“Could I get that in writing?” Gray asked. Her face, which had been pinched with worry in the wake of my admittedly rude opening remarks, transformed with a smile.
“That won’t be necessary,” I assured her. “The word of Death is more powerful and binding than ink on a page. I am everywhere, from the smallest speck of dust to the tallest mountains and—”
“Beyond. Yes, we’re all aware.” Gray smiled again, looping her arms around my neck and pressing her body against mine in an unexpected show of pure affection. “I was seriously starting to think you’d forgotten about us little people.”
I patted her back awkwardly, still unaccustomed to my human vessel. Unaccustomed to her very warm, very human touch.
“I haven’t been able to sense you until this evening,” I told her, disengaging from the embrace. “I worried you’d left this realm altogether.”
“What?” she asked.
At this, the demon finally showed a modicum of concern. “You’re saying you couldn’t get a read on her at the house?”
“If said house is where she’s currently spending the majority of her time, then yes, that is what I’m saying.”
“It’s spelled,” he said, snapping his fingers as the realization dawned. “Fae magic obscures it.”
“A worthwhile investment,” I said. “It’s impervious even to me.”
“But tonight isn’t the first time I’ve been outside the house,” she said. “I go out every day.”
“Not this far from the property line, though,” Asher said.
“And likely you weren’t using your magic,” I said, “so there was nothing for me to pick up on, so to speak.” My mind clouded with frustration once again. “Unlike tonight, during which you could not have sent a brighter beacon if you’d—”
“Clearly we have a lot to catch up on.” Gray smiled at me once more, then turned her back, heading toward a tree where it looked like she’d left her things. “Just give me a sec to get my clothes, and then—”
“Gray!” A male voice crashed through the woods, followed by a second, and then a third, each calling out for her as though she’d been lost to them for years.
I recognized them immediately. The crossroads demon, the vampire, and the wolf shifter.
Stealthy her friends were not.
“Ronan? Guys?” Gray called, squinting into the trees. The smile touching her face far outshone the one she’d offered me, and again some foreign unpleasant feeling overtook my vessel.
The trio burst forth like water breaking upon the shore, and she ran to them, letting them envelop her. It seemed an overdue reunion.
“How did you know we were out here?” she asked them.
“I scented you guys,” the shifter said, offering the incubus a brief nod of acknowledgment. “And something that smelled a hell of a lot like death. And I don’t mean Colebrook.”
Gray wrinkled her nose. “It’s… kind of a messed-up story.”
Ronan took her hand, pressing a kiss to her palm. “You’re okay though, right?”
“Better than okay.”
Confused by the relief I sensed among them at their reunion, I asked the incubus whether fae magic had kept the others away, too.
He shook his head and laughed, placing a hand on my shoulder. “Stick around, Spooky, and you might just learn something here.”
“Save your patronizing for another being, demon. A single eyelash on my vessel contains more knowledge than all of your feeble minds put together.”
He laughed again, and I’d meant to ask him what he found so humorous, but that would’ve been a waste of time. I needed to know about Gray, not the company she kept. I needed to understand what had happened here. What her magic had created… and destroyed.
It was the first I’d seen of her since they left the city. For her protection, they’d kept her under magical lock and key. I couldn’t fault them for that—in fact, I appreciated the caution.
But Icouldfault them for this.
