find another resting place for a while. We don’t want to make a dumb mistake because we’re tired.”
I look to the witch. She says nothing. Her face is carefully blank.
“Alright,” I grunt.
We sling our packs down by the fire, and Blaise is quick to toss wood and twigs into the circle of stones. He smiles at Hecate, presses a finger to the wood, and lights it on fire. It irritates me a little that he’s trying to impress her. But she doesn’t look impressed, she looks tired.
Another pang of guilt flares inside of me as I watch her spread her cloak out, then lie down on it, facing the flames. She looks...like a broken butterfly. That strangely fluid dress of hers spreads out around her. Her knees are partially drawn up to her chest, and her blue hair is spread behind her.
Blaise jostles me, and I blink, then tear my gaze away from her.
He’s watching me watch her, which I don’t like. “Should we eat?”
“You can’t eat anything here or you'll be forced to stay forever,” she says, her voice strangely hollow.
Blaise smiles. “We were warned, so we brought our own food.
Her gaze moves to him, and she looks uncertain.
Blaise removes his sleeping bag roll from the bottom of his backpack and unrolls it before the fire. He sets his backpack on the end of it, near Hecate, then sits down and undoes the zipper. He pulls out a protein bar and hands it to her.
She sits up very slowly, eying him and the food. Tentatively, she reaches out and closes her hand around it, then snatches it away and backs up, as if afraid he’ll take the food from her.
My jaw drops open, and I have to work to close it. The shade had told us my brother had some witch as a lover. I’d thought she bespelled him, or perhaps he was forced into it. But this witch doesn’t act like a woman who has been prancing about the Underworld as Hades’s guest.
She tears open the bar and begins to eat, and Blaise gets another protein bar out and eats his slowly, watching her, his brows drawn together. I know he’s thinking the same thing I am. That this witch doesn’t make any sense.
“So, how did you get to know Andros?” Blaise asks.
She glances at me, and I realize I’m still staring, rooted in place. I force myself to move, to unroll my own bedroll and to sit down. I pull out a protein bar and eat it, careful not to look in her direction.
“He was my guard. Tasked with keeping me prisoner and punishing me when I disobeyed.”
“Liar,” explodes from my lips.
She jerks.
“My brother is a good and honorable man. He would never punish a woman.”
She draws even further away from me. “The Underworld does strange things to a man.”
“It wouldn’t change Andros. Not like that.”
“Andros is a good man,” she says, as if carefully choosing her words. “But this place changes everyone.”
“You’re a liar,” I repeat again.
She falls silent and Blaise casts me a dark look.
Anger rolls through me. This witch had tricked my brother somehow into falling for her, and now it seems she will do the same to Blaise. I want to believe they are smarter than that, but beautiful women have a way of influencing men.
Not that I think she is beautiful.
“So, uh, what was the Underworld like?” Blaise asks.
She shrugs. “I didn’t see much outside of my cell.”
“How long were you there?”
She takes another bite of her food, closes her eyes, and chews it as if memorizing the feel and flavor of it, then speaks. “I have no idea. Many lifetimes. I never really counted until my daughter was born.”
“Your daughter?” I stiffen. Had we left a child behind?
She nods.
“Is your...where is your daughter now?” Blaise asks.
Hecate drops her arm and her bar is in her lap. Her gaze is locked on the flames. “I created a distraction and she escaped. That was the last I heard of her, but I hope Em is happy somewhere on earth.”
“I’m so sorry,” Blaise says.
She gives a terribly sad smile. “I’m not. The pain of losing her is nothing compared to the happiness of knowing she got free of this hell hole.”
“I understand.” Blaise glances in my direction, but I can’t read his face.
“I’m tired,” she says, suddenly lying down, half her bar beside her. “I’m going to rest.”
Blaise nods. “We’ll keep an eye on things.”
She turns away from the fire, her back to us.