Page 19 of House of Pain
What a massive bag of shit.
“Why don’t we try one of the smaller Houses?” one of the girls asked. “The House of Monkeys or the House of Oxen surely have less protection around their Books.”
Blaze recognized her face, being from the same House and all, but he couldn’t recall her name.
To Blaze’s and everyone else’s surprise, it was Alecto who answered the girl. “Because we’re one of the big four. We don’t steal from lesser Houses if we want to continue being in the big four.”
Ah, how interesting.
Alecto’s eyes were icy cold as she glared at the girl, making her shrink into her seat by the bay window.
The tiny snarl curling her lips amused Blaze more than he would have liked.
Since when was Alecto Black so vicious?
“That’s right.” Val eyed Alecto with a pleased smile, tilting her head to the side. “Blaze, how’s the preparation for the first attack?”
It took a moment for Blaze to drag his attention away from Alecto and realize it was his time to talk.
Blaze cleared his throat.“We’re going to perform the locator spell on their Book. As we know they like to change location due to their protection wards being weaker.” He paused and Val nodded. “I’m going in to steal the Gorms we need for the ritual from Professor Gabetown. Once I have it, we’ll be ready to go.”
Val jerked her chin. “Is anyone helping you with that?”
Blaze pouted, shaking his head.
His original plan was getting the newest pledges to steal the Gorms they needed from the Herbalism in Witchcraft professor. But they proved to be rather pissy about breaking into a classroom after hours to steal something their first week on campus.
Those motherfuckers were going to drive Blaze mad. All the boundaries and tiptoeing around the rules as if they were scared little does.
They were supposed to be the ruthlessandfearless House of Snakes.
“Take Jolene with you,” Val instructed.
“I’mnotgoing to go anywhere with him,” Jolene shot back, crossing her arms.
Blaze pretended to collect the tears from the corners of his eyes in his palm, but he couldn’t hold the chuckle back.
“For fuck’s sake,” Val said, rolling her eyes. But she didn’t push Jolene to agree. Instead, she turned to Alecto. “How about you? You have a good relationship with the professor. If Blaze fucks up, you can help smooth the situation.”
Blaze was about to open his mouth to argue against such foolishness, but then an idea bloomed inside his mind.
An idea so wicked that Blaze almost leaped out of his chair with a happy yelp.
This would be a perfect opportunity to get back to Alecto for that hickey action.
Blaze’s own personal revenge.
“I don’t think—” Alecto said.
“Wonderful idea,” Blaze cut her off. When she shot him a deadly look, his smile only widened. “I’ll take Alecto with me, and we’ll be done with the preparation by the end of this week.”
“That’s what I wanna hear,” Val agreed.
Clearly Alecto had forgotten her place. It was time Blaze reminded her.
After the meeting was over, instead of going to the town for drinks with the rest of the House, Blaze decided to retreat into his room and spend the rest of the afternoon catching up on sleep.
Blaze’s room was on the third floor of their brownstone. He occupied one of the two rooms taking over the whole floor, the other belonging to Val.
