“Do you want me to have him show you?” Farideh said. “Or do you want to say what it is you’re getting at?”
Farideh knew perfectly well what the shopkeeper was getting at: she didn’t belong here. Whatever clientele the shopkeeper was used to dealing with, a seventeen-year-old tiefling trying to rein in the tendrils of shadow that curled and coiled around the edges of her frame was not a part of it. The woman’s eyes moved from the swell of the horns along Farideh’s brow, to the flat color of her eyes, to the sharp points of her eyeteeth when she spoke, as if hunting for a sign of what, exactly, she was up to.
“You a friend of the Dragon Lords’?” the woman demanded.
“Do I look like someone your lord would employ?”
The woman’s eyes lingered a little longer on Farideh’s heavy horns. “Of course not,” she said. “But then, that’s the sort they’d like to have, innit? Skims beneath your notice, and catches you all unawares when the wrong someone happens by your shop. All ’cause you thought sure the Lords on high wouldn’t give a ragged tiefling two coppers together.” She smiled nastily. “No offense.”
The powers of the Hells surged up in her veins, forcing their way down into her hands, throbbing behind the beds of her nails as if they were trying to force their way out in a torrent of fire that would show the shopkeeper just how careful she ought to be about offending the heir of the Brimstone Angel.
“None taken,” Farideh lied.
“But if you’re not with the Lords’,” the woman went on, “then I’m thinking I ought to report you to the city watch. Ought to be conscientious. Since there’s such a fear of criminals.” Farideh could almost hear the old saying about tieflings, running through the woman’s thoughts: one’s a curiosity, two’s a conspiracy, three’s a curse.
Farideh drew a slow breath, trying to calm her pulse and push the powers back down. “He’ll only be a moment,” she said.
“So will the watch,” the woman said.
They couldn’t afford to bribe the watch, Farideh knew, nor pay a trumpedup fine. They couldn’t afford to wait for some jailor to let her out of a cell or some magistrate to say she’d done nothing wrong. Farideh stood, glanced up and down the street.
“That’s what I thought,” the woman muttered.
But Farideh couldn’t leave, not with the spell still tethering Lorcan, and if she went the twenty steps the spell would stretch, she’d still be well in the woman’s sight. The engines of Malbolge churned more slick magic into her and she seemed to pulse from the soles of her feet up to her ears. Her veins were darkening with the unspent power. She had to go. She could not go. The woman narrowed her eyes.
There was nowhere to flee but Temerity’s shop.
An army of scents assaulted Lorcan once he crossed the threshold-arispeg, bitter marka, myrrh, and juniper-crawling so deep into his nose, they lay across his tongue. Long ropes of drying garlic hung from the rafters like garlands, and bins of seeds and blossoms and teas lined the walls, making the space feel much closer and narrower than it was.
Lorcan never understood why Temerity had such a banal cover for her powers-perhaps the smell covered the stronger components of her rituals, perhaps she liked being the one who came by such rare and precious commodities, perhaps she just enjoyed having a supplier for her personal perfumes-but the little shop seemed to satisfy her, which was good enough for him. He had everything he needed from Temerity.
Almost, he amended, crossing the shop. Which step triggered the magical tinkling of a bell, he couldn’t have said, but Lorcan was ready when an auburnhaired tiefling woman with the angry tips of a pact-brand reaching up from under her low, wide collar came around the shelves behind the counting table. He leaned against the table with the sort of smile that usually made her forget he was such a bad person to trust. “Temerity,” he said. “Well met.”
She stopped dead. “Well met,” she said, a smile of her own creeping across her lovely features. “Didn’t expect to see you coming in by the door.”
“All these years, I can still surprise you-I like that,” he said. That sounded right. He was out of practice with her-with any of them, really, aside from Farideh. “I was in the city, and how could I pass through without checking on you?”
She held his gaze, eyes like silver pieces. Eyes empty of the sort of warmth and interest Temerity usually had for him. Lorcan tensed. Reconsidered.
“How long has it been?” she asked, coming right up to the edge of the counting table. “Do you remember?”
He didn’t, which was sloppy and he knew it. He’d been distracted by other things-the plots of his mother and sister, the complicated machinations of the Lords of the Nine. Farideh.
“Too long,” he settled on, with a tone of regret.
Temerity’s smile didn’t waver. “Indeed,” she said. “Ten months. And another two before that.”
“And you didn’t call,” Lorcan said. He took her hand in his. “I assumed you didn’t need me. I hate to be a nuisance. I do hope,” he added, lower, drawing a small circle on the skin of her wrist, “that I’m not being a nuisance.”
A little warmth stirred in Temerity’s features. She was simple-much simpler than some other warlocks he could name. Make her feel special. Make her feel wise. Make her think that she’s making the best possible decisions, even when she isn’t. Make her think there’s something there, under the surface, between them.
“Too long,” she agreed, brushing her curls away from the side of her face. Then, “Long enough your rivals have come calling.”
“Oh?” Lorcan said, as if it didn’t concern him. “I’m glad I can still count you mine.”
“For now,” she said, but she relaxed.
“Well,” he said smoothly, still toying with her hand, “you’ll at least give me the chance to make a counteroffer. I’d hate to lose you because other people’s mistakes kept me away.” He brought her hand to his lips and she exhaled unevenly. What sort of idiots were those other collectors if they couldn’t sway Temerity? “Haven’t I given you everything you want?”
“Not everything,” she said.
“Well we’ll have to see about remedying that, won’t we?” he murmured, even though he knew what she was asking for and he wouldn’t dare try to get it. It didn’t matter-not now. She was listening, and that was enough. “But in order to do that I do need a small favor. A little ritual-no,” he cut himself off and leaned a little nearer, close enough to kiss her just below the ear. “We can get to that later, of course, darling.” Temerity raised an eyebrow and smiled. He drew another slow circle across her wrist.
The bells chimed again, and Lorcan glanced back over his shoulder, careful to hold tight to Temerity as he did. Things weren’t nearly far enough along that he could risk her getting distracted by some customer.
But it wasn’t some customer. Farideh stared back at him, frozen.
No, not at him. At Temerity’s hand in his.
Lords of the shitting Nine, he thought.
“Well met,” Temerity said, the picture of a sweet-tempered shopkeeper. But Lorcan knew better and heard the sudden venom in her voice. She yanked her hand free and moved around the table. “Can I help you?”
“I. . um. .,” Farideh trailed off and she looked away at a chain of seedpods hanging down from one of the heavy shelves. Shit and ashes, Lorcan thought, already sorting through all the things he was going to have to say to soothe her. Every option would turn into something far more complicated than he wanted to handle. Why couldn’t she be like Temerity, wanting to be soothed?
If she were like Temerity, Lorcan thought, you’d have a much bigger problem on your hands. For now, he needed space and quickly, before anybody got any more ideas.
“You’re interrupting,” he said.
When Farideh looked up at him, her expression was guarded-nothing for Temerity to see there. There at least was that. “Clearly.” She looked to Temerity and held out a hand. “You must be Temerity.”