Page 42

Maurice

G rant waylays me before I can leave the next night. The sun went down half an hour ago, so I think I’m pushing it, but he’s already in the hallway when I drag myself out of the living room, planted firmly between me and the door.

I’d shove past him, but there are dark shadows under his eyes, and I have the distinct feeling he didn’t sleep at all today.

“Go shower,” he says, no room in his tone for argument. Not that I want to. I make my way slowly up the stairs and am dismayed to realise what a good idea this is once the warm spray is raining down on me.

Everything still aches, but now it’s more annoying than painful. Except for my centre. My magic. It pulses with pain, with loss, and I wonder if things were this intense the first go around.

I can hardly remember. I remember the bloodlust, the desperate need to hunt, and yes, realising my magic was gone, but the true grief of it came after all that. Too distracted by all the new things my body was going through, I hardly noticed at first, in truth.

Things are different now. I can focus on nothing but the fact that my magic is gone—except then I remember that Njáll is missing, too, and I scrub my hair quickly, scowling at nobody.

How could I forget, even for a moment? I need to find him, and it is going to be so much more difficult now that I am just a regular vampire again.

I need help.

And I cannot ask the Hunt for it. I should not even be here.

I dress quickly when I am finished in the shower, then snatch up the bag I left here weeks ago. Grant is still waiting by the door when I come down the stairs, and I sigh when my feet hit the floor.

“I need to go.”

“You need our help.”

“I can’t have it.”

“You—”

“Grant,” Vlad says, somewhere behind me, and I don’t turn to look.

If anything, Grant looks more stubborn than he did before. I don’t envy what Vlad has to deal with after I leave. But then, it is his own fault. He chose to turn Grant, after all.

“Do you at least have your phone?” Grant says.

I dig it out of my pocket, scowling when he snatches it out of my hand. “Hey!”

“I’m just making sure it’s charged and you still have all our numbers,” he says, and I can’t see what he’s doing, but he’s pressing a bunch of different things on the screen. “You’ve got me, Vlad, Asher, Paxton…”

I snort. “No Jeremiah?”

Grant levels me with a stern look. “He’s literally worse with a phone than you are.”

I want to laugh, but I don’t because I am going to miss them all, aren’t I? Vlad knows the same thing I do—I’m not going to call them. Even if I end up in mortal peril, I won’t call because the Huntsman told me not to, and I have no doubt what the next step after removing my fae blessing will be.

I accept my phone when Grant hands it back and put it in my pocket again. Maybe he’ll send me messages still. Is Grant even technically part of the Hunt? I’ve never asked and now doesn’t seem like the time.

“Be careful,” Grant says, and I reach out and mess up his hair before I can think twice about it. He squawks in annoyance. I laugh. Vlad is still a looming presence somewhere behind me, but I don’t want to look back at him.

“I’ll be fine,” I reply. “I’ve always done just fine on my own.”

Grant’s gaze sharpens at that, but he doesn’t say anything else, and when I gesture at the door again, he finally slips aside.

“Maurice,” Vlad says as my hand lands on the doorknob.

“Yes?”

I’m angry with him, even though I know I shouldn’t be. He could have warned me that the Huntsman was here. He could have argued for me.

But he has Grant. Losing my magic hurts, but it is not a person , and I don’t think Vlad was lying—they’re not lovers—but the connection between them must be something profound for Vlad to have turned him. He follows the rules. Always.

“I am sorry,” he says, and he means it, I know.

“Yeah.” I glance back, once. He doesn’t look upset. Doesn’t mean he can’t feel it. I know him better than that, for the little I know him at all. “So am I.”

I leave the house before I hear his answer and walk out towards the road. All right, so I am no longer a member of the Wild Hunt. I can survive that. There are plenty of places I can still stay—I have my own money, and I have my own wits.

But Njáll… I want to find him. I’ll join the clan but only if he’s the head of it.

The clan might help, but I’m sure they have no better idea where he is than I do. In fact, even less of one because they probably know nothing of the attack on Spectra’s bar.

I find myself heading in the direction of the clan anyway before I can talk myself out of it. It will be a useful base, should they let me in, and I know where I need to go after.

The guards eye me warily before they let me into the building, and I head straight in the direction of Njáll’s office.

I know he won’t be there, but it’s still disappointing to open the door and find the room empty, strangely cold despite the fact that summer days are warm and there still should be some heat trapped here.

“You don’t know where he is?” someone asks, and I turn to see Afsaneh standing in the doorway.

She, like Grant, looks as though she has not slept recently at all.

“No.”

“Are you going to find him?”

“Yes.”

She smiles at that, nodding faintly. “The others are…” She sighs, and her gaze moves over Njáll’s desk as though she doesn’t wish to look at me.

“Well, when Tamesis took Njáll in December, he took Elle too. She’s having a tough time of it.

I’ve left Kayode and Briar to keep an eye on her, to maintain control of their districts… ”

“And you?”

“I’m dealing with the rest.”

“What’s the rest?”

“Augustine appeared before Hunter Alwynn earlier this evening,” she says, and I can’t help my growl. Afsaneh gives me a sharp nod. “There’s nothing we can do. He broke into Kieran’s pack house but did not actually harm anyone. Deacon is close to agreeing to a challenge.”

“He can’t.” Njáll wouldn’t want this. He wavered on what to offer Augustine, I know that, but once he knew how hurt that young wolf is… “Can I speak with him?”

“Alpha Deacon?”

“No, Augustine.”

Afsaneh shakes her head. “Not through any usual route. He says he fears for his life. The hunters are keeping him under lock and key.”

Which wouldn’t have been a problem for me last night , but there’s the odd witch among the hunters, and I’ll be fucked if I come up against them now.

“You’re different,” Afsaneh says, brow furrowed as she looks me over properly this time.

There’s no point in lying or holding out on her. Njáll will know from the first instant, I think. “I am no longer a member of the Wild Hunt.”

“Oh.”

“I want—I want to help find him, but I am not sure what I can do.”

“You have a better idea of who took him, don’t you?” she asks, and I nod. I can’t force myself to say the words. Still keeping their secrets, even after the Huntsman cast me aside.

“I do,” I say when Afsaneh doesn’t speak.

“Then use your contacts. If you need help from us, just ask for it. Do you have a way to keep in touch with me?”

For the second time tonight, I pull out my phone. Afsaneh smiles a little when I hand it over and enters her number alongside all those of the Hunt.

“I will answer when you call,” she says, “and whatever you need, you can have.”

“Thank you.”

She eyes my bag next, which I’ve dropped at my feet. “I’ll have someone take care of that, too. The rooms you used before are still empty. Will they do?”

“Y-yes.” I clear my throat. “That’s more than… Thank you.”

Does she know what Njáll and I were doing? Did , that one time anyway, but did he tell her? Or can she just see that I… feel something for him?

It doesn’t matter, does it? The point is that she’s helping, so now I need to fulfil my side of this deal and go find her crai.

“I’ll call you when I have anything,” I say. I know where to go first.

Sam and Spectra are both standing outside the front of Kieran’s pack house when I arrive. I frown. It’s still early in the evening for them to be performing magic so openly, but then I realise that I don’t know if they are—I can’t feel if they are.

Spectra notices me first, and her eyes go wide when she realises what’s missing. Sam scowls. “What’re you doing back here already?”

“I… need some help.”

“More of it?” he says, but Spectra shakes her head, and he looks at her, then at me again.

His eyes widen. He can sense it, too. “Oh. What happened?”

“I am no longer a member of the Hunt.”

Sam waves a hand, and I assume I can pass through the wards now, so I walk further up the path. Sure enough, nothing stops me, and Spectra frowns when I get close.

“He took the blessing back?”

“It was his blessing, to do with as he liked.”

“What does that mean?” Sam asks.

“I used to have access to some magic,” I say. Not my magic. I can’t force those words out just yet. “Now I do not.”

He narrows his eyes. “But you’re still strong. Still old.”

I huff. “Yes. Thanks.”

Sam laughs, to my surprise, and Spectra shakes her head.

I sigh. “I assume you know that Njáll is missing.”

“We heard,” Sam says, sobering immediately. “Have you heard about…”

“Augustine?”

He nods.

“I did. What is going to happen?”

“If the hunters weren’t watching him,” Sam mutters, “then we’d get rid of him. Even if he doesn’t kill Quinn during the challenge, he’s going to break him beyond repair.”

“Did you tell the hunters about the fact that a fae helped him to break through your wards?”

Sam nods. “They don’t care. Alwynn is more concerned about a vampire attacking a werewolf than a fae on the loose.”

“That makes sense,” I say, and then, in response to his outraged expression, “She is in as precarious a position as the rest of your leaders. If she fails, all the humans will turn on the rest of you.”

“Still a dick move,” Sam says, and Spectra nods in agreement.