Page 45 of The Crow Games

“All of them,” he whispered. “All of the gods.”

His words were a seductive purr. It was exactly what I wanted to hear and more. But I’d been alive much too long to be fooled by any of it. Words so wonderful were never what they seemed.

“What do you want in exchange?” He wasn’t going to be upfront with me, but I could learn a lot from hearing what he was after at least.

He smiled at me the way a patient teacher might at a particularly stubborn pupil. “There’s a secret lower level to the library here. The god Alwin hosts a trial of his own, and only the worthy win. I seek the prize, but I am ineligible.”

“Why?”

He pointed down at the bronze circlet. “I’ve already won a prize from Alwin. He never awards a second, but I need the book he’s holding. It’s a relic so powerful it can end the games for good. Maven, there is no one in any realm more worthy than you. Get me this boon. I’ll tell you everythingandgrant you your freedom from the Otherworld. How could you say no to that?”

My nose wrinkled. “Free me how?”

“Bring me the relic, and I’ll show you.”

He knew exactly what would motivate me best. I pulled my hands out of his chest and stepped back, certain that keeping my distance from him while negotiating, given his gifts, was more pertinent than threatening him with gray magic. “Is it a hexen relic?”

“Yes, but the witch it’s made out of is quite dead,” he drawled. “I don’t think she’ll mind now how we use it.”

My nostrils flared. “Let me just make a book out of your flesh and blood, then we’ll see if you mind.”

“They say it’s made from the remains of Fria after the goddess relinquished her divinity and broke it into pieces for her priestesses.”

I shook my head so vehemently my braid slipped out of its coil and spilled over my shoulder. “Lies.”

“You sound so certain.” His gaze fell to the delicate chain around my neck and the torch amulet dangling from it, and I realized too late that he’d been goading me—a trick I hadn’t seen coming. In a few minutes, I’d given him more than I ever had in months of his spying, and he didn’t even have the circlet on his head. “But how could you possibly know it isn’t the goddess of magic, Maven? You haven’t even seen it.”

I wasn’t foolish enough to answer that question, but I sensed the damage was done. I’d revealed something I hadn’t meant to. Bram truly was several steps ahead in every match.

“You knew I would come for you,” I said.

“How could I? I’m not a prophet,” was his coy response. “I couldn’t know, but I hoped you yet lived. I hoped you’d find me, or I’d never have you. All that time chasing after you proved that. Coming to you never works, does it, Maven? The harder I tried, the further you retreated and the thicker you built walls around yourself and your sister.”

“Stay away from me, and my coven,” I growled, “or I’ll do more than just threaten harm next time.”

I hated that he was right and my threat was an empty one. The information in his head was too precious to me to kill him. I couldn’t have the name of the guilty god if he was dead, and he knew it. He may not have been a prophet, but his ability to understand the people he interacted with and read their motivations put me at an instant disadvantage in any negotiation with him.

Bram showed me his palms like I’d pulled a pistol on him. “I have no desire to hurt you or yours. You don’t have to sneak about when you come and see me. My Guardians won’t harm you.”

I caught myself staring at his mouth, watching him form each word. I needed to get out of here. I didn’t like what his talents were doing to me, how they made me want to sit close, hang on his words, and admire his beauty.

And he was beautiful in a fearsomely unnatural way. The way Nott was beautiful. The way the Otherworld was beautiful; Too perfect. Too clean. Too divine.

Too deadly.

He’d changed somehow, was something more down here than he had been in the Upper Realm all covered in soot. He’d seemed so harmless then. But perhaps we were all different down here.

I marched for the exit and made it as far as the door before he spoke again.

“See you soon, Maven.”

* * *

That night after the feast, my coven took over the lounge car, and we included Blue and the sisters in our deliberations over drinks. Things were becoming too serious to make another move without them. We caught them up on the day’s events, leaving out any mention of gray magic or my brand of peculiarities.

I was beginning to feel guilty for the deception.

“When we arrived to barter for ammunition,” Nola said, dropping four fresh rounds in front of me beside a mixed drink that smelled like juniper berries, “the quartermaster already knew to expect us, and he gave us these. Gifts from their high warlock. No trade.”

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