Page 141 of The Rogue's Curse

“In part,” he admitted. “I didn’t say I didn’t enjoy killing her. One can mix business and pleasure, can’t they?”

The spirit sneered at him. Not a connoisseur of his humor, then. “And the scarlet-haired one who weaves through time?”

“Brigitte?” he asked.

“How many times did you try to thwart fate?”

“Twice,” he said.

The creature’s eyes gleamed with hunger as she leaned forward. “Twice, you say? I see once, some thirty years ago.”

He nodded. He’d spotted Brigitte by chance in an Atlanta nightclub, and he’d made up his mind to spare Julian the pain of seeing her again. It would end the same as it always had, with an ugly death, and so he vowed to make it quick. Perhaps Julian would suffer from wondering and uncertainty, but that was better than watching the love of his life die again, listening to her final heartbeats yet again. But fate had other plans, and his attempt had nearly cost him his life.

One minute, he’d been seducing Brigitte into a dark alley, and the next, he was knocked unconscious by a blast of magic so powerful it had permanently marked the nearby buildings. He woke up a day later at the bottom of a lake with a bullet in his head and a cinderblock tied to his ankle. He’d never told Julian where he was on those two lost days, simply saying he’d made some questionable choices.

“Back in Europe, I saw her as a child. It must have been after the third time she died,” Paris said. “I found a witch who could locate her, and I found her in a little village in Germany. Cute as a button, with that fiery hair and the birthmark on her neck.”

The creature leaned forward, eyes gleaming with excitement. “I don’t remember this,” she said.

“Perhaps you were asleep at the wheel. Or perhaps I knew all along I wouldn’t be able to do it, and so you never noticed,” he said.

“Why didn’t you kill her?”

“I intended to. I thought it would be less cruel, but when I saw her, I couldn’t do it. She was a little girl,” he said.

“So you are weak-willed,” the spirit said.

“Would it have worked? Or would fate have stopped me as it did thirty years ago?”

Her eyes flared bright. “Fate has not interfered. The workings of the witch are not the will of fate. She twists and torments the weave. She dams the flow of time and corrupts everything.”

Anger. That was good.

“So you don’t think Brigitte should die repeatedly?” he asked.

“We are not here to talk about Brigitte,” the spinner said.

“Then what are we here to talk about, Nameless One?” he teased.

She rose, casting over him her long shadow. “You are disrespectful and brash.”

“If you’ve been with me for two hundred years, you know neither of those things are true,” he said. She glared back at him, and then flashed him a toothy grin. The sheer number of teeth was unsettling.

“You are many things, Phillippe Rossignol. At the very least, you have been entertaining, though being entertained is not my purpose,” she said.

“Your purpose is to serve fate,” he said.

“That is correct.”

“Then help me so you can get back to it,” he said. “If you know me, then look into my heart and decide if you can set me free. I have neverloved anyone like I love Misha Volkov. You know this is true. Tear me open and read me.”

“Don’t be so crass,” the creature said. She threw up her hand, and the night sky was suddenly a garish film of his life, flashes of memory; there was blood and smoke as he and Misha fought; there was sweat and heat as they made love. It was dizzying, pain and pleasure in one, light and dark, madness and agonizingly sharp crystal clarity.

A warm hand fell on his shoulder, and the world went so silent that his ears rang from it. When he opened his eyes, he saw Misha, ethereal and angelic. “Paris, we’re trapped in my mind. You have to trust me to get you out of here,” he said, offering his hand. “Whatever you do, don’t look back. Do you trust me with everything?”

“I trust you,” he said. Was this it? Or was there some hidden tell on Misha’s expression that he was supposed to notice to prove how much he deserved him? His eyes were warm amber, and a large ruby ring adorned one finger. Paris took a step closer and took Misha’s hand. The world went dark, and he felt as if they were surging upward, through icy wind and rain.

Voices called to him. There was Alistair, telling him to turn back, to come back for him. There was Tobias Pfahler, begging them to end his suffering. There was Shoshanna, telling him he had no mate. And there was his little sister, crying that it was so cold down in the earth, so cold and lonely and frightening in the dark.

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