Page 46 of The Deathless One (The Gravesinger #1)

There were more infected than before.

She’d slept in the graveyard before wandering the streets of the Factory District in the early morning to see how these people were dealing with them. It seemed their methodology was violent but effective.

Big men corralled the drooling and moaning creatures into back alleys, then used crowbars or other weapons to bash their heads in.

But there were more blockades every day.

More houses closed up, and the groaning sounds of infected mingled with the scraping of fingernails against the walls.

The Factory District was managing it better than others, but that didn’t make any of this right.

Soon enough, the infected would get free because there weren’t enough men to kill them all, and then where would her people be?

Her could-have-been husband had a large project on his hands, and it was a distraction, which worked in her favor.

She didn’t know how he’d gotten everyone important in her castle under his thumb, but she would need every weapon in her arsenal for the moment she finally struck at the man who had killed her.

But first, she had to learn to harness her power. And that meant spending more time with the Deathless One.

Even in her head, she feigned disappointment at the thought. Because her favorite thing was working on spells with Elric, even if it was for all the wrong reasons.

Magic didn’t come easily to her. It hadn’t with Sybil, and some part of her had hoped that with him teaching her, he would have some divine ability to make her see magic in a different way. That just being around him would make everything easier.

Had it?

Not in the slightest.

Elric taught her more complicated spells than Sybil, with the thought that perhaps she was too gifted to learn the easier ones.

Now there were so many rules to follow. So many tools that made little sense.

Consecrating tools, symbols and runes to etch into the ground.

Chants to be spoken and called out during the right phase of the moon.

All that he seemed to think she should have memorized by now.

But she didn’t even know what half the words meant!

He spoke in a language that she didn’t know, so what did he expect?

Jessamine had never had the talent of learning other languages. Her mother had tried for years to teach her all the other dialects of their kingdom, at the very least, so she could greet visiting dignitaries, and Jessamine had always been terrible at it.

But then she’d thought of her mother, and they had missed an entire day of learning magic because every time she tried to cast a spell, it had the flavor of sadness, Elric said. And then he’d left her alone because apparently he was like all men and didn’t know what to do with a sad woman.

He couldn’t fix what had been broken. But neither could she.

And seven days after she’d asked him to teach her, she met him again in the Factory District’s graveyard at twilight.

Jessamine was nearly ready to give up this idea. Maybe she could find someone to teach her hand-to-hand combat. If she was good with a knife, then she could make someone a little scared if they tried to attack her. It was as good an idea as learning magic, apparently, because she was shit at both.

But this time, instead of carrying some new ritual bowl or anything else, Elric stood next to the tombstone they’d been using as an altar with his hands empty.

Her stomach flipped, as it did every time she saw him now; that, or her traitorous heart would start beating harder.

Both organs signaled her ridiculous need.

Trying not to sway her hips too much, she approached him and asked, “Have you given up on me, then?”

His brows rose in surprise. “No. But perhaps you aren’t the kind of witch I’ve been expecting you to be.”

“That shouldn’t sting as much as it does,” she muttered.

She’d always been good at everything. She was the princess who was always described as perfect. Exactly what the kingdom needed. A lovely young woman for the best kingdom.

Even the guards in her castle had felt comfortable walking into her rooms at any point of the day and talking to her about all manner of random topics.

They wouldn’t have done that with anyone else.

She was welcoming, honest, the person everyone wanted to be around.

But she had failed at witchcraft, and that dug underneath her skin.

He took a step toward her and took her hand in his. “This is not a bad thing, Jessamine. There are many kinds of witches in this world, and I believe you are not a ritual witch. Gravesingers are rare, yes, but they aren’t supposed to be able to cast spells. You’re supposed to use me.”

“Isn’t that what we were doing? I have no magic without you.

” She lifted both of their hands, shaking them in his face.

“This is the only reason I can use magic at all. If there was no connection between the two of us, I’d go back to being the useless princess who was murdered on the day of her wedding. ”

He hummed low under his breath. “I don’t appreciate the ‘useless’ addition, but yes. I do believe that our connection is what you are forgetting. You’re trying to do this on your own.”

“That’s the point.”

“No, it’s not. You’re not necessarily asking me to cast a spell.

That’s not what you did with Benji. But you are asking permission to use my magic in whatever way you see fit.

And in that moment with Benji, you wanted someone to blame.

Even as you were casting that spell to rip his memories out, you didn’t want it to be you who was using the magic. Does that make sense?”

She supposed in some twisted way, it did.

She hadn’t wanted to hurt Benji. But at the same time, she had. It was hard to imagine herself as someone who would hurt other people, so she had drawn upon his magic so she could tell herself it was his fault. Not hers.

“So you think I need to use that same logic when dealing with regular spells?” she asked. “That I need to expect it to be you doing the magic, not me?”

“In a way. It can’t hurt to try.” He gestured for her to walk ahead of him. Together, they strode toward a giant stone angel. “This would be considered a particularly advanced spell. I also suspect you are not very good at lighting candles because the thought of it bores you.”

“Am I so transparent?”

“Very,” he replied, his tone dripping with sarcasm. “Now, the angel in front of you is nothing more than stone. But stone is malleable, just like the human form is, because stone is nothing more than clay that has hardened. If you ask the earth to do something for you, then it will.”

She stood in front of the angel, imprinting the beautiful sculpture to memory.

The face had faded with the years, but the wings were still pristine.

Feathers so delicate, she could see the center shaft and the faint etchings of texture on them.

The folds of the angel’s dress were so delicate that the sight made her heart skip a beat.

“This is beautiful,” she murmured. “Who made this?”

“Does it matter?”

“It does to me.”

He sighed, coming up behind her so close that she could feel the heat of him pressing against her spine. “Stop distracting yourself.”

“I’m afraid I’ll disappoint you.”

“You could never.” Hands landed on her shoulders, gently squeezing. “Let’s try this first time with me touching you, yes? A reminder of who you’re drawing the power from.”

She could almost hear her mother’s soul screaming in anger that her daughter was falling prey to such a dangerous god. And yet she leaned into his touch.

His hands were warm now, and she knew the lingering touch wasn’t necessary. He had been hesitant after she had seen his memories, now that she had revealed the man beneath the mask. But that meant she knew that when he touched her, he wanted to.

So she leaned into him even more. Pressed her back to his chest so she could feel his ribs expand with every breath and sense the stuttering rhythm that changed the moment she wiggled against him.

Flush to his body, she could feel the twitch of interest pressing against her bottom.

He leaned down to growl in her ear, “Focus on the angel, nightmare.”

Sighing, she focused on the wings. She zeroed her mind into the touch of his hands on her shoulders, and she let her soul yearn for whatever it wanted.

Right now, she wanted to give this angel life. She wanted to see what natural magic coursed through the stone that had been locked away for years. It had been chiseled by a loving hand, by an artist who had seen something to free from a block of nothing.

Just like she was finding that she wanted to free Elric. She wanted to let him out in this realm, and it didn’t matter what madness he brought with him—she just wanted to see him free.

A sudden flush spread through her body. His fingers trailed down her arms, and she heard his sudden intake of breath as though he felt that sudden warmth as well.

The sensation made it hard to think or breathe.

She wanted to touch and be touched. She wanted to let this warmth turn from desire into passion and to make the world tremble with the force of her need.

With a sudden thunderous crack, the angel’s right wing moved.

It stretched up and wide, catlike, and then folded around the angel like a fine mantle draping over a rich woman’s shoulders.

Then the other wing unfurled with another echoing reverberation of sound, and suddenly the entire being bowed.

She watched in awe as the angel straightened and pressed a hand to its heart.

Then, with a nod of its head, it shot up into the sky.

Jessamine gasped, leaning back against Elric’s shoulder to watch as it disappeared over the rooftops and soared into the clouds.

“It can fly?” she whispered.