thirty-six
Gentry
The Weavers left soon after introductions, Wren as usual promising that they would be back the following night. Gentry nodded numbly, aware of Kit’s furious eyes on her. She’d already explained the deal she’d made with Clea, but the country witch had barely reacted in the presence of Wren and Adrienne, merely nodding at the news.
So it made sense that he exploded as soon as Adrienne shut the door behind them. “A deal with the Weavers, Gentry, are you mad?”
Gentry flinched. “It wasn’t like I had much choice. Clea was going to kill me if I didn’t come up with something. I was a little surprised when this”—she gestured at the apartment broadly—“worked out. If Wren can excise my soul from Drayer’s without killing me, then it’ll be curse over.” Her voice broke at that last part, because, really, she didn’t like her odds so far.
Kit softened, his gaze turning heart-wrenchedly sympathetic. “I should’ve gone in there with you,” he muttered. “I could’ve distracted Clea so you could have ran.”
She noted how he saiddistractedinstead ofkill. Gentry melted. The chivalrous bastard meant he’d take the fall for her if it meant for a chance for her to get away. Did this man not have any sense of self-preservation? She’d imprisoned him, taken his free will away with Favors, for fuck’s sake. He had every right to want her dead.
He deserved to know the truth.
“There’s one last thing you should know,” Gentry began softly, “and it’s not good news at all. You might want to sit down.”
Kit remained standing, his eyebrows furrowing in confusion.
“Clea had Visha’s hair and she managed to track her down to the bunker and she—” she cut herself off before she could say the wordkilled. “Visha’s dead, Kit.”
For a few seconds, Kit didn’t react and Gentry wondered if the witch had comprehended what she’d just told him. But then he spoke, his voice choked, “Do you know how she…?”
She shook her head, thankful that Clea had spared them both the details. “I’m sorry, Kit. I didn’t know how to tell you any of this.”
A terrible silence stretched between them, Kit’s eyes lost and so hurt that they took Gentry’s breath away.Visha had no clue how lucky she was,she thought.
Before she could reach out to comfort Kit, to apologize more about how things had played out, Kit turned around and walked out the door.
He was gone.
thirty-seven
Kit
Kit never wandered further than a few floors from Gentry, his nerves so completely shredded that he didn’t know where to go. Mary and the others would be at the Spinners’ hideout and had no love for Visha. The one other person who would understand — Samar — was sequestered at the Jumpers under the watchful eye of Georgia, Clea’s apprentice. Sure, perhaps Clea had pulled the detail because the business with Visha was dealt with, but then again, Kit wasn’t sure if Samar could mourn Visha in the same way he did.
She hadn’t been perfect, far from it, but she’d saved him from a very vulnerable time in his life. She’d given him a purpose, a little bit of pride to survive his sister Breanne’s rejection of him. She’d validated his anger at Nona, his sister, and the rest of his siblings for pretending like everything was fine.
While that anger had alienated him from his family, Kit recognized that he’d needed the righteous wrath at the time to protect himself. Visha had protected him. Sure, she’d used him for frivolous things, and that flaw had gotten her killed in the end, but that didn’t make him happy. Far from it.
Kit sat down at a pitch-black hallway window and closed his eyes. A shady apartment building wasn’t the place to mourn, he knew that, but at the same time he didn’t want Gentry to see how much the woman who’d almost killed her meant to him. The little magic-less woman would find it pathetic how much he mourned the woman who’d played him like a puppet.Illogical, she’d say. Kit agreed with her sentiment.
But shared trauma and history had a way of making logic fly out the window.
A few tears escaped his eyes as he realized just how colossally he’d failed the man who’d given his life to protect his own. At the time, Kit had thought keeping Visha safe would be easy because they would always be together. He never foresaw the years of killing and greed, the years of jealousy and endless fighting. It’d been unexpected; Visha’s transformation into someone who was never satisfied with her blessings in life.
Oh Raja, he remembered his father figure,I hope youand Visha are together again. She was always happiest when she was with you. I’m sorry I couldn’t keep her safe.
Kit cried for the dead father and daughter for some time.
thirty-eight
Gentry
Kit returned sober and quiet while Gentry was failing epically at her attempts to meditate. She’d placed the tonic on the table as a reminder that she’d soon have to take the nasty stuff, and it mocked her accordingly.
Have a good time breaking the heart of the witch you’ve enslaved?it seemed to whisper.Take me so you can have your nightmare next!
