Fine.
“Did we always argue this much?”
Maisri burst out laughing. “Of course,” she managed to gasp between giggles. “Ask me something harder.”
Ancestors save me.
“Who fell in love first?” I hardly believed I asked it. There was no one else I would have voiced that query too. Only a child, a daisy fae, who worshiped my mate with a ferocity I aspired to.
“I never heard either of you say it,” Maisri admitted, toying with the ends of her hair. “But the way you looked at the queen… someday, I hope I have a mate who looks at me like that.”
Her eyes went a little dreamy. My throat closed. But I managed to get out a few gruff words. “I hope you do.”
She shrugged, eyes drifting over my shoulder. Already bored with the little game she’d devised. “I suppose I ought to go start packing. Osheen said we are leaving again soon.”
My beast snarled, sharp and demanding.
Osheen had agreed to accompany Veyka—without knowing whether I would be coming as well.
Good—I wanted the best watching her back.
I should be the one watching her back.
Maisri could not hear the snarl or the growl that was building inside of me. She was halfway up the stairs before she called back one last question. “Are you coming with us?”
My beast growled in answer. I did not fight him. “Yes. Yes, I am.”
88
VEYKA
I chucked the amorite amulet at the witch’s feet. “Put that on before you take another step.”
She lowered her eyes to examine it, exposing the column of her neck to me. One bound, and I could remove her head from her body. Stupid, arrogant, or lethal. Probably some combination of the latter two.
In some ways, she was identical to the sister I’d slain in the Tower of Myda. Her long nails curved downward, but instead of razor-sharp points, hers had grown into graceful curls that brushed the icy floor of the cave. Those eyes were the same as well—all-seeing and damn eerie.
“I have not seen a gemstone like that in an age,” the witch cooed, adoration flickering in her eyes. “What a gift you have brought, Veyka Pendragon.”
“I am not sympathetic to your circumstances,” I said. The daggers were still in my hands; ready if she were to make any move of aggression. “But I would rather not have to kill you before I get my answers. Put it on,” I ordered again.
The witch swiped the amulet up without bending her waist at all, courtesy of those grotesquely long nails.
“You have discovered the one weakness of the succubus.” As she spoke, she turned over the amulet in her hands. It was simple. A stone the size of my thumbnail in a rough gold setting, affixed to a narrow leather strap. She did not lift her gaze back to me as she considered it. “I am a female. What need have I of your trinket?”
Already, she was asking me questions. The witch in the Tower of Myda had tried to do the same, to distract me so that she could gain the upper hand.
I gritted my teeth. “A test? You shall have to answer my questions regardless once I have my blade pressed to your throat.”
Maybe her throat was not the best bet. Too close to those vicious nails. My rapiers crossed behind her neck, forcing her down to her knees before me… yes, that was a better idea.
The witch’s nails clicked together in an unnerving symphony. “Humor an old female.”
So many times, I’d thrown myself into the void over the last month and a half. A sweet escape, yes. But most of those times, I had appeared in Eilean Gayl’s library. In the priestess’s reading room. In Pant’s private studies, dotted throughout the castle. Each time, inching a bit closer to this—to the witch. The last remaining one in Annwyn, if the history was to be believed.
I almost laughed aloud at the absurdity of that.
But I stifled the impulse, my face cool. Giving the witch nothing. “You are not like the other,” I observed.
