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With a cute little humph, Anabel took a seat at the table. “Back to the consort thing . . . if you’re happy about it, Wyn, then I’m happy for you. But Ishtar won’t be. She is gonna freak.”
Wynter couldn’t help but smile. “I know.”
Ishtar was not only one of the seven Ancients, she was someone who’d shared a bed with Cain once upon a time. She was pretty proprietary over him and had repeatedly tried edging Wynter out of the picture. The woman was not at all pleased that she’d failed, and Wynter wasn’t so certain that Ishtar had thrown in the towel just yet. Time would tell.
“She’ll be bummed when she hears that Saul didn’t manage to kill you,” said Delilah. “Speaking of Saul . . . I doubt he’s left Devil’s Cradle. If he has, he’ll be lurking on the outskirts.”
Xavier nodded, sobering. “If he truly has nothing but vengeance on the brain, he won’t go far.”
“No, he won’t,” agreed Wynter. “Nor will he quit trying to end me and Cain. He might just succeed with me. Aeons are exceedingly powerful—you all saw that for yourselves when they battled the Ancients.”
“You came back from death after you accidentally got whacked by Ishtar’s power,” Delilah pointed out.
“But she didn’t put all her strength behind that strike. If she had, I might well have died for real.”
“But you might not have,” Anabel cut in. “It could be that the Aeons, for all their power, have no way of permanently destroying a revenant. Let’s not make morbid assumptions.”
Wynter blinked. “This is coming from the woman who insists that death hovers over us at practically every moment? Really?”
Anabel pressed her lips together. “I’m simply saying that there’s no need to borrow trouble. We have plenty of that already.”
“The girl has a point,” said Hattie, putting a hand on her hip. “At least it will distract Cain from trying to pry your secrets out of you, Wynter. I personally don’t think it’s necessary for either of you to confess everything. People say it’s important to spill all your secrets to your partners, but some things are better left unsaid. Take my husbands, for example. If I’d told the second, third, fourth, and fifth how the ones before them died, they wouldn’t have given me a chance.”
Delilah threw the black widow a look. “And then maybe they’d be alive right now.”
Hattie sniffed. “Doubtful. They were all self-destructive pricks. A little like Saul, in that respect. Taking into account the things that Cain told us, the Aeon won’t be easy to locate.”
He’d probably be no easier to take down when he was located, which was a major issue. “Cain’s sending out search parties to track the bastard.”
“And what are we going to do?” asked Xavier.
“We’re going to scry for him, just as he did for me,” said Wynter. “And if we find him, we’re gonna butcher his ass.”
Xavier smiled. “Works for me.”
*
Having relayed the finer details of last night’s incident to the six Ancients sitting around his dining table, Cain sat back in his chair. So far, the search parties had failed to locate Saul—even the lycans, whose sense of smell was excellent. It seemed that Saul’s trail would abruptly disappear here and there, suggesting that he was traveling from spot to spot using the element of air.
The search parties would continue to hunt him, though. If nothing else, the pressure of being pursued would hopefully distract him from attempting another attack on Wynter.
To help keep her safe, Cain could of course insist that she didn’t head to the surface of the town until Saul had been caught, but those insistences would have no effect. His witch did her own thing, and she wasn’t the type to hide. She had the heart and soul of a warrior.
As the partial owner of her soul, he had ways to force her compliance. But to resort to such measures would be to destroy the trust she had in him. It would cause the sort of damage to their relationship that could never be fixed. Plus, if he didn’t accept her as she was, she’d never do the same for him when she finally learned all there was to know.
His inner creature wasn’t too worried about Saul having his sights set on her. In its opinion, the person who needed to be anxious was the Aeon—he’d made himself a personal enemy of Wynter, and her enemies tended to not live long.
Well, that was one way to look at the situation.
Cain could in fact concede that his creature was right to have such faith in her ability to take care of herself. She was every inch the apex predator. And making yourself the prey of a revenant would never be a good call so, yes, Saul should be anxious. But, too arrogant to believe he’d ever be overpowered by a mortal, the Aeon would not hesitate to target her again. And so, despite what a force of nature she was, Cain would still worry for her.
Azazel twisted his mouth. “I figured that the other Aeons would storm our town at one point.” Contrary to what many human religions upheld, he wasn’t a fallen angel . . . though many claimed he had the look of one, whatever that meant. “It was a no-brainer that Saul would want vengeance, and it seemed unlikely that Abel wouldn’t seek to punish us for Lailah’s death, considering she was his consort. But a sneak, uncoordinated attack that concentrated solely on one resident?” He shook his head, skepticism lighting his deep blue eyes. “This doesn’t seem like something they would do.”
“It is worth pointing out that the aforementioned resident is someone they want dead after she infected their land with a spread of blight that they cannot combat,” said Inanna, as elegant as always with her perfect posture, sophisticated air, and sleek blonde hair pinned up in an elaborate do.
“It still makes no sense that they’ve made a careless try for Wynter if for no other reason than that it has given away their presence here,” said Azazel. “It means they have lost the element of surprise.”
Having already considered that, Cain dipped his chin and said, “Which is why it could very well be that Saul is here alone.”
