He drew close. “Hey. I’ll do what I can to help. You know I will.”
She glanced up at him. “Thanks.”
“There is something I’m curious about. You never told me how you came to know Kiara, only that she was your mentor and at times a therapist.”
She turned toward him and huffed a breath. “When I was abducted by Veyda and used my power to kill those witches, afterward I was left with a memory gap. I can’t remember what happened. All I know is that without knowing how I got there, I ended up at Kiara’s front door. That’s how I met her.”
“Kind of a strange introduction.”
“Very. But she took me in. Protected me. Taught me how to develop my security spells to withstand even Veyda. I owe her so much. I mean a month after the abduction she had me back here, at my house, long before it became Hard Landing, and I went to work hauling people out of the Graveyard. You know the rest.”
Braden took a step closer to the fireplace. “So, why are you telling me all this now?”
She met his gaze. “I’ve always trusted you. But ever since you ended up here, I’ve wondered if fate isn’t somehow involved. And things seem different between us. Know what I mean?”
He leaned his arm on the tall mantle. His lips twitched. “Well, we have shared the same bed.”
She chuckled, but her amusement dimmed quickly. He sensed how worried she was about Kiara.
“Look, Maeve. I owe you big time and I care about Kiara as much as you do. She always took the time to answer my questions about Elegance. Maybe if we put our heads together we’ll be able to get her out of Veyda’s hellhole.”
She held his gaze. “I’m working hard to find the right spell, but I’ll need some muscle going in.” She moved to sit down on the couch. She shared her effort over the past few days.
He nodded solemnly. “So, we have Veyda’s security spell to contend with. What about Veyda’s compound?”
“I don’t know much about it. I’ve only been on the west side with the row of cells.”
He thought for a moment. “It might be wise to start at the beginning. Why don’t you tell me everything you can about the night you were inside Veyda’s compound. Any physical details of the location will help as we put a plan together.”
“Okay. The biggest problem with my memory occurred at the beginning because I was drugged and spelled. I don’t even recall seeing the outside of her complex, only the inside of the killing room. That’s where I was when the spell or the drugs or both began to peel away and I became aware of my surroundings.”
He turned to face her fully, his back to the fireplace.
She shook her head. “The smell was like evil burning, I can’t explain it any other way. I remember I was facing west in a large room with high ceilings. The walls were all covered with red velvet drapes. The south end was the main entrance. On the opposite side were risers, where the witch choir chanted. There had to be at least thirty witches present all dressed in red velvet robes.”
“Were they performing, as in music of some kind?” He wanted as much data as he could gather.
“It was the most horrific sound. Like chanting but all in dissonance constantly. Something was in the center of the space, though I’ve blocked that part out. I can’t remember what it was at all. The only thing I knew was that Veyda was forcing my induction into her dark coven. I was horrified. I’d only been in Elegance Territory two weeks, yet I knew enough to despise what these witches did. Everyone knew about the human andaltersacrifices they made.
“Somewhere in there, I went berserk. My killing power lit up and in order to escape I killed those two witches. I produced the strangest glittering gold streams of power.”
She lifted her left hand and stared at it. “I haven’t used it since.” She took a moment to take a few deep breaths. “Veyda never bothered me again after that. I think I did more than kill those witches but I honestly don’t remember. The next thing I knew, I was standing in front of Kiara’s door.”
“Who were the witches you killed? Do you know their names?” He’d asked her before while his investigations. But it couldn’t hurt to pose the questions again.
Her gaze shifted to the empty grate. She shook her head. “I can’t even remember what they looked like. I can see a lot of other things, like the scarlet velvet drapes, the general beauty of that terrible room. It looked high-end. But I can’t recall the witches in any detail. Only that I killed two of them.”
“You don’t regret it, do you?”
“Not at all. I hate that I’ve taken lives, but there was so much darkness in that room. I could feel how many people had died there. I’m convinced, too, that it’s the same place Veyda has been torturing Kiara and the other women in those cells.”
She shook her head back and forth several times. “I’ll never forget Kiara’s kindness to me when I showed up that first night. Do you know she hugged me? She wrapped me up in so much love I fell apart then and there. I sank to her entry floor and wept. And you know, I’m not a weeper, Braden. I never was until I landed in this horrible place. But that hug broke down enough of my walls to start talking. I owe Kiara so much.”
He crossed his arms over his chest, but he smiled. “It’s her witch magic. She did the same to me. Got me to talking.”
Maeve shifted her gaze to him, her light blue eyes firing up. “Not everything a witch does is about her magic. She’s just…gifted.”
“I agree. I was being—”
