Page 61 of A Dose of Agony
Janet leans against the table. “I’m having a hard time with mine. I feel like the magic isn’t strong enough.”
“The painting is amazing,” I tell her. Every time I glance at it, I’m careful not to look too long, but I don’t want to look away, honestly. It’s this beautiful cavern, with shades of amber and purple and black so dark I’m surprised it’s real. There are twinkling lights inside and so many layers of stone it feels like a maze.
Every day, I feel like it can’t get better, but she keeps adding more layers of shadows and highlights.
“I didn’t mean for it to turn out like that, actually. But I kept thinking about that song—you know, from the Akrasia Games? It was a creepy circus song, kinda like I’d planned to use, so I think the whole painting sorta turned into that memory.”
“Oh!” I say. “I didn’t realize.” Suddenly, the imagery is a lot darker to me. Instead of pretty, it’s horrifying.
“Even dark and scary things can be lovely,” Lola adds.
I nod. Definitely true.
“I’m not necessarily worried about pretty. Interesting is just as good.”
“Well, it’s definitely interesting. I always wanted to keep looking at it to find out what’s inside those shadows, but now that I know what it is—” I shiver. “I might avoid it.”
Janet chuckles.
“Have you come up with anything new for your big plot?” Lola asks me, looking over my scribbled notes.
“I found a new death potion. It’s not as strong as I need it to be to work on all of them, but I’m trying to see how I can maybe alter it to make it stronger. Oh! And I did throw in a few antidotes in my last batch of potions. Just in case.”
That was Janet’s idea. She mentioned how much of a difference it could have made the last time, when Jarron was magicless. She’s totally right. I probably should have thought of that before. I can’t imagine a circumstance in which Jarron ever accidentally gets nullified, but even so, we may as well learn from our previous mistakes.
It’s not like I don’t have the cauldron space.
I’ll be sure to make an antidote to the death potion as well, once I decide on one. Which honestly has to be extremely soon, or I’ll risk not being able to finish it in time.
“And the nullifier?” Lola asks.
“No real progress there.” I shrug.
Lola looks disappointed, but she darts around the room, taking a careful look at each of my current works in progress. “You’ll figure something out.”
I don’t have the heart to tell her that right now, making a permanent nullifier is not very high up on my priorities list.
“And if you don’t,” Janet says. “You could always just bluff.” She winks.
My brows rise, almost impressed with her suggestion. She’s the one that was nervous about the idea of a permanent magic eraser, now she’s suggesting I lie even if I don’t achieve it.
I kinda love it.
Right now, the first thing on my mind is getting my sister away from the creatures who intend to kill her the moment she’s not of use anymore.
29
If You Like It Then You Shoulda Put A Claim On It
“Where’s your boyfriend,little human?” a low voice calls when I cross through the sunroom. I ignore the comment as I always do, but from the corner of my eye I note the three males huddled by the windows watching me. One of them I recognize as fae, but the others… I’m not sure.
I don’t like not knowing.
The situation is the same whether they’re wolves, vampires, fae, or whatever these beings are. They want to make me feel uncomfortable; they want to see how far they can push me to get a reaction.
The longer Jarron is away, the worse the backlash has gotten. It’s going on almost six weeks now, if we don’t include his visit the other night. Part of me wonders if I’ll even see him for my birthday next week.
“Everyone is so convinced you’re the one,” the boy with shining green eyes says.
