Chapter 16
SIXTEEN
LAYDEN
Phoenix looks down at her phone and makes a girlish noise of delight. “I texted, and Professor Rossi has time for us!”
“Shouldn’t he always have time if Vlad bought him for you?” I growl under my breath as my eyes flick all around at the other students flooding out of the lecture hall. I don’t know how she can be so excited about this guy shedding light on what we’ve fought so hard to keep secret.
We always knew the conspiracy theorists would have a field day with the footage of the Devourers that covered the media outlets and internet sites for about six hours straight last month before my brother Remus blasted them out of existence.
Governments denied it all as a hoax, but much as I wish they were, people aren’t stupid.
Most of the conspiracy nuts are going on and on about secret government weapons and the like. Frankly, I’m shocked that Phoenix is encouraging anything that—while it might not be the absolute truth—is near enough.
Phoenix stops walking. She spins on me, and I can see the hurt flash across her face before the anger replaces it. “Don’t ever say that to me.” Her voice is tight. “I don’t let Vlad buy anyone for me. That’s disgusting.”
I hold up a hand immediately. “Phoenix, I didn’t mean—”
“I only allowed Vlad to offer Rossi an incentive package to teach here, but I never expected that to equal special treatment or consideration.” She’s talking fast now, defensive in a way that makes me realize I’ve touched a nerve.
“I’m just like any other student. I get by on my intellectual merits alone. ”
Dammit, I really stepped in that one, didn’t I? “Look, Phoenix, I’m sorry. I know you don’t—”
She bats my hand away, but I can see her shoulders soften slightly. She rolls her eyes. “Never mind. I shouldn’t have expected you to understand how important this is to me.”
The words sting worse than if she’d just yelled at me.
She strides away from me down the hallway. I easily keep up with my longer legs. “No, Phoenix, I do understand. I do. I know getting your degree was always important to you.”
I reach for her arm, then think better of it and pull back. At least she stops walking. I can control my hunger to touch her. I have to.
We’re in a mostly shadowed alcove now where there aren’t as many students around. The architecture here is old stone, creating little pockets of privacy between the main corridors. A window nearby lets in slanted afternoon light that catches the dust motes in the air.
“I just don’t understand why you’re so concerned with what this guy thinks.” I lean in closer, keeping my voice low. “I mean, sure, he’s got his theories, but you know what happened. You were there.”
“Do I?” She turns to face me fully, and there’s something vulnerable in her expression now instead of just anger.
I frown, confused by the question.
“Yes, I know what happened last month. I called a power I couldn’t even begin to understand from another realm into this one.
” She shifts her weight, and I realize she’s closer to me now in this alcove than she’s been since we woke up this morning.
“But beyond that, what the hell do I actually know?”
She leans in further, and I’m briefly overwhelmed by the her scent. My brain stutters for a second before I force myself to focus on her words.
“You know, one of the last things Sabra’s mother foresaw before she died was a fissure in this plane that would allow other spirits in. Professor Rossi found prophecies of a similar fissure in ancient texts. That spoke about a time when the gods would return.”
She’s animated now, her hands moving as she talks. Her blue eyes are bright with intellectual passion. “Think about it, Layden. I know we haven’t really ever talked about this, but you’ve been around far longer than me. Was there a time when gods roamed the earth, then went away?”
I watch her hands gesture, and the way her whole body is engaged in her explanation. She’s beautiful when she’s passionate like this. I never want to put out her fire, so I try to focus on her words.
“Sure, spirits from other realms may have always occasionally breached this plane, but I think they used to do it a lot more often.” She steps closer without seeming to realize it. “But then something happened, and they stopped. Maybe there was even a mass exodus. Or an expulsion of some kind.”
I blink as I think about a story my father always told me.
“Well… I’ve felt old my whole life, but you know, I’m still relatively young if you consider the earth’s age.
Only two or three thousand years old.” I lean back against the stone wall of the building, trying to focus on her words instead of how close she is. “My father, though... he’s much older.”
Phoenix nods, encouraging me to continue. There’s no impatience in her expression now, just genuine interest.
“Many angels from the Great Hall used to walk this plane until one day they left. But my father didn’t want to leave, so he stole the Spark of Life and came back to forge his sons and dominate this world.” I look back at Phoenix as it clicks into place. “Because he was the only one left.”
Her eyes light up as she realizes the same thing I am. “Maybe because he saw that all his competitors had left. Not just the angels, but everything else. Other spirits that the humans used to call gods.”
“What could have happened to send them all running back to the realms they came from?”
“I don’t know but it sounds like there was a great exile. And your father just managed to escape it, or at least sneak back after it happened.” Phoenix’s voice is filled with wonder now.
We both stare at each other, momentarily stumped by the implications.
“Don’t you see?” She reaches out and touches my arm without seeming to realize she’s doing it.
The contact sends electricity through me.
“That’s why I’m studying under Professor Rossi.
He might not have all the answers, but he’s spent his life studying human texts from that age.
He knows what people who lived back then said about what they saw when it was all happening. ”
Her hand is still on my arm. I don’t dare move in case she notices and pulls away.
“If the prophecy is right, and more spirits are going to be pouring back into the world, don’t we need to be prepared?” Her voice has gone softer now, almost pleading with me to understand.
I do understand. Of course I do.
“Are you suggesting we need to find a way to send every spirit in this realm back to where they came from? A second great exile? How? Like some global version of the circle the mage and I cooked up to send my father back to the Great Hall?” My head shakes in disbelief at the thought.
“It took years for us to figure that out, and that was just working out the magical coordinates to a single realm that I’d already visited once before. ”
“I don’t know!” Phoenix’s frustration is evident, but it’s not directed at me anymore. It’s at the situation. At the unknown. “But we have to try and find out, don’t we?”
I try to focus on the “we” in her statement. And the way she’s looking at me so emphatically, like she needs me to be on her side in this. Like we’re partners.
I nod. “Yeah. We do.”
She smiles at me then, and it makes me feel radiant inside, like the sun breaking through clouds after a rainstorm. It’s a real smile, the kind that reaches her eyes.
I fight the impulse to reach out and take her hands. She’s asking for a partner. Maybe that’s all I’ll ever be to her, but I’ll take whatever I can get if it means staying by her side.
“Thank you,” she says quietly. “For understanding. I know this probably seems insane to you.”
“Phoenix, you’re one of the sanest, most intelligent people I’ve ever met.” The words come out more intense than I intended. “If you think this is important, then it is.”
Her cheeks flush slightly, and she pulls her hand back from my arm. She only seems to just now realize she was touching me. “We should go find Professor Rossi before he changes his mind about meeting with us.”
Right before I can say anything else or do something stupid like ask if she’d ever want to try this marriage thing out for real, her phone buzzes loudly in her pocket.
She frowns and pulls it out. Whatever she sees on the screen makes her face go absolutely grim. The light that was in her eyes a moment ago extinguishes completely.
“What?” I ask, immediately concerned by the change in her expression.
“It’s Vlad. He’s sending us to go investigate something.” When her eyes come up to meet mine, they’ve lost all the joy she had when she was texting her professor earlier. “There’s been a murder.”
The word hangs heavy in the air between us. Whatever moment we were having in this alcove is gone now, replaced by the grim reality of what being bound to Vlad means.
She takes a breath and squares her shoulders. “I’m sorry. I know you probably wanted to avoid getting pulled into Vlad’s business.”
“Hey.” I do reach out this time and touch her shoulder briefly. “We’re in this together, remember? That’s what you just said.”
She looks up at me, and something in her expression softens. “Yeah. Together.”
For just a second, I let myself hope that eventually, she might come to mean it in more ways than just as a research partner. In the meantime, I’ll take every moment with her I can get.