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That was the moment I realized it wasn’t my sweet wolf son. I heard a low growl behind me.
Hellhounds. And we were surrounded.
* * * *
Liv
I looked down at the image of the brand on the dead cat and back up at the seemingly never-ending pages of recognized brands in the book I’d been handed. Luckily for us, the House of Sloane boasted what Tix had explained was an agricultural and farming library.
It’s like a regular library except without any fun books to read.
So it fit the Hell plane motif of pure torture.
I pointed to the page. “This one is close, but not enough.”
“I think we might need to go to the night market and ask some questions.” Casey pinched the top of his nose as though trying to stave off a headache, which I happened to know he didn’t have anymore. But he was young, and young vampires tend to cling to their human mannerisms.
Don’t we all cling to what we know, to what feels familiar and safe?
Was I making the mistake of letting myself cling to him?
“I think that’s going to have to be a you thing.” I closed the book because it had been a while, and I was getting nowhere. “I don’t think I’m allowed out of the house.” A shiver went through me. The last few minutes I’d been feeling something coming off the walls. At least it seemed to. “Actually, I don’t think the house likes me being here at all.”
I stood. I was calmer now, though the encounter with Lucifer was still playing through my head.
“What do you mean the house doesn’t want you here?”
A flash of cold went through me. “You can’t feel that? It’s like someone put up a ward.”
This was where I would normally defend myself with a charm or talisman, or I would simply find the fucking ward and trash it. But I didn’t have any magic, and there wasn’t anything for me to punch.
Casey seemed to think for a moment, or try to feel. “Nope. I don’t feel a thing, so I have to think it’s meant for witches. Or it could be calling out to your human side.”
“I don’t have a human side.” The words were automatic. They came from my mouth without any need for me to think them. Those words had been buried deep in my soul, burrowing down.
Casey stared at me for a moment. “Olivia, your parents were human. You were a foundling witch. You didn’t even know our world existed until you were in high school. Did Myrddin make you think your parents were witches?”
My parents were unworthy.
A flash of my mom cuddling me and reading me a story about some fairy princess went through my brain. My dad lifting me up and tossing me in the air, and I didn’t care because he would never drop me.
I cut myself off from them. To protect them.
No. You did it because Myrddin told you to, and you didn’t want another lashing.
“Talk to me, baby. You’re remembering things, aren’t you?” Casey’s voice had gone low and soothing.
I didn’t want to be soothed. I needed to get out of here. “I’m going to be sick.”
He closed the book he’d been looking at and moved to me. “Come on. We can get you back to our room, and I’ll talk to the staff about what’s going on.”
Was someone trying to get rid of me? It would work because I hated that feeling in my gut.
As we walked to the door, a worse flash went through me. Pure ice seemed to stop me in my tracks, and my whole body started to shake.
Maybe whoever had put this ward in didn’t want to get rid of me. What if it was playing a game with me?
“Liv, you just went cold.”
