She hopped a little to show her front hooves. Around each was a loop of solid gold.
“You have gold handcuffs?” Jean asked. She gave Bathin a slow look up and down. “Respect the kink, dude.”
He tipped his head likeyou are not wrong, but turned immediately to me. “I need to tell you something.”
“If it isn’t how to turn frogs into people, I don’t want to hear it.”
“It’s important.”
“What could be more important than un-frogging people?”
“Xtelle is my mother.”
The silence in the room was like plunging into deep, cold water, dropping down, down, down to the bottom.
“What?” Delaney shot up to her feet and so did Ryder.
Jean, still in the chair, laughed. “Your mother is a unicorn, Bathin? Well, it might explain those eyes of yours.”
“You like my eyes, huh?” he said with a smile.
She rocked her hand in a so-so motion.
This was the part where I was supposed to say something. Where I was supposed to take over the problem, figure out what was going on, and present the solution. But my brain refused to wrap around this new information. It was like all my wiring had shorted.
“I…I don’t even…” I said.
Bathin nodded like that was the most cogent thing I’d ever said. “She took the form of a unicorn so she could trick you into staying in Ordinary. She opened the first vortex of Hell into Ordinary.”
“Itoldyou, I did no such thing,” she snarled. “I found the vortex and stepped through it. I did not make it.”
“I don’t believe her,” Bathin said, “and since I’m her son, you can trust my judgment of her character.”
“What? Now I’m a terrible mother?”
“You’ve always been a terrible mother, but a fantastic demon. Which is why I don’t trust you and have never trusted you.”
“Oh, you can trust I’ll make you pay! I’ll tell your father you’re upworld slumming with mortals and monsters and neutered gods. He will raise the fire of Hell and despair upon you.”
“Xtelle,” Bathin said, so cold, so unlike what I’d ever heard him say before, “if you put Ordinary at risk, I will break your bones apart, atom by atom, and leave your flesh for the crabs.”
Bathin’s delivery was so matter-of-fact, so certain, it shocked her into silence.
He had shown a glimpse, just a sliver, like the shine off the edge of a razor, of the power he possessed. It was massive. Destructive. Caught there just beneath his wicked smile and pretty eyes.
Jean was wrong. There was nothing so-so about his eyes. They were gorgeous. And dangerous.
And why was I thinking about his pretty eyes? I should be thinking about how to get rid of not one, but two demons who did not belong in Ordinary.
But first, it was time to get Delaney’s soul back.
I walked out of the room and to my office. There was no tug in my chest, nothing that was driving me to do this. But I was done. Done being lied to by demons. Done with the tricks.
I wanted my town to go back to normal. I wanted my sister to go back to normal.
“Myra?” Bathin called.
“No.” Delaney’s voice carried the clean strength of the earth and stones that made Ordinary what it was. “Leave her alone. You’re going to stay away from her until we get this worked out. Let’s start with this: What the hell, Bathin?”
