Anger issues, indeed. If I had anger issues, she was the reason I had them.
Since the moment she’d dropped that amulet into Taiki’s cloak and shoved her through the portal to the other dimension, Melaina had been a thorn in my side. We might’ve gotten to spend nearly half a year with Quailen, Questa, and Taiki before we were sucked back to the Outer Realms again, but from there on out, it had been just me and her.
Me and her disagreeing about every subject under the sun, constantly bickering, never seeing eye to eye, and sticking together anyway, living miserably ever after.
Even after Melaina had broken her bond to her husband eight years ago and we’d been free to search for two more amulets so we could return to the others once and for all, life with her had still been hell. Melaina nitpicked about every breath I took, never missing an opportunity to put me down, and I’d learned to rail right back at her, slapping her into her place with pleasure.
It had taken Taiki and Melaina sixteen years to procure four amulets last time. Melaina and I had been looking nonstop for half that time, and so far, we’d only found one.
Well, okay, that wasn’t technically true. Melaina wasn’t aware I’d gotten my hands on an amulet a few years back. She still thought we had two to go. But I knew her better than I knew anyone. If she learned we had one, she’d take it for herself and leave without me.
She might be the most vexing woman I’d ever met, and she made it clear every day that she loathed the very ground I walked upon, but she was the only family I had. If she abandoned me here alone, I’d have no one. So, no, I wasn’t about to let her know we were halfway to our goal already. Not until we had that second amulet in hand.
Melaina had gone back to see Taiki and the others for short trips throughout the years—since short trips were all we were allowed without amulets—and those few moon cycles without her had been a worse agony than all the suffering I put up with daily with her around. It was far better to have someone irritating and obnoxious in your life than no one at all.
Every visit held such a high risk that I’d never chanced going back with her. There were about twenty-five percent odds we’d die in transport, like get dropped into the middle of an ocean and drown to death, or land underground and suffocate, maybe even be plopped in front of something speeding right at us and get run over and crushed. Anything could happen. That was why we needed to get our hands on another amulet, so we could go and finally stay there.
And leave the Outer Realms forever.
“Fine,” I exploded. “You deal with the damn gem dealer, then, and let him grope you six ways ’til Sunday while you find out if he has or knows where we can find another amulet.”
He was the best lead we’d gotten in over a year. Rumor had it that he owned one. So I could swallow my pride and admit she was right this time; she should be the one to barter with him.
“Oh, honey,” she purred, tapping her chin with a long-nailed finger and looking distinctly entertained. “I wouldn’t let him stop with a simple groping. I’d need far more than that. In fact, sex is a grand idea. Excellent suggestion, my dear. I should just give the poor darling a taste of Melaina, and he’ll be singing like a canary, eager to tell me all he knows or maybe even give me all he has. My God, why hadn’t I thought of that before? I should’ve been the one dealing with the gem dealers all along.”
“Whatever.” I sighed and rolled my hand toward her encouragingly. “Are you going to alter me now or what? I’d rather get this bread-selling shit done and over with now rather than later.”
Her smile dropped into a pout. “Why must you always spoil my moments when I’m having a brilliant idea?”
“I thought you said it was my idea?” I countered, unable to keep from quarreling with her.
“That’s it,” she shot back, waving her hand in a circle and then flicking her fingers my way. “You deserve this.”
A familiar tingling sensation spread over me. Being glamoured always felt as if my skin was being covered with a swarm of