imagination.”
“I guess I had a few times like that, too.”
“Once you're older, that sort of thing becomes a ridiculous fancy, doesn't it?”
“Yeah.”
“My earliest memories are a favorite. It was when I had freedom, when I was important, and when I learned the most about myself. Thaimon has indicated he doesn't recall too much from that era. I know from both you and him that I was part of the Victorian time, but I personally can't see it very well. You seem rather plagued by it, however.” Wraithbane took the first bite, leading the way by dipping a piece of bread in the oil and vinegar and eating it with meat and cheese. “Each one of us have faced times when the world didn't want us any longer. For me, it's the day the Veil fell and we didn't need a shadow-walker anymore. For Thaimon, he became a wraith and the Black Death started. And for you, it seems the Victorian era particularly disliked your ambitiousness. Curious, isn't it?”
“Hmm.” As soon as I began to eat, I was instantly ravenous and ruthless about not sharing. Once a certain selection of anything began to get low, Wraithbane replaced it with something new from his pantry. Beyond the third glass of wine, I lost count of how much I'd had because he kept topping the glass off rather than letting me finish it first.
I couldn't resist not asking, “I want to know who I am. Who I was.”
“You are as you always have been and always will be, yet you're a very changed person all the same. You are Brandy Marie Silver, you are Dawn Marie Smith, and you were Charlotte Lovell and others before her. A few ignorant individuals still think of you as Charlotte, but you're distinctly different from her.”
“What of Dreamweaver?”
Wraithbane scoffed. “Dreamweaver was a fictional creation of sensationalist media. A physical embodiment of a monster society wanted to fear. A villain for a power-seeking government.”
“I thought you didn't know if she'd killed her husband or not.”
“Your questions had me intrigued. I found some information, not much, but enough. I know how to spot propaganda when I see it.”
I joined him by the oven, not-quite brushing elbows with him, positively purring inside when he slung an arm over my shoulders. “Is this why you were so insistent on having me as a partner?”
“I knew that you've been a hex-breaker, and I knew the Kettle needed your talents. Hex-breakers need someone to watch after them. They lose themselves to their work, forget to eat, have trouble sleeping and knowing which day it is. It wasn't until later that I tied you to my memories.”
Call me pathetic, but I knew he was right. I did lose myself to work, forget to eat—and even tonight I'd failed to sleep even with the aid of pharmaturgicals. Had it not been for Kayla's phone, I wouldn't know what day it was.
I groaned and tried to forget about all the questions, about Thaimon and past lives and just everything. I closed my eyes and we talked about cheeses first, then about nothing. For the first time in a long time, I felt easy just talking with another person, swimming in the conversation, saying whatever words came to mind in whatever order they came to me in. Feeling unquestioning confidence in how it would be received. Getting bolder with the things I hadn't felt safe talking about in the hours before.
“It's good to be back,” I said. “When I was in the dungeons, they had me in a cell which had no spell traces at all. Blank walls. Everything felt dead. Worse than dead. Decaying, infectious. Not that I knew it literally, though.” I thought of the life leeches. “Here, there's bits of your spells hanging around. Lots of them really faded and old, but even those matter. Things from Jay and Willow, too, and every now and then from Doc Mike. I thought I'd never see it again.”
“It is a terrifying feeling.”
I snorted. “I can't imagine you ever feeling isolated, helpless, and unable to do even the simplest thing.”
Wraithbane rolled a cigarette. Or something like it. The sulfuric scent of a match tickled my nose as he said, “Not even tied down to a hospital bed, drugged, watching the suits haul away the person who just saved my life?”
A flash of heat touched my cheeks. “I hadn't thought—I didn't mean to be...”
Wraithbane exhaled a puff of smoke, looking like a dragon. “Want to make it up to me?” He held up his rolled cigarette to my lips.
“Are you sure it's a good idea? I just got out of containment.”
“You're in the wrong line of work if you want to reach a ripe old age.”
He had a point.
Still, I hesitated. Wraithbane wasn't the sort of man who took sharing lightly. The food had been one thing—this was another. Even stealing a sip of coffee had nothing on what he was offering. Not to mention the other connotations, thoughts which turned me suddenly shy. Quickly, I took a small puff.
Wraithbane tutted. “Into the lungs. That barely made it down your throat.”
Blushing even more fiercely than ever and pleased by the encouragement, I did as he said.
“Hold it for a little.”
Tasting it across my throat and tongue, I slowly exhaled in his direction and wagged a finger at him. “That's not the usual flavor of Marlboro.”
“That's because it isn't Marlboro. Cheap cigarette. If you're going to have a vice, make it a good one,” Wraithbane said and eased his weight against the enamel oven, watching me with soft, bright eyes. Whatever he was smoking was taking the edge off the withdrawal pain. It made me feel better to know that, but perhaps I shouldn't call it a cigarette. Or was it one? I didn't want to admit not knowing, so I stayed quiet and just enjoyed being with him.
I loved this side of him, the side that smiled and joked and flirted. I loved it because I knew the other side, the serious, gruff man who was not above underhanded techniques and blunt force. Odd, I'd thought that I'd be angry with him for not coming clean about the past lives earlier, but instead I understood. I'd needed stability, and he'd done his best to provide it.
He said, “I did this backwards. Should have brought out the wine now instead of earlier.”
I said, “You know, this side of you isn't so different after all. Putting your hands where they don't belong, bossing others around, shoving if they don't give over fast enough.”
He laughed, echoing a merry challenge in his smile. “I am what I am, and you haven't lost your knack.”
“My knack for what?”
“Hex-breaking.”
“So, what, I magically see what's wrong with a person and bam, I fix them?”
“Not so easily as that.”
“What, then?”
Wraithbane shrugged. “You're as ruthless in defeating a hex as I am in defeating an enemy. You'll use whatever resources are available to meet those ends. Rites, rituals, beliefs, lies, truths, herbs, tools, medicines.”
And Bliss, whispered a guilty part of me. I cleared my throat. “What's a hex, then? A curse?”
Or a black shard embedded in the heart?
Wraithbane said, “Could be. It's a broad term, covers all sorts of ailments. Physical, spiritual, physiological. The root cause varies.”
I nodded. This made sense with Dreamweaver's book and what I knew of her past. “Is that why Thaimon wanted me, then? To find a way to make him not a wraith?”
“Perhaps. And it's time I told you the full reason why I hunt him in particular.” Wraithbane curled a lip and puffed a bit of smoke before continuing, “Prior to working for the Kettle, I was making a good living doing private security. My last client had been a rich man but he was terrified that someone was going to kill him on a certain night. He hired me about two weeks in advance of this date as last-minute security to add to his present forces. I lived in the mansion with his family along with the rest of the force. Everyone had two sets of keyfobs which opened inner and outer doors, there was a metal detector prior to entering his office. All staff had two forms of identification checked should they leave and attempt to re-enter the premises. Supposedly the building had been designed to withstand a small bomb. This is only the start
. I can't go into the less-common security measures. I thought he was paranoid, but you don't say that to someone who thinks they 'may get by' on a six-figure income if the market crashes.
“A week prior to the date, the client stockpiled food and put the building into complete lockdown. No one allowed inside, no one allowed outside. In theory there was not even internet or phone access, but his teenagers found a way around that. Between what they told their friends and what the cook told the maid, I pieced the story together.
“Twenty-seven years prior, my client had been in debt and recently unemployed. At the bottom of a bottle of tequila, he met Thaimon who asked what the client would give to obtain all his earthly desires. They made a bargain, Thaimon withdrew a little blue appointment book, and they set a date for payment. Understandably, my client did not believe that Thaimon had any supernatural powers, so he thought that he was simply wishing rather than signing a contract. Upon hearing the tale, I was not convinced of the so-called Wishmonger, either.” Wraithbane's lips curled in contempt. “My first mistake. But nevermind that.
“My client, over the following years acquired all that he had desired. After every piece of good news, he received an invoice. 'One position in corporate headquarters, delivered on this date,' and the date was the time of his good fortune. Or, 'the love of your life seen today.' As the invoices continued, my client became concerned that he could not now stop payment. Then came the note, 'The day