Page 16

"How do you fail a ritual?" Her brown eyes stare up at me with determination, and a trust I certainly do not deserve.

"By doing one wrong," I tell her, "or not showing up, or by dying. Which is redundant, because that’s typically the result of doing one wrong."

"Won’t attending the rituals make it easier for the people that are hunting me? They’ll know I’ll be there."

"What makes you think that's not part of the ritual?" I say, not bothering to hide the malignancy I feel deep inside me from pouring into my voice—the hatred for this world, for what it was supposed to be and what it became instead.

And now it’s going to rip my fated mate from my hands in the most brutal fashion of all.

MacTavish and Midnight House, a match made in the lowest circles of hell.

"So the rituals are going to be about me staying alive?" She nods curtly, as if I've just told her the rituals are as easy as reciting the alphabet.

I blink. "How much wine did you have again?"

"Listen." She steeples her hands in front of her chest, which only manages to draw my attention to where her breasts are pressing against the fabric of her shirt.

I swallow hard.

"Learning things is what I do. Studying is my superpower and always has been. I'm familiar with court functions throughout the eighteenth century, across cultures and countries, and I'd be happy to learn as much as I can about this society. The problem is..." She arches an eyebrow at me. "...this has been the sole research I've done for the last several years. I fully planned on rewriting my dissertation about what I found⁠—"

"The astrolabe," I interrupt.

"Yes," she says. "And the caverns under the city."

"Caverns?" I ask, my brow furrowing in confusion. “I’ve never seen a cavern under there.”

She waves a hand at me. "Tunnels. Whatever. Sorry, I did have half a bottle of wine. I'm allowed to misspeak."

"I never said you weren't," I tell her, laughing in spite of myself again—which annoys me.

"Well, I'm going to have a lot of time, is what I'm saying," she says. "And I'm not going to be allowed to write about Midnight House, will I?"

"No, nothing can save you if you decide to go public with everything that you've seen today," I say, shaking my head. "It would be something I do not recommend. It would be decidedly bad for your health. Got it?"

"Say less," she says.

"I can't say less. I've already said all of that."

"How old are you?" she asks.

I roll my eyes.

"As I was trying to say, all I'm going to have on my hands is time. Now I don't have to worry about rent, according to you. I don't have to worry about healthcare, because we have some kind of doctor on staff here. So as long as you're footing the bills for food⁠—"

"Footing the bills?" I interrupt again with a snort, unable to help myself. "Lass, you're richer than Croesus—Midas himself. You've just taken over an extinct line. All of the funds available to Midnight House are yours. And whatever they were a century ago, they've certainly doubled in investments."

Her mouth drops open, and she flicks her pretty pink tongue distractingly over her lower lip.

"Okay." She holds up a hand, waving it at me. "I am going to need more Scotch."

"What happened to being sober so that you could concentrate tomorrow?"

"Excuse me? You've just let me know that not only am I being hunted—" She holds up a finger. "—I'm going to have to participate in what sounds like some kind of blood rituals where people are going to be trying to hurt me and kill me if I don't pass, whatever that means." She holds up another finger. "And now you're telling me that, along with what looks to be a crumbling estate, I've also inherited a whole lot of money. Did you mention the magic?"

"And magic," I ask wryly.

She raises an eyebrow, and another finger. "And magic. Apparently I now have magic. Do I turn into a bear?" she asks, her tone purely curious.