Azalea places a hand on my arm. “You did the right thing,” she says in earnest. “The hunt must always come first.”
“Thank you,” I tell her. “That helps.”
“That’s precisely why Great-Grandma Bella decided to spare you,” she says as we turn back. “Well, that and the enormous aptitude and courage you showed in dispatching two marks of such a challenging class in the same day, all while keeping that sheriff under your thumb and squashing any suspicion. It’s remarkable how far you’ve come, Piers.”
My shoulders sag with relief. Even though I’d been told as much already, I wasn’t sure until this moment whether I could believe it. I did exactly as I promised Myrtle, calling the venery myself and telling them what happened before they saw it on the news. I confessed to Myrtle’s untimely death at the hands of the Stranglerandto burying her in the woods so I could hunt him down. The only part I kept to myself was our fight, how in my rush to protect Regis and the fever of the hunt, I’d left her vulnerable. In the end, it was Myrtle’s own words that convinced me I didn’t need to share it—would you really leave that man in the world to take more innocent lives?If I told them I’d attacked her, however unhinged the hunt had made me, however unintentional her death, they’d come for me. And it would all have been for nothing—her investment in me, her loss. Countless men would continue to hurt those weaker than themselves, men she and I should have put down. In the end, I believe this is how she would have wanted it.
“I owe it all to Myrtle,” I say, our steps slower, more relaxed. But I can’t help but seize on Bella’s implied veto from their gathering. “I take it the conclave didn’t go completely in my favor.”
Azalea laughs. “It wasn’t all bad. Rose and Barbie will still need some convincing. You’ll win them over with time. But everyone else was in your favor, believe it or not. Well, except for Lattie, who withheld her vote. But in the end, it’s always Bella’s decision. And she was on your side from the beginning.”
“You voted for me?” I ask, peering at her through my lashes.
She stops walking and turns to me. “We may be witches, Piers, but we’re still human. We’re not perfect. We make mistakes. No one expects you to get everything right, they just want you to understand what it can mean when you don’t. And to try your best, for all our sakes.”
Muscles in my stomach that have wrought themselves into knots since Myrtle’s death finally begin to unwind. “Now what?”
She lights up, taking my hands in hers. “You’re a bane witch without a post.” Her eyes arch overhead and back to mine. “And this is a post without a witch.”
“You don’t mean…”
“If you’ll have it,” she tells me, grinning.
“Of course,” I manage to spit out.
“Good,” she says, dropping my hands. “This is what Myrtle was grooming you for, after all. It would make her proud. And nobody can handle that sheriff as well as you can apparently.”
I blush despite myself, despite the caution I feel discussing Regis with her, the protectiveness I have around our secret relationship.
“I wondered if that was the case,” she says quietly.
When I start to back away, she reaches for me. “Relax, Piers. I’m not here to hurt you. To be honest, no one much cares how you keep him happy so long as you do and we get to keep this place in the venery. But you have to know, your mother’s arrangement still stands.”
“My mother’s?”
“If he turns, if he decides to blame you or us for any reason, if at any time he becomes too great a risk, it’s your duty to protect the family first.” She’s not smiling anymore. This contract is binding.
I nod. “I won’t risk the venery,” I tell her, and I mean it. I love Regis, but I have a purpose now. We all do. And I won’t let anyone take that away from us. Fortunately, Regis loves me. He has no desire to stand in my way. His only focus, apart from protecting this community at my side, is protecting me.
“Excellent,” she says. “Because it looks like I’ll be staying for a while.”
My eyebrows raise dramatically as I cock my head in her direction. “Pardon?”
She shrugs, sniffs like it’s no big deal. “You could use a little more training, and I could use a place to lie low.” Before I can panic, she goes on. “Nothing to worry about. I’ll be back in Portland before the snow melts. It’s just smarter to not be there when the news breaks on my last mark. I was careful, covered my tracks. But he’s a big fish, bound to get a lot of media attention. It’s purely precautionary.”
“The news?” My eyes round as I look at her. “Who did you kill?”
“A Hollywood mogul with a habit of date rape.”
“You mean a Weinstein?” I ask, incredulous.
“Worse,” she declares as we start forward again. “If you can fathom it. This one liked to keep sex slaves in a secret basement room—the last one he tortured for weeks before she finally succumbed to her injuries.”
I can feel my face going green.
“Besides,” she says brightly, the snow beginning to fall in soft flurries around us, freckling her trench coat in ice. “I heard you might be able to use my help with your latest mark.”
My latest mark. As much as I’d accepted my fate, it was something I didn’t like to think about. It had only been a couple of months since I’d taken Henry and the Saranac Strangler. I thought I’d get more of a break before another predator began to prick at my magic like a cactus needle. But a couple of weeks ago I began to sense him, like a bad dream that hangs around after dawn. And then I caught wind of the news reports. He likes to hang his victims in their own homes, from ceiling fans, wooden beams, even towel racks, using whatever is at hand—belts, tights, bras, bedsheets—but his favorite is shoelaces. He’d been active in the New Jersey area for weeks, only recently going underground,silenced for reasons no one can understand. Except me. My allure is drawing him north. And when he gets here, I’ll have work to do.
