“What the hell was that for?” Mickey asks, face scrunching up in disgust. Kit makes a disgruntled noise since she’d been planning on sprawling out in front of the AC.
“Spite.”
“It’s hot out.”
“Yes, I’m aware!” I grab the AC and begin hauling it toward the door.
“You’re so fussy. If you wanted one, you should have told me.”
“I didn’t know you had all of this! While I’m over there with tiny little rechargeable fans.”
Torin, who followed me in, is busy staring at the TV. How gracious of him not to break Mickey’s TV like he did mine. “Can this thing show the video of me riding on Riley’s naked back?” Torin wonders, asking the least important question here.
“It sure can,” Mickey says as he reaches over and does something that immediately pops up the video. It’s like he had it primed and waiting, just to cause me mental anguish.
Torin laughs in delight while I glower at them.
“Turn it off or the TV is going with me too,” I demand.
“I will get you a TV and an AC, so stop being so fussy. Joy, can you have Misty get that arranged?”
“Sure,” Joy says, looking irritated that I unplugged her source of air conditioning. Like do the undead evenneedAC?
“So what did you come down here for if it wasn’t to enjoy my AC?” he asks as he replays the video for Torin’s entertainment.
I grab Mickey in a headlock and peel the remote out of his hand. “We… were thinking… about going through the Door into the god’s realm.”
“Yeah? Sounds like a horrible idea,” he says.
“I’m aware.”
“I have a better one. What if I send some of my undead through? They can scout out the area and start mapping it so we at least know where we’re going when we enter.”
“But what if they alert the god that we’re coming?” Torin asks. “I don’t want to give him time to prepare for us. I think we need to just go in and find Riley’s horse and get out of there.”
I decide to pull a Mickey and slump down on his bed while holding my new fan that I picked up and will also be putting in my room. “I don’t want a horse.”
“How could you not want a horse? I’m going to be honest… I tried taking Death’s horse after he died,” Torin says. “He was just so fucking cute, so I tried conning him into coming with me. I made plans to capture him… and then the next day he was gone, and I was heartbroken.”
I stare at him as I realize what this means. “Perfect. You can have him, and I will just… be around him. Problem solved.”
Mickey looks less than convinced. “Is it solved? Because you have to go into the god’s world to get him. And that sounds like a huge fucking problem, especially since you said your magic didn’t work in that world.”
I pick up the pendant around my neck and twirl it. “I’m not sure why. It works here.”
“Conquest said something about how your magic is connecting to the souls of the people you touch,” Torin says. “It works here in my realm, but I wonder if there’s some kind of disconnect. Could there be a barrier around the Door or something that severs you from that connection? Maybe things like your pendant don’t work over there as well.”
“So I have to go in blind… and there’s no way to change that?” I ask.
“I don’t know because I’m not sure what happened,” Torin replies. “I… don’t plan on taking you with me when I go in.”
That makes me stop my fan hugging as my attention snaps over to him. “Excuse me? There’s no damn way you’re going in alone.”
Torin says nothing, like he thinks he can make me forget what he just said by remaining mute.
“Torin!”
He finally gives me a nonchalant shrug. “Why risk both of our lives?”
