better a bitch than a gremlin that lives under the bed.
Some people bring out the worst in you, others bring out the best, and then there are those remarkably rare, addictive ones who just bring out the most. Of everything. They make you feel so alive that you’d follow them straight into hell, just to keep getting your fix.
Karen Marie Moning, Shadowfever
Marketplace Meeting
“If luck were left to fate, then it would indeed be a cruel thing.”
— Quinn Darkova, former slave
Silver strands whipped around her face as an errant wind brushed over her bare forearms, raising goosebumps in its wake.
Quinn shivered, then paused.
The southern market of Dumas was alight with happy faces and playing children. The sun shined, and the sand drifted in the breeze. It was the same as it always was.
And yet it wasn’t.
The scent of smoked meats and salt water filled her nostrils, but there was something else there too. Something subtler. A shadow in an otherwise peaceful scene. Quinn glanced down the row of brightly lit tents, pausing for only a moment longer before someone bumped into her.
“Sorry,” she breathed as a stranger hustled by with a muttered curse.
Shrugging off the strange feeling, she turned and ducked into the tent to her right.
“Quinn,” the middle-aged woman said in greeting. “Is it that time again already?” The woman stood and the colorful swaths of her patchwork dress fell loosely to her feet. Quinn pressed her lips together in a tight smile as she reached around to the back of her neck and lifted the leather drawstring.
“So it seems, Jada,” Quinn answered. Her fingers brushed over the black opal stone that dangled off the end. It flashed for a brief second, and Jada frowned.
“I renewed the barrier just two weeks ago…” she began, her brown eyes filling with concern and trepidation. Quinn’s fingers tightened around the amulet, her neutral expression going cold as tendrils of fear wafted from the other women’s rust-colored skin. It was cloying, sinking into Quinn’s pores as though attracted to her own power.
“It’s not working.”
Jada swallowed for a moment, her eyes moving from the pulsing stone to Quinn’s face.
“If it’s not working then it’s not because the spell weakened,” Jada said, treading cautiously. “That renewal should have lasted at least two more weeks…”
Quinn bit the inside of her cheek as the shadows under Jada’s skin stirred further. Riling her up more, the smell of midnight weeds and damp petals grew stronger. Why was it that they always feared her?
Was it the marks on her skin from all her past masters? Perhaps it was the quiet tone she used; accented, but without emotion. Or maybe, just maybe … it was the look in her ice blue eyes—the crystalline color tinged with darkness.
“The amulet isn’t working and you’re the only apothecarian that will see me.” Quinn took a step forward just as Jada took a step back. The flap of white material behind her shifted as a child came bounding through and ran around the rickety wooden table.
She stopped short at the look on her mother’s face. Jada pulled her to the side and spoke soft warnings under her breath about disturbing her while there were clients about. Quinn pretended not to notice the way she shielded the young girl with her body, or how she sent the child to the back of their shop instead of back out into the streets.
“My apologies,” Jada said. “As I was saying, though, I want to help you, Quinn. I really do.” She opened her mouth to continue, but Quinn looked away, a familiar tingle spreading through her limbs as she clenched her jaw shut to keep herself in check.
“You’re telling me there’s nothing you can do to make this work properly again?” she asked, wrapping her knuckles in the leather string and holding it up. The colorful veins running through the black opal sparkled as beams of light shined through the cracks in the tent.
“Magic is not easy, Quinn. It’s even difficult for those of us who have ancient scrolls and potions to go by. There’s not much known about your type, and—”
“Can you do anything?” Quinn asked. It was the last time she would. She didn’t come here for excuses. She came here for a fix. A solution for her problem, if only temporary. A barrier.
“No … I—maybe,” Jada said, clasping her hands together. “The best I can do is renew it, but if the current one hasn’t lasted, I don’t know if that