“And most of them end up dead.”
Like the one who’d killed my sister and who almost succeeded in taking my life. Though his body had never been found, plenty of his blood had. The high council had eventually declared that the demons he’d trafficked with had taken advantage of his weakened state and torn him apart.
My psi dreams had been telling me for years this wasn’t true, but then, my psi dreams also tended to be overly dramatic.
“Even if the hone-onna is an unwilling participant in the hunt, why would she be showing me the witch? Why wouldn’t she just go about her bloody business and then move on?”
“It is not unknown for witches who tread the dark path to be so twisted by the magic they call into being that their ability to think logically deserts them.”
“Which is a roundabout way of saying … what?”
He laughed. “It could be that this witch has decided there is no end game. Perhaps she has decided that all cheaters must pay, not just the person the hone-onna was summoned to hunt.”
A chill went through me. That certainly appeared to be what was happening now. “But surely the longer the witch holds the hone-onna’s leash, the greater the chances of her slipping up? No witch can hold a spell—or a spirit—for long. It’ll sap your strength and eventually kill.”
I knew that from the few times Belle had summoned dark spirits.
“If she used her own magic, yes. But if she uses blood magic, then no. All she’d have to do is refresh the sacrifice, and the spirit remains on the leash.”
“How hard would it be to find her circle?”
“On a scale of one to ten, it’d be fifteen.”
I laughed. “If I send you a description, would you be able to arrange a search through the high council’s dark witch register and see if she’s there?”
“Of course, but there is a strong possibility she won’t be. Few witches strong enough to summon such a spirit would be caught in a backwater such as this.”
“You moved into this backwater, remember.”
“Because I’m close to retirement and people I care about happen to live here.”
“Not to mention the lure of unforgettable cakes and scones.”
He laughed. “There are a couple of witches who sneak in ahead of them, but only by a smidge.”
“I’m sure Monty will be pleased to hear that.”
“You know well enough who I mean, lass. But enough of this guff—why do you think the summoner remains here? Did you get more than just an image when you picked up the bone?”
“No, but she’s got the coloring of a royal witch, and she’s around my age.”
“That doesn’t explain why you believe—”
“It does,” I cut in, “if the hone-onna saw me from a distance and thought I was the witch who’d summoned her.”
“Possible, but the leash really should have told her you were not holding the other end.”
“What if the leash is tied to the altar rather than the witch?”
“Again possible.”
“It would not only explain the rollover, but also why she’d run from Monty and me rather than magically combatting us. If she’d believed I was the one holding her leash, she wouldn’t have dared risk a direct attack.”
“Spirits can attack aplenty if they get desperate or angry enough.”
“This one isn’t desperate. She’s just furious.”
“Which makes her all the more dangerous, lass.”
“All dark spirits are dangerous, but I think this one is willing to negotiate.”
He snorted. “It’s never wise to negotiate one on one with darkness, because it rarely ends well. That’s why the leashes are employed.”
“This one saved a kid, Ashworth. A human kid. I’m willing to bet that she’d be happy to leave this reservation in exchange for her freedom.”
He was silent for a second. “While I never advocate allowing darkness to walk free, perhaps in this case it might be worth investigating.”
“It’s a better option than trying to track and kill the hone-onna.”
“I think you’ll find the witch won’t be any easier to take down.”
“Yeah, but at least she’s human.”
“Which won’t give us any edge. Not if we’re dealing with a full-blood royal witch gone rogue.” He paused, and then added in a sterner tone, “And if we are, you are not to hunt her alone. It might well take the four of us to cage her.”
“There’s one problem in that statement—we can’t risk leaving Mia or Aiden unattended.”
“Don’t you mean unprotected?”
I grimaced at the slip of the tongue. It seemed that for all my protestations of trust, there was some inner—probably green—streak that didn’t. Or maybe I just didn’t trust fate not to throw another spanner in the works. “Of course I do.”
He chuckled softly. “This place is safe enough from the likes of a hone-onna on a short-term basis. But I’d nevertheless advise against any attempt to read that bone here. As much as I’d be interested in seeing the results firsthand, it might well draw us to the attention of the hone-onna and the royal witch.”
“I wasn’t intending to.” Our café was the safest place in the entire reservation when it came to dealing with—or even seeking—spirits of any kind, thanks to the protections around it and the reading room. And the latter had been specifically designed with darker forces—no matter what type—in mind.
“Good.” He paused. “How exactly are you going to convince Aiden to remain here? Because we both know what his instinctive response will be.”
“I’ve broached the subject, and he did refuse. But his only other choice is to stay at the café, and I really don’t want to risk drawing the hone-onna there.”
“A statement I rather suspect is both the truth and a lie,” Ashworth commented.
The man was too canny for my own good sometimes. I sighed. “There’re already too many good memories of him and me there, Ashworth. I don’t need any more battering my senses if our relationship goes ass up.”
“A point I can understand, but one I doubt he will. The man has a deep aversion to confronting the emotional side of life.”
“Only with non-werewolves,” I muttered, then quickly added, “I’m not sure when we’ll get there—Mia was involved in a car rollover, so we’re currently at the hospital getting her checked out.”
“That’s no problem, as neither of us are going anywhere.”
“Thanks, Ashworth.”
He bid me goodbye and hung up. I shoved the phone away then opened the glove compartment and raided the stash of chocolate and energy bars Aiden kept there specifically for me. A couple of Picnic bars at least toned down the idiots in my head but didn’t do much against the growing wave of tiredness. I locked the doors, then grabbed my coat, balled it up, and propped it against the window to use as a pillow. I was asleep within minutes.
A sharp rapping on the window startled me awake hours later. A squeak of surprise escaped, and I sat bolt upright, blinking rapidly for several seconds while my mind scrambled to shake sleep and start functioning.