Chapter 28

Rosabel La Rouge

It was a neighborhood like any other crowded part of towns and cities I’d been to while I worked as an agent. Buildings close together, lots of small shops and plenty of people about the streets, fancy cars parked on the sidewalks and graffiti on every empty surface around, most portraying red horns atop their names.

What was different here was the fact that everybody was looking at us walking down the street, and the vibe in the air was something else, too. The smell of magic, or maybe other things as well, was unlike any other place I’d been to.

“I don’t look like me, right?” I asked Seth, just to make sure that the charm was still working.

Seth nodded. “Your hair has lightened up, but the rest of the illusion is still intact. Nobody will recognize you,” he said. That was good enough for me. For now, at least.

I put my phone back in my pocket—Cassie had texted to ask where I was and with whom, and I’d told her. She was most definitely going to be surprised when she saw Seth’s name.

“Then why are they looking at us like that?” I wondered. Everybody—people walking down the street, or driving, or walking in and out of shops and cafes—they turned to us at least once, without exception.

“We’re outsiders,” Seth said, and I realized his voice was strained and he wasn’t smiling in the least. Instead, he kept one hand in his pocket, I imagined to touch his raven feather, and the other was fisted at his side. “They can smell that we’re not from here. The wards here are very sensitive—everyone can feel the shift.”

Well, fuck.

“If they’re all staring at us, how the hell are we supposed to find Taland?”

Seth threw me a look. “Oh, we’re not going to find Taland. The Devil’s watchers will most probably find us, if they care enough to stop us. If they don’t, well…”

“We’ll search the buildings.”

“ All of them?”

“Yes—all of them. What, you have something better to do?”

“I do, actually.” He shrugged. “I can think of at least ten things just off the top of my head.”

“Don’t be a dick.”

“I’m not a dick—I just have one, and I could be pleasing him right this second, but instead I’m doing this.”

I couldn’t fucking believe I was having this conversation with this guy in this place and in this situation.

“You need help.” And I said that very honestly.

“And you need to learn to accept that there are some things you just can’t do.”

I stopped on the sidewalk—and so what that people were watching? I didn’t look like me anyway. “Then why are you here, Seth? Why the hell did you come here?” I didn’t invite him. On the contrary—he basically begged me to let him into the car.

“Because Radock made me. And also because my brother’s here and if there’s a chance we can save him, no matter how slim, I wanna try. That doesn’t mean that I don’t half-regret being here, though.”

Impossible, was the word that came to mind. “How the hell did Taland turn out normal?” I wondered out loud just to spite him again, and I carried on down the street.

“You think Taland’s normal?” He laughed his heart out. “Oh, boy. You’re in for a surprise. You just wait.”

I rolled my eyes but said nothing because the deeper into the neighborhood we went, the more people came out of buildings and shops to look at us, as if they’d been notified by somebody already that we were going to walk past here, and they were curious to see us.

So many people…

“Seth, are you sure we shouldn’t go back and try to sneak in here when it’s dark?” Because if so many people were going to try to stop us when we got to Taland… Shit. A little voice in my head had already begun to insist that I was, in fact, going to die here.

“That’s the only idea in the world that’s worse than this,” Seth said. “Remember what I told you about the Devil and his people?”

I swallowed hard. “Kill first, ask questions later.”

“Exactly,” he said. “Just keep walking. They’ll stop us eventually.”

I did.

Six minutes later, we turned a street corner to find a hulking guy with a goatee and chrome-colored glasses on, waiting for us in the middle of the street. No cars passed by here, no bikes, barely a few people.

We stopped in our tracks, and every instinct in my body became perfectly alert. He was a tall guy, over six foot five, with a leather vest on and tattoos for sleeves, and he was a mage—Whitefire if the bones hanging from a leather cord around his neck were anything to go by. Definitely a mage, though I could have sworn that most people we passed in this neighborhood were human.

“There they are,” said Seth under his breath, shoulders rigid.

“Now what?” I asked because my magic was ready to burst out of me and that gun in the waistband of my jeans was making my index finger itch to pull its trigger. Unload those bullets right into this guy’s forehead.

Something about the way he was looking at me—and I could tell even though he was wearing those weird sunglasses.

Something about the way he smiled, then raised his hand and moved two fingers to tell us to come closer.

“I guess we go talk to them and ask them if they can hand over Taland to us nicely.” Seth moved ahead. “Come on, Rosabel. Don’t be afraid now. We either die or we don’t.”

Sweat beads lined my forehead. It was all I could do not to grab that gun, not to start chanting the spells that were at the tip of my tongue. People watched us, and more that were dressed in those leather vests just like our friend standing in the middle of the street were around us. Near cars. By the shops. By the entrances of the apartment buildings, some even sitting on the ground, smiling ear-to-ear.

When we stopped in front of the sunglasses guy, it was so, so hard to breathe. The air was so damn thick with magic.

“Hey, there, big boy. I’m Seth Tivoux, looking for my brother Taland. A little birdie told me he came here a few days ago. Mind pointing me in the right direction?”

The way Seth spoke, you could never tell that something was up with him, that he was afraid, or that he believed he was going to die here today. Nothing about his voice or smile or demeanor indicated that he wasn’t talking to an old friend.

Then Sunglasses Guy smiled and turned his head to me. The way his black goatee moved on his chin was kind of disgusting, but he said nothing. He just turned around and started walking down the street, right there in the middle. Another six guys joined him, while four came behind us, two near Seth and two near me. They weren’t all as big, and I doubted any of them was particularly strong, but there was strength in numbers.

Fuck, fuck, fuck. What the hell was Taland thinking, turning himself in here ?

“Shall we?” Seth said, waving for me to follow Sunglasses Guy, still looking perfectly at ease while I had given up on trying to shield my emotions. I’d gone a lifetime doing that—I refused to do it anymore, at least when it didn’t matter.

Together, Seth and I followed the men, and the other four followed us, and we turned another two corners until we were in front of the only house in the entire place. It was two stories high, wide, with a red rooftop and peach-colored walls.

A few men wearing leather were spread all around the wide yard, and the first one who pulled the fence gate open for Sunglasses Guy was wearing Taland’s jacket.

My heart skipped a beat. My eyes were stuck on him and I could barely make out his face—just the jacket. Taland’s fucking jacket.

It was it, I recognized it. It was his jacket. I’d know his stuff anywhere in the world—it was his .

The rage that came alive inside me could have scared me. Suddenly I was at that Ghost Festival in the Iris Roe all over again, and I wanted to kill each and every person around me, and I wanted to take my time with the one wearing Taland’s jacket, too. I’d rip it off his body together with his fucking skin— how dare you, you filthy prick?!

“Eyes ahead.”

Seth was beside me, his hand around my arm, and he jerked me just a little to get my attention.

I blinked and looked up at him as if I just remembered where I was. By the door of the two-story house following the guy with the goatee and the sunglasses, which he didn’t take off even when he led us inside.

A foyer, doors, hardwood floors. The guy wearing Taland’s jacket remained outside.

“Did you see his jacket?” I asked Seth in a whisper, and he narrowed his brows.

“What jacket?”

Never-mind, I thought, and I prayed with my whole being that I was wrong. That that man was wearing another jacket that looked like Taland’s. It wasn’t the same jacket, just similar.

I prayed in vain.

“Hey, where exactly are we going?” Seth asked when more men and women moved to the sides to let us through a door that led to a set of narrow stairs, which I’d have missed if the sunglasses guy hadn’t been there.

He said nothing, not a single word. He didn’t even turn around to look at us, and his friends didn’t follow us. Now, it was just the three of us going down the stairs—not one level, but two.

Concrete walls around us. I was started to get really claustrophobic, and if someone didn’t tell me why that man was wearing Taland’s jacket soon, I was going to fucking lose it.

Then the stairs ended, and we found ourselves in a square room with two doors on either side, much better lit than the stairway. Two people were in the middle of it, looking down at a phone and smiling.

Sunglasses Guy stepped to the side to let us through. The woman and man looking at the phone raised their heads.

“Oh. What do we have here?”

The woman smiled and her canines were pointy—actually pointy like she was wearing those plastic vampire teeth they sold for Halloween.

They looked terribly real, though. If vampires existed, I’d have labeled her one and wouldn’t doubt it.

As it was, the man who’d been with her pulled the phone they’d been looking at behind his back and stepped aside, while the woman straightened her shoulders and turned to us, hands folded in front of her, nails sharp and at least two inches long. They looked more like claws than actual nails, and she wore a shimmery green dress that flared from the hips like a balloon and had a corset that pushed her boobs almost to her chin. Her reddish-brown hair was pin straight and down to her waist. My mind was having trouble accepting she was real for a moment—she looked more like a doll than an actual person, and I was pretty sure those red eyes were contact lenses.

“They’re here for a prisoner,” said Sunglasses Guy, and his voice was thick and dark and scratchy—exactly like the image of him.

“Are they now,” the woman said, coming closer as she analyzed every inch of me slowly.

I almost covered myself—her gaze was so potent. Paired with that smile and those sharp canines… what the hell are you? I wanted to ask but didn’t make a single sound.

“Let me guess—you’re here for the old man—Laurent, was it?”

She turned her head to the side just slightly, and the man who’d been with her said, “Yes, Mistress.”

I swallowed hard, prepared to speak, but I knew that my voice was going to come out breathless anyway because of that word— prisoner. Taland was their prisoner. He’d spent all this time with these people—and he wasn’t the only one, apparently. A guy named Laurent was right there with him.

“Taland Tivoux, actually,” said Seth, saving me from showing this people just how afraid and furious and overwhelmed I was.

Breathe, Rora, breathe, I told myself, because everybody was going to know soon that I was ready to either burst out in magic or tears—and wasn’t I the same girl who took pride in being the best at impersonating a rock?

“The handsome one,” the woman said, and it’s like she lit a fire right under the last of my patience. “Should have figured—you look alike. So charming.” And she bit her bottom lip with those sharp teeth as her strange red eyes scrolled down Seth’s body slowly.

Seth wasn’t bothered in the least. He nodded his head deeply, and said, “Coming from the beautiful Yuri herself. I am beyond flattered.”

“Oh, you know my name!” She clapped her hands, and how she managed that with her nails was beyond me. Then she turned to the tall guy who must have been her guard. “He knows my name!” she told him, like she was that excited.

“Of course, I do. Your reputation precedes you,” Seth said. “People talk about your beauty everywhere.”

I risked a quick glance at Seth, hoping he didn’t look as fake as he sounded. I hadn’t known the guy long, but even I knew he was full of shit, even though this woman was beyond beautiful in a very scary kind of way.

“You’re so, so sweet,” she said, bringing a hand to her mouth as if to hide her smile—and again, I couldn’t get over those nails, pained a blood red. “Much sweeter than your brother—he is your brother, I assume.”

“Taland, yes,” Seth said. “That’s my little brother.”

My stomach fell and fell because my body knew what was going to happen even before I did. “And you’ve come to pay his debt, I assume?”

Every hair on my body stood at attention.

“Actually, we were hoping to talk to him,” Seth said, and Yuri pretended to be absolutely shocked at his words.

“Oh, but you can’t just ask that, handsome. What would become of my name if I allowed anyone to just waltz in here and demand to talk to my prisoners?!”

She laughed. It was cold and bloody, and it was all I could do not to jump her or turn to my magic that was begging me to release it right now.

“No, your brother is in his grace period, which, if you didn’t know, is the seven days we keep those who’ve failed to deliver to the Devil alive, so that his loved ones or friends can come pay the price he owes. He’s in day…” She looked at the tall guy by her side, and he raised four fingers. “In day four, correct. Now, if you’re not here to bring what he promised the Devil, you still have three more days to go fetch it.”

That script on the piece of marble Taland had taken from the Vault was right in the center of my mind’s eye and I couldn’t believe Taland hadn’t made me return to get it, knowing what would happen.

Regret made my limbs heavy—I remembered that night when I put him in the trunk of Madeline’s Mercedes, how I’d told him that we were not going back for that script when he first realized he’d lost it.

If only I’d known…

And how was I supposed to go get it now when the IDD was after me, when my grandmother was after me? If I asked Cassie for help, she would try to get me inside, but there was a good chance we’d get caught, and if we did, Taland would die.

Three more days, that’s all he had. Three.

“What exactly did he promise the Devil?” Seth asked, but the woman tsk -ed him and shook her head.

“That’s not for me to say. If your own brother didn’t tell you, how can I?” She feigned innocence so well.

“But if I?—”

“We can’t get you what Taland promised,” I cut Seth off because my mind was working, and if I didn’t speak now, I was afraid I’d burst for real. “Not in three days.”

Yuri arched a brow at me. “Then I’m afraid I can’t help you.”

“I can offer you something else,” I said, and maybe I’d lost my damned mind, but I didn’t regret it for a second. “I can offer you something that’s worth more than what Taland promised the Devil.”

“Oh?” Yuri slowly folded her arms in front of her chest. “Is that so.”

It wasn’t a question, but I answered her anyway.

“Tell the Devil that he doesn’t have to take my word for it—I will demonstrate before he agrees to anything. And I assure you that he’ll want this.”

I had no clue what the hell that script was or why the Devil had wanted it in the first place, but the bracelet around my wrist was worth more. I would lie to them, tell them they could use it, too—who cared? I’d demonstrate and all those colors that the bracelet drew out of me were bound to make anyone want them. Any Iridian.

Goddess, please, let him want the bracelet, I prayed, because if the Devil didn’t care for it, I had nothing else to give him in exchange for Taland’s life. I’d still try to break into the Vault, but I’d die before I made it out. I was sure of it.

“Interesting,” said Yuri, and she started pacing in front of us for a moment, fingers around her pointy chin as she looked at the floor. “Very interesting. I wonder if it’s true.”

“It is,” I said, even though it might have been a better idea to just let her come to her own decision. “It’s very true. I’ll demonstrate for the Devil.” Probably through a camera or something, I figured, since the actual guy would be in the Tomb as we spoke.

“If she means what I think she means, Yuri, the Devil will want to see—I guarantee it,” Seth said, and it was almost like he was forcing the words out of his mouth, and the look he gave me said he was…regretful.

Maybe he didn’t want me to give the bracelet to the Devil?

See if I care, I thought. I’d give the man my own fucking soul in exchange for Taland’s life. Right now, no hesitation.

Then Yuri stopped in front of me. “Bes, what do you think, pup?”

The tall guy whom I thought was her guard, stepped closer to her, and practically towered over me, eyes wide and dark and dull as he looked at mine.

My instinct to raise my hand and start chanting that spell was so strong I almost gave in.

“I think she’s telling the truth, Mistress,” said the guy, and I forced air down my lungs. Steady…

“Very well,” Yuri said. “My pup Bes here is a very loyal guard, and he has a nose for bullshit. I tend to trust his judgment despite his… low capacity for smart thinking. His instincts make up for it.” Her lips pressed into a tight smile. Her guard Bes didn’t even flinch, though he heard her just fine. “So, I will grant you the right to speak directly to the Devil’s advocate in his Regah chamber. He’ll look forward to seeing you two, I’m sure. Such a sweetheart.”

Yuri giggled. Seth threw me another one of those looks—full of regret, definitely. And fear, too. The guy looked terrified.

At first, I wasn’t—-to hell with whoever this Devil’s advocate was. He didn’t scare me. I was raised by Madeline Rogan— nothing scared me anymore.

Except one thing.

They took us through the door on the right, Yuri and Bes. In there were more wooden doors with small, barred openings in the middle and torches on the walls between them. Through those openings we saw the people—the prisoners , Yuri had called them.

On the third door left was Taland.

Goddess help me, I was barely standing.

He was chained by the arms, his toes three feet over the floor, his blood pooling over the surface, black and dripping still. His left eye was bruised and swollen completely shut, and his torso was naked. The tattoo of the tallarose on his chest was a bloody mess, like someone had tried to carve every drop of ink off his skin. His pants were torn to reveal the wounds on his legs, and though his head was up and his right eye half open, it was obvious to see that he was barely awake.

Yuri said something, and so did the man who’d been in there with Taland, sitting on a chair, playing a game on his phone.

While Taland’s blood dripped and dripped and dripped…

The ground beneath my feet could have disappeared. The entire world could have stopped existing when Taland saw me and recognized me and tried to move. Swung to the sides, opened his bruised lips and tried to speak but couldn’t.

It was worse than being turned Mud—so much worse than being shot and being beaten and almost being eaten by a giant spider or incinerated by a dragon. Worse than anything I’d ever endured, to see him like that, and my instincts took over.

Couldn’t stop them if I was conscious enough to try. I moved forward, and I wouldn’t stop until I got to him and took him out of there—I wouldn’t fucking stop.

Except strong arms wrapped around my torso and held me down before I’d taken a single step.

The scream was at the tip of my tongue.

“ You’ll kill him. ”

The scream died just as fast.

My eyes blinked slowly, and those words sunk in.

“ If you try anything right now, you kill him first, and then we die, too. ”

Seth—it was Seth whispering in my ear. It was Seth holding me back with all his strength. It was Seth begging me to stop, to think, to spare our lives. To spare Taland’s.

My ears whistled when I forced myself to take in our surroundings again, to see Yuri right there by our side, watching me with a small smile on her lips, waiting while the golden necklace full of red crystals around her neck sparkled, hummed with magic. Redfire, just like I suspected. And the fact that she was here, in charge or the Devil’s prisoners, meant she would be powerful, too.

I couldn’t care less about her, but there were too many of them. Bes and the guards and all those people—an entire fucking neighborhood of them that I couldn’t fight while carrying Taland out.

Yuri waited, wanting me to make a move so that she could attack. And I wanted to see the light die in her eyes, too, so badly, but this was a battle I couldn’t win.

I stopped straining against Seth’s hold, and he let me go and stepped back.

I stayed put.

Yuri looked disappointed, and she actually sighed, pouted, and pretended to wipe a tear.

“Very well. I thought you’d be fun, but everybody is just boring .” She waved those fingernails at Bes. “Put him down. Get them to Hakim. I need a good long bath to unbore myself.”

With that, she turned around and walked out of the door, pissed off that I hadn’t caused trouble.

“Don’t try anything,” Seth whispered, and I didn’t. As much as it cost me, I didn’t.

But I’d take the image of Taland falling to the floor when they unhooked his chains from the wall to my fucking grave.