The Frozen Witch Book One (15 page)

I’d only known this man for two days, but
this interaction was enough to prove that loyalty was clearly the
most important thing to him.

“It is the truth, though you cannot
appreciate it and maybe never will – but your grandmother
sacrificed her life, her health, to keep you safe.”

I wanted to point out that what he was
saying was utter madness. I wanted to thrust forward and slap him.
But more than anything, I wanted to run away. Go home. Fall to
sleep, wake up from this brutal nightmare. Instead, I just stood
there, broken and tired. So very tired.

Briefly, Vali looked almost compassionate,
but then that compassion disappeared as his jaw stiffened.
“Tonight, once you have finished your first caseload, you will meet
me in my office. You will dress elegantly. And you will accompany
me to a function.”

“What? What kind of function? And why do
you want me? And what the hell did you mean about my grandmother?”
I lost it again, voice tightening with emotion as I tried to
dismiss what he’d said. Uncomfortable memories suddenly came to
mind. Back when I’d been a teenager, after I’d been dragged in by
the police for stealing, my grandmother had sat me down. I could
still remember the tea she’d served, the roaring crackle of the
fire in her sitting room. Even the damn sickly scent of the perfume
she always wore. More than anything, I could remember her
expression. She’d stared at me with such utter disappointment. I’d
just nicked some shitty, worthless costume jewelry from a friend.
Something I’d stolen for the thrill of it. But in her eyes, I might
as well have attacked her. The way she’d looked at me, the harsh,
acerbic words that had spilled from her stiff lips – they’d been
totally out of proportion to the crime.

“The function is at nine PM. You will be
in my office at eight. Do you understand?” Vali
continued.

Pushing the memory from my mind and
shaking my head, I returned my full attention to him. “Why exactly
do you need me to come to this function? Why can’t you take your
secretary?”

He didn’t answer.

“What the hell did you mean about my
grandmother?” I asked once more. I was starting to lose it. As
uncomfortable memories flooded back in, I was beginning to feel
something I’d pushed away, something I couldn’t afford to feel
right now – total grief.

I fought and fought against the tears
threatening to well in my eyes.

“Megan is not suited to this task. You
are. And considering you still have not accepted your folly, you
will have to work even harder to pay off your sins.”

“Bullshit,” I spat under my
breath.

He stiffened.

“You need me to do something. Some task.
This has nothing to do with my sins. This is to do with those
symbols. My magic,” I began.

I didn’t get the opportunity to finish. Vali
took a sudden, strong, quick step towards me.

I almost had to flatten myself against the
door. He did not, however, proceed to strike me or harm me in any
way. He stared at me with the totality of his icy gaze. And that,
coming from a god of revenge, was saying something. I couldn’t move
as I stared at him.

“Never forget what I told you. You will
tell nobody of those symbols. No one of your magic. And you will
never, ever,” he began.

I pulled up my bangles and stared at them.
“I’ll never take these off unless I get a direct order from you,
unless I’m in your presence,” I finished his statement, voice dull.
It was dull, because I was suddenly completely taken by his
expression. Vali usually looked strong – impossibly strong, because
he was a frigging Nordic god and not a real human. Right now? Right
now he looked weak. Vulnerable. Searching.

It was enough to still my anger, to turn the
anxiety that always shot down my spine into curiosity.

Slowly, he nodded. “Only in my presence,”
he continued, voice so low it was a hushed whisper. “Now, return to
work. And I suggest when you do, you apologize to Alice and
Cassidy. Whether you appreciate this now or not, the people in
there are your only family. Turn your back on them, and you will
truly be alone.”

I shivered. I didn’t stop watching him,
though. The curiosity that had been ignited by his strange reaction
could not be dulled. If you’d asked me two days ago, I would’ve
told you that Vali could not feel emotion. Nothing could scare him.
He was nothing more than a brute. An automaton – an uncaring,
unfeeling god. So what was the look in his eye? And why was he
staring at me like this?

“8 o’clock,” he said with a snap as he
turned and walked off, steps strident, the powerful, in-control god
back.

But now I’d seen his single moment of
searching vulnerability, I couldn’t unsee it. It was there, there
in the way his shoulders were slightly hunched. There in the way
his steps were slower than usual, his legs stiff with
tension.

In the past, I’d never done well with
situations that unfolded quickly. I was exactly the kind of girl
you didn’t bring to an emergency. It wasn’t that I was slow, and I
could be pretty quick on my feet when the situation dictated. It
was just that it took me a long time to process things. A long time
to figure out what something truly meant. And as Vali disappeared
out of sight down the corridor, I realized it was going to take a
heck of a lot more than one night to plumb the depths of his
secrets.

Slowly, almost in a daze, I turned around
and walked back into the room. Everyone had been chatting excitedly
before, but now the entire room grew into a sharp silence.

I felt everyone’s gazes on me once more,
but this time they were different. There was an edge to their
curiosity.

As for Cassidy and Alice, they both appeared
to ignore me as I sat down.

While Cassidy looked dejected, I could
tell Alice was fuming. A second later, she snapped towards me,
twisting her head and snarling. “The only way this unit can get
along is if we don’t judge each other. You may think I’m nothing
because I’m a bent cop, and Cassidy doesn’t deserve your respect
because she burnt down a few houses. But getting someone killed—”
Alice didn’t even finish her sentence. She just snapped her head
back around, grabbed some papers off her desk, and began to read
them.

I felt cold and a little sick as I sat
there.

Cold, sick, confused, and curious. I was now
coming to terms with the fact my life would never be the same
again. I still, however, had no idea what would lie in store for me
next.

I didn’t have to wait long, staring
dejectedly at my hands and wondering why the heck my desk was so
dusty.

Precisely ten minutes later, an
officious-looking man I’d previously identified as the middle
manager, bustled up behind me. He cleared his throat and shot me a
judgmental look as I turned around.

Without so much as a hello or an
introduction, he dumped a file on my desk.

“That’s your first case.” He shifted back,
crossed his arms, and nodded at the file. “As it’s your first case,
you have the option of going alone or heading out with more
experienced officers so you can learn the ropes.” He gestured
towards Cassidy and Alice. “It’s up to you, rookie,” he growled.
“If you can’t work with us, then you can learn to survive in this
world on your own.”

He stood there, arms still crossed as he
glared at me, and I realized he was waiting for my
answer.

I looked over at Cassidy and Alice. The
smart, good-girl part of me wanted to shake her head. As if I was
gonna go out with a bent cop and an arsonist. But then a little
voice echoed in my mind. Annoyingly, it was Vali’s voice. These
guys were my family now, weren’t they? I wasn’t ever going to get
out of here. I had to work off my sins and pay my dues. And I could
do that alone, or I could try to learn from others.

My grandmother had once told me that I was
an unforgiving soul. That was pretty fricking rich coming from her.
She held a grudge for eons.

She told me that I had a broken sense of
morality. That I always judged others for what they did, but never
put myself in their shoes. She said it was a distraction. A means
to stop myself from judging my own sins and finding myself
lacking.

As her words flashed through my memory, I
opened my mouth to tell this middle manager that I could do this on
my own.

I stopped.

No. Granny had been wrong. I could see the
good side of people. I’d done that with Larry, hadn’t I?

I blinked. “I’d prefer to work with… help,
if I can,” I said, words so quiet they barely made it past my
lips.

“Sorry? What did you say?” the middle
manager asked in a tone so loud it echoed all the way through the
room.

I took a steeling breath and clenched my
teeth. “I would prefer to work with help,” I repeated much louder
this time.

The guy’s eyes glittered as he clearly
thought he’d won a victory. Then he promptly turned hard on his
foot and gestured to Alice and Cassidy. “Well, it’s up to you guys.
I won’t make you work with a greyer if you don’t want
to.”

I had no idea what the word greyer meant,
but from the exact growl he gave and the look in his eye, it didn’t
exactly sound like a compliment.

My hackles rose, my back stiffening as I
stared from Cassidy to Alice. You didn’t need to be a genius to
realize they were both going to say no.

Cassidy crossed her arms, sniffed, and
turned from me. “I already have a big caseload. I don’t need to
help out a greyer.”

Though she’d clearly insulted me, for some
reason I got the feeling her heart wasn’t in it.

The middle manager swiveled his attention
to Alice. “What about you?”

Alice glared at me. Glared at me as if she
were trying to make me burst into flames with nothing more than her
gaze.

Shoulders receding, I turned from them
both. “It’s all right. They don’t have to work—”

“Don’t you put words into my mouth,” Alice
snapped. “And I’ll work with you. There’s nothing I hate more than
people who hurt others through their own sheer stupidity and
ignorance.”

Ouch.

Alice clearly never held back.

Though my gut twisted with a burst of
anger, and I got the desire to tell her to sod off, I held my
tongue.

“Oh, in that case, I guess I’ll come along
too. I wouldn’t want Alice to be alone,” Cassidy said, a measure of
her cheerfulness back.

I locked my arms in front of my chest
defensively, but looked up at them both from under my eyebrows.

Why did I get the sudden impression that
this was like some buddy-cop film, and the bent cop, the arsonist,
and the innocent waitress were about to run amok?

“All right then. This should be a simple
case. You’re just gathering evidence on this one. One of the more
experienced units will tag this guy and bring him in. I don’t want
any bravado. And I don’t want any unnecessary use of magic.” The
guy’s voice dropped down real low, ringing with such a note of
warning I couldn’t help but shake.

Alice shifted forward, snatched the file
off my desk, and nodded in a strong, short move. “Got
it.”

“Normal check-in time, normal procedure.”
With that, Mr Middle Manager turned around and waddled
off.

He obviously assumed I knew what normal
procedure and normal check-in time were. But I knew absolutely
nothing. Momentarily forgetting my recent interactions with Alice
and Cassidy, I turned. “What does that mean? What’s normal check-in
time and what exactly are we meant to do?”

Cassidy crossed her arms and shot me a
cautious look that didn’t match her usual cute and friendly
smile.

Alice cleared her throat. “When this is
over, I’ll hand you the procedure manual. Study it. Breathe it.
Live it. Make a mistake, and you’re on your own. Now get your
jacket. We’re heading out.”

I spluttered at her sudden orders, but I
wasn’t stupid enough to question further. Whilst Vali acted
unpredictably around my incessant questions, Alice would not. She
would probably wrestle me to the ground and spit in my ear.

Dejectedly, I rose.

A lot of the other workers in the room were
still staring at me, but slowly they were getting back to their
work. The show, apparently, was over. Now all I had to do was hit
the city streets with an arsonist and a bent cop to track down some
criminal.

Crap, this couldn’t be real.

Problem was, it was.

I was expecting us to pile into one of those
old blue sedans with a cop light on top – like you see in the
movies. We didn’t. Instead, we exited out of a door in the side of
the building. A door that promptly disappeared as it closed behind
us.

I paled as shock shot through my stomach.
“What the hell?” My voice arced high. “That door—”

“Yeah, it disappeared,” Cassidy said in a
casual tone. “If you point that out to everybody on the street,
you’ll break Regulation 1 B, landing you several more months of
service. So I suggest you keep your big mouth shut and follow
us.”

Cassidy still looked insulted. Her cheeks
were red, her bubbly gaze hard.

I got the sudden urge to apologize to her.
But just as soon as that urge formed in my mind, I shook my head.
She was an arsonist. She’d admitted to burning down several houses.
I couldn’t even begin to imagine the shock and hardship she’d put
people through for nothing more than a thrill. As for Alice? Who
knew how many crimes she’d ignored? And if she hadn’t ignored them,
who knew how many crimes she could have prevented by dragging in
the mobsters of this city?