21. Leah #2
I start to examine the plant as the owner shuffles away.
Syrus, who’s been ducking to avoid the jungle of vines and hanging plants dangling from the ceiling, knocks a watering can with his foot.
It makes me stifle a laugh. When he gives me a questioning look, I shake my head, refusing to explain that I once idly pictured the Lord of Malice with a watering can and thought it an impossible sight.
If six weeks ago I told myself I’d feel even slightly normal around demons—and around this demon in particular—I would’ve said that spell the sorcerers cast must’ve driven me insane.
Maybe it did, but if so, then that insanity is a kindness at times.
It gives my weary heart a chance to rest. My gut isn’t always twisting in fear, and sometimes there’s even a shred of peace in all this.
“So what’s particularly special about this plant? Does it repel parasites?” he asks with a knowing smile.
“No,” I say. “I just liked the name.”
It’s the truth. I wanted it because it reminded me of Evie, but I don’t want to expand on that point.
Thankfully, I’m saved from having to explain by a commotion outside, the background noise of the city starting to swell.
Through the store’s large front windows, I can see demons on the street turning to look toward the end of the road. Someone’s shouting.
Syrus pulls open the door, catching a demon in a dark uniform hurrying along the street.
“You, warden, what’s going on?”
The demon looks frustrated at being stopped, but his eyes widen with recognition, and he hastily bows. “My Lord, a contingent has had to open an emergency rift from the Mire.”
“Here, in the city center?” Syrus asks quickly.
“Yes, my lord. Near the Daughter’s Temple. They sent a messenger ahead, but they’re coming through now,” the warden starts to edge in the direction of the rising noise. “Most of their riftsmiths were killed in battle—this was the only point left for retreat, but it’s very unstable.”
There’s a distant scream, and the warden gives Syrus a pleading look.
“Go,” Syrus says. “I will come and help.”
The warden nods and starts running. “Thank you, my lord,” he calls over his shoulder. “We’re trying to get everyone through before it collapses!”
Syrus moves further out into the street, stretching out his vast, black wings before glancing in my direction.
“You should stay here,” he says, then soars upward, banking over the rooftops and heading in the direction of the noise.
I weigh up his instructions, then dip back into the shop, tucking my Evie plant down by some larger pots. “I’ll come back for you later,” I promise her before hurrying down the street, following the gathering crowd.
I know I’m getting close when the chaos thickens.
Demons soar above me with stretchers, others rush down the street on foot, pushing carts loaded with healing supplies.
Some Malicites are going against the tide, trying to get away from the crisis, but most are moving toward it, and I let them carry me forward.
The cluster of people fans out when we hit a square, dispersing between whinnying kelaryn and armored demons. There’s a tall, grand building at one end—the temple the warden mentioned, I assume—except my view of it is partially obscured by a huge rip in the air.
I’ve never seen one of the larger rifts up close before.
It’s incredible—a flaming portal to another world, thirty feet high and wide.
Blue Stratan sky shimmers through it, the light bright and garishly yellow compared to Infernum.
The dark shadow of demon forces pours through it.
It should be a familiar sight, except from here on the ground, yards from the action, it feels totally different from watching from the city walls.
I can see every expression on their faces as they dive through the rift to safety: determination, exhaustion, pain, fear.
Infernum’s forces barrel through the opening, many barely managing to pull their wings up in time before they collide with the city buildings.
A few do actually crash, hitting low rooftops and rolling across them in a tumble of limbs and armor as Malicite civilians rise up to lift them from where they’ve fallen.
Some soldiers even stumble through the rift on foot, carrying injured comrades or dragging limping kelaryn, unwilling to abandon their steeds.
Healers and helpers whisk the most badly injured away while others collapse to the ground against buildings, bloody and dazed, incapable of going any further.
And of course, that says nothing of the ones who couldn’t make it through the rift at all.
Once, I would’ve sized these people up like prize hogs, hoping the most well-equipped among them would fall and not get back up.
I would’ve prayed the rift would close too early, leading to more casualties abandoned on the battlefield.
Now it’s like I’ve stepped into a scene I’ve only ever viewed as a flat painting, seeing it come so vividly to life around me it’s impossible to look away.
And in the middle of it all is Syrus. He’s down on one knee in front of the rift, head down, wings folded, and arms outstretched on either side of him, angled toward the ground.
From his palms stream twin plumes of shadow, arcing around and up toward the huge rift, wrapping around its perimeter.
They don’t look like ordinary shadows either, burning orange at the edges, flickering like the periphery of the rift opening.
I don’t know what precisely he’s doing, but I can tell it’s working.
The rift is trying to curl inward, the sides weakening as the aether seeks to seal the hole back up.
But his power alone is keeping it open, shoring up the portal and holding it in place so the others can come home safely.
I always thought it was nearly impossible to fight the aether once it’s decided to swallow back up the rips we create in it—I have seen wingers try and fail out on the plains—but Syrus is managing it.
By the time the last of the soldiers and kelaryn are staggering or flapping through, it’s clear the rift won’t hold for much longer. Despite Syrus’s magic, the sides are collapsing, the rip narrowing as the edges draw together. I hurry forward, placing a cautious hand on Syrus’s shoulder.
“It’s okay, Syrus,” I say as he lifts a strained face toward me. “They’ve made it through. You can let go now.”
He looks through the tear in the air to the realm beyond, and for a second, I see his eyes cloud over with a look of pure longing.
Then he nods and closes his fingers over his palms. The shadows sputter out and so, too, does the orange light.
The rift finally shudders closed, leaving nothing but empty air behind and a clear view of the temple.
Syrus gasps as he climbs to his feet, wiping a sheen of sweat from his forehead with the back of his hand.
He looks tired but satisfied, and the expression tightens my chest. He’s pleased he could do something to help the soldiers.
Such a simple emotion for a man who just displayed more power than I’ve ever seen from a demon in my life.
We both look around the square at the same time. Most of the injured are gone by now, taken to be healed, and the remaining people are too busy to pay much attention to us, which is maybe why Syrus thinks now is an appropriate time to tell me off.
“I thought I told you to stay at the store,” he says, though he sounds exasperated rather than angry.
“No, you said I should stay at the store, not that I had to,” I point out.
His lips press into a thin line, and for the first time I wonder if it’s not, as I assumed, an expression of anger for him. It’s almost like he’s trying not to laugh?
“I realize you might be a bit worn out from saving the day,” I say, testing my theory, “but could we maybe pick up my plant before we go back to the castle?”