Page 96 of Hopelessly Teavoted
“Sorry, Prissy.” The distance between Vickie and Azrael seemed smaller now, compared to an ocean.
“I’ll fly out and work it out as soon as we get things cleared up here, but I don’t want to leave before we solve this business.”
“Oh, good,” said Vickie, though the look on Priscilla’s face suggested there might be more to the story than that. Az shook his head again when his sister turned to pick up a water bottle, and Vickie got the message loud and clear.
This was a friend thing. Which was good. They were friends.
And besides, a mid-October night hike in Vermont was cold enough to warrant gloves and outerwear that would keep them protected. It was the perfect activity, even if it was the opposite of what she would rather be doing with him.
Which involved less clothing, but more danger. And the possibility of death.
The hike was better. Even if the trail narrowed the farther they climbed, and as they had gotten to the tricky part, they weren’t talking to save breath, so when Azrael moved to walk single file behind her, he’d brushed his hand against hers.
She had flexed without meaning to in the glove, a tiny spasm of emotion at being so close to touching, and yet so far away.
“Sorry,” Az said, the gravel of his voice seeping through her layers. Fuck, why did he have to be so hot?
“Hey, guys, I’m going to go pee,” yelled Priscilla unceremoniously.
They paused, Vickie sitting on a rock. She knew this trail like the back of her hand, and they were ten minutes away from the falls. Around this corner, they’d make a steep descent, and then the path would level off. It was always harder coming than it was going.
“Vickie,” Azrael began. “I’ll follow Chet, and then maybe we can reconvene. Go over everything.”
“I see you started the important conversations without me,” said Prissy, emerging from the bushes and rubbing hand sanitizer in. “The Council still has the wards up around the hospital, and we did determine that if we can figure out who tried to take Connie’s soul out of her body, we have a better chance of setting her right. The Council thinks that the person may have inadvertently been successful with just a miniscule fraction of it.”
“Someone stole part of her soul?”
“It isn’t technically possible, because she’s nonmagic, but the thing is, one of our research assistants found this old tome about how most mundanes have small threads of magic in them, so inconsequential that they’d almost never come into play, unless something really weird happened.”
“Really weird like an unknown villain attempting to reap a soul, finding it to be boring and human, and then stuffing it back in?”
“Yep, just like that. Anyway, if the person were to be apprehended, we could probably figure out how to release that scrap of soul without killing them. Probably.” Her smile widened. “And if that person—a villain, obviously—did end up dying, well, it should solve the problem completely. That would make my life much easier, actually, paperwork and all. Whatever does happen to Madam Cleopatra is my jurisdiction, so it will be my problem.”
“Is there a point at which we can ask the Council to step in and help us find them?”
Prissy frowned. “Maybe. They are already trying, is the thing. So it would be stepping in and saying you don’t think they—well,we, really—are doing a good enough job. It would be a little messy. I’d give it till the full moon, run a tracking spell then.” She paused. “The concern is that if they become… irate… with you, the retribution could involve looking into all of your past.” Vickie winced at that. “If you don’t come up with anything, that gives you two weeks to get the Council involved.”
Azrael shook his head. “And once they’re involved, they won’t wantusinvolved unless they say so.”
“Exactly,” said Priscilla darkly. “That’s why it would be better if we had new leadership to steer it back in the direction Dad was taking it. A more collaborative community, and less of a hierarchy modeled after the human shenanigans that pass as politics.”
“Until the end of the month,” Vickie said. They were missing something, and she wasn’t sure if they should force the puzzle if it meant shoving their lives under the microscope of the Council’s scrutiny. Beside her, Azrael sighed, pushing a curl out of his eyes. His hair was getting long, and she wanted to catch it in her fingers, to weave it around her hands.
To push her mouth against his and feel with her lips, her tongue, her teeth, what it was to love Azrael Hart. When she looked at him she wanted, she realized, with a start, to bind her soul to his.
Probably. And it was too big of a thing to admit just yet.
For now, Vickie settled for rummaging in her backpack and pulling out a few baggies of homemade snacks.
“Trail mix?”
He took the bag, his shoulders relaxing slightly and the corners of his mouth twitching.
“This is a bag of chocolate candies with a few walnuts on top.”
“What? Trail mix is just chocolate candies with obstacles. Everyone knows that.”
Laughing, Azrael pushed her shoulder gently. Like they were bros. Like he hadn’t stared her in the eye and told her that he was done pretending. And then fucked his hand watching her writhe under her showerhead until he came all over her bathroom tiles. They could always settle on the easy way out. Be friends at a distance after Halloween. Phone calls only, sight unseen. Something in her chest twisted painfully at the thought.
