Page 118 of Tales of a Deadly Devotion
‘The house keeps bringing it up.’ Gideon came to stand next to me, hands braced on his hips, lips pursed with thought. ‘I thought it was just getting amusement out of scaring William.’
‘Maybe the house wants it gone,’ I offered. Wondering why Emrys had kept the little monstrosity at all. Maybe as some strange trophy.
Gideon seemed to chew over the idea before tugging at his hair again and it was a wonder he had any left. ‘The house should be more worried about that cursed bastard book.’
Those words made me turn back to his desk. To the navy tome sat amongst the papers.
My nose twitched, the barest of my instincts coming back. ‘It didn’t smell like the others. I don’t think there is a fiend inside it.’
No, the strange archaic rot had been missing from that tome when Kat had pulled it free. It hadn’t made my beasts recoil. Just the faint old ink, dried lavender, clove and a strangely familiar smoky scent I usually only found in Kat’s presence.
‘What about the pages from the coffin? The diary?’ I scraped my teeth over my tongue, suddenly overcome with the horrid taste of decay, remembering rooting through those remains in bird form.
‘Nothing but fucking madness about the Alder Kings and seeking something beneath.’ He moved back to his desk, the scent of charred wood and apple tea reaching my nose. The scent I had associated with the witch upon first meeting – once the ale and poppy smoke scent had faded. At least my senses were returning.
‘Beneath what?’ I frowned.
He shook his head, holding out the page to me. I took it, even though I couldn’t fully read it. My eyes making the words blur and shift. Then I turned it over, to what I assumed was the last entry in the diary.
Tell him. Beneath. Beneath. They sleep but they can be found. Beneath.
Gideon moved back to his desk, turning over the other scraps of half rotted pages. His scrawled notes next to them where he’d been poring over them most of the night. Muttering to himself as if he could have missed something.
Giving me the opportunity to glance in the direction of where the Portium door was hidden behind the bookcases. Worried how silent it was. How still the house was, too – not up to its usual mischief – as if it was holding its breath.
‘I wouldn’t worry. Emrys knows the safe house portals better than anyone,’ Gideon offered reluctantly, as if the last thing he wished to do was comfort anyone.
I couldn’t help the amused huff of breath that left me. Of course, Emrys did. Crafty cursed bastard that he was. However, I thought Gideon needed to reassure himself more than he needed to assure me.
I had to find some positives in all this mess. We might not have the book open, but at least it wasn’t in Montagor’s hands. We might not know what the monster was after, but at least we’d stopped him gaining this advantage.
Then the study door began to rattle on its hinges, perhaps reminding me too much of that horrid Greymark house. The evil that lurked there. Wondering how such a place could have created anyone who was linked to Kat.
Then I heard the soft voices, the familiar deep tone of Emrys.I moved around the cluttered mess of the study and into the hall. Seeing it bathed in the weak dawn light, multi-coloured from where rays seeped through the stained glass the house had made the ceiling out of today. Depicting wrywings and griffins in flight.
Kat was in her leathers, her hair unbound, face turned to look up at Emrys. In some deep conversation, their fingers intertwined. Almost unable to let each other go. She was also strangely missing her boots.
‘Where have you been?’ I asked, slightly appalled at her relaxed ease. Especially after how we’d parted last night. The panic I’d smelt rising from her flesh that I couldn’t sense now.
Kat jolted, turning to me. Her strange golden-hued skin flushed pink, making the freckles across the bridge of her nose stand out. Lavender eyes wide as her lips parted, not speaking but somehow telling me everything I didn’t necessarily want to know. I suppose I should thank the ancestors I’d lost my sense of smell.
‘A safe house. The portal stone ran out somewhere in the west fields,’ Emrys replied, saving my dear friend from her own incriminating embarrassment as he pulled her down the hall.
‘Bloody saints. Locked in a safe house all night.’ William appeared in the hallway, running a hand through his curls as if he’d been summoned by their return too. ‘Good job it let you out.’
‘Yes, William, I’m certain it wasquiteharrowing for them,’ Gideon replied dryly from where he’d come to lounge in the doorway behind me. Unimpressed. ‘Now you’re back from yourescapades… how do we get this fucking book open?’
I expected the interest from Kat, or her eagerness to get started on the cursed thing. Instead, I felt the gentleness of her touch as she took my arm. That warm bite from her magicas if it was concerned. The deep worry marring her features. So reminiscent of the first night we’d met.
‘Are you all right?’ She pressed the back of her hand against my forehead.
‘I’m fine.’ I pulled back, shame wounding deeply inside of me. Of course she saw everything – even the things I wished to hide – because she cared.
I didn’t want her to be distracted by me. By how weak I’d become. How useless.
‘You look …different.’ Her lavender eyes roamed across my features unable to place what was wrong. I saw her own fear there, as if she could see that pain in me. As she tried to understand it just as she always had.
‘That happens when a being gets shot out of the sky,’ came the annoyed sharp voice of Thean. Turning me to see the voyav where they had apperated against the wood panelling of the hallway in female form, amber eyes hard with annoyance and focused on me before they moved to Kat.
