“Minnie is dying,” I choke. “Do something!”
“I’m not a doctor! Shit–” He pulls out a phone and presses a few buttons before putting it against his ear. “Pull up–no, not up front, out back. We need to get the fuck out of here.” Still holding the phone, Kas glares at me. “Follow me.”
I do, though as we run, I catch sight of the destruction wrought by Udtuk: broken glass like piles of gems, abandoned shoes, abandoned limbs, blood…
It’s nothing I haven’t seen before, but for the mortals of this realm,thisis Hell.
More and more people start to appear around us, splattered with blood like Minnie. No one bats an eye at us as we run to a door labeled EMERGENCY and step into the night. The car we arrived in screeches to a halt, and we get inside it.
“We have to take her to a hospital.” Kas says to someone, me or the driver. “No, wait, shit, the hospitals will be crawling with people. We might…” His eyes dart around in their sockets like he’s reading a map as fast as he can. “Shit.”
“The Coven,” I offer. “Witches can heal, can’t they?”
“Oh, they’re gonnahateyou.” Kas pokes his head between the front seats, speaking frantically with the driver.
My gaze falls to Minnie in my arms, her eyes still open but hazy. My whole body starts to shake. If I had agreed to her contract in the chapel… A painless death is all she wanted, and I refused her out of pride. Or guilt. Out of my selfish desire to be humane. Fuck me–if I had agreed to her first contract, if I had only said yes, none of this would have happened.
I kiss her forehead. “You’re going to be alright. I’ll burn this city…” I wince, recognizing my rage can’t save her, same as siccing Udtuk on the gala didn’t save her. “Hells, Minnie… I’m not ready to say goodbye.”
Several screaming, illuminated cars barrel past us, heading in the direction we came from. When Kas settles back in his seat, he doesn’t look at me. His only concern seems to be whoever he’s talking to on the phone.
“Stop being paranoid for one second,” he says to whoever’s on the other end. “We’re going to Lucky Witch if you need us.” His phone is only away from his ear a few moments before he’s blabbing again. To whom, I don’t really care.
The car pulls over, and through the dark glass, I can see Amber and another woman standing by the door of the shop. The driver opens the door, and as soon as I step out, Amber is beside me, her face almost as washed out as Minnie’s. She doesn’t ask any questions, just takes Minnie from my arms and utters something under her breath. I follow her the way Leaf follows Minnie when she has a can of food in her hands.
Inside the shop, my nose immediately starts twitching, a sweet smell burning my nostrils. Kas is behind me, and he sneezes before grumbling, “Juniper.”
Walking through the shop, it feels like a bigger version of Minnie’s apartment: books, crystals, and wands everywhere I look. It’s comfortable, minus the damn smell.
Amber disappears into a stairwell. I move to follow, but the other woman steps in my path and grabs my shoulder. “This is as far as you go.” She must be Amber’s sister with how similar their features are, that warm brown skin and those dark, slender eyes. I look at her hand still gripping my shoulder, then scowl at her. She grips my shoulder tighter.
There’s so much energy in the shop, it’s hard to know where it originates from. Yet, the longer I stand here, it dawns on me the energy isn’t from the random stones or ceremonial bowls. It’s all from this one woman. Magic surrounds her, kneels at her feet.
Her hand slides off my shoulder. “Leave if you must, but you will step no further into this house.” She brushes past me and grabs a jar off a wall behind me. Kas and I watch as she spreads a mixture of salt and some other herb across the threshold of the stairwell. I stifle a cough. Kas sneezes again. Then she’s gone, and as I expect, the magic in the room settles and fades.
“We’re so fucked,” Kas whines.
“Do you think they’ll save her?”
“I think they’re going to send your ass back to Hell in a handbasket.”
I grimace, trying my damndest to keep Kas focused. “I wouldn’t fit.”
“For fucks sake, Rosier!” He throws up his hands. “What were you thinking? Summoning a… what even was that? A shaved manticore?”
My expression falters as I huff. I fucked up. From the very start, I fucked all of us.
Kas sighs. “The things we do for love, I guess.”
“I’m incapable of such a thing. My hubris, my pride, those things are why we’re in this mess. Why Minnie is…”
I refuse to say it. Dying. Because of me. And all she wanted in the end was a peaceful death.
I pinch the bridge of my nose, recalling how diamonds fell from her eyes when she spoke of her Mother. I wish I could cry, I wish I could feel an ounce of her pain.
Kas groans and throws his head back. “Come on, Rosier. Don’t tell me you believe that shit?”
“Love is a mortal experience,” I snap. “I would think a person who feeds on lust would understand that better than anyone.”
