Page 96 of Do You Even Hex, Bro?
I follow her deeper into the market, the weight of the pendant a comforting presence in my pocket. I can't explain why it feels so right, but my wolf is practically purring with satisfaction at the idea of giving it to our mate.
“That was reckless as fuck,” Sadie scolds as we push through increasingly dense crowds. “Giving your DNA to random witches is the magical equivalent of hopping into a van because some weird guy offered you candy.”
"It wasn't candy, it was a necklace," I grumble.
Sadie's eyes narrow. "How are you fucking alive?"
"Look, it just felt right, okay?" I sigh. "I think Regina will like it."
Something in my expression must convince her, because her irritation fades. "Fine. Your fur, your choice. But don't come crawling to me if that old bitch makes you her thrall."
"Yes,mom."
She flips me off with a snort.
We arrive at a stall that doesn't look like a stall at all. It’s more like a tear in reality itself, edges frayed and smoking slightly. Inside the tear stands a figure draped in what appears to be liquidized shadow, face hidden beneath a hood that somehow contains galaxies.
"Sadie Bennett," the figure says, voice like distant thunder. "Right on schedule."
"Chronos," Sadie says with a respectful nod that’s practically a bow coming from her. "I need lunar venom. Three drams."
"Purpose?" The figure's voice ripples through the air.
"Siphon-shifter bonding."
A sound like cracking ice emerges from the hood—laughter, I realize with a start. "Ambitious. The wolf is involved, I presume?"
I step forward. "I am."
"Four alpha wolf shifters," Sadie adds. "One witch. Hence the triple dose."
"Fascinating." Chronos extends a hand—or what I assume is a hand, but it looks more like a black hole in roughly hand shape—and a small vial of silvery liquid materializes. "Payment?"
Sadie digs in her mesh bag, extracting something wrapped in black cloth. "As discussed. Three minutes of fossilized time, harvested from a ley line."
Where the fuck did she getthat? Not the kind of thing Killian can just put on his limitless credit card. Even I can sense this is serious magic. The exchange of items has the weight of ceremony, both beings careful not to directly touch the other. At all.
"Pleasure doing business," Chronos says, already beginning to fade from view. “Do invite me to the bonding. It's been millennia since I witnessed a spectacle like a siphon and fourwolves.”
“Not happening,” Sadie says flatly. “Private, intimate ceremony. You know how it goes.”
The tear in reality seals itself with a sound like someone inhaling sharply through teeth, leaving us standing before an empty space.
"Well, that was anticlimactic," I remark.
"Trust me, boring is good when dealing with semi-corporeal entities who exist outside linear time." Sadie carefully tucks the vial into a special padded pocket in her bag. "One cosmic mishap and we're all experiencing puberty backwards for eternity."
"Is that an actual risk?"
“With Chronos? Everything’s a risk.” She checks her pocketwatch again. "We should go. Market's shifting soon, and wedon'twant to be here when the night vendors arrive."
"Too spooky for Madame Goth herself?" I ask dryly. "Impressive."
Sadie rolls her eyes, as usual.
As we make our way back toward the entrance, I pull out my phone, surprised to find out I actually have reception in this impossible space. The group chat has exploded with notifications.
TOP DAWG: Hey, anyone heard from Regina? She hasn't been in the group chat.
