Page 42 of Encore
Arden would happily paddle my bottom if I asked him to. But, actually hurting me? He didn’t even want to do it when it was pretend. Arden didn’t want to do it on the off-chance Marsden was wrong about this. It was against everything in his DNA. But he did when I asked him to back off and let me do this. He’d never try to control me.
Marsden just stood there like we weren’t all desperately waiting for him to tell us if he now felt the need to murder all of us. Marsden let out this whoop and grabbed the nearest dancer, which happened to be Bevan. Marsden swung Bevan around and kissed him straight on the mouth.
I got it was probably a good sign, but Bevan was particular about who he let kiss him. Plus, I didn’t like Marsden putting his lips on my boyfriend any more than Arden did. Was hetryingto get another curse on him?
“I feel nothing. It’s not like the other times. I feel completely fucking normal!”
Normal was relative when it came to Marsden. He was over one hundred and fifty years old but hadn’t aged a day since Selena cursed him. He kept reinventing himself and doing the exact same things repeatedly. It reminded me of those YA human vampire novels I used to love that were super popular where this vampire was centuries old but kept repeating high school for some reason. I used to eat that up until I found out I was a witch and met an actual vampire. Plus, Marsden was justreallyeccentric.
He tried to pounce on Bevan again since he was the closest, but Bevan sidestepped him and moved closer to Merlin. Merlin and Bevan were just friends, but I knew Merlin had major issues with consent, and if he saw Bevan was uncomfortable, Marsden was going to have to worry about him, too.
“Sorry, Bevan. I’m just so excited. I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable. You don’t know how long I’ve wanted this. I’m tired of the deaths and watching people I care about die of old age while I’m still here. I think this is it. It’s over.”
“Hold up there, cowboy,” I said. “Curses are my business. One of my mentors deals with curses daily at the Museum of the Profane. The other runs the Library of the Profane. They are both relatively close with Minerva Krauss, who is the best curse breaker in the entire world.
“Sometimes, they would talk about all the dick cursing that went on at the Academy of the Profane. Ripley met one of her husbands because he came to the library looking for a cure for his. If you piss a witch off, you aren’t walking away without something cursed. If youreallypiss a witch off, there will be all kinds of nasty things woven into it so that if you think you’ve found another witch to remove it, it’s going to get worse when they try.
“I get you’re not feeling like you want to murder anyone now, but that could just mean things have gotten worse. Curtain will go up, and you’ll try to murder us in front of an audience. She waspissedat you if she cursed you like this. She may have been pissed enough to booby trap her curse to fuck shit up right when you thought it’s over.”
“No,” Marsden said. “I’m sure you know curses, but I know my wife. She was furious at me, but family is sacred to her. Giving up her daughter was always one of her regrets. Especially how it was done, and she didn’t know her name or who she ended up with.
“After the Unseelie came for me in Mexico and we had to defend ourselves, we couldn’t stay. We made a gigantic mess, and the Mexican government was worried about retaliation from the Unseelie Court. So, we were asked to leave. Selena could have stayed, but we couldn’t bear being apart. She missed her family dearly. They wrote all the time.
“She might be furious at me and want me to suffer, but she’dneverhurther family, even if she didn’t know you. Believe me. Nothing will happen at curtain call. Selena always intended it to go down like this. She wanted me to know she was the one who cursed me, and it’s the ultimate ‘fuck you’ to me that the only way to end it was someone of her line. I took away a role without consulting her. I never tried to pretend I was more powerful than her, even if I was technically her boss, but I did that time. It’s a power play. Her curse only ends when her descendent says so.”
“Selena’s curse can’t hurt you anyway,” Bevan said. “Witches believe in reincarnation. Everyone expects you to curse your spouse over something. It just happens. No one expects you to go to the extent Selena did, but everyone knows you don’t curse or hurt your family. You’ll end up putting a generational curse on your entire line and fucks up your reincarnations. Selena was mad, but she wasn’t stupid.”
“No one ever told me that, and I worked with some damned good witches,” I said.
“Because it’s dark magic. Most everyone teaches witches how to fight it or undo it but never cast it. My family uses it, but not for bad things. My education on dark magic differed from yours but trust me. If you’ve been taught dark magic, it’s not aimed at anyone you’re related to.”
“Bevan is right. Even if Selena were furious at me, she would be so proud of you if she met you. It’s not just the blowback from dark magic. Selena would be so damned proud one of her descendants took up ballet and was as good as you are. Now, I’d like to be alone in my apartment. This is a major moment for me and something I’ve been trying to do for a very long time. I just need to celebrate in my own way. Go home and take care of yourselves. I can’t thank you enough for what you’ve done for me.”
I was ready to get out of here. I just wanted a hot bath and to snuggle with my guys. I got what Marsden said. I even understood what Bevan said. I knew enough about witchcraft and watching shit blow up for Ripley and Ravyn to know that nothing was ever simple.
I was going to be watching everyone’s back until the final curtain went down on opening night.
Chapter39
Beyla
Iwas still looking over my shoulder for any signs this curse was about to rear its ugly head, but honestly? This was the life I always dreamed about before Derek broke my feet. I always thought I’d be dating one dancer, not four, because I still thought I was human. But four guys weredefinitelybetter than one.
The Pwas a pretty fantastic place to dance now that the toxic people were gone, and Marsden wasn’t plotting and manipulating anyone to break this curse. I knew Madame Lucinda was an excellent ballet mistress and mentor from the first class. Now that Marsden focused on ballet instead of his curse, he was a terrific artistic director.
We were getting all the benefits of Marsden’s cursed existence. He wasn’t just the artistic director here once. He somehow managed to dance here, retire, and get hired as artistic directormultipletimes. Marsden might not have learned that some people need to be fired and very soon, but he was still impressive at what he did.
He clearly didn’t learn his lesson with Tabitha, or the whole situation would never have happened with Bellatrix and Ivory. After rehearsal, I had a ‘come to Lilith’ talk with him about that. He should have been older and wiser about allowing toxic dancers in his company.
If I were the answer to this curse because of my relationship to Selena, Marsden would have been totally fucked if Bellatrix had shot me. My mother was an only child, and so was I. I doubted he would find someone distantly related to me who was a trained ballet dancer. I was sure some took lessons, but not to the extent to become professional.
If Bellatrix had just hit me and not killed me, I wouldn’t have healed in time to dance the lead unless I asked Ripley to send Reyson. And if I had gotten shot because Marsden couldn’t control his girlfriend, my desire to help him would be in negative territory. So, I would have quit the bureau before coming back and helping him after I healed.
He agreed with me. He confessed something to all of us that made a lot of sense. He’d done the whole artistic director thing multiple times. If you asked him to create something in nearly every artistic medium, you’d get something amazing.
He could handle the people and politics when it came to running a ballet company, but not terminating a dancer’s contract early. If any dancer were trying to get on with a new company, they would want your work history before they even let you audition. So, terminating a contract early, whether it was your choice or forced on you was a huge red flag, especially if it was somewhere likeThe P,where plenty of dancers would die to work.
We got he didn’t like to do it because it would make it harder for that person to dance again, but what about his other dancers? What about the dancers who chose to leave the company because of Bellatrix and Ivory? He was terrific in rehearsal, but he really needed to nut up about firing toxic dancers.
