Kipa stared at Vixen like they’d grown another head. “Well, then…as long as it’s not going to inflict anything else on him, we can use that and then wrap the chain around him. It will be less violent than me restraining him without help.”
“I’ll have my man bring it up.” Vixen summoned the butler and requested he bring up the “Restraint Chair”…and apparently the butler knew exactly what they were talking about. When he returned with two of the housemaids who were carrying the chair, he arranged it in place of the rocking chair, which he moved out of the room.
True to what Vixen had said, the chair looked like a sculptural piece, but one that was functional. The arms were curved and ornate, and the chair was padded with a velvet cushion. Vixen showed us the almost invisible slits on both sides of each arm that housed retractable cuffs.
“You’ll have to move fast,” they said. “I’m not programming the leg cuffs because that requires more precision, and most of the people who’ve sat in this chair were willing participants. But you should be able to get the chain around his waist before he goes berserk.”
“Most of? No, don’t tell me. I don’t want to know.” Kipa eyed the contraption. “Where did you get this?”
“I have a friend who makes furniture, mostly for dungeons—and I’m not talking about the dank ones, but the ones that are oh so fun. He made it for me.” Vixen winked. “Want his number?”
Kipa quickly declined. “No, we’ll pass.”
Vixen laughed, glancing at me. “What about you? You think you could use his number?”
Snickering, I said, “What Kipa said. Our bed play is wild enough. I’m dating the Lord of the Wolves, remember.”
At that moment, the doorbell rang.
“Lenny,” Vixen said, sobering instantly.
“Well, then…it’s go time. Let Kipa and me hide so he doesn’t see us.” As we left the room and hid in Vixen’s office, which was right next to the parlor, Vixen motioned to the butler and instructed him to escort Lenny in.
“Ready?” Kipa asked as we stood near the door to the office, cracking it so we could hear when Vixen called for us.
“I hope so. Once we take care of this…I guess that’s the last I’ll see of Vixen for a year. Or maybe two.” I paused, then added, “I’ll tell you one thing, the Banra-Sheagh has made an anti-monarchist out of me. I’m angry, Kipa. So angry I wish I could—”
“Don’t say it,” he quickly said. “You don’t know who’s listening.”
I started to answer but stopped as the sound of Lenny talking to the butler echoed from the foyer. Lenny was bitching about not having the time to coddle Vixen and the butler was remaining politely silent. Kipa and I waited, straining to hear what was going on. There was muted conversation from the parlor and then, a moment later we heard Lenny shout.
“Hurry! Got him!” Vixen screamed.
We rushed back to the parlor, Kipa first, silver chain out and ready. We entered the room to see Lenny struggling against the cuffs holding his arms to the chair.
“You fucking freakshow bitch!” he was screaming at Vixen. “Let me go!”
As we came in the room, he glanced at me and shouted again. “Get away from me, you witch!” But when Kipa approached him, silver chain in hand, he gritted his teeth and his eyes grew narrow. “No—don’t you dare!”
“Shut up or we’re going to have to do this the hard way,” Kipa growled under his breath.
I said nothing, watching as Kipa bound the chain around Lenny’s arms, cinching him tight against the back of the chair. I felt oddly detached as I began to prepare the spell. I began to spin the webs of energy in my head, focusing on building the structure of the spell. It was like a puzzle, moving a thread of fire this way, a thread of earth energy that way, weaving it like I might weave a lattice.
Kipa fastened the chain so Lenny couldn’t get away and turned to me. “I’m ready to go out and—”
At that moment, something coiled around my neck and I couldn’t breathe. The aztrophyllia had jumped from Lenny to me. Struggling for air, I clawed at my throat but the creature had a firm hold and was squeezing hard, and I couldn’t see it to attack it. It had a tighter hold on me than the first time, and I was quickly running out of air, without Raj there to help me.
Before Kipa could react, Vixen was at my side and they morphed into a massive snake, almost ten feet long and a beautiful golden brown. Vixen reared, mouth open to show long fangs. Petrified, I watched the snake weaving back and forth, using their tail for balance with their head at eye level with me. And then, even as the room started to blank out and my mind grew hazy, Vixen struck.
I wanted to dart away, to fall back, but the aztrophyllia held tight, not letting me move. I braced myself for impact, but the fangs never touched my skin. Instead, through my fading eyesight, I could tell that Vixen had hold of the creature with their fangs, trying to drag the aztrophyllia off of me. There was a sudden flash, and then I could see what Raj had described—the bat-like creature. Its tail was wrapped around my neck, but Vixen had stuck their fangs into the body and was tugging hard.
Kipa shouted, leaping over the chair to land beside Vixen and me. He brought out a silver dagger and, doing his best to avoid Vixen, plunged the blade into the body of the aztrophyllia.
I could barely keep my eyes open. My lungs were burning and my head was pounding like it was going to explode. Wondering if this was it, I started to fall. The next moment, everything went black.
Chapter Twenty
I found myself standing in the middle of a crossroads under a wheeling sky of stars, and in front of me stood Arawn, Lord of Death. Everywhere, billowing mist tumbled along. I couldn’t tell whether I was in a field because the ground was covered with the rolling fog, and overhead was black as night, black as pitch, studded with stars.
I turned back to Arawn. The massive god was cloaked in shadow, and he wore an indigo-colored cape with a hood that covered his face. All I could see were diamonds where his eyes should be. His arms were visible through the slits on the cape, but he was wearing silver gauntlets ornately embellished with Celtic knotwork. He held a tall scythe, silver blade attached to a jet black handle that must have been ten feet tall. Arawn himself had to be over eight feet, and he rose above me, staring down imperiously.
“And so…we come to a point of fate in the timeline of your life,” he said. His words echoed out over the fog, then were immediately sucked into the mist and vanished.
I stopped. “Am I dead?” I didn’t feel dead, and I worked with ghosts so much I should be able to tell. But then, I had never been dead—at least not in this lifetime.
“No, Raven, you are not. But you stand on a turning point in your life. You stand at the crux. If you choose to live, your life will never be what it was. It will never be the same. That timeline has been wiped out by the past few days and the past few decisions you’ve made.”
I thought back, nodding. “What about Väinämöinen? I was supposed to study with him for a year.” I felt myself suddenly frantic, and realized how much I wanted the opportunity. I hadn’t realized it meant so much to me until now. It had still seemed so fresh and frightening that I hadn’t realized it was also the fulfillment of a dream for me—the chance to train under one of the great sorcerers of history.