A tall three-story building made of dark wood rose before us. Scowling, I stared at the closed door. I had lived in Eldar before, and I had my fair share of connections among its secret shady groups, but I’d never been here before. I glanced over at Audrey. We had agreed to stop our attempts to kill each other until we’d finished this mission. However, she was vicious enough that there was still a risk of her leading me into an ambush. I’d have to keep my eyes sharp.
“What is this place?” I asked.
“The Black Emerald,” Audrey said as she stepped up to the front door. “It’s a thief bar.”
Without waiting for me to reply, she pushed down the handle and strode across the threshold as if she owned the place. After flicking a quick glance around the area to check for potential ambushers, I stalked after her into the dark wooden building.
A spacious room met me. Tables and chairs were arranged across the floor, and booths with dark green cushions lined the back wall. There appeared to be a kitchen through the door on the right while a long counter made up the bar. Beyond it was a staircase leading up into the building. Light from the candles fell across the faces of the men and women drinking and eating around the room.
Yeah, this was a thief bar alright.
It was funny. The leaders of Eldar truly believed that everything was perfect in their democratic little city. They had no idea how much resentment actually festered in its underworld. Even though the majority of the population might be happy and content, not everyone bought into the idea of sharing magic equally. There would always be mages who were angry that they had been forced to give up their powerful magic. People who had wanted to become dark mages, but who hadn’t been strong or sneaky enough to escape before the graduation ceremony. And they gathered in places like this. Hoping to one day get hired by a real dark mage, and attain their slice of power that way instead.
Eyes tracked us curiously as we moved towards the brown-haired woman behind the bar.
“I’m looking for Paige Turner,” Audrey said as she stopped before the counter.
The woman regarded her in silence for a few seconds while she continued wiping down a mug. “I don’t know where she is.”
A sharp smile spread across Audrey’s lips. “Perhaps I wasn’t clear…”
“No, I mean,” she began before Audrey could finish her threat, “I really don’t know where she is. She had to move recently because of… interference.” She jerked her chin towards the stairwell. “There’s a group up there in the VIP room, though. And I think they know.”
Audrey studied her for a moment, as if making sure that she wasn’t lying. Then she nodded and started towards the stairs. I followed. Our boots thumped on the wooden steps as we made our way upwards.
“Paige Turner?” I snorted. “Seriously? That’s her real name?”
“No. But it’s a subtle way to tell the right clientele what she is without drawing the attention of the constables.”
“It’s a ridiculous name.”
She whirled around. Since she was in front of me on the stairs, the extra steps brought her face level with mine. Anger flashed in her eyes as she pressed the knife that she had pulled against my throat.
“Watch your mouth,” she said, her voice like smooth poison.
Amusement flickered through me as I raised my eyebrows at her. “Touchy, huh?”
Clenching her jaw, she glared down at me as if it was taking every ounce of her self-control not to slit my throat. It just made me want to bait her even more.
“You done?” I cocked my head while a smirk slid home on my lips. “Then put that knife away before I make you.”
“As soon as we have Lance locked up in Peter Essington’s warded mansion and this mission is over, I will kill you, you know.” Threats dripped from her pretty little mouth as she smiled at me. “And it won’t be a quick death.”
I snorted in genuine amusement, but before I could reply, she rammed her dagger back in its sheath and stalked up the final steps to the hallway beyond. Her shining black hair rippled down her back as she strode straight for a doorway on the left and yanked it open. I took the remaining steps two at a time and then followed her as she walked inside.
“I’m looking for Paige Turner,” she announced without preamble.
An entire room full of people looked up from their tables and turned to stare at her. When the woman at the bar had said VIP room, I had expected something small. This room was huge. And the group she had mentioned was more like four groups.
They were seated at a mass of round tables, and based on the cards and dice that littered the tabletops, they all appeared to be in the middle of different games. Both men and women occupied the seats around the tables, and all of them had that hungry look in their eyes that marked them as people who had dreamed of becoming dark mages.
“Who’s asking?” a muscular man called back.
Audrey had stopped a few strides into the room, and the look of absolute authority on her face as she crossed her arms and arched an eyebrow at him almost made my heart skip a beat. Oh I had never wanted to make anyone submit to me more than I wanted to make her do it at that moment.
“I’ll be asking the questions,” she said. “Now, tell me where I can find Paige Turner.”
“Who the hell do you think you are?” another man spit from a table on our right. “Coming in here and thinking you can give us orders.”
“Yeah,” the muscular man added as he pushed to his feet. He was almost as tall as me, and he towered over Audrey as he took a few steps closer to her. “If you want answers…” a grin split his face as he looked down at her and palmed his cock through his pants, “you’re gonna have to earn them.”
Cold fury crackled across Audrey’s face. She slammed her hands together before the burly man could take another step, and glittering green mist shot out. It blanketed the whole room in a matter of seconds, forcing its way down everyone’s throats.
The panicked cries were quickly cut off as every single person in the room reached up and clawed at their own throat. I swept my gaze over the large room and the mass of people currently choking to death in it. So this was how Audrey Sable had survived to become one of only six dark mages left alive.
I had seen her powers before, of course. But when we had fought one on one, her attacks had always been much more concentrated. And the times when she’d left droves of my people dead, I’d only seen the aftermath, not the actual attack. I slid my gaze back to the poisoner still staring at her choking victims. I was going to have to kill her quickly once this mission was finished.
When several people toppled out of their chairs, their eyes bulging and their desperate breaths only coming in shallow bursts, Audrey pulled back her poison magic. The men and women in the room sucked in deep breaths and coughed as they tried to refill their lungs. Once they had managed to get some air back, they all turned towards her. A hushed silence fell over the room. These people wanted to work for a dark mage, and they had just realized that Audrey was one.
Audrey touched her hands together, and glittering green tendrils snaked around her arms. The crowd flinched.
“Do you want me to spare your miserable lives?” Audrey said, her voice pulsing with cold command. “Then bow down.”
Wood clattered as people shot up from their seats, knocking their chairs over in the process, and dropped to a knee on the floor.
Audrey’s piercing eyes cut through the room. “Both knees.”
Dull thuds sounded as people hurried to do as she said. When they were all kneeling on the dark floorboards, Audrey cocked her head.
“Now beg.”
A cacophony of voices filled the room as the bowing men and women begged for their lives. I slid my gaze to Audrey. She just stood there, staring down at them while power pulsed from her body.
My mouth dropped open ever so slightly. What the hell? Blood rushed to my cock, making it strain against my pants. Orchestrating a power play like this just for the pleasure of it was something that I would have done. But I hadn’t expected it from Audrey. And why the hell did I find it so hot?
“Enough,” she said, her voice slicing through the noise like a blade. “Tell me where Paige Turner is.”
Several people started speaking at once. Audrey held up her hand to silence them before pointing at a man in a rumpled blue shirt. I watched the way the expression on his face shifted between embarrassment, fear, and anger while he gave her the directions she wanted. Sweeping my gaze over the rest of the crowd, I found similar expressions in their eyes as well. These were useful people. I marked their faces as I realized that this might be a good place to come back to and recruit from.
“Good,” Audrey said once he was finished. “Congratulations. You get to live.”
Spinning on her heel, she stalked towards the door while her eyes drifted over my body. Wicked satisfaction blew across her face as she brushed past me. It took me a second to realize why. A low growl of irritation rumbled in my chest as I remembered the treacherous state of my cock.
I whirled around before anyone else in the room could notice it, and then strode after Audrey with powerful steps.
She was dangerous, there was no question about that. And it infuriated me that she was starting to find ways to get under my skin. I had wanted to subjugate Audrey Sable since the first time I saw her arrogant face when she declared that the land she had stolen from me was now hers. But after this power demonstration…
The ruthless authority she had displayed, making people get down on their knees and beg her for mercy, had me itching to do the same to her.
Dark desire burned in my chest. Now that I knew how powerful and lethal she really was, I wanted even more to make her submit to me. I wanted to make her grovel. I wanted to make her beg and plead, and to know that I was the one who brought her to her knees.
And by all hell, I swore I would make it so.
