The vial that now held the soul of the princess who’d insisted on being his friend and who had instead taken over his heart.
The thought of stealing one hundred souls for Teague sent sickness crawling up the back of Sebastian’s throat and made his chest ache. He was going to do the unthinkable on the desperate hope that at the end of it, he could make everything all right again.
He could destroy Teague.
Rolling the stack of contracts into a thick scroll, he shoved them into his coat pocket, and then turned to face the princess’s limp body lying at his feet.
“I’ll keep watch over your precious Arianna while you’re gone,” Teague said as casually as if they were discussing the weather or the possibility of having an early dinner.
“I’m not leaving her with you.”
“My dear boy, I own—”
Sebastian rounded on the shorter man and said with quiet vehemence, “I’m taking her with me. If you want to stop me and lose out on all the souls you’re due to collect by midnight, then stop me. Drop me where I stand. If not, then get out of my way.”
Teague arched a brow, though his eyes glinted with malice, but he didn’t argue as Sebastian scooped up the princess and cradled her to his chest as he walked out of the study.
Her body felt strange—unwieldy and unaware—and he had to stop himself from straining to listen for a breath from her lips. From telling himself that maybe he’d felt her move on her own.
She was gone—locked inside the vial in his pocket. Hovering just out of his reach.
But not for long. He’d promised to protect her. He’d promised to help her destroy Teague. All that stood between him and keeping those promises was the terrible agony of collecting one hundred souls.
He laid her on his bed in the room he kept at the back of the villa and locked the door. The sight of her sun-streaked brown hair spilling around her body while her dark eyes stared at nothing nearly sent him to his knees with a fresh wave of grief.
He didn’t have time to grieve. Not if he wanted to fix this. He had to put the next part of her plan into place and then go do his part to make sure she had the chance to finish it.
“Forgive me,” he said as he carefully pulled free the blank contract she’d hidden in her chemise. Unfolding it at his desk, he dipped a quill into his pot of ink, took a moment to remember her exact wording, and began to write.
When he’d filled out the space reserved for the specific exchange of goods and services, he returned to the bed and pricked her finger with the blade he had strapped to his ankle. Pressing her fingerprint to the debtee’s side of the contract, he refolded the parchment and carefully tucked it back into its hiding place.
Her plan was ready. All that was needed were the souls of one hundred people and an opportunity to turn the tide against Teague once and for all.
He bent and kissed the cool skin of her forehead, and then left the villa and headed into east Kosim Thalas.
He couldn’t take the souls of one hundred innocent people. Not even for Ari. Not even to stop Teague.
Panic lanced his chest, bright and hot, and he clenched his fists.
There had to be a way to do this. To save the girl he loved without losing the rest of himself. His heart pounded painfully as he grasped for ideas that all seemed destined for failure.
Drawing in a deep breath, he willed his thoughts to settle and his heart to slow as one idea—one crazy, nightmarish idea—took hold.
He couldn’t take the souls of innocents, but he could find the strength of will to dismantle Teague’s entire criminal network, one employee at a time. He just had to trick them into thinking the contract they were signing was to renegotiate their terms with Teague. Or gain a promotion. Or stay on his good side. Whatever would motivate them into putting their mark on the contracts Sebastian held.
The runners assigned to night duty stood at attention when he stalked through the entrance of east Kosim Thalas. He swept them with a glance and barked, “Get your bosses and every single member of your teams to the north warehouse within the next hour. I will personally punish anyone who is late.”
Without waiting for a reply, he headed through the warren of streets, glaring at anyone who dared to meet his gaze, until he reached the warehouse.
Two entrances. Skylights instead of windows.
It would do.
Ignoring the pounding of his heart and the sickness that kept creeping up the back of his throat, he chained the back door shut from the outside, lit a few torches along the inner walls, and stood by the front entrance as Teague’s people began arriving.
In just under an hour, he had one hundred people gathered at the front of the warehouse. He’d turned away the extras, telling them simply that they’d been summoned by mistake. It was a flimsy lie, but they were in no position to question Kosim Thalas’s collector. Not without displeasing Teague.
Now, he faced the crowd and felt his throat close as they grew silent beneath his gaze.
He was gambling with their lives. Betting on the princess and her plan, because if he didn’t, Teague would win.
Still, it didn’t matter how lofty he told himself his motives were. He was going to lie. Going to trick them into a bargain they’d pay for with their lives. The fact that if the princess’s plan worked, he hoped to be able to put their souls back into their bodies didn’t take away an ounce of his guilt.
He glanced through the skylight and tracked the position of the moon.
Three and a half hours left.
He cleared his throat and forced his guilt and fear into the darkest recess of his mind. This crowd expected to deal with Sebastian the collector—ruthless and unyielding.
“Teague is expanding his business,” he said, his voice as hard as the floor beneath his boots. “He has inroads in Akram, Ravenspire, Morcant, and Loch Talam. He needs trusted employees with unquestionable loyalty to accept a promotion and an accompanying pay increase and prepare to go into those kingdoms to recruit and train new teams. You were all chosen”—he cleared his throat again and swallowed hard against the knot of guilt that lodged there—“because you arrived early. You left your homes, your families. You left everything behind the instant he asked you to, and that proves your loyalty.”
He couldn’t bear to see the mix of satisfaction and excitement on their faces. Instead, he pulled out the sheaf of contracts and unrolled them.
“A promotion requires a new employment contract with Teague. The terms of service list your new responsibilities and pay increase.” It was sickening how easily the lies rolled off his tongue. He glanced at the moon again and reached for the dagger he’d strapped to his waist. “Form an orderly line and make your mark on your contract. Once all contracts have been marked, I will give you further instructions.”
It took far longer than he wanted to prick each person’s finger and push their bloody print onto the debtor’s side of the contract. He had just under three hours left, and the journey back to the villa was forty-five minutes.
When each person had marked a contract and stepped back, Sebastian drew out the glittering diamond vial and uncorked it. A murmur rippled through the crowd, but they stayed in place.
They didn’t realize they needed to be afraid.
His hands shook as he smoothed out the bit of parchment with the incantation written on it. He’d have to make this quick. As soon as the crowd realized bodies were dropping, they’d rush for the exits. He was blocking the only one they could use, and he couldn’t stop a mob from leaving. He’d start with the people closest to him and form row after row of bodies in hopes that it would slow the others down.
Taking a deep breath, he said, “Teague has instructed me to seal these contracts with a bit of magic in his old language. There’s a small chance it will have an adverse effect on you, but don’t worry. It will wear off.”
Swallowing the bitterness of his lies and telling himself he was doing this to save not just Ari but the entire kingdom of Súndraille, he look
ed at the parchment and said, “Ghlacadh anam de Elina Pappas agus mianach a dhéanamh.”
Before the light of Elina’s soul could finish gathering in her chest, before her soul separated and sent her body plummeting to the floor, he’d spoken the incantation for Savas Andris, Athan Gretes, Vadik Palas, and five others.
Conversation erupted across the warehouse as the bodies fell and lay unnaturally still.
He read faster, whipping through the contracts and barking out the incantation as the frenzied bursts of conversation became screams of horror when the remaining people realized that those who had fallen were dead.
They rushed for the back exit first—fleeing the sound of his voice. He read faster, flinching each time a body hit the floor.
Each ball of light that arced its way from a body and into the vial he held left a mark on Sebastian’s spirit. A scar deep beneath his skin that bore the name he’d whispered as he spoke the incantation that sealed their fate.
The bodies piled up. The contracts seemed to grow heavier as he moved through the stack. And the incantation, long-since memorized, became harder and harder to force out of his mouth.
By the time the remaining members of the crowd rushed for the front exit—for him—it was too late. He was down to eighteen names, and they were blocked by the enormous sea of bodies lying across the floor.
Eighteen more names to add to the scars that he carried inside. Eighteen steps closer to rescuing the princess and losing himself.
He’d told her after taking Kora’s soul that he didn’t know his way back from it.
She’d told him that he wasn’t alone.
He was alone now, and every name he spoke, every ball of shimmering light he added to the vial, pushed him further away from any sort of help. He was an island of guilt, lighting torches to every bridge.
When he’d taken the final soul, he left the warehouse and locked the door behind him so that no one would disturb the bodies until he could restore their souls.
Stars, he hoped he could restore their souls.
He looked at the position of the moon, turned his steps toward the villa and found it nearly impossible to move.
He’d done the unthinkable. If Teague didn’t keep his word, or if Ari had been gone for too long, then every piece of himself that he’d just sacrificed had been in vain.
It didn’t matter that he’d only gone after the guilty. It didn’t matter that he was hoping that Ari’s plan would succeed and that the vial full of souls would be freed to return to their bodies.
He had no actual proof that any of it was possible. He had nothing but desperate hope and faith in his princess.
His shoulders bowed, crushed beneath the weight of what he’d done. He’d become something worse than his father, and that knowledge was a razor blade to the part of him he’d tried so hard to extricate from the nightmare of his childhood.
There was no turning back now. He’d made his choices. All that remained was to see it through.
All that remained was to keep his promise to Ari.
Holding that thought close, he began running south through Kosim Thalas, the slowly drifting moon chasing his every step.
His breath tore through his lungs, and his sides ached when he finally reached the villa. He took the stairs three at a time and burst into his room. Ari was lying exactly as he’d left her. The contract hidden beneath the neckline of her nightdress rustled as he scooped her up and hurried down to the study.
Teague was standing at the window, his unlit pipe in his mouth and his back to the door. Maarit’s body still lay crumpled where she’d fallen.
“I have them,” Sebastian said, as he stalked across the room and gently placed the princess in the desk chair.
“Put her on the floor.” Teague waved one elegant hand in the direction of Maarit’s body.
“It’s too late. We’re almost out of time. Let’s finish this,” Sebastian said as he handed the contracts and the vial to Teague, making sure to bump the top desk drawer open just enough to see the glint of the dagger Ari had told him she’d seen on her first foray into the study.
Teague hefted the contracts and then set them down. Taking the stopper out of the vial, he sniffed at the mist that rose, and then smiled widely.
“Well done.”
“Save her.” Sebastian couldn’t keep the desperation from his voice. “I held up my end of the bargain. Now you have to hold up yours. The magic binding our contract compels you.”
Teague acknowledged this statement with a flash of his golden eyes. He swirled the contents of the vial, and then said, “An anam Arianna Glavan filleadh ar a corp.”
The mist swirling within the vial spun frantically, and then a single wisp of light rose out of the flask, gathered itself into a ball of brilliant white, and sped toward Ari.
Sebastian watched, heart pounding, fists clenched as the light sank beneath her skin and spread throughout her veins. When she remained still, her eyes closed, Sebastian felt himself sliding. Falling through the flimsy net of hope he’d managed to cling to and plunging into a pit of despair that felt endless.
But then the sallow skin on her face began returning to its golden sheen. A finger twitched, and her eyelashes fluttered. When she took her first shuddering breath, Sebastian had to grab the desk to steady himself.
She was alive.
She was safe.
Whether her plan worked or not, whether Sebastian was freed or spent the rest of his life in servitude to Teague, for this moment, it was enough that she was here.
Slowly, she opened her eyes and found his. He was about to tell her that she was going to be all right, when he heard parchment being viciously crumpled behind him.
He whirled around and found Teague wadding up Sebastian’s contract, his lips curled in malice as he threw the contract toward the wall.
As the parchment that promised safety for the princess in exchange for Sebastian’s services hit the floor, Teague bared his teeth and said, “Thanks so much for the additional souls, my boy. That will give me the ability to manufacture enough apodrasi to quadruple my business. I’m afraid, however, that you and the princess are too much of a liability to keep around. Our contract forbids me to harm the princess as long as you uphold your end of the bargain, but it doesn’t forbid me from killing you.”
Sebastian barely had time to brace himself before Teague charged straight for him.
FIFTY
ARI BECAME AWARE of her body as if she was awakening from a long slumber. First, there was a sense of heaviness wrapping around her, anchoring her to the ground. Then her scalp tingled and her toes itched. She took a deep, shuddering breath and felt her rib cage expand and contract. Her nostrils flared and the scent of fae magic and blood swamped her.
Ari blinked, and the room swam into focus. She was sitting in Teague’s chair in his study, her torso leaning against his desk. Her skin felt cold, her muscles sluggish. Just beyond the desk, the crumpled form of Maarit lay unmoving on the floor.
She stared at Maarit as her memories flooded back.
Stealing the contract. Teague somehow stepping out of Maarit’s body and speaking the last word in Ari’s incantation. Unbearable pain and her desperate attempt to reach Sebastian before everything disappeared into a vast sea of nothing.
Teague had taken Ari’s soul.
And somehow, Sebastian must have found a way to make Teague give it back.
Something crashed into the bookshelves to her left. Slowly, Ari turned her head and saw Sebastian kick Teague off him and then lunge to his feet as the smaller man attacked.
Teague moved with incredible speed, landing punches that were a blur of motion Ari could barely track. Sebastian blocked some of the blows and took the rest, but he didn’t seem to be paying attention to the fight the way Ari would have expected him to. Instead, he was steadily working his way toward the desk where Ari sat, flexing her fingers and marveling at the steady cadence of her heartbeat.
Sebastian rocked back on his h
eels as Teague’s fist connected with his face, and blood began pouring from his nose.
A trickle of anger ran through Ari, igniting warmth in her chest. She pressed the palms of her hands flat against the desk and slowly sat back in the chair.
She had her soul again, but they were still in trouble.
Sebastian was in trouble.
Teague whirled and slammed his fists into Sebastian’s stomach, sending him crashing onto the desk in front of Ari. She tried to reach for him, her movements disjointed and slow, but Teague got there first.
Landing on top of Sebastian, his face a mask of fury, Teague wrapped his hands around Sebastian’s throat and squeezed.
Sebastian punched the fae, landing blow after blow, but Teague simply laughed while his fingers squeezed, and Sebastian’s face began to darken.
Maybe Teague was stronger and faster because he was fae. Maybe Sebastian had already been injured to the point that he could no longer defend himself.
The reason didn’t matter. All that mattered was that Sebastian was choking to death at the hands of a monster, and Ari, with her sluggish, uncoordinated movements, was his last defense.
Her legs shook as she tried to stand, and she gripped the edge of the desk as she swayed. Sebastian cut his eyes to hers and then stared at her chest.
Really? He was dying in front of her, and now he decided to stop being a gentleman about her neckline?
Teague laughed—a cold, cruel sound that sent anger flooding through her body, lending her strength.
She met Sebastian’s eyes, trying to send him a silent promise that she would find a weapon and do her best to get Teague off him, but his gaze slid from hers and very deliberately looked at her chest again.
“I do enjoy killing a human with my own two hands.” Teague’s voice wrapped around the syllables with elegant rage.
Sebastian made an awful noise in the back of his throat and grabbed for Teague’s hands, trying to pry them free, but his gaze on Ari’s neckline was unwavering.
“The moment I kill you and nullify our contract, I will greatly enjoy killing your precious princess,” Teague whispered as he leaned over Sebastian, his feral eyes wild, his hair in disarray for the first time in Ari’s memory.