Page 75 of The Cursed and the Broken
“Strip,” she ordered.
I blinked. “I beg your pardon?”
“You may beg, but it won’t cure you of your curse. Now remove your dress so I can get a look at the mark.”
A shiver ran down my spine. “How do you—”
“I’ve seen it in my dreams. It binds you to him but, equally so, it serves as a tether foryouto tug on. I’ll need it to summon Death within the devil’s trap.”
Grumbling, I peeled my dress over my head, thankful I was wearing a simple velvet gown without stays or ties. Setting it down on the table, I shivered in the thin under-shift as Margit directed me to the edge of the star, her fingernails making quick work of the tie at my neck. She peeled it back from my shoulders, revealing the upper stretch of the three rippling scars upon my flesh. “Gruesome,” she remarked with fascination.
I flipped her the middle finger in response. “Hurry up, it’s cold as a witch’s tit in here.”
“Cute. But it’s about to get colder.” She began intoning in what I presumed to be Old Latin, a dialect unfamiliar to my ears. The scars pulsed, throbbing down my back. Frost speared down my spine, leeching into the floor and filling the chamber with a low fog roiling at our feet.
The hairs on my arms raised as the temperature plummeted and her words grew louder, urgent. The candles flickered in response, sending eerie shadows scattering over the walls. I gritted my teeth as my shoulder blades trembled, my back arching. It felt like a demon clutched at my spine, ready to rip it from my body.
Tears pricked at my eyes and I doubled over, but Margit kept her palm on my back, a force immovable. “Make it stop,” I gasped. “I can’t … it’s too much. Make it stop.”
The pain stopped abruptly and Margit stumbled backwards, the breaths heaving from her chest. An unmistakable presence washed over me, an aura of darkness and despair. He was here.
“You could have asked nicely,” Death purred from behind a blackened cloud. When at last he appeared, I was face-to-face with a void of black, only this time eyes glinted dangerously in the shadows within. Not pupils or irises, but a shifting of light that somehow portrayed his anger. His aura rippled with it and I shrank despite myself. “You dare to summon me,” he whispered, his voice so low it pierced the stillness.
“I-I—” Words failed me. I bent my head in supplication, throat bobbing as I forced my tongue to untie and my lips to loosen. “I only wished to ask for your guidance.”
“Do you think you’re clever, trapping me in a circle of this chalk? I may not be able to intervene while you’re alive, but I can make your soul suffer in exquisite ways when you’re dead.”
I suppressed a shiver at his threat, forcing myself to breathe, to remember why we’d called him. “I have some information you might find most intriguing.”
He paused, his robes billowing in shadowed tendrils. “In exchange for my assistance, I presume.”
“Nothing comes without cost. Witches know that well, as do you.”
He paused, considering me. “Very well. Speak your piece. If I find your knowledge valuable, I shall offer my wisdom in return. But if you waste my time”—he lifted a bony finger—“youandthe seer will suffer the consequences.”
I felt Margit move behind me, but I didn’t turn away, wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of seeing my fear written in sweaty drops upon my face. “There is a priceless artefact Fate seeks, hidden by Sylvie before she died. With it, one holds the power to rule over the Under World.”
“I already know this,” Death said coolly. “I was the one who promised it to her. A crown for the weaver of time, a ring for the ruler of the dead. A gift for my bride to be, before that wretch of a witch stole it when she summoned me last. Fate refused to be wed without it.”
“That must have angered you greatly,” I said carefully. “But why not take your hand without it? Surely she could have no better match in hell.”
Death hissed, his raspy breath filming over my face. “My patience wears thin, little witch. You did not summon me to discuss my marital woes. What’s it going to be, a time loop of your worst nightmare or torture at the hands of my minions?”
“Wait,” I blurted. “Once she obtains the crown, she plans to overthrow you and rule over hell alone.”
Death went preternaturally still—even his robes ceased their floating. “You lie.” His rasp sent a thousand bugs skittering over my flesh, his skeletal fingers stretching for my throat.
“She speaks truth,” Margit cried, stepping past me. “I have seen it.”
“Show me.”
She held her chin high, jaw set stubbornly as she approached the demon before us. The barest shiver prickled over her skin as she placed one hand in his own, her disgust visible in the slight twitch of her lips upon contact.
Eyes rolling back into her head, mere seconds passed until she gasped back into herself, and Death withdrew his hand with a hiss. “Blasphemy,” he shrieked. “Betrayal.” His robes thrashed against his trap, slamming against an invisible barrier as his wrath lashed again and again. “Speak, witch, and you shall have your answer.”
Breathing a sigh of relief, I stepped toward the star. “Fate said my blood would bring Sylvie back. That it was the only way we could destroy her once and for all. But she said I’d have to die first.”
Death stopped his thrashing, falling silent. I could have heard a pin drop. It was so quiet. To my surprise, he laughed. Cold and cruel and hollow. Margit and I exchanged a baffled glance.
