Curse of the Witching Hour Page 9

  As always, Lucifer avoided his brother.

  Teachers whispered about the growing threat of the Raven Court kidnapping students when they visited the nearby Witchkin town. Ravens had been sighted circling overhead. The schoolboard had officially accepted Mr. Khaba—a Fae and a djinn—as the long-term principal. Lucifer couldn’t tell whether a powerful Fae administrator meant the school was safer from attack or more at risk.

  The air was tense with the impending promise of change, but Lucifer couldn’t tell what that change would be. When he could stand it no longer, he went to Clarissa’s art room—now Hailey Achilles’ room—and composed her a note in his best handwriting.

  Hailey,

  This is a message written by Lucifer, Mrs. Lawrence’s familiar. I am desperate for news about Clarissa Lawrence and Vega Bloodmire. Are they all right?

  Your friend,

  Lucy

  He had hoped she might leave a response for him on her cluttered desk. When no response came, he feared she may have ignored it or never found it. His next step would be to speak with her in person as he had done with Imani. He didn’t relish the idea of making himself known.

  One evening as Lucifer and Gertrude were engaged in wild animal sex—while they both were in human form—the air around them shifted. The room tasted of starlight and ozone, not the usual combination of Gertrude’s magic or his. The flavor of graveyard dirt tingled in the air.

  Lucifer was suddenly aware of the new presence in the room.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  An Uninvited Guest

  The moment Lucifer realized he and Gertrude weren’t alone, his protective instincts took over. He pushed Gertrude behind him and leapt from the bed.

  A blindingly bright light flared before him, searing his vision.

  “Well, well. Someone is all dressed up and has nowhere to go,” a sultry female voice said.

  Lucifer held up his hand, shielding his eyes. His crouch was defensive, ready to attack should this be the Raven Queen who had broken through the school wards.

  Instead, Vega Bloodmire stood before him. She was the last person he’d expected to see.

  “What are you talking about?” he growled. “I’m not dressed at all.”

  “Exactly.” A smile curled her ruby lips upward.

  She was as elegant as ever, dressed in a beaded black gown that was more fitting for a cocktail party than what a schoolteacher might wear. There was something different about her magic, but he couldn’t place his finger on what it was. Her hair was certainly longer and wilder than last time he’d seen her, a thicket of shadows that flowed down her back.

  Gertrude tucked a blanket around herself more modestly. “Vega, why can’t you just knock like other people?”

  “Who wants to settle for the ordinary way of doing things when one possesses magic? Especially not when one’s former student mentions a cat with excellent penmanship inquired after the health of yours truly.” She leaned in closer to Lucifer, her gaze unfocused, as though she was seeing more than his naked body. “Ah, I see your curse is broken permanently this time. Good for you.” Her smile was as cunning as a cat’s. “You’ll be more useful that way.”

  Lucifer stared at her in disbelief. He wanted to believe it was true and his curse was truly broken this time, but he hardly dared to hope.

  “How do you know?” he asked.

  “Any Merlin-class Celestor worth her weight in starlight could tell you that.” She smirked at Gertrude. “Don’t tell me you weren’t aware of it. I know you’re more than adequate at detecting curses.”

  Annoyance coupled with hurt flashed through him. Gertrude wouldn’t meet his gaze.

  “You knew? And you didn’t tell me?” he demanded.

  Gertrude’s cheeks flushed.

  Vega laughed. “Why would she do that and lose her latest boy toy like she did with her last one?”

  “Close your mouth,” Gertrude said through clenched teeth.

  After all this time that he’d feared she might think he was using her, it was the other way around.

  Vega strode toward the door. “I have a proposition for you. I’ll meet you in your office in five minutes. Don’t make me wait.”

  She walked to the door, her heels hammering into the floor like nails in a coffin.

  Lucifer didn’t know whom he loathed more at the moment, Gertrude or Vega. He called after her. “Nothing you could say would entice me into any kind of proposition you have in mind.”

  Vega halted, glancing back over her shoulder. “I think this one will. It involves your precious Abigail.”

  Lucifer’s spine stiffened at the mention of her name.

  A soft cackle rose from Vega’s throat, reminding Lucifer of Baba Nata. “I have your attention now, do I?” Vega kept on walking.

  Gertrude flopped back onto the bed. “I would swear she was planning this and knew exactly when to interrupt us.”

  He doubted Vega had timed her entrance. There was a high probability that anytime Vega would have stopped by that wasn’t school hours, Lucifer would have been in Gertrude’s bed. Five minutes later, Lucifer was dressed and in Gertrude’s office down the hall, where Vega was waiting for them.

  Vega had seated herself in the only chair in the office. Lucifer made it in before Gertrude, only bothering with his pants. He leaned against the cold stone wall, trying to look aloof and uninterested. The stone was uncomfortably cold against his back.

  “Well, what’s this proposition?” Lucifer asked.

  He had no doubt she took after her grandmother and would want him to agree to some kind of bargain that was as good as enslavement.

  “Recently my household was attacked by Fae. By the Raven Court to be exact.” She drummed her fingernails against the desk. “No doubt they came for Clarissa, but they didn’t manage to harm her. Not worse than she already is anyway. Though they did injure and kill others.”

  Lucifer tried to detect the meaning in her words. “Clarissa is still in a coma?”

  “No, she woke from that ages ago.” She waved him off.

  Relief flooded through him.

  Vega went on. “But she has some side effects from the incident with the Raven Queen, and I don’t know all the details. Nor would I share them with you if I did know.” She skewered him with an eyebrow.

  Gertrude rushed into the office from the short hallway that led from her private quarters. “What’s this bargain you mentioned?” She was out of breath, and her added presence made the small room feel even more cramped.

  Vega’s expression remained grim. “The Raven Court kidnapped Imani.”

  “No! Not Imani!” Lucifer clutched at his chest, feeling as if his heart were being crushed under the weight of the news. She had always been so kind to him. First it was Abigail and Clarissa, now the Raven Court had stolen Imani from him. Fury burned in him.

  “Those monsters murdered a child in my house. They killed our servants.” Malice flashed in Vega’s eyes. “Furthermore, I discovered they previously stole Felix and Clarissa’s baby. Apparently, he and Clarissa had a child, and he didn’t tell anyone because she was stolen by the Raven Queen.”

  “What?” Gertrude asked. “They have a baby? He didn’t tell me.”

  “You know how secretive the Thatches can be.” Vega eyed Lucifer as if she lumped him in with the rest of his family.

  He pushed himself from the wall, about to object to the unfairness of that remark.

  Vega continued. “Poor Felix Thatch. All alone with no one to understand his emo angst. Here we were, all just thinking he was being a grouch because of Clarissa with her cursed coma, but it turns out he lost a baby last year too. So sad.” Vega didn’t sound sad. She said all the right words and arranged her face in a façade of sorrow, but her eyes were as hard as steel.

  Gertrude sighed despondently. “No wonder he’s been so depressed. That poor man. He’s been through so much.” Gertrude wrung her hands. “What can we do t
o help?”

  Vega grinned like the Cheshire Cat. “You would do anything for Felix, wouldn’t you?”

  Lucifer could see how well Vega manipulated Gertrude, even if she couldn’t see it herself.

  He crossed his arms. “Vega, what do you really want from us?”

  She turned her cunning gaze on him now. “It’s tragic about Abigail, isn’t it? Stuck in the form of a tree until she can be freed by her prince.” Her smile was mocking. “If Imani hadn’t let it slip that she’d spoken to you last year. . . . Don’t worry. I promised her I wouldn’t tell anyone. I didn’t tell your brother.”

  Lucifer balled his fists, his human fingers feeling so pointless against a creature like Vega. He spat out each word like a cat making a threat. “What. Do. You. Want?”

  “The same thing both of you want. Revenge.”

  “I don’t want revenge,” Lucifer said. “I want Abby.”

  Vega inclined her head. “And you shall have her back. All you have to do is help me defeat the Raven Queen.”

  Gertrude laughed, the sound bordering on hysterical. “Have you gone mad?”

  “I never get mad. I’m a witch. I get even.” Vega winked.

  “How do you propose we defeat her?” Lucifer asked.

  Gertrude gave him a pitying glance. “Lucy, think this through. It’s a suicide mission.”

  “No, it isn’t. I have a plan.” Vega stretched languorously in the chair. “In three days’ time, Clarissa is going to write letters to staff members asking for assistance with her plan.”

  Gertrude’s plump lips puckered downward. “Did Clarissa tell you this, or did you divine it?”

  Vega shrugged noncommittally. That was just like her to keep her cards close to her chest.

  Vega smoothed her fingers over the beads on her dress. “She won’t think of asking you. Partially that’s because she doesn’t know you exist. No offense, Lucifer. And Gertrude, how can I put this in the gentlest of terms? She probably assumes you’d hex her in the back just to get Felix back into your bed.”

  Gertrude stepped in so close she looked like she might slap Vega. “I would do no such thing!”

  Lucifer placed a hand on Gertrude’s arm and steered her back from Vega. He supposed Gertrude’s previous relationship with Felix might make sense why she wasn’t keen on telling him she was sleeping with his brother.

  “In any case, you should probably show up at her meeting to hear her plan and join her in the revelry. If you’re anything like the rest of the Thatches, I expect you can put on a poker face and at least act surprised when you see her. She’s going to need an army to assist her. Not that she’s going to call it that when she seeks an audience with the Raven Queen. By joining Clarissa, that’s the invitation that’s going to get you into the Raven Court’s castle.” Vega’s gaze slid over Lucifer’s crumpled pants and tangled hair. “You didn’t hear this from me, but once Clarissa realizes you’re around, she’ll be excited to bring you along. So will the Queen of Pain and Pleasure. You’ll be valuable bartering material with the Raven Queen in exchange for their child.”

  “No!” Gertrude threw her arms around Lucifer. “Don’t do it!”

  “Of course I’m not going to do it. I’m not Clarissa’s pawn.” Or Vega’s. “The only person I’d be willing to trade myself for is Abby.”

  Gertrude had already explained all the reasons that plan would fail. But if he had Vega on his side, things might turn out differently.

  “Good,” Vega said. “You have your eye on your own prize. Let Clarissa think you’re there to help her. But in actuality, you’re going to be there to assist me.”

  Gertrude rolled her eyes. “Everything is always about you.”

  Vega stood. “I need you to charge your magic to its fullest, because that night you join Clarissa in her mission, I need to draw on your power to kill the Raven Queen.” Vega glanced at Gertrude. “Your magic wouldn’t hurt either.”

  Lucifer was taller than Vega, but she radiated so much magic, he edged back. “So that’s how this is going to go down? I will be permitted a free pass into the Raven Court’s territory because Clarissa invites me to join her. Then you will kill the Raven Queen.”

  “And I will ensure you have Abigail.” Vega held out her hand. “Is it a deal?”

  Lucifer took her hand. A jolt of electricity surged through him. This wasn’t like the pinky promise he’d made with Imani. This was a binding oath.

  He’d just made a deal with the devil. He hoped he wasn’t going to regret it.

  THE END

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  A SNEAK PREVIEW

  Magical Maladies for Beginners

  Book 3

  CHAPTER ONE

  Sleeping Beauty’s Curse

  The moment Lucifer Thatch laid eyes on the leafless tree, he knew it was her. Abigail MacQuillan Lawrence, his witch. The love of his life. No one would have guessed the oak tree growing in the forest of dead trees had been a human once, now cursed to live the rest of her days in that form.

  On the other hand, some might have correctly guessed from Lucifer’s untamed mane of dark hair, his unkempt beard, and the wild look in his eyes that he hadn’t been human long.

  The Fae and half-Fae spawn known as Witchkin who were searching for an oak—Abigail’s affinity—gave him a wide berth. He didn’t blame them after the way he’d lashed out with claws and teeth when he’d been trapped in the body of a cat. When the wicked witch had cursed him in that form, he’d been eighteen. Over thirty years later, returned to his human form, he should have been fifty. Whether it was his half-Fae lineage or the curse, Lucifer suspected he looked closer to a man in his early twenties.

  He didn’t bother telling his supposed allies he’d found the oak tree. He needed this moment alone with her.

  As Lucifer approached Abigail’s tree, the clouds parted, and sunshine warmed the forest. After centuries of darkness, the magic that had oppressed the forest lifted. Flowers sprouted from the earth. Leaves budded on the spindly limbs of trees around him. The graveyard of trees transformed from their perpetual winter gloom into a verdant spring.

  Greenery erupted everywhere except for Abigail’s tree. That wasn’t a good sign. He wanted to believe she had survived the darkness of the land surrounding the Raven Court’s castle. He needed her to be alive. Now that Lucifer’s curse had been broken and he was human once again, he needed her to be human too.

  He couldn’t live without her.

  Lucifer hastened toward the tree. Abigail’s adult daughter, Clarissa Lawrence, beat him there. She was petite like Abigail had been, with auburn hair so similar to her adoptive mother one would have thought they were related by blood. Though the ends of Clarissa’s hair were dyed pink—and Abigail would never have approved of that.

  Clarissa’s emerald eyes were wide with hope as she placed her hands on the tree. Green buds sprouted from the limbs and that gave Lucifer a hint of reassurance. He recognized the scent of Abigail’s plant magic from the times she had partially transformed into a tree years before during their youth. She smelled of acorns and pitch, like earth and spring.

  Yet there was doubt in Clarissa’s eyes.

  “It’s Abby,” Lucifer said, his voice raw with emotion. He stroked the rough surface of the bark and leaned his cheek against the tree.

  Vega Bloodmire, wicked witch extraordinaire, strode forward with the regal grace of a queen—which she no
w was. Her midnight hair flowed over her shoulders and into her shadowy dress. She wore her crown, an oil slick of spikes that looked lethal to the touch. She was nearly as tall as Lucifer, but she managed to look down her nose at them all.

  With the amount of forbidden magic and power she wielded, Lucifer was glad they were on the same side. At least, he hoped they were. He’d only joined her recently to defeat an evil queen in order to save Abigail. What he did next would depend on whether she proved herself to be friend or foe.

  Vega smacked Clarissa with a two-foot-long unicorn horn she was carrying. “Out of the way.” She prodded at Lucifer with the horn next. “You can’t touch my patient until after the process is complete.” Unlike Lucifer, her accent was American. She sounded elevated and educated.

  Grudgingly, Lucifer backed away a few paces to give her room to work. Vega strolled around the oak, looking the tree up and down. “Remember, this might not work.”

  Lucifer lifted his chin. “It must work.” His own accent was British, but it came out like a feline growl. Abigail had once said he sounded posh and refined, though he had never gone to school. It was simply the accent he’d inherited from his parents along with their affinities for forbidden magic.

  No one paid Lucifer any mind as Vega inspected the oak tree. More Witchkin released from the enslavement of the Raven Court trickled out of the shadows and crowded around.

  Vega performed a ritual for resurrection, using up almost all the potion inside the bottle to draw runes across the bark of Abigail’s tree. One drop remained.

  Lucifer held his breath in anticipation. The Raven Queen was dead, and Vega was queen. Clarissa was reunited with her baby and students. Vega had woken the dead and together the two witches had saved the land from evil. He just needed this one last miracle so that he would have his happy ending too.

  The moment Vega touched the unicorn horn to the tree, the color of the bark changed from brown to pink. Green leaves shuddered and shrank. Outstretched limbs receded. A face formed in the bark. She was still a tree, but the woman emerging from the oak became more dominant.