“Yes, ma’am,” the incubus mumbled.

Mae glowered at the door when it shut again. She hesitated, stripped out of the nightshirt Violet had brought over from her apartment, and got under the shower.

“Cortes was right,” she grumbled, squirting soap into her hands and lathering up Brimstone and Hellreaver. “She should be a cartel leader.”

The fox sneezed as bubbles got into his nose.

Mae emerged from the guest room a while later. The smell of freshly roasted coffee made her stomach growl when she crossed the landing. She headed down the stairs spiraling to the first floor of Vlad’s penthouse and made her way to the kitchen.

Her right leg twinged a little, courtesy of the wound Nikolai had inflicted on her. Her broken bone and the hole in her abdomen had healed the night she’d incurred the injuries. All that remained was an ache that would soon fade.

She wished the pain in her heart would abate as easily.

The juicer came to life just as she entered the kitchen.

Mae rocked to a halt and eyed the green liquid in the machine Vlad was operating. “Please tell me that’s not breakfast.”

Vlad switched it off with a grimace. “It’s for Mrs. Son-Ha.”

The subject of their conversation strolled in. She beamed at the sight of him pouring the contents into a glass.

“This is a nice place you have here.” The old woman climbed onto a stool at the breakfast bar and accepted the drink. “My spirits approve.”

“Thank you,” Vlad said grudgingly.

He handed Mae a cup of coffee and took out sausages, eggs, and bacon from the refrigerator. Tarang trotted into the kitchen just as the incubus put three platters of assorted, raw meat in his breakfast spot. The tiger licked his chops, came over to nudge Brimstone and Hellreaver, and headed over to his meal. The fox and the weapon hesitated before following him.

Mae bit her lip. She knew they hated leaving her side even for a moment. The ordeal they had suffered still haunted them. If it hadn’t been for her second core and Ran Soyun’s magic,Subjugatewould have worked.

It wasn’t until they’d finished breakfast that Mrs. Son-Ha voiced what she’d come to say.

“Take heart. The future is not set in stone. You can still save him.”

Mae stiffened and met Vlad’s troubled gaze. Right now, neither of them could see a light at the end of that particular tunnel.

She knew the incubus had spent days racking his brain to figure out how they could free Nikolai from the Dark Council’s influence, just as she had done in the hours when she’d been awake.

Mae recalled what Mrs. Son-Ha had told them the night they’d discovered she was a Shaman. “Was Nikolai turning against me one of the outcomes you foresaw?”

Vlad lowered his brows at her question.

“It was the most likely one.” Mrs. Son-Ha hesitated at Mae’s frustrated stare. “But warning you about it would have cast ripples in your destiny that would have had unintended consequences.”

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