Switchblade Goddess (31 page)

“It is cool,” he said, sounding amazed. “It does not burn.”

“It might still flame up,” I replied. “Please put my opera glove back on, just in case.”

   After I got dressed in the sacristy, Teresa led me back out to the hallway outside the chapel where Cooper, Pal, and my father were waiting.

“Please come with me to my office,” Magus Shimmer said to me. “My personal physician is there; we want to make sure the ritual worked and that you have truly been cured of your illnesses.”

His physician turned out to be a slight, middle-aged man with a pointed white chin beard and monocle. He had me sit on a stool and peered in my eyes, ears, and down my throat, and took some blood from my arm that he mixed with strange liquids in various test tubes.

Finally, after much frowning at the tubes and shaking the contents therein, he declared: “She is free of disease.”

“Thank goodness!” Pal exclaimed, and Cooper gave me a big hug.

I
dreamed again that I was a little girl back in my old house. I stood on the kitchen stool beside my mother at the counter; we were making Christmas cookies. Mom was cutting the rolled buttery dough into snowmen and candy canes and arranging them on the cookie sheets, and I was decorating them with colored sugars and jimmies. I was warm and happy; it was a perfect moment.

And then I remembered she was dead. Killed by the Virtus Regnum for saving me from brain cancer.

“I’ve missed you so much,” I told her, finally finding my voice in the dream. “I never got to say good-bye to you. Every day, I’ve missed you.”

“Oh, but honey, I’ve been right here,” she told me. “I haven’t ever gone anywhere, not really.”

My body began to shrink on the stool, and I reached up to try to grab her hand, not wanting to leave her, not wanting the dream to end—

—I jerked awake on the silk sheets. Cooper moved sleepily beside me. He’d still been dressed in his fatigues when he spooned me to sleep; we were both far too tired for more than a couple of good-night kisses. But now he was dressed in pajama pants and a T-shirt. I saw Pal’s shaggy bulk snoozing on the rug by the
fireplace. By the angle of the light coming through the curtains, I guessed it was already late morning.

I slipped out of bed and went into the bathroom to wash the sleepy grit from my eyes and rinse out my mouth. My shoulders and heels hurt, but I wasn’t as sore as I’d expected. As I dried off my face, I decided to take the bull by the horns and deal with something that had been put off far too long.

I dressed quietly, brushed my hair, and went out into the hallway to look for a servant or guard. It didn’t take me too long to find a white-aproned chambermaid.

“Excuse me, miss? Can you tell me where the Warlock’s room is?” I asked her.

She made a quick, formal head bow. “Yes, meine dame. Please follow me.”

The maid led me down the corridor to a separate wing of the castle, and we stopped in front of a chamber door.

“He is in here,” she said. “May I help with anything else?”

“No, thank you.”

The maid bowed again and went back to her duties. I faced the door, took a deep breath, and rapped my knuckles on the wood. I waited a few moments; there was no response. I wiped my sweaty palms on my jeans and rapped again, more loudly. This time I heard the slap of a man’s bare feet on the stone floor and the click of the lock pulling back and I held my breath as the door swung inward—

—and I found myself staring at Randall, who was wearing nothing but a pair of snug black boxer briefs and a slightly hungover expression. His body hadn’t
been a wreck by any stretch back in Cuchillo, but he was looking a whole lot more fit now; I briefly wondered how many hundreds of sit-ups he’d been doing every day to get ripped abs like that. I’d always been reasonably satisfied with my figure—at least I never angsted over it like many women seem to—but looking at him made me wonder if I could get that kind of definition with a better workout, or if his Y chromosome was a magical trump card in his genes.

“Oh, hey, s’up?” he yawned, running his fingers through his mussed blond hair.

“Uh … sorry, the maid told me this was the Warlock’s room.”

“It is.” He turned away from me, back toward the bed and yelled, “Dude, put some pants on, my sister’s here!”

“Am I interrupting something?” I asked, finally noticing the hickeys on his chest and neck. The world seemed to have tilted sideways. It was suddenly a little hard to breathe as a complicated mix of jealousy, relief, and embarrassment took hold of me. I was glad to see I hadn’t given the Warlock an aversion to sex … but how much had he told my brother? Well, whatever icky details he’d revealed, they were out there now; I couldn’t very well erase my own brother’s memory. I tried with mixed success to shove my unwanted emotions back down where they’d come from.

“Nah, don’t worry about it,” he replied, seeming more awake. “I guess you guys should talk, huh? It’s cool; I wanted to go for a jog anyhow.”

Randall opened the door wide, and I saw the Warlock standing by the bed, dressed in dark green plaid
pajama pants and a black bathrobe. He smoothed his mustache and beard with one hand, glancing at me nervously. I tried not to stare at the huge pump bottle of lube on the bedside table. Or at the crumpled wet wipes and Kleenex littering the floor by the bed. Nor at the leather-wrapped handcuffs that still dangled from the bedpost.

“So, yeah, it’s about ten miles around the castle’s lake. A nice solid little run,” Randall said, apparently trying to fill the awkward empty air with conversation. He dug a pair of black sweatpants out of a nearby duffel bag and slipped them on, then plopped into a nearby chair to put on his running shoes. “I’ll probably be gone for ninety minutes or so. Wanna meet up in the downstairs dining room for some lunch afterward?”

“Yeah,” the Warlock replied. “Sounds good.”

“I’ll be there,” I said.

“Awesome.” Randall gave us a bright smile, slipped on a long-sleeved gray T-shirt. He pulled Spike out of the bag, set his mechanical familiar on his shoulder, and then he was heading for the hallway.

After the door clicked shut behind my brother, the Warlock cleared his throat uncomfortably and gestured toward the pair of armchairs by the fireplace. “Want to sit down?”

“Sure.” I settled into the chair that faced away from the bed, and the Warlock took the other one.

“So … yeah,” I continued. “You and my brother are … seeing each other now?”

The Warlock nodded slowly. “I guess you could say that.”

I expected him to elaborate just the teensiest bit,
but he fell silent for one long minute. The second hand dragged around the face of the mantel clock. Was he going to say something else, or should I just forge ahead with my apology? It seemed like there should be a more graceful way to ease into the whole thing. Maybe I should have gotten him a card or something. Except that Hallmark didn’t make “Sorry I attacked you in my hell!” style greetings, did they?

Could this possibly be any more awkward?
I wondered to myself, and then opened my mouth to start saying what a monster I’d been and could he please,
please
forgive me, but the Warlock held up his hand in a stopping motion.

“Wait,” he said. “Just give me another moment. I’ve been trying to figure out how to say this, and I’m still not sure I know how, so … just give me a minute.”

“Okay,” I said, a little puzzled, and more than a little anxious, and waited.

Finally, he inhaled deeply through his nose and sat up in the chair. “All right then. What I did to you was … horrible. It was completely inexcusable. I honestly had no idea I was capable of that kind of nonconsensual violence.”

I was staring at him with what was probably an openmouthed look of pure stunned stupidity, but he didn’t look up at me to notice.

“You’re apologizing to me for what happened?” I asked.

“There’s no apology I can give to make up for what I did,” he said, his jaw set in a grim line. “I spent two whole years volunteering at the rape crisis center, listening to people’s stories, vowing I would do everything
I could to make the world a safe space for women … and look what I did.”

He was actually starting to tear up a little, and he finally lifted his gaze toward me, his expression pure misery. “Jesus Christ, look what I did to you.”

“No. Warlock, just … 
no
. You weren’t the perpetrator of anything that happened between us.
I
was in control.
I
let it happen because
I
gave in to some seriously violent urges.”

I paused. “If there’s more blame to be laid here, well, okay, we can share it, if that makes you feel better. You didn’t do a bad thing to me; we did bad things to each other. Because of Miko.”

He shook his head. “I can’t lay it on her. I did it, and every time I think about what I did to you, I feel sick. I feel … poisoned.”

I got up and walked over to him and put my hand on his shoulder. He flinched a little at first, but he didn’t ask me to stop touching him.

“I know that poisoned feeling way better than I wish I did,” I said quietly. “But I kicked her ass for good last night, and she’s not going to trouble us again.”

He shook his head. “But I—”

“Hey. Look me in the eye. Right now.”

The Warlock finally looked up.

“Do I seem traumatized?”

He shook his head.

“Am I looking at you like you raped me?”

Another head shake.

“Then I’m not, and you didn’t. And that’s all there is to it as far as I’m concerned.” I took a deep breath. “I’m sorry for what I did to you, too. I hurt you, and
I don’t feel like I can make up for that, either. I know you still have a lot to work through, and I know that things can’t be the same … but can we at least be friends again?”

He gave me an uncertain, lopsided smile, and then put his hand on top of mine.

“I think so,” he replied. “I’d like that.”

O
ne of the palace guards was waiting for me outside the Warlock’s room. He snapped to attention and saluted me.

“Meine dame, Magus Marron wishes for you to brunch with him on the dining balcony of Tower Three,” the young man announced. “I am here to escort you, if you like.”

It took me a moment to realize that he was talking about Cooper. “Oh. Okay, sure. Lead the way.”

The guard took me down the long hall, through an open breezeway, and into the tower, where he bowed me into a modern elevator that had been decorated in marble and wrought iron inside to make it match the style of the rest of the castle.

Cooper was sitting at a small round table sipping coffee; apparently he had the spacious balcony all to himself. I’d expected him to be in jeans and a sweater, his hair still a bed-head tangle, but he’d showered and shaved and was wearing a nice pair of pants and a suit coat, with a black silk dress shirt underneath. He’d even put on a fancy pair of Italian loafers.

He turned his head at the sound of my footsteps and smiled at me. “Oh, great, they found you!”

“Well, don’t you look sharp today?” I sat down across from him. “Suddenly I feel underdressed.”

“Oh, no, you’re not, not at all. I just … wanted to look nice for you.” He cleared his throat. “So, the maid said she took you to the Warlock’s room.”

I nodded. “We had a talk.”

“How was it?”

“Surprising. But good, I think. We got some things worked out.”

A waiter who’d been standing discreetly by the curtained doorway stepped out and bowed to me.

“Would you like a beverage?” he asked.

“Coffee would be great,” I replied. “And some orange juice, if you have it.”

He nodded and disappeared into the tower.

“Wow, it’s just crazy beautiful out here, isn’t it?” Cooper leaned back in his chair, smiling out at the sun gleaming on the lake and the snowcapped mountains. “I got lunch out here yesterday, and thought breakfast for just the two of us would be nice.”

“Yes, it’s really nice, honey.” I inhaled deeply, closing my eyes for a moment to try to steady my nerves. “Look. I guess this is my day for clearing the air, and … I have to tell you something.”

His smile vanished. “What’s wrong?”

“When Miko trapped me in my hellement, we ended up doing … stuff.”

“Stuff?”

“I had sex with her,” I blurted out, feeling my cheeks grow hot. “It was horrible, but also … wasn’t. I … thought you should know about that, in case …”

“In case what?” he said after I went silent.

“In case you don’t want to be my boyfriend now that you know I’ve had hell-sex with both your brother and our mortal enemy.” I was staring at a spot on the linen tablecloth, afraid to meet his gaze. “In case you think I’m a dirty whore you don’t want anything to do with.”

“Jessie.” He reached across the table and took my hand in his. “Look at me.”

I looked up.

“I love you,” he said, gazing earnestly into my eyes. “And Miko was a fucking monster. I mean that in every sense possible. It makes me furious that she hurt you and twisted your mind around and made you think that you’re anything less than a beautiful, wonderful person. And it makes me just as furious to think that she made you believe I wouldn’t love you anymore because of what she did to you.”

He paused. “And as for the sex, I would still love you even if you gave the stable boy a blow job this very morning.”

“Juice?” the waiter asked loudly behind us. He was standing stiffly in the doorway holding a pitcher of fresh-squeezed OJ in one hand and a silver pot of coffee in the other. The man wore a carefully neutral expression, pretending he hadn’t heard what my boyfriend had just said.

But clearly he had, and now it was Cooper’s turn to blush.

“Yes, please, thank you,” I said.

The waiter carefully poured our beverages, and a moment later a second waiter wheeled out a cart bearing sliced baguettes and soft cheeses, scrambled
eggs, huge glossy blackberries, caviar, and a platter piled high with fresh cooked bacon.