My brain twitched at picturing Brad’s tiny dick in the bath. “I’ve seen it. He’s got a lot to prove.”
Dolly giggled and then stopped herself. How many times had I watched Evie do that and done nothing? “That too, but his magic thing. The sword.”
Oh, she meant the Calix. “Well, that’s going to be tough because it’s a fake.”
Her eyes grew huge. “Don’t tell him that!”
“Pretty sure he already knows.”
“He does?”
Where had Brad found this innocent lamb? “Yep.”
The information overwhelm spread over her face in real time. “Well, he’ll figure it out.”
This poor girl looked to Brad to answer all of life's questions. I felt a pang of sympathy for Evie. While she was never that naïve, I made sure of that, I was glad shewas in a healthy relationship now. She could have been this so easily.
I owed Evie a real grovel for making her situation even harder. Dolly picked through the socks with a look of concentration I only gave to magic.
“I’ll help you sort. It will go faster.”
Dolly’s smile actually warmed my heart. I grabbed the first sock and tried to be helpful, pairing and folding them, but my patience quickly ran out after the fifth pair.
“Where can we put these so you don’t have to fold them?”
I gathered them up despite her fluttering hands. His wadded-up socks belonged in the fireplace, but this was for Dolly, not for me.
“The cabinet over there.” Dolly pointed to a piece of furniture full of pegs and velvet backing. When I opened it, I found a pile of expensive-looking weapons tossed in the bottom.
I might not be the best assassin in the world, but I still slipped the palm knife in my pocket and arranged Noth’s treasures in a somewhat respectful pile. Unwilling to put the socks on top of them, I pulled open a drawer beneath and found a bunch of jars organized with a meticulousness missing in the rest of the room.
I opened a jar out of sheer fuckery and the scent of turmeric and pepper hit my nose. The second jar held rummy cedar fern. The third, grey Ahmad tea. I recognized all of those compounds. Rue mixed them all thetime and drilled them into my head. Combined, you took them for serious sickness. One you didn’t come back from.
“Oh no. Don't touch those,” Dolly said. “He needs them.”
Dolly opened another drawer and I dumped all the socks in it, folded or not.
Maybe Brad was on his way to dying on his own. Not fast enough if my impending torture remained on the table.
I stilled Dolly’s hands as she went to arrange the socks with desperate precision.
“How about we get out of here, kid?”
She shook like a leaf, socks tumbling out of the drawer.
“None of this is your fault. We can leave if you want to.”
Her gaze whipped to mine and guilt almost strangled me for never saying those words to Evie. My resolve hardened as tears filled her liquid violet eyes. Bitter magic filled the back of my throat, spilling over my tongue, darkening my whole hand instead of just my fingers.
“What are you?” Dolly asked, fear filling her eyes.
“Pissed,” I replied and took hold of her wrist.
My hand rummaged around in my pouch and came up with two raw black tourmalines, their jagged edges soaking in my sigil of intent. Rue always used it when she needed to get shit done and someone stoodin her way. From the butcher to a disgruntled husband, she didn’t hesitate to use this one on our townspeople. It was a spell I kind of did without magic, bending my will into a weapon. With my magic, I was literally unstoppable.
The guard barred our way with a wide-legged stance and a scowl.
“Don’t think about it,” I warned him. I nestled the crystal between Dolly’s breasts as I tucked mine in a secure pocket, activating the sigil of beige. Magic glazed his eyes as we disappeared before his eyes. He slowly forgot that we had left before he could raise the alarm.
