Page 88 of Until the End of Ever
I flushed.
Cassius paused at the door. “I understand you have a little magical sleepover scheduled. Yell if someone’s dying or if the manor’s on fire.”
37
LUCIAN
After filling the tub with hot water, I uncapped the lime green potion I’d concocted and poured four drops out.
It was experimental enough for me to hesitate over adding a fifth. I’d tried five on myself, but Kleos was around sixty pounds lighter than me. An extra drop could strengthen her defenses, but it also could react negatively. I stuck to four.
“You’ll need to bathe for fifteen minutes, and stay completely immersed underwater as long as you can,” I said, choosing to play it safe.
“It’ll protect my mind?” she asked with that cute little frown she always wore when she was trying to work out the kinks of something she wasn’t familiar with.
“Theoretically.” I wished I had more time to test it out. “One of the major dangers of projecting our consciousness elsewhere is wounding it—shattering it. Thisshouldensure it remains in one piece.”
“Thanks for that brand-new fear.” She shivered. “I dread to imagine what a shattered soul would be like.”
I winced. “It could lead to deep psychosis, schizophrenia, insanity, death…” Quickly, I added, “But from what Iunderstand, it’s arareside effect of the ritual. I’m simply taking precautions.”
“How do you even go about testing things like that?”
“Eighty percent of my work is theoretical. The last stage for this potion was creating something a little like a soul, and trying to break it. Once that worked out, I tried it on myself.”
I decided against telling her I’d then attempted to split my soul to check if it worked. I knew how to put it back together, but I doubted Kleos would be particularly impressed with me for that.
“Is there anything youcan’tdo?” she asked with a grin, removing the last of her clothing.
Damn her. Our friends were in my summoning room waiting for us. I didn’t have time to sink into the delicious body on display.
“Resist you?” I replied, my thumb circling her nipple. I shook my head. “In the bath, you little minx. I don’t want to use too much of that potion, which means it will only work for a few hours. Rush back soon as you’re done.”
I turned to go, but Kleos grabbed my wrist. The moment I faced her again, she pressed herself against me, bringing her mouth to mine.
Forget everything I just said, and bend over,I wanted to demand. But the damn witch moved her perky little butt to the tub and sank into the bath.
“Later,” I promised darkly, to her and myself.
Leaving her in our en suite, I retreated towards her old guest room to reapply the spell to myself, Phobos on my heels.
In the corridor between the rooms however, I came to a halt. One tiny, irritating, pink-and-silver-haired nuisance leaned back against the wall, an eyebrow raised.
“Smol.”
“Daddy,” she countered.
I wrinkled my nose. “What do you want?”
“To help you, believe it or not.” She tilted her head towards the room I’d just left.“You’re going to have to use your mouth with her, you know.”
“What makes you think I don’t?”
“Not likethat,you heathen.” She made a face, then seemed to think better of it. “Or yes, like that. Butalsoto form words. Has it crossed your brilliant brain that she might like to hear that you like her too?”
I rolled my eyes. “Kleos knows how I feel about her.”
“Does she? Look, I do. But that’s because I look at actions. I have foster parents who say ‘love you’ before they wave and leave for six to eighteen months. They care about me, just…you know. Not that much.” Silver shrugged, like it wasn’t a big deal. “So I don’t give a damn about what people say; I look at what they do. Kleos? Her familynevertalks about feelings. They rarely talk about anything at all. It’s all superficial pretense for the public, evasion. She needs words like we need action.”
