10. Chapter Ten

Itrailed behind Mordecai wondering what the Hell had just happened. The man was confusing, and his moods were giving me whiplash. Was I really going to let him have some witch put a spell on me so that I couldn’t tell my friends anything?

But I knew I’d already decided. If I had even the smallest chance of beating Mordecai, I knew I needed everyone.

“Well, if it isn’t everyone’s favourite triune.”

I looked up and spotted Selene leaning against a large chair set beneath a high vaulted ceiling.

“This is the witch you want to use? Nope. No fucking way.”

She blew me a kiss. “Aw, love you too, honey.”

I turned back to Mordecai and caught his smile twitching. “I’m not letting her anywhere near me. I don’t trust her.”

“Neither do I.”

“Hey!” Selene called out with a pout.

Mordecai shrugged. “It’s the truth. You have your own goals in life, I’m sure. I don’t trust that you’ll follow the plan if it stops you from getting what you want. We’re all the same, Selene. We’re all concerned with what we want, and, at the moment, we want the same thing. Lucifer gone.”

“I won’t do it, Mordecai.”

Selene giggled manically. “Ooh, first name terms. How endearing.”

Mordecai scowled, but I wasn’t sure whether it was at me or Selene. To be honest, I wasn’t sure the pair of them actually liked each other.

“Lori, you know you don’t have a choice. Just sit in the damn chair, before I put you in it.”

I looked between the silver haired vampire and the ancient looking chair. It looked more like a medieval throne than anything else. Mordecai was right. I knew I didn’t have a choice, well, not really. I could try to fight him now, while my demon and my magic seemed to be missing, and probably die, or, I could sit in the chair let Selene do her stupid spell and hopefully live to fight another day.

Why couldn’t life just give me a break? Just once, it would be nice not to have to deal with shit like this.

“Fine,” I growled, stepping towards the chair and eyeballing Selene. “But if you, so much as—”

“Yeah, yeah,” she interrupted, “you’ll gut me, or rip out my heart or whatever. I’ve heard it all before, sweetie. Besides, it’s not like you could really hurt me in your current state.”

I huffed and was about to respond but Mordecai beat me to it.

“She might not be able to, but I can. Stick to the spell, Selene. And trust me, I’ll enjoy playing with you before I kill you if you harm what’s mine.” His words were a low, lethal growl and fuck, that did something to me. Dammit. Why did he have to be so confusing?

Besides, he wasn’t protecting me, per se, but his investment. That’s all I was. His tool to the destruction of one of the men I loved. I needed to keep reminding myself of that, even if his voice did sound like pure sex.

Selene glared at me as I sat in the ridiculously uncomfortable chair, obviously pissed that she wasn’t going to be allowed to do anything to sabotage me during her spell. As soon as I placed my hands on the wood of the arm rests, a soft hum vibrated through the chair and into my body. Guess it wasn’t just a random piece of décor then.

“Can you feel that?” Selene said excitedly. “This chair was forged by my first coven, and we bound some of our magic in it to use as a conduit. This magic is old and extremely powerful.” Her eyes narrowed. “You have no chance of resisting it’s pull.”

Oh, great. Just what I wanted to hear. I glanced over to Mordecai who was standing near the back of the room with a scowl on his face. He looked like he was almost regretting something.

“Right. Keep your arms and legs inside the vehicle at all times and just relax.” Selene drew her hands around in a large circle and the floor glowed with bright blue runes she’d clearly cast earlier. “This won’t hurt a bit.”

She lied.

It hurt a fucking lot.

Iopened my eyes and blinked up at the high ceiling. My body felt like it had been trampled on by a herd of elephants and my ears were ringing as I tried to focus on what was around me.

Deep breath in. Deep breath out.

Notes of deep, rich earth tangled with something muskier hit my nose. I took another breath, turning to follow the scent. What was that? It was gorgeous. It was… a man’s chest.

“Welcome back to the land of the living. Well, almost living,” Mordecai chuckled as I scrambled my brain trying to remember what the Hell had happened.

Oh, yeah. Selene. Spell. Pain. Unconsciousness.

I hoped the spell worked, because there was no way I was putting myself through that again.

I felt like the dead. And I’d clearly lost some brain cells along the way because I was letting Mordecai stroke my hair and there was no way I was enjoying that. Nope. I was only letting him because I didn’t have the energy to move.

He wants to kill Lucifer.

Ah. There was my snarky demon. And yep, her words went straight to my gut and I scrambled out of his arms with all the grace of a new born baby giraffe.

“Where’ve you been? Are you okay?” I asked her but she just grumbled in response. It brought me back to the comment Iver had made, about talking to the demon. Apparently, that wasn’t normal so maybe she was just learning to talk?

I can talk. Just don’t like it. Don’t normally need to.

Ah, Iveri. I supposed that if she always did the talking, the demon didn’t need to.

Iveri and I were always one. This is… new. I can feel your mind in here but it’s like I’m sharing.

Hmm, maybe I should talk to Iver. Normally I’d seek out Levi for this kind of thing, since he was a literal walking encyclopaedia, but he wasn’t here. All I had was a demon whom I didn’t know if I could trust, let alone if he had anything useful to share.

Anyway, that was a problem for later. For now, I’d take having her back and being able to feel her under my skin again as a win. I had a troublesome vampire and a shitty witch to deal with.

“Tell me about what I want you to steal,” Mordecai asked.

“You want me to steal the little moon stone thingy and not tell anyone or you’ll go on a murderous rampage and kill everyone.”

He nodded, his eyes a little wild with something that hinted at madness. “Guard. Come here.”

A man walked into the room and stopped next to Mordecai to await further instructions but the original vampire looked at me and grinned.

He looks like a maniac.

She was right. He looked completely unhinged.

“Now, little one. Tell him exactly what you just told me.”

Clearly this was an experiment to see if the spell worked. Knowing Selene, it would probably work too well.

“You want me to st— mother fucker!” I yelled as a sharp pain lanced my insides. It felt like someone was drawing a knife from my stomach to my sternum. It was a sudden, sharp slice that faded quickly. “Holy fuck, that hurt.”

Selene jumped on the spot and clapped her hands. “Ooh, it works so well. I’m so pleased.”

“Fuck you,” I hissed as I tried to catch my breath.

“Not my type, sweetie. But thanks,” she replied with a wink. I was going to enjoy getting rid of her when the time came. She deserved to be thrown back in the Pit and then some.

“Selene. This wasn’t part of the plan. It was supposed to gag her, not inflict pain,” Mordecai said, his mouth turned down in a grimace.

“Oops?” She shrugged her shoulders. “At least you know she’s definitely not going to spill the beans now. Any time she even attempts to mention your plan, that spell is going to sting like a bitch.”

I groaned. At least I’d get to go home. Speaking of…

“I’d like to see Jasper, and then I demand to be returned to the conclave.”