Oathbound (The Legendborn Cycle #3)

Chapter 17

17

I CAN IMMEDIATELY tell that the man sitting at the far end of the booth is a goruchel. A full-blooded demon, wearing the skin of a man he killed. A mimic whose eyes scorch my skin in only the way that Shadowborn attention can.

I’ve become somewhat desensitized to the twins’ gazes by now, but it’s been a while since I’ve felt the angry attention of a full demon. It doesn’t erase my apprehension—and fear—for the Rootcrafter girl I’d just seen in the bathroom, but it grounds me back in my own body at least for the moment.

“Who the hell is this?” the man asks as I slide across the booth to sit beside Elijah. Zoe moves in next to me, and the three of us make a tight arc opposite our guest.

“We’re watching over her”—Elijah shoots me an unreadable expression as he sips what appears to be something dark brown and alcoholic—“for him .”

The man’s eyes widen at that. He draws his own liquor closer, clutching it tightly. “You mean you two are actually in touch with…” He gestures with one hand. “Him?”

Elijah’s eyes haven’t left my face, the only indication that he has any emotion whatsoever about my presence. “Yes, Regazel.” Elijah’s eyes flicker red, then brown as he turns to face the man across from him, drumming his fingers on the table in what I know to be a tell. He’s irritated. “But you aren’t here to impress him. You’re here to impress us . Now that we’re all in attendance, what have you brought as tribute?”

“A valuable trophy.” Regazel produces a small velvet box. “I hope this will suffice.”

Trophy. That’s what Elijah had called my necklace. Does that word mean more here than what I’d first realized? Zoe said there were “protocols” with demons. Is this one of them?

I can’t help but think of the Rootcrafter girl and the warlock who wanted her for her power. Would he bring her as tribute to some demon employer? Was that demon employer the King? My confusion and anger mingle into a toxic knot strong enough that Zoe kicks me under the table and shoots me a glare with a message. Calm down.

Elijah drags the box across the table and flicks it open. Within it lies a single deep-golden-colored coin. “What is it?”

“A coin from a bank robbery in the seventies, tainted with human greed.” Regazel gestures at it. “Give it a whiff yourself.”

Elijah lowers his head and inhales, long and slow. His eyes flash red, and he swipes a tongue over his lower lip. “Smells weak, but good.”

“Smells even better if you actually need that humanity.” Regazel tilts his head, looking between both twins. “But you don’t need it at all, do ya?”

Zoe takes the box for herself. “No, we don’t.”

Something ugly passes through Regazel’s eyes. “Must be convenient. Never starving.” His lips pull back. “How easy it is for you balanced cambions. All the perks of demonia and none of the drawbacks.”

Elijah’s eyes slide to Regazel’s. “You would think that, wouldn’t you?”

Zoe snaps the box shut, sliding it under the table and into a pocket. “Your tribute is accepted, Regazel. We’ll hear you out as official representatives of the King, but you still have to prove your worth and loyalty to him, or else we’ll end this little interview that you insisted on having a day early, for some reason.”

“Call me Reggie,” the man says, glancing at me. “I can speak freely in front of her?”

Zoe snaps at him. “Don’t look at her. Look at us.”

Elijah sighs, long and deep. Almost bored, even though he was so visibly anxious about making this meeting less than an hour ago. “Tell us what you have to offer, or we’re out of here. So far, all you’ve said is that you’ve faced off against a Merlin and won.”

I hold perfectly still, unsure how to play this game of politics, of urgency and patience, of inviting the other party to show their hand without showing one’s own hand at all. All I want to do is chase after the kidnapped girl, but the quick burn of Reggie’s eyes on my face lets me know that while the demon’s still playing the game, he’s growing tired of it. An explosion is under the surface.

Reggie clasps his hands together. “Sent ’im packing, yeah.”

Zoe leans back. “You got lucky, so what? Maybe if you’d killed one, I’d be impressed.”

Reggie takes a loud sip of his beverage. “Y’have any idea how hard it is to kill a Merlin?”

“We’ve heard,” Elijah responds smoothly. “Tell us something new.”

“I got your something new .” Reggie leans in close, expression turning sly. “Have you heard that someone is taking Merlins out? I bet that’s some intel the King wants.”

For the second time tonight, alarm bells ring in my head. I know Merlins. I may not know their faces or names, but I know their strength, their speed, their skill with aether. Sitting here in the bar, I can see their features and techniques behind my eyes. Golden irises, amber, deep orange. Fangs both beautiful and frightening. Bright flashes of silver-blue and blue-silver… quarterstaffs and scythes and mage flame tornadoes.

What of the Merlin boy who sacrificed his humanity to save you?

Wherever he is, wherever I sent him, I don’t want him to die.

My technique for sealing my root is good, but something about my body must have changed at the memory of this Merlin I know—my scent, my heartbeat—because Elijah’s eyes dance over my cheeks and the bridge of my nose. By the time I look up, he’s looking at Reggie again.

Zoe turns to Reggie. “What do you mean, ‘taking them out’?”

Reggie lifts a lazy shoulder. “Deading them. One by one. Eliminating the Order’s perfect soldiers. Real methodical-like.”

“I don’t see what that has to do with us, and it’s not why we agreed to meet.” Elijah’s face tightens. “That better not be your intel, or we’re leaving.”

Reggie waves a hand. “Nah, consider that a freebie. A demon-to-cambion courtesy, if you will. Maybe you’re protected by the old man, but Merlins give us all equal trouble. Want us all equally dead. They don’t check to see how much demon you are when they’re running you through with an aether spear, kid.”

Elijah’s eyes narrow at the word “kid.” “Thanks for the tip. But the old man is looking to retake the Court, not entertain a woulda-coulda-shoulda goruchel who’s gone soft for human food and drink.” Elijah raises a brow as Reggie finishes off his beverage.

Reggie’s deep red eyes darken further at Elijah’s insult—and stay that way. “Watch your tongue, crossroads child.”

“What did you just call me?” Elijah snaps, fangs glinting.

“You heard me,” Reggie snaps back. “I was on this plane killing humans for sport before you were a bad idea in your father’s ballsa—”

Zoe’s hands shoot across the table to grasp Reggie’s throat. She squeezes hard enough for a human to choke, but Reggie merely grins. “Be very careful what you say about our father—and my brother. It’s not nice to call people names, Regazel.”

“You’ve gone and upset my sister,” Elijah purrs. He leans forward on one elbow, tilting his head at Reggie. His eyes flick up to the bartender, Syd, who is watching our table as he dries a glass. “Zoe here is going to let you go. And when she does, tell us what you have to offer, or this meeting is over.”

After a beat, Reggie withdraws his smile and gives a shallow nod.

Zoe releases his neck, and he rubs lightly at the imprint of her nails. “I heard the… the old man ,” he tries the phrase out, “is looking for something.”

On either side of me, the twins grow still. Then, Elijah taps his glass once. “He is. Has been. Are you suggesting you know where that something is?”

Reggie leans in. “I know who has a lead.”

“You know who has a lead ? I thought you were the lead.” Zoe scowls and stands up. “Let’s go, Elijah.”

“No, no, wait,” Reggie hisses, waving her back into her seat and glancing at the full bar behind us. “This is legit. It’s a member of the Shadow Court, one of the King’s own precious Shades who’s gone rebel.”

Elijah and Zoe stare at each other in silence. Elijah turns back to Reggie. “A Nightshade has the crown?”

“No,” Reggie says, voice irritated. “A Shade has a lead on the crown. Aren’t you listening? Approach her and she’ll tell you. Probably.”

“You’re wasting our time.” Zoe leans forward, baring her teeth. “The rebel Shades won’t rejoin the Court if the King isn’t wearing the crown. They won’t even take a meeting with us as his emissaries. They’re all mini-sovereigns of their own fiefdoms now. Approaching one empty-handed is an insult and a death wish, even for us—that demon, whoever they are, will ship us back to the King in body bags just to send a message.”

“Then don’t approach her empty-handed,” Reggie says. “Bring tribute.”

Zoe rolls her eyes. “You’re full of bullshit. The crown has been lost for centuries. Even the King can’t sense its location.”

“Not lost,” Reggie says. “Hidden.”

“By the Morgaines, yes, we know.” Elijah sighs. “The Morgaines enchanted the crown to be undetectable by any demon, including the King himself, its original forger and only bearer. I find it very difficult to believe that the Line of Morgaine suddenly, after fifteen hundred years of keeping both the crown and themselves concealed and untraceable, decided to change their tune and trot the crown out for public display.”

A memory rises in my mind. Arthur’s dreamscape. The King’s crown behind an aether cage, like an artifact in a museum. Brief snatches of conversation between the original Morgaine and her half brother: This crown is not unlike your Caledfwlch. It’s… tied to you. Connected. That’s why no one else can wield it in battle but you. An aether weapon.

Just as I am connected to Excalibur, the King is connected to his crown. Our weapons are alive. Is that why the King took Excalibur from me? I think. Because he knows what it means to lose our living weapons?

Reggie beams. “That’s the thing—they didn’t trot it out. It was stolen from them.”

Elijah’s smile drops. “Say that again?”

“Word is, the Morgaines got overconfident and lax. Thought their secrecy and special enchantments would protect them forever, but times change.” Reggie lifts a shoulder. “They’ve been making deals with a few demons lately—warlocks too. Seems they linked up with the wrong one. A warlock who didn’t share their commitment to keeping the crown locked up. He snagged it and ran.”

A warlock stole the King’s crown? I just saw a warlock stealing a whole human being. Clearly these pact magic users keep themselves busy, but was this thief working for demons—or against them?

Zoe raises both brows at her brother, encouraging him, but Elijah does not appear to be moved. Not yet, anyway.

“The Morgaines didn’t want one of the King’s loyal demon servants to be able to return his crown to him in the event that its location was ever found, so they also enchanted it to be untouchable by demon hands,” Elijah says. “Which means that, unlike a demon, a warlock could actually touch the King’s crown without erupting in flames. But the rest of the story’s a stretch, Reggie.”

Reggie snarls. “I didn’t come here to lie! I’m telling you, the crown is on the move!”

“On the move where?” Zoe demands. “Does this rebel Nightshade with a lead know where the warlock thief scuttled off to? A lot of good that does us. Only a Morgaine can remove a Morgaine spell, and they’ll never help a Shade or the King. The crown could be sitting on this table right now and the King still couldn’t touch it.”

Reggie lowers his voice. “I’ve been working for this Shade for years and I want out . She ain’t interested in going back under the boot of the King. She was never gonna tell anyone on his side that the crown resurfaced, but I overheard her talking to someone about it on the phone! She wanted to keep it secret, used code words, but I know who Shades mean when they call someone ‘the old man.’ I knew the crown she was talking about belonged to the King.” He points to himself. “And I contacted you because I knew you’d want to know!”

The words leave me in a rush, my curiosity too much. “Which Nightshade has it?”

Zoe claps her hand over my mouth. “Don’t answer that, Reggie!”

“Goddamnit, Bree,” Elijah groans, squeezing his eyes shut.

Reggie grins. “But one of your party has asked for the name, Zoelle.”

“She’s not a member of our party,” Zoe hisses. “She doesn’t count.”

Reggie’s eyes sparkle with dark mirth. “She’s at the bargaining table. She asked for the information. I am now free to give it, and if I do, that binds you to my demand in return.”

My eyes widen. “M’sorry!”

Elijah groans. “Fine. The name will prove your loyalty to the cause. Name your demand.”

“If the King retakes the Court, then I want in on the blessing,” Reggie says.

“We can’t make the King do anything,” Elijah says.

“Then commit to making a case on my behalf.”

Zoe and Elijah exchange glances. Finally, Zoe releases me and nods. “We’ll commit to making the case for your blessing. Give us the name of the Shade.”

Reggie sits back. “Daeza.”

Zoe curses immediately. Elijah drops his head into his hands. “Couldn’t have been any of the others?”

Reggie shrugs. “I didn’t say it’d be easy.”

Zoe curses again and glares at Reggie. “Daeza would throw you in the ring if she found out you were sharing her business.”

“She already did.” His eyes darken. “Why do you think I’m ratting her out to you? She needs to learn a lesson about treating her people like crap.”

Elijah heaves a sigh. “If we can get in to see Daeza, if we can convince her to talk to us, if the lead on the crown checks out and we get it back, then we’ll make sure you get prioritized when the time comes.”

Zoe shakes her head and waves a hand. “That’s a lot of ifs , Reggie. Don’t know why you bother.”

Reggie taps a finger on his glass. “You’re too young to realize this, kid, but when you live as long as we can, you hedge your bets in every direction… and wait. I’ve given you three the name. Pay Daeza a visit or not. Your call.”

After that, Reggie slides out from the booth—not before his eyes turn back to a dull brown—and the twins watch him go for a beat before turning their burning gazes on me.

“Sorry,” I say, shrinking back into my seat.

Elijah springs to his feet in a blur. Using cambion speed in public, even in a dark corner of a human bar, tells me exactly how frustrated he is with me. “Home. Now.”

Five minutes later, we’re back out on the nearly empty sidewalk, walking home under the glistening light of snowfall and streetlights.

“So…,” I drop the Pendragon coin necklace back into place on my chest beneath my reacquired coat. “Daeza?”

Elijah and Zoe flank me, and neither one of them answers right away.

“Sounds like the King’s been searching for a needle in a haystack for hundreds of years.” I grimace. “Gotta be frustrating.”

Silence, made worse by the quiet stillness that only snowfall can bring.

“Can’t touch his own crown even if he finds it,” I murmur. “That’s wild. Morgaine magic sounds pretty intense.”

“Morgaine enchantments are the most powerful concealments in history,” Elijah mutters. “After the Order excised them, they went into hiding and perfected their spellcraft. The Morgaines themselves are untraceable when they want to be and so are their constructs, and anything those constructs are forged to occlude.”

I pull my coat hood up higher, wincing at the pungent scent of the warlock’s magic. “Can’t he just forge another crown back in the demon dimension?”

“The King can’t go back to the demon dimension!” Elijah whips around. “When Arthur Pendragon and Merlin took his crown, they did so with the intention to kill him, and it nearly worked. He eventually regained most of his lost power, but he can’t return to his domain unless he bears the crown. He needs it to cross over; there is no passage back without it.”

I stop on the pavement. “The King is… trapped here?”

“ Arthur and the Round Table trapped him here. And in doing so, they denied the other world its king and denied the King his Court—but they guaranteed his revenge.” Elijah turns around. “And I’m going to help him get it.”

I don’t know what to think of this revelation about the King, but I know one thing: it explains his potent anger and his single-minded focus to punish and destroy the Table. Not only did the original Round Table take his crown, depowering him near to death, but in the wake of that theft, his loyal subjects scattered and splintered, and he was blocked from returning to his own kingdom. No wonder he hates not just Arthur Pendragon, but his entire legacy. His entire bloodline. Including the blood that runs through my veins.

Sometimes when Erebus looks at me, I catch a flicker of dark humor and satisfaction pass across his features. Is it because he sees me, and our training together, as the poetic justice within his revenge? A phrase from my ancestor Vera appears bright in my mind: wound turned weapon.

“Does he—” I begin, but a bright red glow from my chest cuts me off. Each twin grabs one of my arms and blurs me into a nearby alley. We only barely make it into the deep, cold shadows between two buildings before my bloodmark fully awakens and begins to pulse.

The mark flares first at my sternum, bright enough to glow through three layers of material. It spills outward, liquid fire making furious branches down my ribs and up my collarbone, spreading over my shoulders, and forking into crimson lines across my biceps and forearms.

The twins stand back from me, eyes wide, having released me just in time not to be affected by the bloodmark’s burn.

“Goddamn, that’s bright,” Zoe whispers, shielding her eyes.

Elijah edges closer, drawn to the pulsing red glow by an inch, then two. “Is he—”

“Calling me?” I mutter, watching the bloodmark rise in time with my heartbeat. “Yes.”

Ever since the King reset his connection to his bloodmark, when it comes alive it brings with it his aether signature: myrrh, oud, saps, and incense. I associate those scents with Erebus’s signature, but other times the magic of my mark smells—charred. Spices heated far too long to be pleasurable. An ancient scent that was once rich and full, now burnt to ashes. That scent I associate with his true form—not Erebus, the Shadow King.

“Does it hurt?” Elijah asks.

“No, it’s…” I purse my lips, shame flooding me at once.

Elijah’s eyes flicker up to mine, for once the red in them coming not from his own power but mine. “It’s what?”

I take a beat to find the words until they spill out of my mouth in an angry stream. “It’s a reminder, okay? That while he isn’t the source of my power, he’s forever linked to it, and I’m forever linked to him.”

Elijah watches me closely, as if he can see that there’s more that I’m not saying. “He do this often?”

The power begins to fade, finally, casting the alleyway in a softer red light. “Some times more than others, never predictable. Just often enough that I don’t forget that I’m not entirely in control here,” I say with a sour smile. “It’s an unnecessary display of power, if you ask me.”

“Every display of power is necessary,” Elijah counters without ire. He steps back as the power dims. “But that one’s particularly…”

“Creepy?” Zoe suggests.

“Annoying?” I offer.

“Conspicuous,” says Elijah with a frustrated huff. “Imagine if he’d done that while you were at the Rat?”

“I wasn’t supposed to be at the Rat, remember?” I say. “I was supposed to be safe at home, tucked away and hidden by his wards.”

“Ugh, don’t remind us,” Zoe says, turning to walk back to the sidewalk. “Let’s go.”

By the time we get back to Erebus’s historic Tudor home, it’s snowing in earnest. Fat, wide flakes fall into Zoe’s hair and across Elijah’s dark knit cap. I know they’re littering my two braids too. I shiver and wrap my hoodie tighter around my hands, more focused on my chilly fingers than where I’m going, so I bump into Elijah’s back at the front step of the house where he’s stopped.

“What’re you doing?” I mutter. “Let’s get inside, I’m cold.”

Elijah turns back to me and eyes me up and down. “Why does your coat smell like warlock?”

I falter. Zoe doesn’t help. “There was a Rootcrafter girl in the bathroom with a warlock. I tried to stop him from taking her away, but I… I couldn’t. They escaped. Zoe—”

“Found her looking like a lost puppy,” Zoe interrupts quickly, rolling her eyes. “Don’t think Bree’s ever encountered a warlock before, but I explained what their deal is. How gross pact magic smells.”

Elijah sighs. “Didn’t think Syd would entertain warlocks, but he did say business was slow. Must have let them in the back way. Offered the Rat up as a pit stop for a handsome fee, I’m sure. Rootcrafter power is hard to come by.”

“You know about the Rootcrafters and the King?” I ask.

Elijah tilts his head at me. “The greater the demon, the greater the hunger.” The wind shifts, and Elijah scowls, covering his nose. “You’re gonna have to take that coat off. Leave it outside or, better yet, burn it. The old man hates that scent even more than we do and if he smells it on you, he’ll know we took you somewhere we shouldn’t have.”

“He’s right,” Zoe answers. “Take it off.”

The snow’s really coming down now. “Out here?” I squeak.

Elijah’s brows rise. “That’s the point.”

This is the first time I’ve ever felt the closeness of a shared secret with the twins, and I don’t want to jeopardize the tentative peace with them over something that costs me nothing except a coat I found in the back of Zoe’s closet.

I take the coat off and ask a question while I have their attention. “Won’t the Rootcrafters’ families call the police about their disappearances?”

“It won’t matter if they do,” Zoe says.

“Why?” I ask. “Does the King have contacts with the local police the way the Order does?”

“How do you know so much about the Order?”

“He told me,” I say, carefully holding the coat out to Zoe, who snatches it between two nails, then blurs off into the woods. To bury it, I suppose. “But what happens when the ’Crafters get reported missing?”

“The amount that anyone cares about a missing person report depends entirely on who’s gone missing,” Elijah drawls.

My teeth are chattering, but I ignore them as I follow him to the front door. “You mean…”

“You know exactly what I mean,” Elijah calls over his shoulder as he unlocks the front door. “Whether your abduction ends up on the news depends on who deems your unexplained absence newsworthy. Rootcrafters are Black. Rootcrafter girls, specifically, make a good target, because a missing Black girl won’t raise the alarm bells the way a missing white girl would.”

“You don’t think it’s messed up that he’s taking advantage of human bigotry and apathy?”

“I tend to be more furious at humanity for cultivating and perpetuating said bigotry and apathy,” Elijah says with an air of finality, “so, no.”

In this moment, I find I don’t have a counterargument for him.

All the same, as I lie awake in bed that night, I think about that girl and the iron in her voice when she told the warlock that I wouldn’t follow her. The certainty that I’d choose myself and forget about her, and I wonder what kind of person I’d be if I let this go—as Zoe and Elijah seem capable of doing.

I may not know the people in my life, but I know myself.

I won’t be able to let this go.