Chapter 7
The room beyond the door is not what I expected.
I was braced for more gold, more oppressive wealth, more of the overwhelming sensory assault that is the rest of the house so far. Instead, I step into a space that’s almost...restrained. Comparatively speaking.
Almost.
It’s large, maybe forty feet across, with ceilings that soar at least twenty feet high.
The walls are still gold, but muted somehow, brushed rather than polished, the light softer here.
There are windows along one wall, tall and arched, but they don’t show the outside world.
Just the same golden light I glimpsed earlier, like looking into pure sunlight.
It should be blinding, but somehow it’s not.
Just warm. Eternal. Like standing at the edge of forever.
The floor is polished marble, white with veins of gold running through it like rivers on a map, and my boots echo as I step inside.
The sound carries in the vast space, announcing my presence more effectively than any introduction could.
Each footfall seems too loud, too heavy, too human against all this immortal grandeur.
My heart is hammering so hard, I’m surprised he can’t hear it from across the room. Hell, maybe he can. Maybe that’s part of his power, hearing fear, tasting it in the air like smoke.
The furniture is sparse though expensive, all but screaming old money.
A massive desk sits near the windows—sleek and modern, black wood inlaid with gold filigree.
I’d be so afraid of ruining the desk, I couldn’t use it.
Bookshelves line the walls, filled with what look like ledgers.
A few chairs are positioned around the room—low-backed, elegant, beautiful, but not meant for comfort.
And in the center of the room, standing with his back to me, is Croesus.
I know it immediately. There’s no one else it could be.
The air itself feels different around him.
Heavier. Like gravity works differently in his presence and reality bends just slightly to accommodate him.
It’s not magical, exactly. Or maybe it is, and I just can’t tell the difference anymore.
Either way, every instinct I have is screaming at me to run.
To turn around, walk back through that door, and take my chances with whatever consequences follow.
But I don’t move.
Can’t move.
He’s tall. I’d guess six-four, maybe six-five, with broad shoulders that taper to a lean waist. He’s wearing a suit in charcoal gray with the faintest gold pinstripe, which is tailored so perfectly, it might have been sewn directly onto his body.
Every line is clean, precise, deliberate.
His hands are clasped behind his back, and even from here I can see the rings on his fingers, all gold, multiple on each hand.
His hair is black, cut short at the sides and longer on top, pulled into a bun at the crown of his head, and when the light catches it, I can see veins of actual gold running through it.
Not dyed. Not highlights. Gold, like someone took molten metal and threaded it through each strand.
The short sides of his hair look almost like he’s sprinkled glitter throughout.
He doesn’t turn to face me when I enter. Doesn’t acknowledge my presence at all. Just stands there, perfectly still, looking out the window at nothing. Unless...he sees something different?
The door closes behind me with a soft click which sounds like a death sentence.
I stand there, frozen, uncertain. My palms are sweating. My mouth is dry. I’m acutely aware of how small I am in this space, five-seven in a room built for giants, human in a space designed for angels. How completely and utterly outmatched.
This is a being who has existed for thousands of years. Who has collected more souls than I can count. Who could probably kill me with a thought if he wanted to.
And I’m supposed to what? Negotiate with him? Stand my ground? Pretend I’m not terrified?
The silence stretches. Five seconds. Ten. Twenty.
My throat is closing up. I need to say something, do something, but the fear is paralyzing. Every horror story I’ve ever heard about the houses, about angels, about what happens to humans who displease them. It’s all flooding back, drowning me.
Finally, because I can’t stand it anymore, because silence feels like dying slowly, I speak. “I’m here.”
My voice comes out steady. Whew. Small victory.
“I know.” His voice is deep, smooth, like aged whiskey poured over velvet. Every word perfectly enunciated, no wasted syllables, a voice that could read a grocery list and make it sound like poetry. Or a threat. “You’re on time. That’s good. I appreciate punctuality.”
He still doesn’t turn around.
Another beat of silence. I shift my weight, and my boot scrapes against the marble. The sound is too loud in the quiet room, and I wince internally. Clumsy. Human. Graceless.
I’m making a fool of myself, and he hasn’t even looked at me yet.
“Are you going to turn around?” I ask. The words come out with more bite than I intend, sharp edges on what should probably be a respectful question.
But I can’t help it. Sarcasm is my armor.
Always has been. When I’m scared, I get mouthy.
It’s kept me alive this long. “Or should I just talk to your back for the next year?”
Inside, I’m screaming at myself. Shut up. Shut up. Don’t antagonize the ancient angel who literally owns you for the next twelve months.
But my mouth has never been good at listening to my brain.
That gets a reaction. A soft laugh, barely audible, like wind through dry leaves. Then, slowly, so slowly he turns, and I get my first real look at the Angel of Greed.
He’s beautiful.
That’s the first thing my brain registers, even though I don’t want it to.
Even though beauty shouldn’t matter when you’re looking at something that could destroy you without effort.
But he is beautiful, in the way classical sculptures are beautiful, all perfect proportions and elegant lines and features which seem designed by some divine hand rather than born.
Sharp cheekbones that could cut glass. Strong jaw.
A mouth that’s almost too perfect to be real, looking like it was made for either poetry or sin.
My heart does something complicated in my chest. Fear and attraction tangle together until I can’t tell which is which.
But it’s his eyes that stop me cold.
They’re gold. Pure molten gold, glowing faintly in the soft light of the room like embers in a dying fire. No white. No pupil. No iris. Just liquid gold where eyes should be, beautiful and alien and utterly wrong.
I’ve never seen anything like them. Never even imagined eyes could look like that, like someone poured precious metal into the sockets, and it somehow came alive.
He’s looking in my direction, his face turned toward me, his body angled to face mine, but something about his gaze is off. Like he’s looking at me but not quite at me, as if his focus is somewhere to the left of where I’m standing, or maybe through me entirely.
It’s unsettling.
“Better?” he asks, and there’s amusement in his tone. Like he knows exactly what I’m thinking and finds it entertaining.
I swallow hard. My throat feels like sandpaper. “Debatable.”
Better? No. Nothing about this is better. You’re terrifying and beautiful, and I want to run, and I can’t, and I hate this I hate this I hate this—.
But I keep my face neutral. Or try to. I’m pretty sure I’m failing.
“You’re Croesus,” I say, because stating the obvious seems safer than anything else I could say right now.
“I am.” He moves then, walking toward me with a grace that’s both leonine and predatory. Each step is deliberate, soundless despite his size. Like he’s not walking but gliding, like gravity doesn’t apply to him the same way it does to me.
I fight the urge to retreat. To give ground. Every instinct I have is screaming at me to create distance, to maintain space between myself and this thing that looks like a man but absolutely isn’t.
But I don’t move. Can’t. Moving would be admitting I’m afraid. And I can’t afford to show weakness. Not here. Not now. Not to him.
“And you’re Raven Vesper,” he continues, still closing the distance between us. Six feet now. Five. “Sin eater.”
He stops about four feet away from me. Close enough that I can see the way the gold in his hair catches the light, creating glints that shift and shimmer with each tiny movement.
Close enough to see the faint lines at the corners of his eyes, laugh lines, maybe, or just the weight of thousands of years pressing into his skin.
Close enough that I can smell him.
The scent hits me like a physical thing.
He smells like metal, brass, and copper, and gold, the sharp mineral tang of wealth made manifest. But underneath that, there’s smoke.
Not cigarette smoke or wood smoke, but something older.
Incense, maybe. Or the ghosts of fires that burned millennia ago in temples that no longer exist.
And underneath even that, there’s something darker. Richer. Like old books in older libraries, like wine that’s been aging in a cellar for centuries, like the scent of power so deep and so old that it’s become its own fragrance.
It’s intoxicating. And I hate that my traitorous body is responding to it, that my pulse is quickening for reasons that have nothing to do with fear.
Or maybe it has everything to do with fear. Maybe fear and attraction are just two sides of the same coin when you’re standing this close to something that could kill you with a thought.
“That’s me,” I say, and I’m proud that my voice doesn’t shake. “Here to serve my year and settle the debt.”
“Your seven years,” he corrects, his tone mild but with steel underneath. Velvet over iron. “The debt resets when the contract is incomplete. Your grandmother served two years. You’ll serve all seven. One to each house.”
Right. Seven years. Not one. Seven.