Page 11 of Tethered Fates

I wait for her to finish.

“I really don’t wanna involve you, Teagan, but I left all my paints in Apollo’s basement at the tattoo studio, and they changed the locks.”

“Your paints?” My thumb rubs over the white flecking on my knuckles.

“Yeah, and…” she bites her lip. “Actually, don’t worry about it.”

“I can get you inside?” I offer. “I’d hate to be without my stuff.”

For a long time, she stays silent, two deep lines forming between her brows. I can tell she’s about to say ‘no,’ but while Summer is more Kai’s friend than mine, I’ve lost too many people I thought of as friends in this last abysmal year to not hold close to the small group I still have. So if I can help get something important back, I will.

“Really, Summer, it’s no big deal, and I’ll keep it between us.”

Summer shuts her eyes for a moment before opening them, her gaze wet, and pulls me into a hug. I go willingly, hugging her back loosely.

“I’m sorry, Teagan. Thank you.”

I’ve always liked hugs and the feel of being close to someone, getting to rest my head on their shoulder and breathing them in. Learning new things about someone, like Summer smells a little cold in the same way copper does.

She lets me go, her lips wobbling, like a smile that got dropped in a puddle.

“I’ll text you when I have the keys, deal?” I tell her.

She nods once, the two lines between her brows stamped there with no plans of leaving.

I give her a reassuring pat on the arm before slipping out and heading towards my parents’ house. Thankfully, it’s empty; Mum and Dad are both out at some event or gala, and I head upstairs into my bedroom, dropping my bag and broken board by the door.

Like my studio, my room is a constellation of art against the walls and ceiling, not an inch left untouched by my brushes or spray cans or fingers. I wanna rip off all my clothes and collapse into my unmade bed; instead, I find myself putting my black face mask on, opening the windows, and grabbing some white paint for a base.

“What do you think, Erica?” I muse, even if she isn’t with me, and stare up at a detailed painting of a roller coaster filled with skeletons in bobble hats.

I pour white paint into a tray, watching it fold over itself in fat, slick sheets. Then I grab a roller brush, and as I paint over my old art, creating a new canvas for all these new feelings, I drift into my place of creativity.

Sen. His name is Sen.

“I’m thinking…” I trail off. Images of dark, reflective eyes and the sound of his dangerous and seductive voice play in my mind, so close I can feel his warm breath coasting down my neck as he whispers into my ear. “An ocean…I’m thinking an ocean.”

Chapter Five - Sen

I’m seated in a comfortable high-backed chair in my hotel’s restaurant. Milky, morning sunlight seeps through the cold wall-length window, soaking the other handful of guests scattered throughout the large dining area.

The keys on my laptop click away as I search a never-ending stream of news articles to find murder, more murder, and would you look at that—another murder. All written about in gory, attention-grabbing detail. But none match the emptied bodies a blood mage leaves behind.

As a man who is paid extremely well to find interesting things for rich idiots wanting to show off to other rich idiots, gathering clues and sorting between useful and trash is my incredibly satisfying forte. This time, each wasted minute brings a new wave of impatient frustration.

My search has only begun for Summer. She might be a shadow mage, but now she’s working with Emma, who ripped Kai’s soul out and is the owner of the First Blood Mage Tome—a spellbook that can turn any mage into a blood mage. I’d be a fool to think she hasn’t used it on herself.

Unlike other blood mage spellbooks, only the owner can touch it. Anyone else who even lays a finger on its human-leather cover will burn. But when we hunted Emma down, Kai dying in Vidar’s arms, Emma was nearly dead herself. Which is when Summer betrayed us—Emma would give her the First Blood Mage Tome she so badly craved, and Summer would heal Emma.

“Here you go, sir.”

I glance up to find a smiling woman in the restaurant’s blue waistcoat uniform, red flushing her pale cheeks.

“Thank you, honey,” I reply, smooth as the dark roast espresso she sets next to my slim laptop.

She all but swoons, and I smirk when my eyes dip to her fluttering hands.

“Is there…I mean, would you like anything else, sir?”