Jenna Black - Dark Descendant

What would he do if he were no longer part of Anderson’s crew? His divine ancestor wasn’t Greek, so he couldn’t become an Olympian even if he wanted to. And if being separated from Emmitt had worsened the effects the death magic had on him, I couldn’t imagine what being separated from all his friends and his home would do to him.

“Maybe he deserves another chance,” Jack said into the silence.

That surprised me—and everyone else, too, by the look of it. Jack seemed to have embraced his trickster heritage with gusto, and I’d never seen him be serious about anything. Of course, Jamaal, with his nonexistent sense of humor, was Jack’s favorite target. The jokes sometimes had some pretty sharp teeth, but he wouldn’t have teased Jamaal so much if he didn’t like him.

“He’s had enough chances,” Blake countered with a snarl. “He’s proven he can’t control himself—or won’t —and there’s no place for him here.”

“Surely he’s learned his lesson,” Maggie put in softly, and I was glad I wasn’t the only bleeding heart in the room.

“Too late!” Blake snapped.

The tribunal was about to devolve into a free-for-all, but Anderson nipped that in the bud.

“Show of hands. How many of you think we should give Jamaal another chance?”

Maggie, Jack, and I all raised our hands. I got a couple of startled looks—and a sneer from Blake—but I was sure giving Jamaal another chance was the right thing to do. I didn’t think he would fall over himself in gratitude because I supported him, nor did I think he would suddenly be convinced I didn’t work for Konstantin. Maybe I’d end up regretting the decision later, but I couldn’t vote to throw him to the wolves. Steph might have been hurt because of him, but that certainly wasn’t what he’d meant to happen. And there was no guarantee Steph wouldn’t have been hurt if I’d made the rendezvous in time.

Blake, Logan, and Leo didn’t raise their hands, despite the sad look in Leo’s eyes. That left us deadlocked, though in truth I wasn’t sure how much our opinions really counted. Anderson had made it very clear: his house, his rules.

Anderson thought about it for a long moment, then nodded. “Since Nikki, as the injured party, is willing to give you another chance, I’ll let you choose your punishment. You can either pack your bags and leave. Or you can submit to an execution once a day for the next three days.”

There were gasps and winces all around the semicircle of Liberi , and I saw the flicker of fear in Jamaal’s eyes. Nevertheless, he didn’t hesitate in his answer.

“I’ll submit to whatever I have to if you’ll let me stay.”

I wasn’t sure exactly what it all meant. Obviously, the Liberi couldn’t die, so this wasn’t a real execution we were talking about. (Not to mention that a real execution is a one-time deal.) But something about it sure gave the rest of the Liberi the shivers.

Anderson nodded regally. “Logan will perform the executions,” he continued. “I’ll leave it to him to decide the methods.” He looked at his watch. “We’ll convene at sunset at the clearing. Attendance is mandatory.” He shot a look at me, as if knowing how little I’d want to watch whatever was going to happen. “Jamaal, you will remain downstairs until the sentence has been fully carried out. No passing through the door, or you’re out. Clear?”

Jamaal held his chin high. “Clear.”

Anderson stood from his chair, still running arctic cold. “Everyone out,” he said as he turned his back on all of us and headed toward his desk to pull it out of the corner it had been shoved into. I think more than one of us considered offering to help him put the room back to rights, but we all thought better of it.

I gave Maggie a significant look as we left the room, and she got the message, following me up to my own suite.

“I don’t want to go into this thing tonight uninformed,” I told her as soon as I’d closed the sitting room door. “Jamaal can’t die, so what’s with the execution thing? And why did everyone look so sick about it?”

Maggie shuddered as she dropped onto the sofa, wrapping her arms about herself like she was cold. “It’s not true that we can’t die,” she said. “We just don’t stay dead.”

I joined her on the sofa, feeling a similar chill. “Huh?”

“If we’re dealt a serious enough wound, we die. Our bodies will heal the damage eventually, and we’ll revive, so it’s not permanent. But it is dead.

“I’ve never had a fatal wound myself, but from what I’ve heard, it’s horrible. It has nothing to do with the pain of the wound or of the healing—though that can be considerable in itself, depending on the cause of death—but dying itself is a massively unpleasant experience. Even as an immortal, you want to avoid dying at all costs.”

I salted this information away for later. I probably wasn’t cruel enough to kill Alexis over and over again if I ever got my hands on him. But at least for now, it made a comforting, if gruesome, fantasy.

I checked on Stephevery couple of hours until the Valium had worn off and she was awake and alert. I had to admit, Blake seemed to be taking good care of her. Her face and throat were still darkly bruised, but judicious applications of ice had reduced the swelling. There was also a bottle of Advil on the bedside table, beside a cheerful flower arrangement exactly like the kind you might send someone in the hospital.

He’d given her an oversized T-shirt to wear, along with a pair of drawstring running shorts that would probably fall off if she tried to walk around in them. She was propped up in his bed, surrounded by mounds of pillows as she sipped from a mug of hot chocolate, when I came in.

Blake, still in guardian angel mode, was sitting on the side of the bed, his hand stroking idly up and down the covers over her legs as he kept her silent company. They both looked up when I knocked on the bedroom door, but Blake spared me only a brief glance before he turned his attention back to his patient.

Steph cupped her hands around her mug as if they were cold, then looked me up and down, her head cocked to the side. There was no way she could miss how my injuries had disappeared overnight. She didn’t look completely shocked, so I suspected Blake had told her all the secrets I’d been unwilling to share. Just one more thing to feel guilty about, though truthfully, if I could have gone back in time I’d probably have made the same decision.

“How are you feeling?” I asked, though it felt like a dumb question.

She raised one shoulder in a halfhearted shrug. “To tell you the truth, right now I’m kind of numb. I don’t suppose it’ll last, but I’ll take what I can get.”

The flatness of her voice made her sound as numb as she said she felt, and I wished to God I’d been able to save her. It took about a thousand wrong decisions on my part to put her in this situation, and I couldn’t stop myself from mentally recalling and regretting each one.

“How about you?” Steph asked. “You looked pretty rough last night.”

“I’m fine now,” I answered, which was true as long as we were talking only about my physical injuries. The emotional wounds left me in a state that was very far from fine.

Steph set her mug down on the bedside table, then lightly touched the back of Blake’s hand. “Could you give us a few minutes alone?”

I could tell by the look on his face that Blake was reluctant to leave her side, but he sighed and nodded. “I’ll be right outside if you need anything,” he said. “Just give me a holler.”

She managed a small smile. “I will.”