Chapter 39 Susenyos
SUSENYOS
In the moments Adane House was empty, Susenyos would travel room to room, searching for his immortality. He could never find it, half marveling at the power beyond his comprehension, and half cursing his fate.
He went to the observatory, kneeling on the marble floor, greeting the burning sun at noon, and later, the lonely stars. The heavens had watched him become human in this room, and he’d fought them for years, refused to accept such a soft heart and flesh.
How could he?
He was an emperor. Named Susenyos Malak Sagad. To whom the angels bowed. How could he regress to the boy he was without a crown and power?
In the unforgiving observatory, visions of his court punished him. He could hear Samson’s wrenching cry as Susenyos emerged from that forest alone. Talaa dead in the woods with black rot. He could feel Henok and Biruk screaming from the chains the Lusidios strung them on.
Iniko and Taj being branded with him.
The fire, holy and unforgiving, scorching buildings to rubble and his people to ash.
Memories of every failure cut at him, led by his father’s mighty sword. Weak.
Arin’s ultimatum—kill your companion.
All of it scraped along his mind like claws, robbing him of any peace.
Panting, he braced forward, a drop of sweat falling to the shinning marble. His vision whirled. He couldn’t remember how many hours he’d spent in here, but it had to be at least five.
Human Yos could never lead an army. He could barely save his own mother and betrothed. And if he wanted his strength and people back, he had to kill the only good thing in his life.
Kidan.
A gasp tore from deep in his throat, the merciless torture of the room increasing suddenly.
She never showed up until he was at the edge of death. Until he nearly lost consciousness.
Enough, Yos. The Sage’s voice came to him as sinful comfort, clinking like bells at a holy temple. Walk away from this room.
He first heard her voice when he was nineteen, in the forest with black vines and spoiled roots.
Mighty as the sun, brandishing two swords, a bloodred ring, and a whirling wooden mask with golden accents.
Ever since then, he’d seen her four hundred and fourteen times, all at the brink of death.
He had scoured all the books and consulted every scholar to understand why he could still hear her when he was most afraid.
But their responses had all boiled down to deep childhood trauma, a coping mechanism against his worst fear.
Everyone sought comfort when they neared death.
She might not be real, but she was a part of his soul. His goddess. His guard against death.
I can do it, he strained in his mind. Just a little longer.
Your heart will stop if you keep pushing.
He collapsed forward, and the slam to his head made the world shimmer, then go dark.
Leathery fingers stirred him awake, the scent of warm bread close.
“Come.”
Swaying, Susenyos stood and walked out of his torture room like he had done so many times before, inhaling deeply in the hallway.
“One day,” Etete said in a tired voice, resting him on the floor gently. “All I ask is for one day I don’t find you on your back.”
Despite every muscle hurting, Susenyos offered her a small smile. “Thank you.”
She tipped a glass of water down his dry throat.
Watching Etete, he could hardly believe she once belonged to the poison that was the Eagle Order.
“How are your kids?” he asked.
She gave a small smile. “Well-fed.”
Etete visited the acti orphans in the vampire-free boarding school multiple times a week. To her, they were her children. She was a mother without children. It was her very nature to care.
He’d met her thirty years ago and tried to slam the door on her. Adane House didn’t need another potential traitor. Especially not from the Eagle Order. Now, though, it bothered him to know her cells were dying, her movements slowing, that ache in her wrist growing worse each year.
Susenyos didn’t watch the people he cared about die. He’d told her that once and she’d said, “Well, I’ll do my best to go into town and die.”
Etete regarded him and a severe look possessed her gentle eyes. He straightened for a scolding. What had he done now?
“Are you being kind to her?” she asked.
He relaxed a little. “She is… distant.”
“Hmm. At least you’re done with your silly games.”
Susenyos huffed an indignant breath. Etete hadn’t found it amusing when Susenyos put Kidan on the roof or coated her room in red dye. He thought it’d been brilliant.
“It’s not like she would have been hurt,” he muttered.
Etete studied the hallway, the flickering bulb. She sighed heavily. “And your people? You took Biruk’s ring and Henok’s comb. Did you see them?”
He smiled. Etete knew every Nefrasi artifact and whom it belonged to alongside him, cleaned them just as he did. “Yes.”
“How did it feel seeing them again?”
This time, his smile was wide, proud. “Better than I imagined.”
The hallway transformed, swirling with the taste of artifacts and power.
“But I might have to do something,” he said, unable to meet her deep eyes. “To earn them all back, I might have to leave behind Adane House.”
Etete thought for a moment. Susenyos wondered if she knew what he meant.
Kidan’s life could give him everything he’d lost sixty years ago.
He had known her for only a few months. The Nefrasi had been ingrained to his soul for two hundred years. Logic demanded he hand her over to Arin right now. With Kidan gone, he wouldn’t suffer hunger, he wouldn’t be Mortal Vowed. Or would he damn himself ? Die alongside her?
He still found no way out of this bond.
Susenyos reached into his back pocket and retrieved the letter with no name.
I think I was born to die. Everything I do feels pointless or, worse, hurts those around me.
Even the thoughts I believe are good just end up craving blood.
There’s something inside me that doesn’t belong.
Something solid and sharp-edged that wants out.
It wants to destroy and break the world and rearrange it, shatter it entirely just to please me.
The more I fight this hunger, the more I lose.
It’s taking over my body, my mind, my heart.
I can’t stand it. I want quiet and peace.
I need to end it myself before it wins. Please, tell me how to stand it all.
Etete took the letter gently and read it, sadness lining her features with each word. “She’s lost but so are you. You stood before Uxlay and vowed to be her companion, don’t leave her now.”
Guilt crowded him. But he was running out of options. Arin would only wait for so long. Susenyos dragged a hand down his face.
“I was worried you’d kill her the night the house took the rest of your immortality.
” Etete’s eyes traveled to a hole in the wall as a result of the Nefrasi swords Susenyos had been throwing around in fury.
“But you did something I’d never seen you do.
You saw her pain before yours. And if you’re patient with her, she’ll begin to do the same for you. ”
Susenyos tipped his head forward, a smile tugging at his lips. Etete was always the voice of reason. Always too good.
“Thank you,” he said. “Not just now but all of it… thank you for being my friend.”
Etete was quiet for a while before she laughed softly. The movement made her gray-streaked Afro lightly bounce. “Friend? Yes, I believe you are my friend. I suppose I should thank you for letting me stay in this world.”
He could hear the admiration in her voice, for Uxlay, for vampires.
“Why not be one of us? I could find you a life exchange. Today, if you want—”
She shook her head, and he stopped short.
“It is frightening to live endlessly. To be human is to take death as your companion. I quite like death. I walk hand in hand with him. He waits for me, my ever-loyal servant. You wouldn’t take me away from him, would you?”
Susenyos didn’t understand this. Death was the enemy. You killed it with everything you possessed because it came to whisk you and those you loved into oblivion.
The smell of rotting ground burned his nostrils, his betrothed screaming. His mother’s body attracting the tunnel spiders as he held her corpse.
Death would always be the enemy.
Etete let out a soft sound. Perhaps she was disappointed in him. His skin prickled like it did when he was standing before his father, but no reprimand came.
Instead, she said, like she always did, “Tell me about Farah City.”
Susenyos’s eyes brightened a little. “The war?”
“No,” she said. “After. Tell me about how you took care of your people after they lost their loved ones.”
His lips quirked sadly. This was his favorite story as well. Not because it spoke of their great victory, achieved with unbridled brute force, but because she wanted to know about a time when Susenyos needed no outside strength to rely on to reach his people and win their hearts.