The Necromancer's Betrayal by Mimi Sebastian

Author:Mimi Sebastian
Language: ara, eng
Format: epub
Publisher: BelleBooks, Inc.
Published: 2014-06-25T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter Thirteen

THE NEXT MORNING, I cancelled my Friday class. I didn’t have to feign illness. My voice was hoarse enough from last night’s screaming to convince even the most skeptical of deans. Lysander had brought me home, and after a fruitless search for Delatte, he’d stayed with me until I fell asleep wrapped in his arms. I woke up at around six a.m., my cell phone beeping. Lysander had texted me, saying he hadn’t found Delatte and would try again the next evening, but he needed rest. Even though he could tolerate some amount of daytime at his age, it still tired him out. Daytime rest rejuvenated him to face whatever the night spawned.

I dressed in my only clean clothes—loose fitting, green linen slacks and a purple long-sleeved peasant blouse—and grabbed a bagel and coffee on my way to Xavier’s gallery to recount last night’s events at the Columbarium and see what insights he could provide into the voodoo angle. Xavier was the only one who’d never lied to me even when his truth skimmed the edge of controversy. He definitely was not afraid of controversy.

He owned two galleries in a neighborhood that was currently defining the San Francisco art scene. I entered the smaller of the two, no more than seven hundred square feet, miniscule when compared to his mansion-sized gallery and residence down the street. This one catered to the more hip, avant-garde artists. Its stylized interior—walls inlaid with a rusted metal—gave it an industrial edge.

The attendant directed me to the backroom where I found Xavier with his head bent close to a sculpture he was tapping lightly with a hammer. A breathing apparatus covered half his face, giving him a very post-nuclear vibe. A fine white dust coated his jeans and long-sleeved shirt, creating an incongruous picture of the powerful demon usually decked out in fine suits. He tapped around the bust’s nose a few more moments, then removed the mask and waved me over.

“She’s beautiful,” I said, in awe of the woman’s head emerging from the stone. Her expression was one of amusement, sculpted with the subtlety of a skilled artist. I had no idea how he’d coaxed the beguiling slant to her eyes. “Can I touch it?” I asked.

“Yes.”

I ran my fingers between grooves of hair sculpted to appear as if a wind gust had whipped into the room and blown the strands across her face. The detail was so precise, yet delicate, I half expected her to blink at any moment. The lifelike quality of the artistry reminded me of the gargoyle that guarded the entrance to the demon lair. I was still waiting for it to leap off the balustrade and take flight.

“I had no idea you sculpted,” I said.

“I love chipping and manipulating the stone to see what it reveals.”

“You don’t know what you’re going to create beforehand?”

“Sometimes I have an idea, but the stone doesn’t always agree.”

He regarded me with an enigmatic expression, and I turned back to the bust. He frowned and cradled my cheek in his palm.

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