Gwen had the oven on and was pacing around the kitchen, waiting for something to happen. She wasn’t used to nothing. She never had a moment of nothing. It was nice at first, but now it drove her insane. She had been exited for Dante to show up again, and now grew entirely impatient.

Not that he wasn’t here. He’d shown up about three or four hours ago and crashed on the couch. In a quiet mumble, he’d handed her his phone and told her to cancel his appointments for today, then he’d fallen asleep. She’d already done all of that, though there was only one person to reschedule, and now she was cooking. Partly to keep herself from going insane, partly in the hopes that the smell of food would eventually wake Dante up.

He hadn’t moved since he’d handed her his phone. His body, too long for the couch, sprawled out and flooded over the sides. His legs in particular looked enormous, one bent upright as it hit the arm of the couch, the other draped over the side. One arm crossed his chest while the other lay flat on the ground. She wasn’t sure how he was still asleep, unless he’d been up for the past twenty-four hours.

She didn’t hear him move, didn’t hear a stir, but suddenly his voice resonated through the room. A deep, powerful baritone.

“How goes the demon drug cravings?”

She stopped mid-step and, after she’d gathered her shock, turned to look at the man on the couch. His eyes were still closed. She wasn’t sure whether she should even answer, or pretend like she hadn’t heard and he was still asleep.

“Don’t ignore me,” he said, and this time she watched his lips move, though nothing else did. She turned away, back to the oven where the food cooked. “No sense denying it either. You already admitted to it yesterday.”

She froze at this, suddenly horrified. Suddenly trying to figure out when it what she’d sad anything about her addiction that wasn’t complete denial. She couldn’t remember for the life of her. So he must be making this up. He was gaslighting her. Well, she knew better.

“I have absolutely no idea what you’re talking about.”

She heard him chuckle, and refused to turn around. “Deny it all you want, I’m just trying to help.”

“Help?” Now she did turn around, her hair hitting her in the face when she stopped. He was smiling only slightly, though nothing else had moved. “How the hell does accusing me of having an awful addiction help me at all?”

Now his eyes snapped open, startling her with their pale silver. He watched her, like a cat from the shadows, examining her to move, waiting for his chance to pounce.

“Just because you don’t remember it, doesn’t mean you didn’t tell me. It’s helping you because if it’s been any amount of time between now and your last hit, you’re soon going to start craving it, and I know what happens when you go into detox.”

“And why the hell would you even want to help me?”

“Selfish reasons, obviously. If I’m to keep you around, I need you in a half-decent mood. If you’re too preoccupied with cravings, you’re no use, and more of a hindrance than anything.”

“So you’re only being kind to help yourself?”

“What difference does it make? I could just kick you out.”

The blood ran from her face and she had to look away, back to the stove as if she was going to do anything with it. The only real food he’d had in the house was a box of egg and spring rolls. Maybe if she was nice he’d buy her some groceries. Not at this rate, though.

“Why are you so tired today?” she asked, keeping her voice low as she fiddled with the hem of her shirt, pretending to look and see if the pitiful chinese meal was ready yet. There was rice in the cupboards, but she didn’t much care for rice.

“I was out all night,” he said. She sighed inwardly when he seemed to just accept the topic change. “Not by choice.”

“And you had to come here to sleep?”

“I wouldn’t have gotten any sleep otherwise.”

She heard the couch give as a pair of feet hit the floor. She looked over her shoulder only half a second to see Dante getting up. Nothing needed to be done, but she gave into the need to do something and pulled the tray out of the oven with the skimpy oven mitt she’d found in a back closet. She turned everything over with her hand before shoving it back into the oven. When she straightened up, Dante stood behind her.

He didn’t say anything, so she just looked at him. His eyes were glued to the door, but not in a way that said there was something behind it. Only to be looking somewhere other than her face. It took her a moment to notice he was handing something to her. A small vial filled with clear liquid. On instinct, she knew what it was.

“You just happened to have some?”

“For when you need it,” he said, and let it drop. She caught it at her armpit and pulled it back to her chest. Thank God Dante didn’t see her desperation.

A knock came at the door just then, and Dante headed for it without hesitation. Gwen stood alone in the kitchen for a moment, staring at the bottle in her hand. She felt she should slip it in her pocket, since there was someone at the door and all, but it felt too delicate, like it might break with any pressure. Of course, she knew it wouldn’t. Isaac used to drop these all over the house all the time and they never broke, even when one of the other family members stepped on it and just about split his head open. She didn’t want to risk it, but when the door opened, her hand shot to her pocket and slipped it in.

“Hello, councillor,” Dante said. Gwen shot her head around to see who it was, but the door swung inwards and blocked her view. She hesitated and walked around the kitchen partition, inching forwards to see who was there.

“Good afternoon, Durante. Mind if I come in?”

Dante let the door swing wide and a man stepped in, clad in black robes like a lawyer. On looking again, Gwen realized it was a trench coat, and he swung it off himself to reveal a boring black suit and tie. Just like any other mundie.

He hung the coat up before Dante could make the offer and turned to look at the rest of the space. His eyes landed on Gwen and he smiled to her.

“Hello there,” he said with a nod. He looked back to Dante. “Am I interrupting an appointment?”

“No,” Dante said, like he couldn’t care less about Gwen. “She’s my assistant.”

“Oh, alright. What’s your name, dear?”

Gwen hesitated, still standing at the partition. She looked to Dante, who just looked at her, his expression unwavering, his crossed arms unmoving. “Gwendolynn,” she said, looking back to the man. “Yourself?”

“Gwen,” Dante said, taking a step forward, moving an arm out as if to suggest they should shake hands. “This is councillor François Longueil. One of the seven members of the high court of witches in New Toulouse.”

François stepped forward, hand extended as per Dante’s suggestion. Gwen sighed and tried a smile, extending her own hand. His grip was firm, a solitary shake. His hand was cold, but he let go after only a second. Gwen stuck her hand back under her arm to warm it up.

“I rarely see you outside the courts, François,” Dante said, some french kicking into his otherwise very anglicized accent. “To what do I owe the pleasure?”

“Thought I would drop in,” François said, his eyes scanning the apartment. “See how things were going with you.”

Gwen saw Dante roll his eyes behind the man’s back. He didn’t seem irritated with François being there, just that he would lie so blatantly. She looked back to François to see him wandering around the room, one hand at his side slightly stretched, like he was feeling the air. It wasn’t until then that it hit her that this was another witch, like Dante. Another very powerful witch. She watched him closely, not wanting him to get out of her sight, wary of what he was doing.

For the most part, though, he didn’t look at all like she expected a witch to look. Maybe it was because she had Dante as a reference point, maybe because the only other time she’d seen a witch was at a ball with Isaac, and this one had been heavily clad in sugar skull makeup. This François character looked, to her, entirely normal. A little on the short side, maybe five eight if she was being generous. His hair was a normal brown, as where his eyes. He was a little darker than the average caucasian, so undoubtedly had some french in him. If the name hadn’t given it away, at least. But he seemed very normal. Very much like the average mundane. She didn’t like it.

“Are you looking for something?” Dante asked, taking a step into the room as he closed the door. He didn’t approach the witch, she noticed, like he had to be given space. She didn’t move from her spot.

“My,” he said, his voice distant. “You’ve been doing a lot of magic here. A lot of very powerful magic.”

Dante just shrugged. “Not really. I only got the place a week ago at most. I’ve only had a few appointments since then.”

François turned around at this, his eyes wide. “You’ve only been here a week?”

“In all fairness,” Dante said, assuming his ‘whatever’ character again as he waved his arm in front of him carelessly. “I don’t know who lived here before me.”

“Reich’ler,” he said, his eyes still wide. “There is an incredible amount of magic in this room alone. What have you bee doing in here?”

Dante shrugged. “Just a few customers. Honestly, I haven’t been up to much. Shortened someone’s leg. That’s about the biggest thing.”

François turned around, his hand now shoved firmly back in his pocket.

“The amount of magic here…” He shook his head, still stunned. “This is frightening, Reich’ler. Very frightening.”

Dante’s eyes went dark, and Gwen could see the force it was taking to keep his tone calm. “I’m not sure I understand what’s so terribly frightening, François.”

“No one outputs this much magic in such a short period of time.”

“I’m just seeing customers.”

“No one on the council uses this much magic.”

Dante rolled his eyes, but only because François looked away a moment. “That’s because they can’t control how much they use.”

François turned around, keeping his gaze steady on Dante. “I don’t output this much magic, Reich’ler.”

“That’s because you don’t want them to think you’re better than them. Which you are. There’s a reason the chancellor’s a dark witch.”

“Please, Reich’ler, take this seriously.”

“Oh, I am,” Dante said, crossing his arms. “And if I’d done anything wrong, or anything worthy of being worried about, then I’d own up to it. The fact is, I’m just doing my job. Just earning a living.”

“And how many criminals have you helped escape us? How many of the bad one slip through the cracks because of you?”

“I wouldn’t know,” Dante said. “And I won’t ever know unless you start paying me otherwise. I’d be more than happy to join the guard, if you think that would be a better use of my powers.”

François spun around halfway at this, first right then left, as if he was trying to find someone who agree with him. His arms drooped to his sides and he spun back to Dante, his eyes frantic.

“You will never join the guard, don’t you understand? You will never join the council or the guard, or any other area of the courts.”

“Then tell me this honestly,” Dante said, taking a step forward. “Is it because I’m sick, or is it because you’re afraid of me?”

At this François must have realized his mistake, for his eyes shot wide and his mouth hung open. Gwen watched for his reaction carefully, and when he brought his finger up to his neck to scratch, she knew he was lying about whatever came out of his mouth.

“Durante,” he said, exhaling all his air in that one word. “Please, you don’t have much time left. Live a quiet life, enjoy yourself. I’m sure you have more than enough saved up to live comfortably for the rest of your life. There is no need for this extravagance.”

“I have plenty of time left,” Dante said, his jaw tight. “All the time in the world, in fact. And I’ll do what I please with it. So if that’s the only thing you came here to tell me, then I’d say you are quite done here, François.”

“I just came to check up on you-”

“To keep an eye on me.”

“- to see if you were alright-”

“To make sure I wasn’t causing any trouble.”

“- to make sure you were feeling alright-”

“To see if I wasn’t dead yet. I get it. You care so very much. But I can assure you I’m quite alright, and I will continue to be alright for a very long time. And should the council ever change their minds-”

“They won’t, Reich’ler, you know that.”

“It would be a good move to have me on your side, instead of the other.”

“Is that a threat?”

She could see Dante was fuming now, his eyes darker than they’d ever been, seeming almost black under the shadow of his brow. That skeleton face she’d imagined on him when they’d first met was now almost real, every crease in his face darkening to the outline of his skull. He spoke calmly, but she could hear the subtle shake in his voice as he tried to control his anger.

“No,” he said. “But it would sure help to not be treated as a threat.”

“Reich’ler.”

“I am no threat,” he said. “And I never will be. But it would be nice to be treated with a little bit of respect, seeing as they are so afraid of me.”

“They’re not afraid.”

“Then don’t act like it. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have a customer coming in a few minutes, and I would like to avoid the awkward situation of them walking in on this. If you don’t mind.”

François just looked at him a moment, like he wasn’t sure how to react. Dante turned and fetched his coat, then held it out to him. He yanked his feet from their spot and put the coat on as Dante opened the door. Somewhere in the back of her mind, Gwen wondered if he wasn’t controlling François to do this. Eventually, the man was out the door, and just as he turned to put his last cent in, Dante shut the door and locked it.

He stared at the opposite wall for a bit, his back to the door as he tried to gather himself. Gwen just stood and watched, unsure what to do. Finally, he took a step away from the door, the tension easing out of the room. He didn’t look to Gwen, though. Just walked back to the couch and sat down. Gwen went to approach him, but a sharp look from Dante stopped her.

“You have food in the oven.”

She stopped, because she hadn’t been expecting that, and turned to go get the food out. It still had maybe five minutes left, but she pulled it out anyway. Done enough.

“Do you have any plum sauce?”

Silence for a moment, so she looked back over at him. He just shrugged. “I doubt it.”

She opened the fridge anyway and looked around. When there was nothing there but alcohol, she looked in the cupboards. Nothing but rice and some other pasta sort of thing. She sighed and straightened out.

“Guess we’ll just have to do without.”

She pulled a couple of old paper plates out of the cupboards, cleaned them off with her shirt, and set them on the counter. There was no point looking for cutlery. Even if there was any here, they wouldn’t be clean. She set even amounts of both the spring rolls and egg rolls on the plates and brought them over to Dante. He took his absentmindedly as she sat down next to him.

They sat there for a while, Gwen eating off her plate like it was her last meal, though she tried to slow herself down. Dante barely nibbled at his food. She wasn’t sure if they were ever going to break the silence, but she was okay with that, at least for now. She wanted him to keep her around, after all.

“I should get more food for this place,” Dante said, finally taking a full bite of the spring roll.

Gwen just nodded, because she didn’t want to seem needy. Not after he got her demon drug.

“What do you like?” he asked.

“I’ll eat anything.”

He nodded, thinking about it as he chewed. When he swallowed, Gwen balled up the courage to speak.

“So, you and that guy,” she said. Dante didn’t flinch, going in for another bite.

“Mm?”

“You said something about the chancellor being a dark witch.”

“Mm.”

“What’s that mean?”

“Mm,” he swallowed his food, but still didn’t look at her. “There are two different kinds of witches in the world; light witches and dark witches. Light witches practice white magic, and dark witches practice black magic.”

“What’s the difference?”

“Light witches are born as they are. They can channel white magic, but they don’t have too much control over what it does or how often they use it. The older and more experienced you are, the more you know when it’ll work, but for the most part it’s a matter of chance. Dark witches are mundanes who learn how to control black magic. They aren’t born with it, usually self taught. They can get dark magic to do whatever they want it to do, but it’s usually very hard to use compared to light witches, so they aren’t always as powerful.”

“So which one are you?”

“I am a dark witch… warlock,” he said. “Six of the seven council members are light witches, which is why they don’t like me. François as well as the chancellor are dark. François keeps his power under control so as not to give the council reason to throw him out. They’d be afraid of him. The chancellor, of course, is the chancellor and got to that position by being the most powerful so she doesn’t care who knows.”

“So, you weren’t born into this?”

Dante shrugged. “As close to born into it as I could be. My family practiced black magic for generations, including my parents. They raised me to believe it was as easy as breathing. It was harder for me to hold a pencil than it was to tell the pencil what to do. I learned how to do magic in the womb.”

“So, could you do magic as a baby?” Gwen asked. “Like a baby has an accent when it first cries?”

Dante shrugged. “I don’t know. I don’t honestly remember.”

“Well, what about your brother or sister? Could they do it?”

Now Dante did turn to look at her, his brow knotted, not angry. “I’m an only child.”

Now Gwen blinked. “No you’re not. You have a younger sibling, don’t you?”

His brow furrowed even deeper. “No, I don’t. Why would you think that?”

Gwen stopped, because she realized the reason she knew didn’t work in her favour. After some thought, she reached into her pocket and pulled out the phone Dante had given her.

“I’m about to snatch that back unless you have a very good reason for pulling it out.”

“I do,” she said, rushing at the look on his face. That flat, cold look that chilled her and reminded her how frightening he could be. She shuffled through his phone as she rushed to explain.

“See, I did some research while you were asleep. You know, because I wanted to see if there was anything I could do to repay you for helping me. So I thought I might look and see if there was any family history on here that would help me figure out something I could do.”

“You were trying to blackmail me.”

Gwen blushed but tried to brush it off.

“So I found this one site, you know, after I figured out how I should actually spell your name. And I found this newspaper clipping.”

Dante looked over at his phone, like he wanted to snatch it from her but couldn’t bear to touch it. She looked down at the screen with him, trying to imagine where his eyes were going. First himself, of course. The small boy in front with the jet black hair and lightning blue eyes was the one the newspaper gave Dante’s name. His skin was darker, his self just generally more full of colour. She could hardly believe it was the same man.

He sat happy in his father’s arms, and her eyes flowed naturally from there. His father was young and very handsome. She could see a bit of Dante in him, but Dante’s looks had so drastically changed it was a stretch to say they looked much alike. Maybe if Dante hadn’t gotten sick.

He had the same black hair, though, and the same blue eyes. His smile was just as big as his son’s. This is where Dante’s finger fell first.

“That’s my dad,” he said, as if he needed to say this to confirm the picture’s authenticity. “A little younger, albeit, but that’s him.”

“At that’s you,” Gwen said, though there wasn’t enough room to point with Dante’s finger already there. He looked at the picture a while, like he still didn’t understand it. Then he pulled his finger back.

“That’s your mom, right?” Gwen said. She still didn’t point, but she didn’t have to, there was only one other person in the picture.

Dante just sort of shrugged. “I have to assume so. I didn’t grow up with too many pictures of her.”

“You don’t remember her?”

“I don’t remember this picture,” he said. “She died when I was two.”

“You don’t look older than that, here.”

“No,” Dante said, but he sounded distant. Because he’d finally noticed why Gwen had showed him the picture. She turned to him to see his eyes slowly growing wide. Wide and desperate.

When his eyes finally settled, his mouth opened just a crack but nothing came out. Gwen turned back to the picture to see what it was. Of course she already knew. It could be nothing but the giant, swollen belly of his pregnant mother.

Next Chapter: Dante