Page 11

LUCIAN

I wished I’d just throw up already. The constant nausea was far worse.

Eyes closed, head back against the red leather of my favorite armchair, I attempted to tune out the world when a familiar, and deeply irritating voice disrupted my peace. “Why are you green? Why is he green, Lucky?”

"Oh, bollocks,” I groaned, hoping I was just having auditory hallucinations.

Except I could feel them.

I cracked one eye open, and indeed, found two faces just inches from mine.

Ronan’s curtain of silky iridescent raven hair, which had reached his shoulders last time I saw him, seemed even longer.

The dramatic fucker’s journey into looking like Dracula was going according to plan.

Next to him, Lucky—or Aristeia, but no one used that pompous name—had reverted back to her usual blue hair, darker at the roots, sky blue at the tips.

She came by it honestly, but occasionally self-conscious about her naiad roots, the kid dyed it black.

Lucky’s parents lived next door to the Nachtigall, Ronan’s family. When they died tragically, his family took her in. We’ve all accepted her as an annoying but ever-present little sister.

“Oh, he talks!” she beamed, clapping her hands. “For a second there, I thought you might be decomposing. You’re so pale, usually, but the blue-green hue is new. Are you part oceanid, too?”

“What I am,” I said, slowly sitting up, “is too shit to deal with you guys.”

Ronan laughed. “Balls. You love us.”

“Debatable,” I groaned.

Lucky pouted. “You don’t love me? Should I remove you from the list of sloe gin recipients? Last year’s brew is ready, you know.”

Wisely, I backtracked. The kid knew her spirits. “You are the single most beautiful thing in this room, Aristeia, fiercest of the Priams.”

“Technically, I’m the only Priam left alive,” she reminded me. “But not bad, as far as sucking up goes.”

Taking it from one of the many pockets in her duster, she tossed me a small bottle, tiny dark beads swimming within a gorgeous purple liqueur. I immediately opened it with my teeth and took a swig.

Fuck, the kid could brew. “What do you even do to that gin to make it taste like the nectar of the gods?”

“That’s for me to know, and you to never find out.”

I thought of Kleos, also refusing to share her secrets, and smiled.

The liqueur helped, my nausea slowly receding.

“But seriously, what’s up, man? We don’t see you for months, then we find you dying in your crypt.”

I rolled my eyes.

My potion lab was located in my first basement, because the cool temperature helped control what I brewed.

At first glance, it was a little on the messy side, especially compared to all my other rooms, but there were too many items drying, resting, stored for later use, so I’d had to settle for organized chaos.

My friends called this a crypt because I had a tendency to bury myself in here for days on end when I was developing something important.

Tonight, I only had a simple cleansing potion in the works. My most temperamental cauldron, a sassy pewter and gold creation, small-ish, with too much personality for a presumably inanimate object, was gently simmering a concoction, still purple, but lightening to pink before my eyes.

I could drink it when it became white.

“Too much sunshine,” I said, groaning.

They nodded, understanding me perfectly.

Ronan might take pride in looking and dressing like a vampire, but he was a true son of unders, like me.

His roots could be traced back to furies—underworld creatures, lethal and ruthless, who existed to torment those guilty of blood crimes.

They were almost all gone, and those left remained in the underworld, but back in the day, in between torturing victims into insanity, like all gods, they fucked around with mortals.

Ronan could handle a little more sunshine than I could, as the eleventh son in his line, but he was also more dramatic than me, so he didn’t.

“And also, fiend poisoning,” I added with a grimace.

“ What ?” Lucky screeched. “Fiend poisoning?”

“Ha!” Ronan, for his part, was delighted. “You let a bloody leech’s lackey get its teeth in you?”

“Fuck you, Nachtigall. Some idiot new blood got bitten. I just sucked it off him.”

“Sucked it, how exactly? Never mind. What I’m picturing is highly erotic and I feel like you’ll ruin my fun with the truth.”

I opted to ignore Ronan, leaving him to his daydreams. I’d ruin it later by mentioning Rupert was plain as fuck. Ronan considered ugliness one of the greater sins one could be guilty of.

My cauldron started to vibrate, practically dancing on the spot, the rune on its decorative purple belt changing to laguz —or L, for short. “Thanks, Callie,” I told it, extinguishing the open flame underneath with a wave of my hand.

“You name your cauldrons?” Lucky asked as I stood, making my way to my workstation.

I ought to wait for it to cool, but I was never the patient sort, so I transferred the milk-white, thick substance to a cup, and started to sip.

“Just Callie,” I replied, tapping the rim.

I’d used that specific cauldron growing up, through my rigorous homeschooling lessons.

Suffering with me for years, it assimilated enough of my personality to grow a conscience of sorts.

Callie wasn’t me . It also wasn’t exactly alive.

But it had certainly grown beyond an average object, as it proved by proceeding to pour its contents into several flask, and take itself to the sink for a nice warm soak after a job well done.

“Don’t question his relationship with Callie. I tried before; it’s no use,” Ronan warned Lucky. “He likes it more than his cat.”

Of course I did. My cat was a literal demon.

“Anyway, we’re here to take you out, Luce. Seriously, it’s been ages since you hung out at Pan’s. He’ll curse your bollocks if you don’t show up soon. Come on. You know everyone would love to see you, now that you’re free from your sentence up there.”

I sighed. Ronan was going to be insufferable. “Can’t.”

“What, are you seriously sick? Like, doctor’s note, staying at home sick? Do I need to call your mom?”

I interpreted that as the threat it was.

“Leave Mother out of this. I can’t…” There was no getting around it.

“Because I promised the protector who’s been my partner for the last six months I’d go to a damn farewell party he’s throwing on my behalf.

I won’t stay long, but I’m in no state for two events tonight. ”

Ronan was speechless for long seconds—a reprieve. He’d find his voice soon enough. Lucky winced, anticipating the oncoming storm.

“Are you telling me,” the Nachtigall heir drawled, voice slow and threateningly low, shadows gathering around him, though I doubted he was even calling to them on purpose, “that you, my blood brother, my friend of twenty-seven years, are rejecting my invitation for the sake of a valer bash with your new pals up there?”

“I am postponing,” I reworded, “for the sake of a prior engagement. Which you would have been informed of, had you called ahead.”

“Oh, we’re the kind of acquaintances who call ahead. I see.”

This was going nowhere, and my next headache was going to be due to a fury’s rage hex if I didn’t throw the damn idiot a bone. “Fine. Come with me.”

I would point him in Gideon’s general direction, and take cover. It could only go one of two ways. Murder or filthy, likely public, definitely depraved sex.

“Great!” Lucky beamed. “Can I come?”

“ Hell no.” I wasn’t babysitting a nineteen-year-old around a bunch of valers I didn’t all trust tonight.

“Please, please, please ! I’ll bring you more gin!”

The girl played dirty.