Last Rites (Darkling Mage 6)

I flinched. I admit, that hurt a little. “Well, now you’re just being mean.”

He adjusted his glasses, grinning. “It’s my default setting.”

“But I got you to say I was a seven,” I said.

He sat perfectly still, his expression unchanged.

“So you think I’m cute,” I added.

Herald frowned. “I said nothing of the sort.”

“But that’s what you basically said.”

“Listen, Dustin,” Herald hissed. “I know you’re trying to be cute, but we aren’t kids. If there’s something you’re trying to tell me, I’d appreciate if you – ”

“Oh,” a voice said from the door.

We both started at the noise. Herald’s hands flew to his lap. Mine flew for the covers, which I pulled up to my chest. I don’t know, I guess being so exposed made me feel more vulnerable.

“Sorry,” Asher said. “I didn’t think I’d catch you two in the middle of something.”

“Not at all,” Herald said cheerfully, drawing on his deep, dormant reserves of charisma. “Something?” He turned to me pointedly. “More like nothing. Nothing’s going on.”

Ouch. That hurt more than it should have. I just stared back at him, my mouth open, like I wanted to say something. But I couldn’t find the words.

“I was just checking on Dust,” Asher said. “I was going to offer him some healing if he was still in pain, but I can always come back later to – ”

“It’s cool,” Herald said. “I think we’re done here.”

And there came the second stab of pain. Double ouch.

He rose from his chair, then clapped Asher on the shoulder as he left the room, not once looking behind him.

Asher checked that the corridor was clear, then threw his hands up. “What the hell happened here? What was that about?”

I sat up, wincing at the lingering pain in my chest, right in my heart. That was from what Carver did. Must have been.

“I don’t know,” I said. “I’m not sure.”

Asher shook his head as he stalked to the foot of my bed. He planted his hands on his hips, like an angry mother. “You were a dumbass is what happened.”

I raked a hand through my hair, looking at Mister Grumbles still on the chair, a gift forgotten. Herald hadn’t even taken him.

“Yeah,” I said, staring into the empty doorway. “I was a dumbass.”

Chapter 21

“You’re only going to make him madder,” Asher said, glaring at my reflection. “Surely you know that.”

I pouted back at his reflection. “You know that’s not true. I’m very cute, and very charming. I can fix this.”

Looking back into the mirror, I adjusted my collar, smoothing back this stubborn little cowlick on the crown of my head that, considering the length I liked to keep my hair, shouldn’t have even existed.

“I’m just saying,” Asher said. “If I were you, I’d give it some time. Let Herald cool off for a bit. He’s annoyed, and you’re confused. Hell, what are you even going to say?”

I ran the pads of my fingers over my eyebrows, smoothing the hairs down, like that was going to change anything. Okay, you got me. Everything I was doing in the mirror, all that preening was just me trying to delay the horrible inevitability of what I was about to do. I guess I was waiting for Asher to give me a good enough argument to get me to back down. Herald had just left in a huff, after all.

But something in the pit of my stomach was convinced I could get Herald to stop hating me so much, and it thought that directly attacking him where he lived was the best course of action. Quite literally, too.