Chapter 14
Croesus summons me a few days after I find my grandmother’s ledger entry.
The servant who delivers the message differs from the usual blank-faced attendants.
This one is older, female, with silver hair and eyes that actually see me instead of looking through me.
She waits while I change into something Croesus won’t sneer at and then leads me through corridors towards somewhere?
It feels...official. Since I can find my way alone now.
We go up. I didn’t even realize the house had an up.
Every time I’ve tried to find stairs, they’ve led me in circles or deposited me back where I started.
But she navigates without hesitation, climbing spiral staircases made of gold-veined marble, passing through galleries where the walls themselves seem to breathe.
“Where are we going?” I ask finally.
“The Collection.” Her voice is soft, accented with something I can’t place. “Lord Croesus wishes to show you.”
“Show me what?”
She doesn’t answer. Just keeps climbing.
We reach a set of doors at the top of the final staircase.
Not the dramatic double doors like the library, these are smaller, more intimate.
Black wood inlaid with gold, carved with images of dragons hoarding treasure, kings counting coins, merchants weighing gold on scales.
The doors to well, a collection, I suppose.
The servant pushes them open and gestures for me to enter. I do, and she closes them behind me without following.
The room beyond is vast and overwhelming in its density. Not empty space filled with floating souls, this is packed with…stuff. Every surface covered, every corner filled, every inch of wall space occupied by something rare or beautiful or priceless.
Paintings in ornate frames, their subjects watching me with eyes which seem too alive.
Sculptures of marble and bronze and materials I don’t recognize, depicting gods and monsters and everything between.
Display cases filled with jewelry glittering with more than reflected light.
Rubies that pulse like hearts; diamonds that fracture light into impossible colors; emeralds that seem to hold entire forests in their depths.
Shelves lined with artifacts I’ve only seen in museums: golden masks, ancient pottery, weapons which predate recorded history. Medieval manuscripts rest beside modern hard drives beside clay tablets covered in cuneiform.
It’s beautiful; it’s overwhelming. It’s absolutely suffocating.
“Do you know what all of this is worth?”
I turn. Croesus stands in the center of the room, surrounded by his acquisitions, like a king in his throne room.
He’s dressed casually today, for him, in black pants, a white shirt open at the collar, bare feet.
It’s almost disconcerting to see he has feet.
Like I know he does, but now I can see them.
The gold veins in his hair catch the light from a thousand priceless objects.
“More than anyone could calculate,” I predict.
“Incorrect.” He moves through the space with the easy familiarity of someone who knows every item, every placement, every story.
“I know exactly what each piece is worth. Down to the last cent. The market value, the historical significance, the emotional attachment of previous owners.” He stops in front of a painting that looks like it could be a Rembrandt, dark and moody and probably worth millions.
“This one gained me three souls. The merchant who owned it loved it more than his children. I offered him wealth beyond imagination for three things: his business rivals destroyed, his debts erased, and this painting.”
“And he agreed.”
“They always agree.” He moves on, trailing fingers over a sculpture of a woman in flowing robes.
“This gained me one soul. A widow who wanted her husband back. I couldn’t give her that, of course; death is permanent, even for me.
But I could give her the illusion. Dreams where he lived, visions where he spoke to her.
Twenty years of comfortable delusion for her soul when she died and this statue she’d kept on her mantle for fifty years. ”
I follow him through the maze of acquisitions, watching as he touches things with a familiarity that borders on possession. Because that’s what this is. Not appreciation. Not love. Possession.
“Why are you showing me this?” I ask.
He stops in front of a display case holding a crown. Not a royal crown, it’s too delicate, too beautiful. Something that shouldn’t exist in the human world.
“Because you asked why I do this.” He looks at me over his shoulder. “The deals. The souls. The collection. You wanted to understand.”
“And this explains it?”
“This is it.” He turns to face me fully. “I was cast out three thousand years ago. Fell from Heaven with fractured power and given form and purpose and a hunger I cannot escape. Greed made manifest. The endless need for more.”
He moves closer, and I hold my ground even though every instinct tells me to back away.
“We don’t eat, Raven. Not like you do. We don’t sleep.
We don’t age. We exist in a state of perpetual want, sustained by the very sins we embody.
” He gestures to the collection around us.
“This is survival. Every deal I make, every soul I claim, every object I acquire—it feeds me. Temporarily. Barely. Never enough.”
“So you’re a prisoner of your own nature.”
Something flickers in his gold eyes. Surprise? “Yes. An apt description.”
“Then why not stop? Walk away? Find another way to exist?”
“Because there is no other way.” His voice goes hard.
“This is what I am. Greed. Avarice. A hunger that never fills. I cannot change my nature any more than you can change yours. The difference is”--he steps closer still, close enough that I can feel the heat radiating off him–“you chose to be a sin eater. I was made to be this.”
“That’s not true.” I meet his eyes, refusing to look away. “You make choices. Every deal you offer, every contract you write, every soul you take are choices. You’re not some mindless force of nature. You’re an angel who fell and decided to become a monster.”
I expect anger. Defensiveness. Maybe violence.
Instead, he laughs. Low and genuine and almost surprised.
“There it is,” he says. “The honesty Nathaniel sees in you. The refusal to bow, to soften, to tell me what I want to hear.” He reaches out, and before I can react, his fingers brush my jaw. Feather-light. Curious. “When’s the last time someone called me a monster to my face?”
I jerk back, putting space between us. “Don’t touch me.”
“Why not?” He follows, matching my step for step. “You let me hold you when you almost fell to pride. You let me catch you when you stumbled. You didn’t pull away in the car either.”
“That was different. That was...” I scramble for words. “That was work. This is...”
“What?” He stops, tilts his head. Studies me like I’m another artifact he’s considering acquiring. “This is personal? Intimate? Something that crosses a line we pretend exists?”
My back hits a display case. I’m trapped between priceless treasures and an angel who’s looking at me like I’m the most valuable thing in the room.
“I’m not one of your acquisitions,” I say, trying to keep my voice steady. “You can’t just collect me.”
“I know.” He places one hand on the case beside my head, leaning in.
Not touching me, but close enough that I can smell that scent of his, gold and incense, something rich and impossibly ancient.
“That’s what makes you fascinating. Everything else in this room?
I own it. Completely. Absolutely. But you?
” His free hand comes up, and this time when his fingers brush my cheek, I don’t pull away fast enough.
“You’re here because you choose to be. Because you love your sister more than you fear me.
I can’t buy that. Can’t claim it. Can’t add it to my collection no matter how much I want to. ”
“Then stop wanting to.” My voice comes out shakier than I’d like.
“If I could, I would.” His thumb traces my cheekbone, and the touch is curious, exploratory.
Like he’s trying to memorize the shape of me.
“But that’s the curse, isn’t it? I want everything I see.
Need everything I touch. And you?” His eyes meet mine, and despite his blindness, there’s something hungry in them that has nothing to do with greed.
“You’re the first thing in centuries I’ve wanted that I can’t have. ”
His hand slides from my cheek to my jaw, tilting my face up slightly. His thumb brushes the corner of my mouth, and I feel my breath catch despite myself.
“Stop,” I say, but it comes out weak. Uncertain.
“Why?” He leans closer, his breath warm against my skin. “You’re curious too. I can see it. You want to know what it would be like. If I kissed you again. If I touched you. If I—”
I shove him back. Hard. Put real force behind it even though shoving an angel is like trying to move a mountain. He lets me, steps back, hands raised in mock surrender, that infuriating almost-smile on his face.
“Don’t,” I say, and this time my voice is steady. Hard. “Don’t confuse your hunger with mine. Don’t project your wants onto me and pretend I’m complicit. I’m here because I have to be. Because you’re holding my sister’s safety hostage. Not because I want you.”
“Liar.” The word is soft, but it cuts.
“I’m not.”
“You are.” He drops his hands, but his eyes stay fixed on mine.
“Not about your reasons for being here; those are brutally, honestly clear. But about wanting me?” He shakes his head.
“I’ve lived three thousand years. I know desire when I see it.
And you, Raven Vesper, are very good at lying to yourself about this. ”
Heat floods my face. “Fuck you.”
“Perhaps eventually.” He says it so casually I almost don’t process the words. “But not today. Today, I’m simply showing you my collection and explaining why I do what I do. Consider the rest... educational.”