My throat tightens and I lick my lips. “That’s...” I don’t know what to say. In a time women were forced into marriage and didn’t have the option of divorce, having an abusive husband must have meant a nightmare. How many women took their own lives to escape such fates? And was Giulia doing such a bad thing? “I don’t know how to feel about that.”
Don reaches out and takes my hand in his, thumb stroking my pulse. “It’s not up to us to judge, anyway. This happened many years ago. Giulia was found out, and she was burnt at a stake. Or she’s traditionally believed to have been burnt.” His smile turns all-knowing, like he has a secret. My veins thrum with curiosity.
“What happened to her?”
“She escaped.” Don winks. “They called her a witch so many times, she became one. She’s been hiding here ever since. There’s been only one twist.”
The way his eyes dance and focus on me keeps me hypnotized, staring at him, studying every slight color change in his irises. I lick my lips, and his gaze follows the motion of my tongue. The mere action knots my stomach. “What twist?”
He’s close. I taste his breath on my tongue. “One of the men she killed. It was another witch, a rather powerful one. She didn’t know, and the Council found her after long. Giulia could keep her life, but she was to be punished.” Don’s voice lowers and lowers until it feels like only I can hear him. “So they cursed her.”
“Curses,” Apollo spits, craning his neck until the vertebra pops. “Is it even a thing? Not some myth to keep people on their toes?”
“I’m pretty sure some people may lie about that, as a way of threatening others,” Don says without taking his eyes from me. “But experienced witches, especially the ones in the Council... Curses are taboo, so you don’t use them to punish someone who merely offended you. No, curses are real, but they’re only used on special occasions.”
“Like Giulia,” I guess.
Donatello nods once. “Like Giulia. They said,” and he gets even closer, forehead almost brushing mine, “since she enjoyed judging who lived and who died, they’d give her sight. She could see everything.”
I frown, pulling back so I can fully see his handsome face. “That doesn’t sound bad.”
Donatello pulls back too, so completely it gets easier to breathe again. “When I say she can see everything, I meaneverything.”
“Still not getting it.” I shake my head. How could that be bad? Having complete knowledge of everything, knowing who’s lying and who’s telling the truth, who deserves something or not. I wish I had something like this. I could have known about the Light Mage much earlier, and I wouldn’t have gotten involved in so lousy terms.
Would I still have ended the rapist? Fuck yeah. I would have made it so I wasn’t linked to it, though.
Hell, if I had such a power, I would have known I’m a Shadow Mage even before the seal was broken. I would have known, and I would have never let it break. Then I could still live my easy life playing poker and drinking expensive whiskey.
I swallow. What foolishness. I wouldn’t have met them. The best part of my life. These men make me feel like I belong, and if I hadn’t gone through the thick, I wouldn’t have known what having a family feels like.
Donatello reaches out and tucks a strand of hair behind my ear. Our gazes lock once more. “You’ll see when you meet her,” he says, soft like a secret. “The curse was truly a curse, not a blessing in disguise.”
Heavy words. I nod in agreement and let his fingers intertwine with mine. Giulia stays in the back of my mind, like a warning, and I fear the person we’re about to meet. The forest rises around us, then covers us, hiding the sun. Apollo flickers the headlights on.
I squint at the window next to Ren. The woods here are... Different. Dark, but not in a bad way. Not like a horror movie. They’re almost...
“Dark blue?” I breathe out, seeing how the trees here are emerald green, then navy blue, and all the colors in between. “I’ve never seen trees like these.”
Don smiles. “That’s because this is a fae forest. Slow down, Apollo.”
Apollo obeys, slowing down, but not much. We’re still being chased, and he has that in mind above all else. Even so, once the car’s rumble diminishes, I see the forest come alive. Tiny lights flicker on the corners of my vision, but every time I turn to stare at them, they go away.
“Fireflies?” I ask, mouthing the words in a whisper.
Ren shifts next to me, straightening his spine as he wakes up. “Where?” he breathes back.
“Not fireflies,” Don says, laughter in his voice. “Pixies. They’re hard to see, though.”
Pixies. “Like fairies? Like Tinkerbell?”
The grin on Donatello’s face widens. “Like Tinkerbell, but meaner and smaller.”
Meaner than Tinkerbell? Wow, they must be the devil. I wonder how dangerous it would be for one of them to sneak into the car. Reaching out, I brush my fingers down Tristan’s face until he wakes up. The puppy in his arms rouses too, sitting up and looking out the window.
“Where are we?” Tristan, still drowsy, voices.
“Fae forest,” Apollo points out, then slows down farther, until we stop. I look up at him with surprise, but something starts to cross the road. Apollo cuts the lights. “I never liked crossing them.”