Page 31 of The Death Dealer (Sentinels of Magic Book 2)

Trevor’s link to Soleil sparked to life.

“Dalli.”

Shutting his eyes and thanking the Goddess for small favors, heexpelled a breathin relief.

She entered the hall and didn’t stop walking until she reached the front row of spectators. With a cajoling smile for the unknown man in the aisle seat, she asked, “Do you mind if I have this seat? That’s my boyfriend, and?—”

Every man in the row stood and offered their spot with a warm smile. Each eager to be the one to assist her.

When her gaze locked with Trevor’s, her smile grew tight.

“It appears you’re a femme fatale, after all.”

Her gaze dropped as if she were wary and undesiring of his attention. Perhaps she was. Her suffering at his hands was significant.Only the fence separated them, and his need to haul her across the bar and into his lap was strong.If the situation had been any different and his programmed threat to her any less, he would’ve, to reassure them bothnothing had changed and whatever they had between them was still viable.

“Thanks for the spell, Damian,” she said in a low voice, casting a fleeting glance toward the high table. “I’ve created one of my own.” Opening her hand, she displayed three small vials of what looked to be dirt. “Will you toss them at Asshat Agnes, Devil Deni, or Melvin the Malevolent if they even think the word ‘nothing’?”

“It would be my utmost delight,” he replied. His gaze sharpened as he studied the containers in his hand. “This is dirt from my estate.”

“Is that a problem?”

“It may be slightly more powerful than you expected.”

Her worried gaze dropped to the objects Damian cradled. “Should I modify them?”

“Not at all. But if you’re certain you can live with the consequences of your actions, I’m happy to assist.”

“Why does that sound dire?” Trev asked with a downward twist of his lips. “And why do I want you to save us all the time and chuck them across the room now?”

“Because you’re as bloodthirsty as your mate,” Damian replied dryly. “Soleil, my dear, please take a seat. The trial is about to resume.”

Trevor once again locked gazes with her. “Thank you for coming. There’s so much I want to say, Dalli. And I hope you’re willing to listen. After.”

“I’m willing.”

Beneath her sweet smile lurked uncertainty. The urge to sweep her up and teleport away was chipping away athisrestraint, but resolving the issues at hand was paramount. After another twenty minutes, it became apparent why his instinct to grab her and run had become an insidious need to act immediately.

“Sentencing will now commence,” Councilwoman Maria Aguilar intoned.

As one, the Council rose and joined hands.

“Wait.” Damian’s commanding voice jolted them from the trance they’d entered. “It’s imperative you consider one final fact.”

“What’s that, Aether?” Councilman Doyle asked with arched brows.

“Trevor Blane’s power is no more. I suggest you consider the possibility that you’re sentencing a mortal to a magical being’s punishment should you find him guilty.”

“What’s this?” Agnes bound to her feet.

Damian unfurled the fingers holding the vials. “I removed his magic the first time your daughter used compulsion against him.”

“Give it back!” Melvin demanded, casting a panicked look around. “He’s essential for… er, uh… well, his power is essential for a Death Dealer, should the Council decide to reconstitute him.”

“Reconstitute him?” Damian climbed to his feet and rested his knuckles on the table, leaning forward. “What an interesting term, Mr. Glen.Why should you be concerned with their wish to reconstitute his power, I wonder?How does it benefit you?’

The Aether’s voice deepened, becoming as smooth and seductive as a siren’s. Nearly the entire collective of individuals present stared at him, eyes glazed. The exceptions were the Sentinels, Soleil, and him. Trev sought Fintan across the distance.

“What the fuck is he doing, Fin?”

Fintan didn’t reply, remaining hyper-vigilant and focused on the Aether.

“They’re sharing a power, cher,” Draven responded in the Seer’s stead.

Soleil shifted, turning her head to watch Fintan. “How is that possible? I thought Fintan was a Seer. Is he a Siren, too?”

Trevor glanced at her over his shoulder. “If he is, I didn’t know about it. We’ll ask Damian when this is over.”

“He has work to do.” Agnes was cagey and acted like Damian’s questions were equivalent to having teeth pulled without lidocaine. “We need him.”

“What work?” the Aether asked. Although his coaxing tone hadn’t changed, tension lined his shoulders, and Trevor felt the subtle shift in his energy.

It appeared Agnes and cohorts intended to use Trevor’s gifts for their own nefarious reasons, and Damian was doing his damnedest to reveal what those were. As the explanations fell from forked tongues, Trev grew angry on behalf of Soleil and himself.

In the last months of his relationship with Deni, they’d triggered him three separate times to destroy their enemies. Mindlessly killing and obliterating souls, who may have been innocents like Soliel, while retaining no memory of the act. Their machinations made him sick. The heat of embarrassment for his gullibility crept up his neck. Unable to meet questioning gazes directed at him, he stared over the head of the Authority, focusing his attention on the emblem embedded there. The day he stepped foot on these grounds was the day he’d been damned. Except for Soleil, nothing he touched was good, but he’d also tainted their relationship.

Touching Damian’s wrist, he said, “Enough.”

“We need to get to the bottom of their crimes.”

“You do. Buttheircrimes are mine, with what they forced me to do. I’m ready for sentencing.” He swallowed hard. Removing his ring, he cut off his link to the Sentinels, then purposefully blocked Soleil. “Convince the Authority to take my life, Dethridge. Please.” He didn’t care that his low-voiced plea came out ragged. He didn’t possess the constitution for reprogramming, nor could he live with what he’d done.

“What about Soleil?” Damian asked softly.

“You can ease the sting of my passing.Shehasn’t known me long enough for it to affectherlong-term. And I’m sure, after two attempted murders by me, she’s wary of a relationship anyway.”

“You have it all figured out, don’t you?”

Disappointment was present in the Aether’s tone, and Trevor shot him a sharp glance.

“What do you expect of me, Dethridge?”

“I expect you not to roll over and let them win.” Those disturbing obsidian eyes narrowed. “But perhaps it’s too much to ask of you.”

“It’s too much to ask of anyone. I’ve murdered people. Do you get that? Do you get that my soulis blackenedby their actions?”

“I do. Do you?”

“What the fuck is that supposed to mean?” Trev demanded.

“You said it yourself. Theiractions. Not yours.”

“But I was their tool. A mindless fucking tool.”

“Mindless, yes. Youwere hypnotized.” Damian shifted, presenting his back to the panel, uncaring that they were all waiting for him to continue with questioning. “What if it had been Soleil? What if she had your ability and hadbeen compelledto kill without knowledge or consent? Should she, in turn, be put to death for those crimes shehad no ability toprevent?”

“Of course not!”

“Then what makes you special, Blane? What makes you unforgivable?”

“I’m tired,” Trevor confessed. “So fucking tired. Of fighting them, of death, of the goddamned curse related to my touch. All of it.”

“Live over two hundred years under the taint of your mother’s killing spree, and come talk to me again,” Damian said coldly.“You’ve done your job, andonly to those who deserved it.The exception was the fault of Agnes Vector and her hoard of evildoers. Not you, Trevor.” His tone had softened, as had his forbidding expression. “Forgive yourself.”

“I need to know who their victims were. To make restitution, if I can.”

They sat in silence for an uncomfortable few minutes before Damian spoke again. “And Soleil? What is your intent?”

“To leave her in peace.”

“You’re a bloody fool,” Damian muttered.

“Maybe, but I’m not bringing my ugly into her world.”

As Soleil watchedthe whispered exchange between Trevor and Damian, she experienced a sinking sensation in her stomach. Once the confessions began from the opposing team, Trevor shut down, refusing to glance her way. His profile had hardened with each loathsome detail revealed.

He blamed himself.

When he severed their link, she was sure of it.

Her desire to jump up and defend him was strong. She wanted to hold his head to her breast and stroke his luxurious hair until he understood he was worthy to be loved. But she’d encountered his impenetrable wall before, and there was no breeching or scalingitwhen he was in this mood.

Deni began speaking. “Damian is noth?—”

Had Soleil been any less prepared, the sinister twat would’ve succeeded in flipping Trevor’s kill switch. But her reaction to Deni was instinctual, and she sent one of the vials on the defendant’s table flying in the other woman’s direction the instant she opened her mouth to speak. The glass smacked Deni in the chest and shattered on impact. Dirt particles danced in the air before her, then formed a bony hand. It grew in size, elongating its skeletal fingers, until it was triple human size. The sight shockedeveryonesilent.

For a moment, Soleil took great delight in Deni’s terror, and as the woman opened her mouth to scream, the hand fisted and plunged inside. Her shriekwas choked offas the air left her lungs. The magic expanded, and the soil tripled in quantity, pouring out her mouth, nose, and eye sockets. She began to gag and claw at her throat and, in doing so, sucked in the ever-growing mound of dirt.

There shouldn’t have been that much. Not enough to suffocateher, only the right amount to keepherfrom speaking. Yet the earth magic had a life of its own.When Deni fell to the floor, her pallor gray and blood vesselsburstedin her eyes, thosesame eyes, although those of a deceased woman, were accusing.

Soleil covered her mouth to hold back her cry of horror. She needn’t have.Any sound she might’ve made wouldn’t have been heardover the grief-stricken shrieks of Melvin and the outpouring of complaints from Agnes.

Damian rose and cautiously approached Soleil as if she were a wild mustang ready to bolt. And perhaps she was because she feared the Authority’s wrath for inadvertently causing Deni’s death.

“She murdered my daughter! Before witnesses,” Agnes charged. “Red Guard, arrest her! I want her to stand trial.” No tears poured from her, only demands.

Lifting her gaze to meet Trevor’s, Soleil saw grimness with an underlying compassion.

“It’s no small thing to take a life,” Damian said in a carrying voice as he wrapped an arm around her. “But Soleil Stephens saved two others by stopping Denillia’s plan.”

“What plan?” Councilwoman Doyle stared at them. Worry tightened the skin around her mouth, deepening the lines. “What just happened?”

“Join hands, please.”

“This is highly irregular, Aether. Even for you,” Councilman Reed stated, frowning his displeasure.

“I intend to show you what my future wouldbe hadmy sister-in-law not stepped in. I ask again, please join hands.”

Those along the table complied with the Aether’s directive, keeping a wary eye on Soleil as the Red Guard removed Deni’s lifeless body from the room.

Damian squeezed Soleil’s shoulder and motioned her to sit in his abandoned chair. With a wary glance around the room, she crossed to the table and sat. Trevor made no move to touch her or offer any comfort. He’d shut down, and the knowledge he’d blocked her hurt. For as tough as she could be and had been during multiple murder attempts against her, she was feeling an overwhelming urge to cry.

“Don’t stress it, Dalli.” Trevor’s voice was low and gruff when he eventually spoke. He was sweating it enough for both of them. “She deserved what she got. Damian was right. You saved two people tonight. You should be proud of the fact and hold on to it when things become too much.”

“I’ve never taken a life before.”

“Your reaction was self-defense. You saw a threat, and you ended it.”

She nodded, thoroughly miserable.

Leaning in, he kissed her temple. “You’re incredible. Never forget it.”

It sounded like he was saying goodbye, and Soleil wanted to cling to him.Wantedto hold on so tightly he’d never be able to live without her. But she couldn’t be the only one fighting to keep a relationship alive. Especially when the other person wouldn’t.