The Enterprise of Death - Jesse Bullington [165]
“Of course.”
“Ahhhh”—Kahlert’s head snapped back and forth between the two on its fractured neck, his mind now remembering everything his body had experienced since his death—“aahhh!”
“A day from your house, Inquisitor, a single day out. They’ve been down here for who knows how long and you didn’t suspect a thing!” Awa smiled and shook her head. “And when you took a witch-hunting holiday in Spain you were just down the road from a necromancer, did you know that? So close he hid his mystical treasures in your library—last place a witch would look, but the last place a witch hunter would look as well, apparently. So your house is on top of a warren of bloodthirsty monsters, your summer home is next door to a warlock, and to top it all off you’ve been letting your undead witch girlfriend call the shots. You’re a credit to your profession.”
“Help!” Kahlert closed his eyes. “Please, God—”
“Just thought you should know,” said Awa, and dispelled his spirit.
“That was perfectly charming,” said Carandini. “If you are quite finished I will ask you to leave. Don’t come back.”
The iron portal rang out as Carandini disappeared back down his hole, and Awa sighed, staring at the little red door. What would Chloé have to say? Would they have told her that apparently Awa could have simply asked for them to heal her instead of transforming her into whatever she now was, another Bastard of the Schwarzwald? Nothing for it but to find out, and Awa swung open the door.
Chloé was waiting in a pool of moonlight on the edge of the forest, more beautiful and alive than Awa had ever seen her. Her skin shone, as did the iron circlet crowning her pale brow, dark hair falling over her shoulders and breasts like night falling over snowy hillocks, and Awa nervously went toward her, keenly aware she had not so much as washed her face since spending a week shoved in a witch hunter’s sack, her clothes soiled, her hair a lumpy mass jutting out from her skull. She paused in front of Chloé, rubbing her hands together, nearly crying at her lover’s unbroken jaw, her unbruised skin, her sharp teeth.
“Were you ever going to tell me you were a witch?” asked Chloé, her tone less severe than Awa had feared but nowhere near so warm as she might have hoped.
“Would you have come with me if you had known?” Awa smiled, weak but hopeful.
“No,” said Chloé, and flinched. “I mean, I don’t think so. Maybe? I was superstitious.”
“Oh,” said Awa, confused. Remembering Chloé could not lie, she focused on something that had been bothering her for a long time. “Why did you insist Merritt come with us? You had a new excuse every time I asked, and you knew how much I hated him.”
“I … I liked him,” said Chloé uneasily. “I know he wasn’t as funny as he thought he was, but he was alright enough. I know what you did to him, incidentally.”
“Oh,” said Awa, no more comfortable with the conversation than Chloé. “Liked him like you liked me?”
“Not quite,” said Chloé, “but close? He was just as lost as the rest of us, run out of his birth home after some business with their Henry getting a whim and putting the spurs to honest men. So down he came to Paris, and he was a good enough sort. Kind of an asshole about foreigners, but I was working on him about that. Nobody ever had their mind changed about blackamoors, or witches, for that matter, by being killed by one.”
“Why come with me at all, then, if you liked him close to how you liked me?” said Awa bitterly. Why the fuck were they talking about that asshole anyway? “Thought there was more fortune to be made tagging along with me, is that it? After all the clothes I bought you, the books you never had time to study, thought you’d make money and keep your boyfriend in the bargain and—”
“That’s not fair, and you know it,” Chloé said, crossing her arms, and even if the girl had not been dead Awa would have known she was telling the truth. “Taking to the road’s the most dangerous thing in the world. You really think I’d abandon a comfortable position in the best brothel I’ve come across because I thought there was more to be made