Last Rites (Darkling Mage 6)

I chuckled, buffing my nails against my shirt as I took off my jacket. “Oh, you know. Cuz I’m so smart. And observant. And super handsome.”

He scratched the end of his nose. “Am I that obvious?”

“Little bit. You get all bashful around her, always blushing and shit. It’s cute.”

“Yeah? Well not cute enough, apparently. I guess she’s with Royce now.”

“I know, right? Interesting choice.” I pulled Asher in closer, slinging an arm over his shoulder, mussing his hair with my other hand. “Listen. Buddy. There’s plenty of fish in the sea. All we gotta do is expand your circle. You don’t know a lot of girls. That’s all it is. But there’s billions of them out there.”

“Billions,” he murmured into the sleeve of my shirt, clearly unconvinced.

“Actual billions. Come on. Snap out of it. It’s just a crush. It’ll pass.”

He wriggled his way out from under my arm, suddenly defiant. “Aww, like you would know. When is yours going to pass?”

I blinked at him. “Mine? My what?”

“Your crush on Igarashi.”

I didn’t need to look in a mirror to know that my face had gone bright red. “I – I don’t know what,” I tried to say, stammering.

Asher rolled his eyes. “Oh, get over it. Stop denying it. There’s something going on there, it’s so obvious. I was with you guys at the diner. Back when we had pecan pie, remember?”

I pressed my lips together and shook my head, suddenly the defiant one myself.

“Please,” Asher said, rising from the bed, folding his arms across his chest. “You can’t pull one over on me. I’m smart. And observant. And super handsome.”

“You take that back,” I said, brandishing a finger at him like a dagger. “Those are my words. No, you give them back. I don’t know where you’re getting your ideas from, but Herald and I are just – ”

“Tiger.”

“What?”

Asher flung his wrist out at my bed, where the tiger that I’d stolen from the carnival sat grumpily against one of my pillows.

“That tiger was clearly meant for him. It’s so obvious, and you’re just waiting for the next time you see him to give it over. But for now you’re sleeping with it like – like it’s a replacement Herald.”

“A fucking tiger?” I smacked myself on the forehead. “A replacement for Herald? What are you even talking about?”

“You should just go see him and give it over,” Asher said, an irritatingly smug smile forming on his lips. “Then again, might not make sense, because then, what would you have to snuggle with at night?”

“You’re such a child, Mayhew,” I said. My voice was getting louder, too. “Leave me and Mister Grumbles alone.”

Asher laughed out loud. “It has a name?”

I flicked a marble-sized ball of flame at his back as he scrambled for the doorway, fleeing from the sight of my massive, and surely very intimidating scowl. It missed, but I meant to do that. Annoying as that exchange had been, I wasn?

??t about to set Asher on fire. I made sure to make a loud, decisive “Harrumph” as I slammed my bedroom door shut.

With narrowed eyes I took off my backpack and let Vanitas out, daring him to say something. He floated over to his stone shelf wordlessly, but he was still laughing audibly in my mind.

“Traitor,” I grumbled.

“Liar,” he chuckled back.

Frowning, I brushed my teeth, sloughed off my clothes, and threw myself into bed, still irrationally annoyed over – what, exactly, I wasn’t sure. Whatever, man. I just needed sleep. That was all. It’d been a long day, and I was just tired. That was it.

I stretched over to my end table, clicking off the lamp. I mentally bid Vanitas good night, despite his small betrayal.