Grim Lovelies (Grim Lovelies 1)

“Dorma, dorma, sonora precimo,” Anouk told her.

“Dorma, bastard,” Cricket muttered, jabbing the knife harder. “Dorma, sonora precimo, jerkwad.”

Viggo started to mumble a protest but then slumped forward, falling asleep more slowly than Hunter Black, as Cricket’s whisper hadn’t exactly been quiet or precise. As he fell, his head collided with the hard edge of the kitchen sink with a nasty-sounding crack, and Anouk flinched, but Cricket’s eyes just gleamed with dark delight.

“That was so cool.” She cleaned and put away her blades. “Is there a spell for smashing things? Like stupid boys’ skulls?”

Anouk flexed her hands, trying to shake the odd sparking sensation in them.

The gas light over the stove flicked on, and Beau stood in the doorway with wide eyes. “What maléfice is going on here?”

“Get Hunter Black’s legs,” Cricket said.

He still looked confused but helped Anouk and Cricket drag their prisoners down the wooden stairs to the wine cellar. If the upper portions of the château were old, then down there it was practically prehistoric. The walls dripped with unseen moisture; the foundation was crumbled from time. The door to the wine cellar was made of thick oak with a metal grate set into it like a prison cell’s. It probably had been a prison cell once, Anouk figured. Cricket dropped Viggo unceremoniously on the floor.

Beau shivered. “It’s freezing down here.”

“They can cuddle for warmth.” Cricket kicked Viggo’s arm for good measure. “How long do you think they’ll be out?”

“Not too long, I hope.” Anouk thought of the clock several floors above, its perpetual tick-tick-tick. She dusted off a wine barrel and dragged it beside the door, prepared to wait. “And when they wake up, we’ve got to be ready.”

Cricket left to explain to Petra and Mada Zola what had happened, and after a few minutes of shivering next to Anouk, Beau left to fetch blankets and something warm for him and Anouk to drink. Nestling in her jacket, Anouk let out a long-held breath.

They still had time, she told herself. The way she saw it, Hunter Black was one of them, and so that ticking clock meant just as much to him as it did to her. Come midnight tomorrow, he stood to lose not only himself but his abilities as an assassin and Viggo’s protector, without which he had nothing.

A moan came from the wine cellar.

She jumped up. “Viggo?” She held a candle to the grate, but the light was too faint to see more than a few feet. “Viggo, wake up. I need to talk to you.”

Hunter Black suddenly loomed at the grate, so specterlike that Anouk dropped the candle. She cursed and searched the dusty floor until she found it again, but she had no matches, so she swallowed a briar tangled in her sweater. Ouch.

“Incendie,” she whispered, and a flame flickered to life.

Hunter Black eyed the candle warily, as though he didn’t trust the magic he’d just seen. “What do you want?”

“A deal.” It took effort to keep her spine straight. Even though she was on the free side of the door and he was locked inside, Hunter Black still had a way of making her feel rattled. “I have a proposal for Viggo.”

He gave a cold laugh. “You have no idea what you’re doing without Luc here to hold your hand.”

She narrowed her eyes. “Despite all your glowering, you relied on him as much as the rest of us. I think you feel just as lost without him.” Her gaze fell to the stitches peeking out from his shirt collar, and Hunter Black clamped a hand over them. Luc had done more than just stitch up his wounds—?Luc had shown him kindness when the rest of the world had not.

For a few flickers of the candle he looked as though he wanted to get his hands around her throat, but then his face eased. Grudgingly, he asked, “How is it possible?”

“What?”

He nodded toward the candle. “You cast magic. Just now, and upstairs in the kitchen. Beasties can’t cast magic.” There was an edge in his voice that went beyond curiosity.

She raised an eyebrow. “I could teach you to cast a spell yourself if you’d stop being such a—”

Viggo shoved his face close to the grate, cutting her off. He’d mostly cleaned himself, but his hair was streaked with dirt. “What’s this about a deal?”

“First tell me how you got past the hedge.”

Viggo smirked. “I know a trap when I see one—?we weren’t about to stroll through an open gate. I might not be a magic handler, but I’ve learned a thing or two from the Haute. Witches know to add a stipulation to wall spells to prevent climbing over, but they always forget about under. We followed the hedge fo

r a hundred meters and then tunneled beneath it. And that ridiculous bear? He was only enchanted to keep us out. Once we were already in, Hunter Black made quick work of him. Chop-chop.”

Guilt twisted in her chest. Toblerone was gone because of her.