“Cressida told me all about it: she intends to raise Analise and Elowyn from the dead. It will be everything you witches want: psychotic murderers back in charge.”
“Last time I checked, the psychotic murdererswerein charge.” Rune turned toward him, frowning hard. “Are you saying Cressida told you she’s planning a resurrection?”
She seemed genuinely surprised. But Gideon knew Rune to be an expert liar.
“Are you denying any knowledge of it?” He studied her, trying to determine the truth.
“This is the first I’ve heard of it.” She continued scanning the walls. “Anyway, it’s not possible. Resurrection spells require an exchange of life for life. The life of a family member must be taken to give life back to the dead. Cressida has no family left. She’s the last living Roseblood.”
“She seems to think otherwise.”
“Then she’s mad,” said Rune, wading deeper into the dahlias beneath Soren’s balcony. Apparently finished with this conversation. “Or she was trying to torment you.”
Maybe.
They were running out of time, so Gideon kept his doubts to himself. He scanned the walls, searching for a way up. But she was right: the stones were perfectly smooth. There was nothing to climb.
The balcony, however,waslow enough for him to lift her.
He strode over to where she stood in the flowers. Crouching, he cupped his hands and held them out.
“Hold on to me.”
Rune studied him, as if deciding whether she trusted him to lift her. But soon enough, her hands came down on his shoulders, gripping firmly. Gideon cupped her calf through the silk of her dress, guiding her foot into his waiting palm.
“Let’s get one thing clear,” she said, as he rose. “If our paths cross again, I won’t show you mercy a second time.”
Rune’s grip tightened on him as she lost, then regained, her balance.
“Good,” he said, pushing her higher, muscles straining beneath her weight. “Because the next time my gun is to your head, Iwillpull the trigger.”
“Perfect,” she said, stepping onto his shoulders as she reached for the balcony overhead. “I’m glad we understand each other.”
She made a little sound, like a grunt, and the weight of her eased from his shoulders. She’d grabbed hold of an iron bar holding up the balcony’s balustrade and was using it to haul herself up.
And then she was gone.
Gideon backed away in time to see the balcony doors close and the lamplight disappear, leaving him alone with the crickets and the dahlias.
What did I deliver her into?
It was none of his business. If Rune had wanted to make a different choice, she would have.
Gideon needed to stopfeeling. They were at war—or soon would be. Gideon couldn’t be flesh and blood; he needed to be gunpowder and steel. Impenetrable. Unyielding.
Turning his back on the doors she’d disappeared through, Gideon strode out of the gardens, and then out of Larkmont.
TENRUNE
GOOD RIDDANCE, GIDEON SHARPE.
It was stupid enough saving him once, when he’d come here to end her life. If he tried to kill her again, she would let Cressida have him.
At the sound of voices in the hall, Rune quickly dived into the bed. The sheets were already turned down, waiting for her.
There was no time to strip off her soiled dress and hide it. No time to scrub the blood from her hands.
There was only enough time to smudge the spellmarks on her wrist, dissolvingGhost Walker.
