Prison of Hope (4 page)

“Well, that was interesting,” I commented.

“If I were you, I’d keep an eye on her,” the manager suggested before walking off.

“Wow, she certainly doesn’t like you,” Tommy said after he’d finally finished laughing. “Now you can piss women off before you’ve even met them. That’s quite a talent.”

“Thanks, Tommy. That was, as always, incredibly helpful.”

“Ah, don’t be shitty; she’s clearly got her knickers in a fucking twist over something. Nothing you can do about it.”

I knew he was right. Whatever Mara’s issue with me, there was very little I could do to make it go away. But that didn’t mean I enjoyed being accused of something I hadn’t done.

“Nate,” Emily called out from the lift as the doors reopened. She ran over to me, an apologetic expression adorning her face. “I’m so sorry about Mara; sometimes she’s gets a little . . .”

“Psycho,” Tommy helpfully added.

Emily glanced over at my friend and shrugged. “I was going to go with ‘intense,’ but your word works well enough.”

“It’s fine, I’m just going to go for a walk,” I explained to them both. “There’s a good place in town; maybe I’ll grab something to eat there. It would be nice if when I got back to my hotel room, Mara hadn’t wired it to explode upon opening.”

“I’ll talk to her,” Emily promised.

“You need any company?” Thomas asked.

I shook my head. “I could use the walk. It would probably be best for me to avoid any contact with Mara or her coven, for the evening. I’m not certain I could hold my temper for a second time.”

CHAPTER
3

T
he manager offered to have a bottle of Scotch sent to my room by way of an apology. I accepted on the condition that it be a decent bottle, but still told him that I was leaving for the evening.

About ten minutes of walking into Mittenwald was just long enough for me to enjoy the peace and quiet that came with taking a detour through the nearby forest. There are not a lot of predators to worry about in Germany—the days of bears and wolves stalking the land are long since gone, and although I’d heard that some wolves had started to be repopulated in the northern parts of the country, I wasn’t really worried about coming across anything that might give me concern. In fact, the most dangerous thing I saw on my walk was a squirrel, and I think I could probably take one in a fight.

Despite the cold and the occasional flurry of snow, the real winter weather was probably a few weeks away. It was a shame because, as I exited the forest about a hundred meters away from the town, which was lit up in the night, I remembered how stunning the place was after a snowfall. Plenty of people travel a long distance to stay at one of the Bavarian towns during winter, and owing to the town’s beauty, with good reason. It was still a busy time of year, and a group consisting of
several
men and women said hello to me as they walked past, the winter cheer easy to smell on them, which made me smile as I returned their greeting.

The bar I was looking for was about a ten-minute walk from where I’d entered the town, and by the time I’d reached it, I was glad that I’d decided to go out for the evening. Tommy would more than likely have his hands full with shenanigans brought on by imaginary slights, and I didn’t trust Mara not to do something incredibly stupid at my expense. I didn’t want to give her witches even more reason to hate me by breaking their leader into tiny chunks and scattering them over the hotel.

The bar that was my destination was called
Der Bär und Wolf
—The Bear and Wolf; the sign outside had a black bear standing on his hind legs beside a gray wolf. They appeared to be walking alongside one another, partners in wherever they were going. There was a large car park out front, which was nearly full to capacity with cars of various makes and age.

I passed a couple of young men who were standing at the rear of their truck, whispering between themselves. They stopped as I passed by and nodded a greeting, which I returned without slowing down.

The noise from inside the bar began to wash over me as a few patrons exited the establishment, the open door allowing the sound, for the briefest of moments, to escape into the night.

I reached the door of the bar and opened it, stepping inside, where I took in the surroundings. I’ve been to The Bear and Wolf several times since its conception several decades earlier. It was divided into two parts. The first held several small tables next to a sizeable bar. There were maybe twenty people standing beside the bar while a jukebox in the corner played the Foo Fighters’s “Everlong.”

Next to the door was a small plinth, on which sat an open book. A young woman with short-cropped hair stood behind it and smiled as I asked for a table for one. She grabbed a menu and beckoned me to follow her.

The second part of the bar was in the rear of the building, which I followed the waitress into. It was comprised of dark-red leather booths and wooden tables. Music played through speakers placed high on the wall, although it was piped in from the jukebox at the front of the bar. Oddly enough, none of the riotous noise from those at the front of the bar made it through to the rear. The acoustics were really something, although I think this had more to do with the rune work the owners had hidden on the bare stone wall between the two sides. It probably cost a fortune to have those runes created that would absorb sound the way they did in the bar, but judging from how busy it was up front, the owners probably found it worth the extra cost.

The waitress seated me in a booth about halfway down the restaurant. I ordered the house beer, and she left me alone to decide on what to eat.

Someone, probably Tommy, once told me that if you go out to eat, you should always order steak or lobster. Presumably because he’s a greedy bastard. Lobster wasn’t on the menu, but there were plenty of steak dishes. However, as I fancied a change, I went with slices of suckling pig and chips, with a side order of some bread. Bread and chips. You can take the man out of
England
, but not England out of the man.

I placed the order, along with a second ice-cold beer, and it came a few minutes later, carried by a petite lady who wasn’t my original waitress. She appeared to be a good decade older than the previous woman, and her strawberry blond hair was in a braid down her back.

She placed the food and drink in front of me with a smile. “And you weren’t going to come say hello?”

I got up from my seat and was launched upon, her hug
taking
my breath away as she lifted me from the ground with ease. “Hi, Petra,” I managed to wheeze as she placed me back on my feet.

“Nate, it’s wonderful to see you again. Kurt has gone out for the evening, but he’ll be so glad that you’re here.” Petra Holzman’s German accent was much less pronounced than her husband, Kurt’s, a product of her spending so many years working abroad for Hades, helping with security for his various businesses.

We both sat at the booth, and I took a bite of the wonderful food, which tasted even better than it smelled. “Is Kurt still doing the cooking?”

Petra nodded. “He wouldn’t give it up for anything in the world, although we have another half-dozen chefs who work alongside him. This place gets too busy for it to be just him anymore.”

I glanced around at the dozens of other patrons, mostly in twos or groups, eating food that looked delicious and having a good time.

“It’s been far too long,” Petra said. “We heard you’d come back from the dead after being away for a decade.”

“Ah, yeah—Mordred and his plans,” I said with a forced smile.

“Kurt once told me that Mordred used to be a good man. It’s a shame how he ended up.”

“That was a very long time ago,” I almost whispered. “And he’s never going to hurt anyone else ever again.” Mordred had removed my memories while trying to kill me, but I’d managed to escape. I’d spent the next decade living a life that wasn’t mine. On the plus side, once I’d recovered my past, I’d taken a great delight in being able to put Mordred in the ground permanently.

Petra watched me for a second, and then a smile spread over her lips. “So, why are you here?”

I explained about the school visit and how there had been a few issues with one of the witches at the hotel.

“Witches,” she said with a slight snarl. “I never understood them. Humans playing at being sorcerers, and angry because it doesn’t work out how they want.”

It wasn’t the first time I’d heard witches described in that way. Even those who used to be human often saw them as humans with delusions of grandeur. “Well, apparently, this particular witch holds quite the grudge. Besides, not all of them are bad, Petra.”

Petra snorted in disdain. “When I worked for Hades, I had the pleasure of dealing with Demeter and her damn witches on a regular basis. Their insanity gave me a bad impression of the whole lot of them.”

“Demeter has that effect on people,” I said and finished off my burger while Petra laughed.

“So, since you’ve been back . . .”—Petra rubbed her hands over one another—“have you . . . you know, . . . have you seen
her
?”

“Her?” I asked.

“Don’t be an ass; you know exactly whom I mean.”

“No, I haven’t seen Selene.”

“I heard that when everyone thought you were dead, she was inconsolable.”

“Bet that pleased her husband,” I said with slightly more anger in my voice than I’d intended. “You know—the man she left me for.”

“She still loves—”

I raised a hand to stop her there. Selene and I had been together for nearly thirty years, until the late 1920s, when she’d left me for another man. Despite many people at the time—Petra included—trying to explain to me that it wasn’t as black and
white as I made it out to be, I didn’t care. Didn’t care then,
and still don’t. She left me; end of story.

“Whenever Selene’s husband or another of Hera’s cronies visits Tartarus, she always comes here. She’s always alone, and she always asks about you.
Always
, Nathan.”

I shrugged. “She’s made her bed; she can fuck her husband in it.”

Petra’s eyes narrowed. “If I thought you meant that, I’d slap you so damn hard.”

“Whatever was once between Selene and me is dead and buried. It’s best that people leave it that way. She married someone else.” Petra opened her mouth, and I kept talking to stop her from interrupting. “I don’t care what the reasons were; I don’t care if she still harbors some unrequited love for me. If love were that goddamn important to her, she’d have stayed with me in the first place. So fuck Selene, fuck her husband, and fuck the idea of me seeking some kind of solace in the hope that she and I will get back together.”

Petra slapped me.

It wasn’t hard—more of a tap than anything. A true slap from a werewolf would have knocked me aside by a few feet, but it was loud enough that several of the other patrons stopped eating or talking, to glance my way.

Petra stood up, fire in her eyes. “You can be a cold, arrogant man, Nathan Garrett. Maybe you’re not the only one who was a victim of what happened between you.”

I glanced up at my old friend. “She’s not a victim; she walked out on me and married someone else. All because her dad asked her to.” My words were barely above a whisper. “I showed her how much she meant to me every single day. At least I did before she decided to run off with the jumped-up little prick who she currently calls her husband.”

Petra’s argument faltered with a sigh. “It’s not that simple. She had no choice. Hyperion needed her help.”

I sat back in the booth and took a deep breath. “Everyone has a choice. She just made a bad one. And I’m not sure why
Hyperion
needing her help equates to her marrying someone else. If you know more, Petra, maybe you should tell me.”

Petra shook her head and walked off, and I went back to finishing my chips and bread. We’d had the same conversation since Selene and I had ended our relationship, and usually it wound up with either Kurt interjecting himself to calm things down or with Petra punching me. Clearly, after almost a century of being apart, it was finally starting to sink in with Petra that Selene and I would never be together again.

I wondered why Petra had such a hard time of letting it go. I’d heard the stories about how Selene’s husband whored around and that the two of them barely spent any time in one another’s company. And I knew that Petra and Selene had always been close, but I didn’t care. She was miserable with a man I knew she didn’t love, but she had married him anyway. I’d heard the excuses about not having a choice, and that Selene had to marry him for this reason or that, but none of them ever changed my mind.

I polished off the food and drink, taking my time as people came and went around me. Several beers later, and after adding a lovely warm chocolate brownie with a chocolate fudge sauce and fresh cream to my bill, Petra still hadn’t come back to yell at me some more. I was almost finished with the brownie when a pretty, young woman sat down opposite me.

“Hello, sorcerer,” she said. She had a South London accent, although it wasn’t very pronounced.

“And you are?” I asked, looking up from my brownie and licking the remains from my spoon.

“Sarah Hamilton.” Sarah was, from what I saw in a glance before she sat down, a few inches taller than me. She was thin, with pronounced cheekbones, long elegant fingers, and perfectly manicured nails, painted blue. She wore no jewelry on her hands or wrists, but two diamond studs sat in each ear. Her long, light-brown hair was swept back in a ponytail, which had fallen over one shoulder. She wore a black jacket, under which was a scruffy, light-blue, zipped hoodie that was at odds with the nails and earrings, as if she were trying to blend in with the casual appearance of everyone else I’d seen in town, but couldn’t be without at least a few of her finer things.

“And how can I help you, Sarah?” I asked.

“Telling me your name would be nice.”

“Nate,” I said. There was no point in lying. Despite various sources throughout history saying otherwise, no one can do magic on you just because they know your name. If they could, a big portion of the world’s inhabitants would be up to their neck in curses.

Sarah smiled. “Excellent. Well, Nate, I’m here to offer you a chance to leave this town before your presence means I have to deal with you on a much harsher basis.”

I quickly glanced around the restaurant, not wanting to take my attention away from Sarah too much, but there was no one around I’d have considered a threat.

“Nothing will happen in this restaurant,” she said.

I reset my gaze on Sarah. “Does this have anything to do with Mara and those witches? Are you another one of the coven?”

Sarah shook her head. “I am a witch—that much is true—but not part of Mara’s coven. Mara is, quite frankly, an idiot.”

Sarah produced a palm-sized, round rock from her pocket, placing it between us. It was smooth all over, and it looked a little like someone had drawn a compass on it, but instead of the usual “N,” “S,” etc., there were small runes. Three of the runes were black, while the one pointing toward me was white.

“Do you know what this is?” she asked.

I nodded. “I haven’t seen one for a while.” The small item was a witch finder and was used to track people who can wield magic. There weren’t many witches who still made them; there was a time when people used them to actively track and kill witches, and no one wanted that period of history back. However, a simple change of the runes meant that it could be used to track a sorcerer instead, although it was a change that was rarely used. Very few people want to actively track a sorcerer.