Love & Exorcisms | 18+ | COMPLETE |

- Chapter 65 -

"Get lost on your way to the punch bowl?" Damian watched me approach with a smile that faded into confusion. "Or...you couldn't find the bowl at all?"

I'd returned empty handed. After Lijiali's cold words had sunk into my skull I'd walked away so hurriedly that it was only by sheer luck I'd come upon Damian in the crowd. Perhaps if I hadn't, I would have walked out of the house altogether, disappeared into the night, into the dark. Death had come for me: yet I felt no fear, only sickened resignation. My mind felt melted and slowed, sludging through thoughts at the pace of a snail, the information too much to process.

Did I tell Damian? Was there any good in that? Would it help?

"Samara," Damian's voice had sharpened. "You look like you've seen a ghost."

My mouth opened and closed like a fish out of water. I wrapped my arms around myself, and felt the bite of the ropes on my skin: Damian's embrace. His protection. His promise. He couldn't protect me from death.

"There's a reaper here," I said softly.

He frowned, blinking slowly. "A reaper - oh, brilliant."

"Don't sound so enthused, Damian, you'll make me blush." I nearly jumped out of my skin. Kiiji was there beside me, gazing about the room curiously as if he'd only just arrived. Did he know another reaper was here? Could he sense her? Maybe he could change her mind, maybe he could -

"Why are you here, Kiiji?" Damian said, barely in a whisper. "Do you really think I'll meet my doom at a dinner party?"

The reaper shrugged, floated up off his feet and onto the back of a nearby chair, where he perched cross-legged with impossible balance. "You never know. I've heard these dinner parties can be quite dramatic. There might be a murder." He stretched, looking bored, but there was something in his eyes - something in the way his gaze kept skimming the room from his perch, moving rapidly when the rest of him was so slow.

He knew something. He knew she was here.

I was still trying to muster up some semblance of words to explain, when a high-pitched shriek made me jump in confusion. Many in the room started looking about curiously, conversation lulling as they tried to determine the source of the scream. Damian seized my hand and began to lead me through the crowd, keeping me close. But instead of screaming now we heard laughter, laughter that rang out clear as a bell and sent calm back over the crowd. We had only to step into the next room to see the sources of both peculiarities.

This smaller room at the corner of the house had windows from floor to ceiling on two walls, both guarded by gayly decorated pine trees, glistening with crystal. A massive fireplace crackled and popped, filling the room with the delightful scent of peach wood smoke, above which was mounted a marble bust of a stag, draped in holly.

A round table had been set before the fire, and around this the room's occupants were curiously gathered. At its head, in a stunning canary yellow gown, was Margaux Adley herself. She was holding the hand of a woman seated beside her, with the woman's palm open and upward as Margaux gently traced the lines in her skin with her fingers. The woman was aghast, speaking loudly to her nearby companion in a high-pitched voice that swiftly betrayed her as the source of the earlier scream. Not a scream of fear, it would seem - one of shock.

"And here, darling, your head line, you see?" Margaux smiled brightly as her onlookers leaned nearer, peering at the woman's palm with fascination. "This lovely chaining here tells me of difficulty in your emotional expression. Tell me, are you prone to troubles feeling weary, not wishing to get out of bed or do your household duties?"

"Why yes! Yes I am!" The crowd ooo-ed enthusiastically at the confirmation of Margaux's words. Damian and I kept our distance as the palm reading proceeded. After each of Margaux's statements, the woman whose hand she held loudly and enthusiastically proclaimed how right she was. I had never seen such a thing in person, but had always been told as a young girl that such things were merely witchcraft and trickery.