Page 14 of Trick Me (Immortal Vices and Virtues: All Hallows’ Eve)

Chapter

Six

ERYNN

A sh stiffens beside me. The wolf in my head responds to him, hackles rising, but I squeeze his hand in warning. The last thing we need is to piss off the witch and end up with something worse than a power swap.

“Learned your lessons yet?” she asks, focusing on Ash with intensity. She meant every word of teaching him a lesson from earlier.

“Yes,” I quickly say, before he can say something that’ll get us turned into toads, or worse. “That’s why we’re here. Please, how do we fix this? How do we go back to how we were?”

She takes a languid sip of her drink, the blue liquid leaving a faint glow on her lips. “Fix? Such an ugly word. Implies something’s broken.”

“You cursed us,” Ash says flatly .

She lifts one perfectly sculpted brow, clearly amused rather than offended. “ Cursed is such a harsh word too. I’d say… Expanded. Gifted with perspective.”

“Gifted?” Ash’s voice drops to a growl that would be more impressive if he actually had his wolf.

I nudge Ash lightly with my elbow and step forward. His fingers twitch like he wants to stop me, but he doesn’t. The wolf bristles under my skin. He doesn’t trust the witch, and neither do I, but he knows when to beg.

“Please,” I say, trying for a smile that isn’t all teeth. “We’ve had a really shitty night. Lesson learned, big-time. Whatever you did with the apple, can you just… undo it? Reverse it?”

The witch watches me over the rim of her cocktail, her expression unreadable. She sets the glass down on a small table beside her with a soft clink and folds her hands in her lap, one elegant wrist draped over the other like a lady waiting for a suitor to grovel harder.

“Oh, sweetheart,” she says. “It was never meant to last. It’ll unravel on its own, when it’s ready. Halloween always holds on to its gifts stronger.”

Ash exhales harshly through his nose, and his shoulders coil tighter. “Then end it now,” he snaps, voice as sharp as broken bone. “We can’t afford to wait. This isn’t just some magical inconvenience. I have responsibilities?—”

“He runs a pack,” I cut in. “And if they see him like this, if they sense weakness, they’ll tear him apart. This is dangerous,” I explain to the witch. “Not to mention, my day job relies on my ability.”

The wolf pushes against my insides again.

The woman doesn’t flinch. If anything, her smile softens. It’s the worst part. Like she expected this. Like she’s heard it all before.

“I do understand,” she says at last. “But before I give you what you want, I need something in return. A little insight, perhaps.”

I glance at Ash, who’s already shaking his head, but I squeeze his hand once. His fingers twitch, then settle.

The witch pats the chairs beside her.

“Sit. Humor me.”

We pull the chairs around to face her and settle down.

The witch crosses one leg over the other and leans forward, eyes gleaming.

“First question,” she begins, her voice a touch lower. “In the heat of anger, when you were sure the other was to blame, did you choose rage, or did you find room for grace?”

Ash doesn’t speak right away. He stares at the ground. His fingers flex in his lap.

Finally, he lifts his head. “I was furious. At her. At myself. At everything. We were both spelled, both caught in something bigger than us, but I acted like I was the only one affected.” He scrubs a hand over his face.

“I didn’t explain. Didn’t try to help her understand what was happening to her.

I just expected her to cope with it like I would have. Which was… stupid.”

“And yet?” the witch prompts, eyes glinting like starlight through smoke.

“She didn’t give up,” he says quietly. “She stayed. Fought. Even when she lost control and begged me to fuc?—”

“Oh my god,” I interrupt, burying my face in my hands. “That does not need to be part of this conversation.”

Ash only shrugs, maddeningly unbothered. “It was beautiful and hot.”

“I will strangle you,” I say through my fingers jokingly.

The witch chuckles. “I do enjoy a couple that can argue like lovers and enemies in the same breath.”

“I wouldn’t call us a couple,” I start, but Ash leans closer, his knee brushing mine deliberately.

“You’re really bad at lying, sweetheart,” he whispers.

I swat at his leg. “You’re impossible.”

“And you,” the witch says, staring at me.

I shift slightly, uncomfortable. “Well, he made me furious. So many times. He was cold, sharp-tongued, impossible to read. But then… he stopped running from what was happening to us. He stopped tr ying to fight it, and started trying to fix it. To understand me.” I glance at Ash and then back at her.

“When my wolf spiraled, when I was losing control, he didn’t just restrain me.

He anchored me. He trusted me to get through it.

And when the ghosts came for him, I noticed how much he dealt with it head-on.

It’s not just brooding. And tonight… I guess I saw past the anger. Past the curse. I saw him.”

Our eyes meet across the sliver of space between us.

His expression is unreadable, but something in me knots up anyway.

I don’t know what he’s thinking, but I know what I feel.

My pulse stutters. My mouth is dry. And I hate how much I want to scoot closer, to feel the heat of him again, just to see if it still settles the storm in my chest. Like some part of me is already rewriting the rules, deciding he’s not just a mistake I survived… but someone I’d choose, even now.

“My second question,” she says, distracting me. “Let’s imagine something improbable, yet not impossible. Say she finds out she is carrying your child. What do you do?”

My breath catches, and I blink at her, stunned. “What kind of question?—”

Ash’s hand settles firmly on my thigh. “She moves in with me. Immediately. She gets the entire damn castle and whatever else she wants. I raise that child with her, side by side. I become the father they need. And if she wants it”—his thumb brushes over the fabric of my jacket—“the husband she deserves.”

My mouth falls open. “Really? You’d do all that?”

His gaze slides to mine, calm and unwavering. “For you? I’d do anything.”

We stare at each other, the world narrowing down to the weight of that answer, the absolute certainty in his tone. No hesitation. No fear.

A long moment passes before I say softly, “Okay. Wow. That’s… good to know.”

The witch only watches us, her smile widening. “Delightful,” she murmurs, sipping from her drink like this is the best kind of theater.

Then her gaze sharpens. “Final question.”

The air shifts again to something darker. “You’ve tasted each other’s gifts. What did you each embrace? And what, if anything, could you not live with?”

Ash is quiet for a moment. Then he exhales.

“I embraced the dead,” he groans. “Not because I wanted to. But because I had no choice and got to see my dead friend Mikael again.” His throat bobs. “He’s my ghost. My mistake. But… seeing him gave me something I didn’t know I needed. Facing the past instead of hiding from it.”

I turn to him, reaching for his hand, holding it.

The witch nods once, acknowledging the weight of his response.

“And what can you not live with?” she asks .

Ash is glancing at me, and this time, there’s something raw behind his eyes.

“What I can’t live with,” he says quietly, “is taking my wolf back and losing Erynn in the process. She’s not just carrying part of me; she is part of me now.

My wolf responds to her like she belongs.

Like she always did. I didn’t expect that.

And I sure as hell didn’t plan for it… but I can’t imagine going back to the way things were before. ”

I close my eyes, absorbing that, my toes curling in my shoes at the words he’s saying, words I don’t expect.

Then I answer. “I embraced the wild,” I admit. “His wolf. The strength. The instincts. It’s in me now, and it’s… maddening sometimes, but it’s real. I can feel how deeply the wolf cares and what it’s like living with something inside of you.”

Ash’s jaw tightens slightly at that, but he says nothing.

“And I can’t live with the silence,” I continue.

“With not hearing the dead anymore. That’s who I am.

It’s how I connect with the world. With people that others forget.

It’s like losing a part of myself.” I glance at Ash.

“And I get it now. I didn’t before, but I do now.

That… emptiness. When something so core to you is just gone. ”

His gaze locks with mine, and the air shifts.

His fingers trace along my jaw, a slow glide that has me catching my breath.

When he reaches my lips, his touch lingers, featherlight, and I swear I sense my pulse beneath his fingertips.

My heart trips over itself as heat blooms in my chest, my skin, everywhere.

He leans in, and I tilt toward him instinctively, dizzy with the pull of him. Is he going to kiss me?

A half sigh, half-amused hum draws both our gazes sharply to the side.

The witch leans back, her eyes alight like she’s just tasted something rich and rare. “You’ve both answered honestly to each other.”

“So we passed your test. We danced to your tune. What now?”

Her smile turns wicked. “Since you asked so nicely…”

She rises before us. “There is a way to release what binds you sooner. But it requires intention. And… cooperation.”

“You’ll need to perform a ritual together. One that acknowledges your bond, honors your pain, and surrenders the pieces of each other still inside you.”

The wolf inside me stirs uneasily. “What kind of ritual?”

“Not the sort that ends in fire and chanting,” she says dryly. “Think of it as a… communion. A confession. You’ve already begun. You just need to finish it with truth.”

Ash lifts his chin. “Tell us what to do.”

“Oh,” the witch hums, retrieving a scroll from the folds of her impossible dress. “I think you’ll figure it out.”

She presses it into my hands, then steps back with a grin too wide to be friendly.