He should get his filthy fucking hands off my woman.
And then the rage is back.
I stomp over to the apothecary door, push it open so hard it bangs against the stone walls and shakes hundreds of glass bottles on tens of dozens of shelves, and I just stand there under the arch and watch Tomas as I seethe.
“Fuck you,” Tomas spits. Because after two thousand years, he can practically read my mind. “Do you see?” he taunts me. “Do you see what’s happening here?”
I do. And I don’t like it one bit. “She is mine. You know this. Don’t you touch her. Don’t you—”
“Fuck. You. Monster,” Tomas sneers. He’s pulling potions off the shelves, quickly reading labels, then putting them back and moving on. “Looks like this one’s different. And I’ve been here, under your thumb for far, far too long.” He laughs out that last bit and then he finds the potion bottle he’s looking for, turns towards me, and snarls, “It ends now.”
He has placed the woman on a lounger, and he sits next to her, the potion bottle in one hand. The other slips around under her head and gently lifts it up as he pulls the cork from the bottle, spits it out in my direction, and then places the lip of the bottle up to her mouth. “Drink,” he whispers. “This will bring you back.”
I squint my eyes at the bottle, trying to read the label. There was a time, many, many decades ago, when I was interested in what Grant did in here.
I was hopeful, and he was a competent alchemist, so I let him soothe me with all those false promises. But I never trusted him so the shiny newness wore off quicker than most of the other caretakers I’ve had. It became apparent that Grant was not truly working on a way to lift my curse, just biding his time until he could escape his.
And today, he did escape.
I didn’t even care that he was making no progress. He was stuck in the curse with me. And he would spend eternity here if he couldn’t find a way to break it.
But today—the miracle he had been waiting for happened.
This woman walked into my sanctuary and Grant walked out.
The woman sputters, choking on the glowing lavender liquid. “That’s it,” Tomas soothes. “Sit up a little. It will be easier.”
The woman is not really responsive. Her choking is but an instinct. But Tomas helps her sit up and props her back against the cushions, hovering so close to her, for a moment I imagine he might try to kiss her.
A low growl builds in my throat.
Tomas doesn’t even look at me. But he does swipe a lock of hair away from her face and whisper, “Don’t worry about him. You have me now. I will take care of you.”
“Fuck,” I mutter, then turn and walk towards the door. “Go to hell, Tomas. Oh”—I pause and look over my shoulder as I scoff—“I forgot. You’re already here.”
“Go jerk yourself, Pell.”
I walk out and seventeen leaps later I’m at the bottom of the grand staircase.
I cross the hall and go outside. The moon is dark tonight. New. Fitting.
But I have only one thing on my mind at the moment, and that’s Grant.
His scent lingers in the cemetery. It’s everywhere, and this just makes the anger inside me build once again.
But it’s mixed with pheromones tonight. Fear, mostly.
And he should be afraid. He should be very afraid. Because if I ever see him again, I will tear his head right off his body.
But that’s not that part that pisses me off. Because mixed in with the fear is a dose of excited anxiety.
That growl in my throat is back again. Deeper now. Rage. Hate.
Because he left this place with expectations.
He left this place with hope.
I tilt my head up to the black sky and roar out my rage. Then I gather myself, walk down the path, down the hill, up to the wooden gate that separates us from the outside world, and peek over.
His car—El Camino, he named it—is gone.
He is gone.
I take many deep breaths as I force myself to come to terms with what has just occurred.
This woman is magical. That’s a given. The ability to enter Saint Mark’s Sanctuary without invitation is a skill that runs in the blood. It skips two generations and is only passed on if both parents have a recessive gene for sight.
Or so Grant said.
But how would I know? I have not been schooled in the knowledge of alchemy. Almost anyone can work spells, but I’m not an alchemist. And I only have a few innate powers. None of which are particularly helpful or have anything to do with the curse of Saint Mark’s.
My head is thumping to the beat of my heart, that’s how angry I am right now.
Calm down, Pell. You must think clearly.
It was a nice ride with Grant. It has been easy for more than fifty years. Predictable. But he never did anything for you. This girl is a fresh start.
Here’s my problem. I don’t like the fresh start. I prefer the predictable. I enjoy the easy. And maybe I am whining a little bit—only internally, of course—but the easy is gone now. Grant has left and in his place is this woman.
Woman? Hardly. I have not spent a lot of time outside the gates of Saint Mark’s because Grant had to escort me, like a fucking babysitter, whenever I wanted to go somewhere. But I have kept up with the times. I think. So I have a cursory understanding that in this day and age, the woman in the apothecary is considered to be young. Early twenties. A girl. Barely more than a child.
In my day, a woman her age might already have a daughter who was having daughters. She would be wise to the ways of the world. She would’ve been practicing her craft for well over a decade. She would have discovered things. New things. Important things. She would have ideas about potions, and herbs, and she would not only have opinions about how things inside the sanctuary apothecary worked, she would be plotting ways to make the potions and herbs stronger and more effective.
She would be an asset. But this girl? I scoff into the night, my breath creating a stream of white steam across the blackness.
She will know nothing. She will be useless. She will be a millstone around my neck for decades, possibly even centuries. And maybe I didn’t have a lot of hope that one day I might break this curse, but at least Grant knew what the fuck he was doing.
And now this new thing with Tomas. Surely he is also considering his change in fortune. He is also plotting a way to lift his curse. If that’s what it is.
And he is planning on using my woman to do that.
I place the tips of my fingers up against my forehead and make little circles.
This is more than I can take.
Well, do something about it, Pell. You left him alone with your new woman. He could be telling her things. Things about you. Things Tomas has no right to divulge.
I whirl around and gaze back up the hill at the cathedral. And then I’m running. I will stop him. She is mine. He will not use my slave to fulfill his needs or gain his freedom.
I burst through the doors, leap up the stairs, and then I’m huffing with anger under the arch of the apothecary door.
“Take your hands off her!”
Tomas sneers at me. But I’m not focused on him. I’m focused on her. She turns her head and I already know what’s coming before the scream leaves her mouth.
I turn back around because I’m tired of it. I didn’t bring her here. I didn’t put this curse on her. She did this to herself. She and her family—her bloodline—they are the entire reason I’m stuck here. So she doesn’t get to look at me like I’m the monster when she is the reason I’m cursed.