Page 88 of A Spot of Tea and Sorcery: Vol. 6

“Jastira!” he choked out suddenly, his heart lurching.

Luna drew back from him, gazing down into his face, her brow puckered.

“Where is she?” Nigel demanded. A thread of panic snaked through him. “She’s . . . she’s notinyou, is she?” He reached up to touch her soft cheek, half afraid the vision of her would vanish, replaced by Jastira’s beautiful glamour.

But Luna breathed out a sigh and pressed her hand against Nigel’s, holding his palm against her face. “No, darling,” she assured him. “She isn’t.”

“Is she . . . did she . . .” Sudden terror twisted his heart, and Nigel found he couldn’t ask the question. If Jastira was in hell, then his soul was still compromised. He might, somehow, have returned to his body for the time being, but the nature of Infernus Magic remained, a terrible blight on his life and any life with whom he might dare associate.

Luna shook her head, however, her eyes blazing with confidence. “She’s not in hell, Nigel, if that is what’s worrying you.”

“Where then?” he demanded.

She bit her lip. “Now, don’t get angry . . .”

“Why would I get angry?” Nigel blinked, frowning. He couldn’t imagine ever truly being angry with Luna—the idea wasboth laughable and vaguely horrifying. But those simple words of hers filled him with a great deal of anxiety.

He sat upright, waited a moment for the wild dizziness to pass, then took a look around. He lay not far from his father’s uprooted gravestone and the collapsed forms of the ten sorcerers and one sorceress surrounding it. Were they dead? He couldn’t say for sure, not from this angle. Part of him hoped so—the evil, Dark Sorcerer part of him. Most likely, however, they were still alive. Though they would probably wish to be dead upon waking. He’d watched Jastira drain their magic, one after the other. No doubt they offered it up to her in the expectation that, once fully restored to power, she would give it back again. Ha! How little they knew and understood the woman on whom they bestowed their loyalty and worship.

When they awakened, they would be Dark Sorcerers no more. Just a bunch of pathetic, power-hungry, but impotent men, and one sad, broken woman. Nigel found he had no sympathy to spare for them. Looking around at the devastation within the valley was bad enough, but this place had been devasted for years now. When he looked beyond, however, to the places where Garden’s lush greenness had so recently thrived, his heart threatened to break with sorrow.

“It’s all gone, isn’t it?” he said sadly. Though Luna made little protesting noises, he rose to his feet, swaying hard. She slipped under his shoulder, one hand resting on his stomach, the other wrapped around his waist, offering her support. And he needed it. He was embarrassed just how much. But he was utterly drained.

He surveyed the damage surrounding them, his sorcerer’s vision extending beyond the valley, on to the once-wondrous acreage. So much devastation. So much draining, like a corpse left behind after the vampire’s suckling.

Tears sprang to his eyes. He tried to stop them, but more came. So he gave up and allowed himself to weep. For Garden. For the flowers. For the beauty and life and everything he’d poured into this place, everything it had poured back into him. He’d never really known himself before. Never comprehended his purpose, his being. Never understood his father, his mother, his family of origin, or felt he had anywhere he truly belonged. Not until he finally got his hands deep in that soil. Even then, he’d failed to recognize what it was he felt until it was too late. Until everything was lost.

No. Not everything.

His heavy heart lifted, and he drew a cleansing breath. Because he knew the truth. His great purpose—she was right here. Tucked against his side, holding him upright with her strong arms and her stout heart. The woman he loved. The woman he was born to save.

Only,hadhe saved her? Because if Jastira wasn’t in hell, then . . .

“Where did she go?” Nigel asked, looking down at Luna.

She rolled her jaws, her gaze skirting away from his uncertainly. Then, with a little shrug-like tip of her head, she said, “The Heart Tree.”

“What?”

“The Heart Tree,” she repeated. “It’s alive, Nigel. Garden isn’t dead—his heart still beats. And I locked Jastira away deep inside him.”

Nigel gaped down at her.

He had . . . a lot of questions.

So many questions.

So manylayersof questions, which he couldn’t begin to organize right now, not with most of the lifeforce drained out of his body.

“Wow,” he said, looking up, his brow pensive as he once again surveyed the empty grounds. “Wow,” he repeated. Then, with a snort: “Jastira willhatethat.”

And Luna’s laugher was like the sun rising over the horizon of his soul.

There was no way out of Garden other than the long way.

After some discussion, they decided to leave the unconscious sorcerers behind for now. There wasn’t anything they could do, no harm they could cause in their current reduced state of magicless-ness. Auntie Arabella declared they should let them “sleep it off,” then she and Aurora would return with some reviving tea and send them on their way after a bit.

Nigel hated this plan, hated leaving them where he couldn’t keep an eye on them. But he also couldn’t think of a reasonable alternative. In the end, he agreed.