I am actually a little bit touched at this. “You want a job to support us?”
“Exactly!”
I sigh. “It’s not gonna take weeks, Pie. It’s going to take decades.”
“No.” She shakes her head furiously. “No. I refuse to allow that to happen. I’m smart. Your boy, Grant, he was smart too. And he took excellent notes. I think he was hiding things from you.”
I frown. “What things?”
“I think he had the answer. I found these books written in Babylonian and Greek. And they are all about how to break your curse.” She pauses. “I think he was writing things down in weird languages so he could hide things from you.”
I get up and walk over to the stone counter. “Let me see that.” And sure as shit, that little fucker was hiding things from me. “What’s it say?”
“Oh, you can’t read it?” She’s mocking me. “I thought you were the king here. The ruler, the—”
“What does it say?”
Her whole face brightens. In fact, she smiles at me. And it’s a nice smile too. “Do you want the potion?”
“What potion?”
“The one I just invented to understand Babylonian, and Greek?” She nods her head at me. “It worked.”
I look at her alchemy bench. It’s a fucking mess of test tubes, and beakers, and open flames. There’s jars and jars of herbs, and crystals, and powders. Some of this shit is glowing. Which I’m not sure about because from my experience, glowing potions are very powerful. And she’s on day one of her self-paced Let’s Do Magic course, so that’s probably not a good thing.
“I dunno.”
“Is the great big bull-god scared?”
“Yeah. You have no idea what you’re doing.”
“And yet I understand Babylonian, and Greek. And you can’t even read this book.” She taps the book to illustrate her point.
“Fine. Which of these many, many disgusting concoctions is it?”
“This one.” She picks up a test tube of glowing purple goop and thrusts it at me. “Drink it.”
“If this kills me—”
“If this kills you, you should thank me. Since you’re immortal. That means your curse would be broken.”
Well. She’s got a point there. I put the test tube up to my lips, almost pass out from the horrible smell, then down it in one gulp. It hits my stomach with a burn.
“The burn passes,” Pie says hurriedly. And she puts her hand on my arm, either faking compassion or really meaning it.
Her touch is warm too. And something about it does make me feel better. Soon, the burn is gone and in its place is a tingling feeling in my hands. Then a buzzing in my head.
“Did you get to the buzzing yet?” she asks. I nod. “Good. You’re almost there. Now, while we’re waiting for it to work, let’s talk about this job.”
“No.” I put up a hand. “Not now.”
“Yes. I need a job. Just a part-time one. The Honey Bean is looking for a waitress. I need that, Pell. And I will use all my money to buy what we need and then I won’t have to go into debt.”
“You don’t get it. That won’t work. The harder you fight the curse, the more it works against you. The less magic money you use, the more the curse will force you to use it. Bad things will happen. And that will force you to work harder to…” I pause, not really wanting to say the last bit.
“Harder to what?” she presses.
“Please me. The harder you’ll have to work to please me with the debt book stuff.”
She points a finger in my face. “I will not be blowing you. Just… FYI.”
I cannot hide my laugh. “Good to know. And for the record, Pie, you’re not my type.”
She lifts her chin up in indignation like I just insulted her. “I’m not your type?”
“Nope.”
“What kind of type do you like? Bull girls?”
“I’m not a bull.”
“A satyr chimera girl?”
“There are no female satyr chimeras. We’re all men.”
“Then what is your type?” And now she’s annoyed.
I shrug. “I’ve always been partial to the nymphs.”
“Nymphs.” She crinkles her nose like the thought of nymphs is distasteful. “Water fairies?”
“Not fairies. Nymphs. You know. Willowy girls with evil intentions lurking in the forest.”
She laughs. A real laugh. “You like bad girls?”
“I do.”
“I’m not bad enough for you?”
“Not even close.”
“Hmmph.” She’s trying hard not to show it, but she’s definitely taking exception to my preferences. Either that, or she fancies herself a bad girl and I just… what? Insulted her? Challenged her?
I hope it’s the second one. Because even though she’s completely ridiculous, Pie is… fun. And I could be on board with her being bad with me.
“Oh, for fuck’s sake. Can you just put on an apron or something?” She’s looking down at my… package. Which is growing due to the little bad-girl fantasy currently running through my head. “You’re so gross. Why do you insist on flaunting your penis?”