Page 44 of Hellfire to Come
I swallowed my pride and stepped forward. The house groaned softly under my boots, the floorboards old, well-loved, and not altogether welcoming. The scent of sage and juniper hung thick in the air, masking something older. Smoke. Iron. Memory.
Dominic followed a step behind, steady as ever, his presence the only thing keeping me from unraveling into a thousand threads. But if I expected the shaman to acknowledge him, I was mistaken. She gave him only a flick of her gaze and nothing more.
No, her attention remained solely on me. A scalpel gaze. Watching not just what I was, but what I carried.
“I didn’t come here to start trouble,” I said quickly, ducking beneath a hanging bundle of dried thyme strung from the ceiling like a ward.
The kitchen we entered was sparse and weathered, more function than form. The walls bore the kind of dust that carried generations, not neglect. Mismatched furniture lined the space; A rocking chair in the corner cloaked in a faded quilt, gently swaying in an unseen breeze like some ghost was still lounging there.
“I wouldn’t have stepped foot on your land if I wasn’t desperate,” I continued. “This wasn’t a decision made lightly.”
“Yes, yes,” she muttered, waving one hand like she was shooing off gnats. “You’re all desperate when you come to me. Always on the verge of ruin. Alice was no different.”
Her voice sank into my spine like a thorn, and I halted mid-step.
“What?” I asked, turning my head slowly, narrowing my eyes.
She snorted, unfazed. “The two of you are carved from the same troublewood. Always running toward fire and then crying when you get burned. Maybe if you both made less spectacularly bad choices, you’d require less... assistance.”
I bit back my retort.
The shaman drifted across the room with a grace that defied age. She didn’t walk so much as glide, her bare feet silent against the old pine floor. Every movement carried authority, measured, exact. Like nature didn’t dare defy her.
A feline shape curled on the rocking chair stirred, a soot-colored cat who, upon laying eyes on me, instantly bristled. Her spine arched into a perfect crescent, green eyes slitting into knives. She hissed, lashing her tail like a whip behind her.
Until she spotted Dominic.
Then all hell broke loose.
Her pupils dilated, and she loosed a low growl like she was ready to summon the wrath of Bast herself. And Dominic, my ever-so-dignified mate, hissed back. Full lips peeled back over fangs in a snarl so primal I flinched.
The cat bolted.
Straight between us like a shot, claws skittering on wood, gone before I could even swear properly.
“Really?” I asked flatly, turning toward him. My voice was dry enough to start fires.
He just shrugged, utterly unrepentant. “She started it.”
“She’s a cat.”
“A disrespectful one.”
“Felines of any kind,” Laughing Crow said mildly, amusement dripping like honey from her lips, “arestrange creatures—moody, territorial, dramatic. Little assholes. Especially with their own kin.”
She gestured toward two wooden chairs pulled up near the center of the room, her black eyes dancing with mirth. “Sit. Or hiss some more at each other, but preferably somewhere I don’t have to bless again.”
Her gaze lingered pointedly on Dominic, who arched a brow in that lazy, warning way he had. He didn’t like being dismissed, let alone mocked, but he was smart enough to pick his battles.
I jumped in before the situation could combust. “He’s aware of his assholish behavior,” I rushed to say, dragging a chair backward and collapsing into it before the situation got any weirder.
Dominic’s mouth twitched. Whether in amusement or protest, I couldn’t tell. But he remained standing behind me, arms crossed, eyes fixed on Laughing Crow like he didn’t entirely trust her not to turn him into a worm.
Wise, honestly.
She poured herself a measure from the soot-blackened kettle, steam rising in faint curls that drifted toward the ceiling. Then, without a word, she poured a second cup and offered it to me.
The clay mug was warm, no,hot, and the scent struck like a warning: pungent sage, scorched yarrow, and something darker beneath it. Bitter and old. Like regret, distilled.
