Page 14 of Chaos Carnival (Cirque de Sanguine #2)
Chapter 13: Parisian Witch
Tess
After getting off the train, we stumbled through the Marais district, Maverick's arm slung over my shoulder like we were drunk lovers rather than a witch supporting a dying seraph. His skin was too pale against his jacket, and sweat beaded his forehead.
“Left here.” His words came out slurred. “La Librairie du Merveilleux should be—” He broke off, doubling over as another wave of poison hit.
I scanned the narrow cobblestone street. Paris blazed with supernatural energy. Gargoyles tracked our movement with glowing eyes while wisps of ancient magic curled like fairy dust from centuries-old doorways. Dark wards shimmered across building facades, some protective, others decidedly not.
The shop's entrance writhed with dark energy, promising danger and secrets in equal measure. Just like the man leaning on me, whose touch burned cold even as it set my skin on fire.
I leaned Maverick against the shop's wrought iron gate, watching frost spread from his skin to the metal. “If this is another one of your brilliant ideas gone wrong, I'm leaving you here to freeze.”
“Such concern.” He traced a sigil in the frost his breath left on the gate, fingers trembling. “Madame Celeste's been collecting cursed artifacts since before the Revolution. Tried to kill me at least three times.” A vicious shudder wracked his body. “Have to admire her dedication.”
“Fantastic.” I eyed the shadows writhing behind warped windows like living things. “Because what we really need right now is a homicidal shopkeeper with a grudge.”
“Better than a celestial prison.” His ice-cold fingers slid under my jacket, drawing a gasp as they traced my waist band. “Or are you enjoying our game of cat and mouse?”
“At least the hunter's motives are clear.” But I didn't pull away from his frozen touch. My body heat only seemed to make the frost spread faster. “This place feels like it wants to eat us.”
“Only on Tuesdays.” He nuzzled my neck, practically leaving ice crystals on my skin. “Besides, you need me alive to save Addie. And I need...” His voice rang out, jagged and uneven, as another tremor hit. “I need you to trust me. Just this once.”
The umbra behind the glass distorted into screaming faces, their silent howls promising outstanding torment.
Every instinct screamed to run.
Instead, I caught his jaw, forcing those pain-glazed eyes to meet mine. “If this gets us killed, I'm haunting you for eternity. Again.”
“Promise?” His smile was sharp despite the agony etched in his features. “Though technically, if we're dead—“
“I swear to god, if you make another joke about our curse right now—“
“What?” His expression softened, but the darkness behind it was unmistakable. “Too soon? It's been centuries.” I held him tighter as we crossed the threshold, choosing to trust him, despite everything. Despite knowing how badly trust could burn.
The door slammed behind us with the finality of a coffin lid, and the shadows rose to greet us like hungry wolves.
When they parted like a death shroud, they revealed a woman whose age shifted like quicksilver, ancient one moment, timeless the next. Her silver hair shone, and her eyes held centuries of secrets.
“Maverick.” Her accent dripped old Paris, grandiose and sharp as a guillotine. “Still collecting curses like lovers, I see.”
“Madame Celeste.” Frost spread from his smile. “Still trafficking other people's misery?”
“Only the interesting ones.” Her gaze pierced through me, past flesh and bone into somewhere deeper. “Ah. A soul-bound witch. How deliciously tragic. And your mate too, if I'm not mistaken.”
“We're not here about that.” Maverick's tone was clipped, all traces of playfulness gone. The tension radiated off him in waves, hostility barely contained.
Celeste's laugh echoed like breaking glass. “Such grandiose denial.” She circled us like a shark scenting blood. “Hunter's poison. That's new for you.”
“We’ve tried the moonlight ritual,” Maverick said, his grip tightening as another tremor hit. “Skin contact under the full moon, channeling through her.”
She reached out, fingers hovering mere inches from the veins crawling up Maverick's neck, her eyes narrowing as she studied the patterns spreading across his skin like venomous ivy. “Good. There might be something about soul curses in my collection.” Celeste's eyes glittered with an unsettling mix of academic fascination and something sinister, more calculating.
“How about something useful.” Maverick snapped as frost spread across his shoulders.
“Aren't we beyond spite?” I turned on him, fury boiling up. “Don't you want to stop making each other miserable?”
“No,” he growled, eyes burning despite the ice in his veins. “You’re mine, miserable or not. What I want is to stop the poison so we can be miserable together forever.”
“Children.” Celeste's voice cut through our argument like a frozen blade. “The ritual you've been doing works, and will be curative, because you're bound.”
My stomach dropped. I glanced at Maverick, who had gone still as stone beside me.
Celeste moved toward an ancient cabinet, shadows writhing around her like living ink. The lock's screech raked across my nerves, reminding me too much of sounds that haunted my nightmares. Ivan in his office. Ivan, about to leave his office.
“You see,” she pulled out a leather-bound tome, its pages crackling with age, “the more you fight against each other, the deeper the poison burrows.” Her lips curved into a cruel smile. “Every time you deny what lies between you, every moment you resist the pull—it feeds the curse, strengthens it.”
“That's impossible.” My voice came out weaker than I intended. “The moonlight ritual—“
“Works because of your connection, not in spite of it.” She traced a finger down the book's spine. “The skin contact, the intimacy. It's not just about channeling. It's about acceptance.”
Maverick's jaw clenched, veins fanning out across his neck. “You're saying our... resistance is making it worse?”
“Like a Chinese finger trap.” Celeste's laugh held no warmth. “The harder you pull away, the tighter it grips. Each bitter word, each denial—it's quite poetic, really.”
The truth of her words stole the air from my lungs. Every sharp exchange, every time we'd pushed each other away—we'd been making it worse.
I looked at Maverick, really looked at him, and recognized the same realization dawning in his eyes.
“So what's the solution?” I asked, dreading the answer.
“Stop fighting.” Celeste's eyes glittered with dark amusement. “Stop denying. Let the bond do what it wants to do.”
My heart sank as she explained to us more about soul curses. Each word hammered another nail in the coffin of my hopes.
Then the book she pulled out made my stomach turn, its cover throbbing like living flesh, veins visible beneath the surface.
Celeste's words drifted through the air like dust as she opened to a specific page and smoothed it out. “The moonlight ritual must be performed for seven consecutive nights, without interruption. But today, as soon as possible, you'll need this.”
She left the book open, then reached into the case below and produced two rings. Ancient, carved with symbols that hurt my eyes to look at, the metal so dark they may have been forged of pure evil. “Once placed on your fingers, they can never be removed. They'll bind your souls together permanently, anchoring the healing magic of the moonlight ritual. Without them, the poison will eventually overcome even your combined power.”
My head spun as I stared at those rings, their corruption seeming to pulse with malevolent intent. The walls of the shop pressed in, making it hard to breathe.
First Ivan's control, then the hunters, and now this.
Like the universe was determined to strip away every last shred of my freedom.
“Bind our souls? More permanently than they are already?” I shrieked, my voice cracking with hysteria. The room temperature dropped as frost spread across Maverick's skin.
Celeste's face remained impassive, those ancient eyes boring into mine. “These rings have witnessed countless binding rituals over millennia. Some participants tore themselves apart trying to remove them. Others went mad from the constant awareness of their mate's presence. But they always, always work.”
The casual way she described such horror made my skin crawl. I glanced at Maverick, the same dread reflected in his eyes. We were already connected in ways I scarcely understood, and now this? To be bound forever, to never have a moment's peace from each other's presence?
The rings sat innocently on Celeste's palm, but the magic felt old, hungry. They'd consumed others before us, bound them together until death or madness took them.
And now they were being offered as our salvation.
My stomach churned as I remembered Ivan's control, how he'd violated my mind, my will. These rings promised a different kind of infringement—consensual perhaps, but no less permanent. No less intrusive.
Maverick grabbed my hand, entwining his fingers with mine. His skin was frighteningly cold. The gesture should have been comforting, but it only reminded me of how tangled our fates had become. How each step to save him, to save Addie, seemed to require sacrificing another piece of myself.
In response to everything we were learning, Maverick's laugh was hollow. There was no humor in his voice, only a bone-deep weariness that echoed through our bond and reflected in me. “How fucking romantic. Just what I’ve always wanted, a dark and delirious wedding to save my life”
Celeste's smile was all teeth. “Romance has nothing to do with it.
She pushed the book toward me, and my stomach tumbled, but I reached for it anyway, desperate for a solution. The moment my fingers touched the cover, ancient energy erupted through me—a hungry alchemy that recognized something in my soul.
“More than power.” Celeste's eyes swirled like storm clouds, reflecting centuries of accumulated knowledge. “It demands sacrifice.”
The book throbbed against my palms in time with my heartbeat. My fingers trembled as I held it, but I couldn't make myself let go. Behind me, Maverick's pain and exhaustion through our bond was a constant reminder that we were running out of time. The poison was spreading faster now, turning his immortal blood to ice in his veins.
The book's pages hummed beneath my fingers, each word seeming to writhe and pulse with dark promise. I looked up from the grotesque tome, my heart racing as magic thrummed through my blood, dark and hungry. “What kind of toll are we talking about here?”
“Each curse demands its own, ma chérie.” She tilted her head, a gesture both curious and threatening. “Blood will have blood.”
The words sank into my bones like arsenic. I bent over the book again, drinking in its forbidden knowledge. The pages surged along my skin, but I couldn't stop reading. Each revelation pressing deeper, promising answers if I just kept going. I had to know more.
Maverick’s slouch echoed the heaviness in my shoulders. All those lives, all that pain.
But when I glanced up, he wasn't looking at me at all. His eyes locked with Celeste's in some silent exchange that sent a wave of nausea rolling through me.
The knowing look she gave him spoke volumes. Whatever darkness lay before us, she knew.
“And what do we owe you?” I clutched the throbbing tome tighter, trying to ignore how its pulse matched my racing heartbeat.
“Your firstborn, of course.” Her laugh shattered like ice at our expressions. “Oh, don't look so stricken. I gave up collecting children centuries ago. Too much trouble.” Her expression shifted to something more predatory. “No, what I want is far more precious. Ten years of each of your memories. The good ones only. Sweet dreams make the best currency, after all.”
My stomach lurched at her words. “Our memories? You can't be serious.”
Celeste just smirked, her ageless face betraying a satisfaction that made a cold dread settle in my chest.
“Better than a firstborn.” Maverick's voice dripped with ice, but his revulsion pulsed through our bond. “Though I wouldn't put it past you to collect both.”
“Knowledge has always demanded sacrifice, ma chérie,” said Celeste, her voice like honey dripping over rusted metal.
Her eyes glittered with wisdom and dark amusement—the look of someone who knew exactly what price to extract for their secrets.
“Even I have limits to what prices I'll accept,” she mused, absently stroking the book's writhing cover. “There are older things in the spaces between realities, things that existed before magic had rules. And then there are... gaps.” Her fingers stilled on the book, and for the first time, true fear crossed her ageless features. “Places where nothing exists— not darkness, but pure negation. Even magic fears to go there.” She shuddered delicately. “Their prices... well. Let's just say some knowledge isn't worth the cost of learning it.”
The book writhed in my palms, each heartbeat drawing me deeper into its secrets. Ancient words cascaded across the pages, promising answers, solutions, power. My fingers traced the grotesque symbols while my mind raced.
Celeste's words about things between realities nagged at me. If someone like her—someone who traded in firstborns and memories—feared those ancient beings, what horrors could make even her pause?
I pushed the unsettling thought aside.
Addie's face flashed through my thoughts. Her vacant eyes as she danced for Ivan, her body moving like a puppet on strings. The memory burned, fueling my desperation. And Maverick... the poison spread further up his neck, crystalline patterns that would eventually freeze his heart.
The tome sang to me, ominous whispers of forbidden knowledge. Everything we needed to save them both lay within these pages. Ten years of memories seemed a small price to pay. But they would be the good ones. The rare moments of joy, of peace, of connection. I didn’t have many of those.
I lifted my gaze to Maverick. Black veins covered half his face now, but his eyes were fierce as ever.
“Your call,” he said, voice rough with pain. “I'll back your play this time.”
My fingers tightened on the book's writhing cover.
Blood will have blood.
The words echoed in my mind, heavy with meaning I couldn't quite grasp. But the alchemy thrumming through the tome felt real enough to taste.
“We'll take it.” The words tasted like ash in my mouth. “Take the memories.”
Celeste's smile stretched wider, her teeth gleaming in the shadows. “Excellent choice.” She pressed her palm to the book's cover, and it opened with a sound like tearing flesh.
Ancient symbols crawled across the pages as she worked, her silver hair writhing with eldritch energy. The air grew thick with alchemy that made my teeth ache. My eyes narrowed as I watched her fingers trace patterns in the air, leaving trails that coalesced into uncanny shapes.
Maverick reached for my hand, his skin still frighteningly cold. Through our bond, his guilt, his anger, his resignation echoed across. But underneath it all was understanding… we had no choice.
“Hold still,” Celeste commanded. Her fingers pressed against our foreheads, and pain exploded behind my eyes. It felt like she was reaching into my skull with hooks of steel, sorting through memories. Tears leaked down my cheeks as I imagined all the moments I'd never remember—quiet mornings with Addie, shared laughter, peaceful nights under the stars.
The ritual seemed to last forever and no time at all. When Celeste finally pulled away, satisfaction rolled off her in waves. “It's done. The price is paid.”
I wiped my eyes, refusing to break down completely. There were more important things to focus on—Addie trapped in Ivan's circus, the hunters on our trail, the poison still creeping through Maverick's veins threatening to take him from me and collapse my world. Future memories meant nothing if we didn't survive the present.
We stumbled out of the shop into the twilight. The book's weight in my arms reminded me of everything we'd just sacrificed, but I shoved the grief down deep. There would be time to mourn later. Right now, we had work to do.