Poppy had trained herself not to react. “It’s just an illu—”
Rök vaulted in front of her, wielding his long sword. Slash. He severed a very real gremlin in two!
No time for shock; the remaining creatures attacked, springing off the countertops.
Rök cut through a swath of them. “Illusion, huh? They wet my blade readily enough.” Green blood coated it.
She snagged a pouch from her bag. It disintegrated into her palm as battle magic churned through her—like a hit of Hecate’s divinity. Purple light shone from her hands. When more gremlins leapt for her, she released beams from her palms. The creatures burst, reptilian body parts painting the walls. “This has never happened!”
“What the hell is going on here?” Rök sent fang-filled heads tumbling.
She picked off any that got past the reach of his blade. “I think someone cursed me, turning any conjuring potential I might have against me, forcing me to fuel the illusions. Maybe it was a rogue warlock. Or a rival merc hired a traitorous witch. If we’d met sooner, I might have suspected you!”
He scowled. “When did it start?” Slash went his sword.
Blast went her beams. “Decades ago. I’d spot something amiss out of the corner of my eye, but only on Halloween night.” As he defended to his left, more attacked on his right. She exploded them to the ceiling. “I thought I was imagining it. Then they got worse each year. But they’ve never embodied before!”
“Then what gives?”
As she fought beside Rök, she played out different explanations, settling on the most likely: “Maybe this place is intensifying the curse.” A wizard’s stronghold imbued with magic? She could see it.
If the castle wouldn’t open until dawn and it was turning her illusions into physical manifestations, then she was in trouble. She had every reason to expect many more, and they would only get deadlier.
“Kind of random, no?” Rök moved with the ease of a practiced warrior, all his generous muscles working together to slaughter his enemy. “Gremlins?”
A pair vaulted from a pot rack, heading for a dismount—on her head. She blasted them into oblivion, then admitted, “Not just gremlins.”
“What else?” He skewered three like a scaly kabob.
She reluctantly said, “Anything that haunts mortals on Halloween. Horror villains and monsters.” She knew Rök was well versed in them. “They change over time. I call them my visitors.” Whenever human nightmares updated, so too would the visitors. “Over the last few years, I’ve seen a doll with a knife. A killer clown. Sometimes aliens and . . .” She hesitated, not wanting to cop to the most problematic one.
Rök flung the gremlin kabob from his blade. “And?”
“The . . . Headless Horseman. Or, at least, the humans’ latest version of it.” The last time she’d encountered the methodical swordsman and his red-eyed steed, she’d thanked Hecate he wasn’t real. Would he be tonight?
“You mean the version that hunts heads and can’t be killed? Fantastic.”
“I can’t control this! You think I haven’t tried to? They’ve haunted me!” She would wake to a maniac with a glove of razors looming over her bed. The machete-wielding camp slasher had first greeted her in the bathroom—the last shower she’d ever take after sunset on Halloween.
Dreading the coming visitation, she’d sought help from Mariketa, the leader of the House of Witches. Just a week ago, the young witch had told her that she’d find the answer to her curse within this castle. Poppy had believed the curse would be broken here—not enhanced!
“What do they want?” Rök’s sword never slowed.
“They’ve terrorized anyone who’s seen them.” Like her poor sisters. Poppy hadn’t told her parents how bad it’d gotten, refusing to distract them from their training. “Now that the visitors are embodied, I think senseless killing is the name of the game for them.”
“Kill you? You’re fueling them. Where’s the logic in that?”
“Gremlins: masters of logic.” She blew a lock of hair out of her eyes and fired again. “You want me to call a time-out and ask them about their motivations?”
“You’re certain this is a curse? Maybe it’s your own power gone berserk.”
“A witch’s power rarely harms her, and she gathers more control over time, not less. But even so, I wasn’t fully convinced it was a curse until now.”
“Why now?”
Two gremlins clambered across the floor toward her legs, earning a blast. “Because they are trying to kill me.”
“Then why take a job at bloody Halloween?”
“The castle would only open tonight!”
Rök muttered, “Wiccans, man,” as he beheaded another pair.
She fired on a slavering trio, exploding them like meat sauce in a microwave. The demon cast her a brief look of approval. Only four left, but her borrowed magic was fading.
With an expert sweep of his sword, Rök struck the four down. A row of heads flew, landing with thuds to roll across the floor.
His chest heaved as they scanned the twitching bodies. “Should we be expecting more of these fuckers?”
“I don’t think so.”
He lowered his gore-covered sword.
“But other visitors will appear,” she added.
Bitter laugh. “Course they will.”
The light across her palms sputtered. Fueling her spells and the visitors always depleted her magic, which must be the point of the curse.
Rök met her gaze with his brows drawn. “Your eyes are back to normal for now.”
Did she detect worry in his troubled expression? Not for himself but for her? As they stared at each other, emotions best left buried crept to the surface. She rubbed her neck, feeling as if she was on the precipice of something more perilous than even the visitors. . . .
Rök turned from her, ending the charged moment. He swiped his sword on a dusty dish towel and sheathed it. Since Poppy was the source of these killers, his safest bet would be to leave her behind and get on with his job.
True to form, he left her without a word. There he goes, out of here at the first sign of trouble.
She stared at the doors closing behind him. She’d wanted away from him, hadn’t she? Forced proximity for an entire night would’ve been unbearable.
So why this dejection? She was on a mission, not another ill-fated date. What a farce that had been, stranded by him at the most expensive restaurant in the Lore.
Two years ago
New Orleans
“Ellen Ripley in the furnace,” Poppy told Rök as they enjoyed scrumptious wine imported from Sylvan, oysters from Sargasoe, and a debate about the best character sacrifices in horror flicks.
In other words, the perfect date.
“Ripley? Agree to disagree, Red.” He grinned over his wineglass, emanating sex appeal. He looked so decadent in his bespoke suit that he should come with a health warning. “I think the best sacrifices arise when there’s still a bit of hope that the character can be saved. Once the alien implanted in Ripley, all hope was lost. She just took that plot development to its logical conclusion in the coolest way.”
He knew his Alien lore! As the proud co-owner of a black cat named Newt, Poppy was impressed. High from Rök’s undivided attention, she leaned forward in her chair, chin propped on her hand, hearts in her eyes. Fellow diners kept staring at them, must sense the chemistry sparking between Rök and her.
For the umpteenth time tonight, she mused, What if I am his mate? He might not even realize it. Or was he feeling the same connection?
They’d shared similar interests, swapping merc tips and movie trivia. He’d laughed at her jokes and genuinely seemed to like her. And the attraction . . . Well, they hadn’t even made it to the front steps of the restaurant before they’d assailed each other. A selfie in the parking lot had turned into the best kiss of her life—and it’d only whetted her appetite for more of him.
When she was getting ready for the night earlier, her sisters had gathered in her room, warning her against going out with one of the Lore’s most notorious players. Lea had said, “You told us you wanted to settle down, right? You know you’re destined for a warlock. A demon can’t protect you from magic, but a warlock could. A fellow Wiccan could even help you defeat your curse.”
This was . . . a good point. Their parents were an example of how witches and warlocks could amplify each other’s abilities. In any Wiccan calculation, more magic was always better than less magic. “It’s just a casual date,” Poppy had assured everyone.
After the four sisters had taken bets that one of Rök’s lovers would hail him before the dinner concluded, Sage had summed up their thoughts: “Demons are like bulls: horned and raring to chase any old red cape.”
Ha! How wrong they’d been. I’m not any old red cape.
And this was not just a casual date; something was happening here.
Keeping up with the conversation, Poppy pointed out, “Bishop II’s offer to remove the alien from Ripley could have been real. Though I don’t think her character would ever accept that the alien inside her might live.”
“Exactly.” The gleam in Rök’s eyes made her feel praised. “Just like the priest who dove out of the window in The Exorcist. He couldn’t live with the idea that the demon might survive, which, by the way, stung a little.”
She chuckled at his aggrieved look. “So, what’s your best character sacrifice?”
He thought for a moment. “The dad in A Quiet Place. His chances before his death were better than nil, but he would do anything to save his beloved children.”
“You would’ve yelled and drawn the monster away from them?”
Rök held her gaze. “When you love something, you protect it.”
She swallowed, so caught up in this demon she could drown in him.
Caution warned, Just dip a toe.
Experience screamed, Do not head in deeper.
Desire whispered, Headfirst and make a splash.
Rök reached across the table and took her hand, leaning in to press his lips to the pulse point at her wrist.
“Player,” she murmured. “You’ve got your moves down, don’t you?”
He grinned against her skin. “And you keep calling me out on them. . . .” He trailed off, his body beginning to blur. “Poppy—”
Her name seemed to echo for a beat as he vanished, leaving her hand in midair and the chair across from her empty.
She straightened, collecting herself. He would return directly; he just needed to tell the summoner that he was on a date. Rök had warned her that he sometimes disappeared.
Still, she wondered what he’d find when he answered that call. A naked temptress already in the throes? Would a player resist?
Pouring herself more pricey wine, Poppy waited for him.
She waited.
She waited.
Her imagination went wild. She quaffed another glass and fielded commiserating looks from other female patrons.
After an hour passed, Poppy finally accepted that Rök was off screwing someone else while their entrees grew chilled and her wine bottle drained.
Had she actually thought something special was occurring between her and the demon? Her public humiliation in this upscale place didn’t touch her private humiliation. Her sisters had been right. For males like Rök, one woman was as good as another.
The eye-watering bill added salt to the wound. As Poppy dazedly meandered out of the restaurant and through that memorable parking lot, she felt a mix of grief and fury. Grury. Rök made her grurious.
She’d foolishly believed that he was the one for her.
The one.
Unfortunately, he considered her something else.
One of many.
