Chapter Three #2
“Lymond,” said Eric hoarsely, and then paused. It didn’t feel right to bring up another man just because he was thinking about Ixthan too much. He cleared his throat. “He’s a mage?”
“He’s a demon. Strong, too,” clarified Ix, though he looked annoyed to admit it. “He passed into this realm by himself, without the help of a mage summoning him through the border. He’s been using magic to make himself appear as though he’s been at court for years.”
“What! A demon.” Eric squeezed his eyes shut, trying to figure out what was real or not. “How does that even work? I didn’t know demons could change people’s memories. And Lymond, that’s a real county, how–”
“I helped him, of course.” Ix rolled his eyes, as if it was inconceivable that Lymond could have done this by himself.
“The previous Lymond passed without an heir. A few pieces of false paperwork and Lymond has a new heir and no one’s the wiser.
And it’s not true memory modification, that would be impossible.
He’s just very good at manipulating people into the impression that they know him, and your human mind convinces itself of times that must have happened. ”
“And instead of reporting him to the Magisterium, you… invited him to a party?” asked Eric, fiddling with the necklace as the metal lay cold against his skin.
Lymond’s abilities sounded dangerous. Even though he hadn’t harmed Eric in any way other than the false impression of friendship, he could immediately see the potential of much more treacherous applications.
Ix didn’t care much for their human laws, but still, he knew the precarious balance of his status at court.
Ixthan and Ceronzar shared the king as their father but their demon blood came from two different demon queens, specially chosen by the king as they were rival clans and despised each other.
If Ix was to be seen gathering demonic power around himself, Ceronzar’s mother would surely retaliate swiftly and brutally, and vice versa.
Not even being a prince would exempt him from such dangerous activity as harboring secret demons. And now Eric was complicit.
“He’s far more powerful than anyone my father’s mages are summoning, and he negotiated his own possession bargain,” said Ix.
He looked more pleased by this than anything else, and Eric knew him well enough to guess why.
There was only so much the human mages could teach Ix about magical theory when their own demonic summonings were so heavily regulated and supervised; where else would Ix get a chance to talk to a demon without human fetters?
“So you’ve been talking to him about magic?”
“Indeed. He gave me the idea for the construction of this spell, though I doubt he even knows it.”
“Wait, don’t tell me any details, I’m skirting too close to treason as it is,” said Eric with a shudder. “And I would rather like to avoid the whole flaying, drawing and hanging part.”
“You shouldn’t have gone to the execution.
It’s made you upset,” said Ix, suddenly stopping in his musings.
He turned, tilting Eric’s chin up and looking at his face properly.
Eric squirmed away, all too aware of how gaunt he must look.
And the sudden swoop in his stomach from having Ix grab him like that…
fuck, he didn’t have the mind to deal with that right now.
“I had to go, I —” Eric sighed. Threw himself onto the sofa, burrowed his face into a cushion. And finally, agreed, “I shouldn’t have gone.”
“I did not realize it touched you so deeply. You didn’t like him.” That was, coming from Ix, almost an apology.
“I didn’t. I thought him callous and cold after Mother died.
” This was not news to Ix; he had been with Eric that whole time.
It was understandable why Ix would have thought Eric wouldn’t be grieving after hearing Eric mutter nothing but complaints against the man for the last five years.
“But as long as he was alive, I could hope that he would come to his senses one day. For Petra at least. And now I know with finality that he was no longer the father I remembered.”
He felt something on his head. A sensation so unfamiliar it took him a moment to realize it was Ix’s hand with a light comforting pressure on the top of his head as he ran his fingers through Eric’s curls. And then it was gone by the time Eric turned his face in astonishment to check.
Ix was back to staring at his mirror. Eric waited until he was engrossed in his spell again before hooking the chain with his finger, peering down at his nose to look at the pendant, a streaked amber stone that reminded him of Ix’s eyes.
He tucked it under his shirt, and tried not to think about how he was carrying a part of Ix around with him now.
He still couldn’t feel anything but the strange swirling of the colors looked mysterious and effective, and he would have to trust Ix that it was working.
When the mirror suddenly misted over though, Eric did notice that. “Ix?” he asked nervously, rising up out of the armchair as the glass distorted even more, the reflection in the mirror undulating in the most disturbing way. Shadows that didn’t exist on this side floated across the surface.
“Do not concern yourself. It’s working,” said Ixthan, waving him back down, although he didn’t elaborate on what, exactly, was working.
Probably because Eric had just asked him not to tell him, godsdamnit.
He shouldn’t have said that, he did want to know what was going on, not least because it probably counted as some sort of diplomatic travel if Prince Ixthan decided to go for a visit in the demon realms.
Ix leaned closer into the mirror until his nose almost brushed the surface, waiting.
“Now what?” Eric asked. Mage or not he could tell when touching a mysterious magic mirror was a poor decision.
All of a sudden, a terrible thought occurred to Eric.
What if Ix didn’t come back? He wouldn’t go and simply stay forever with his mother, would he?
That would have been against the terms of the Demonic Accords: a pivotal part of the treaty was that the demon princes would stay in the human realm to…
to… Hellsdamnit, Eric should have brushed up on his politics, why couldn’t he remember the specifics?
Lingering in the back of his mind was a small voice that tried to reassure him, that told him Ix wouldn’t go and just leave him. Surely. Surely.
Ix grinned full-force, and stepped forward. Eric shouted out but it was too late.
The mirror shattered. A deafening crack echoed through the air.
A blast of multicolored wind whistled out of the mirror and through the room, so sharp and vicious that Eric flinched as it whipped across his face.
Magic, he thought wildly, trying to keep his eyes open as it whirled around the room in streaks of rich greens and golds.
So that was what it looked like. It was beautiful.
And just as suddenly, it was gone.
For one terrifying moment, Eric thought that Ix had also disappeared, stepped through the mirror. But as the colors faded like a cloud of smoke dissipating, Ix was still here. Relief swelled in Eric and was just as quickly extinguished: Ix collapsed without a sound.