But if there was a geas, and this bracelet did work, did that in any way imply that Lucian had meant me harm?
He'd made no secret of his desire for revenge, and definitely no secret of the fact that he would do anything—use anyone—to get it. Having a geas placed on me might be nothing more than his way of ensuring a continuing supply of the information he needed to hunt down the Raziq, especially since the only time he could fully read my mind was when we had sex.
Or was I simply trying to excuse the behavior of someone I liked, geas or not?
There was no easy answer to that one—or at least not one I wanted to confront right now—so I pulled the sleeve over the tattoo and said, "Holy water?"
"Ah, yes."
Azriel stepped to one side as Ilianna returned to her cupboard. She came back a few minutes later carrying a purple satchel and a knife. "There's six bottles in here. If you need any more than that, you get the hell out of there."
"And the knife?"
"That," she said grimly, "is for Jak. And no, I'm not going to stab him, as much as I might want to."
I grinned, slung the satchel over my shoulder, and led the way back to the kitchen. Azriel made himself scarce again, although the heat that caressed my spine suggested he hadn't gone far.
Ilianna handed Jak the sheathed knife and said, "This is for you, though you don't deserve it."
He took the knife tentatively. "I'm not much into weapons, you know—"
"If you're tackling hellhounds, you'd better be," she retorted. "And it's not just a knife—it's a blessed knife. It'll work when other weapons don't, so use it. I don't want Risa hurt protecting your useless ass."
"Thanks for the concern," he muttered.
I restrained my smile and glanced at Ilianna. "Are you and Mirri still having dinner with your parents tonight?"
Mirri was Ilianna's girlfriend, though like many mares she was bisexual rather than just a lesbian like Ilianna. She was also very open about her sexuality, whereas Ilianna kept hers a closely guarded secret—at least where her parents were concerned. She and Mirri had been in a steady relationship for a while now, but it was only very recently that Ilianna had acceded to Mirri's requests to meet her parents—as friends, nothing more.