Chapter 13
Rory jumped when the front door burst open, and Sam stomped in with an annoyed look on his face. She was beginning to think it was his default setting.
Standing abruptly, Lauren planted her hands on her hips and glared daggers. “Where have you been?”
It was around midnight, and Lauren had been on edge since dinner. Instead of answering, Sam said, “We need to speak in private.” He opened the front door and gestured for Lauren to step outside.
“You should go to bed,” she suggested to Rory with a look that brokered no argument.
Rory bristled at being ordered around like a child but didn’t argue. “Fine.”
She strolled toward the stairs, and when the front door shut, she ran the rest of the way to her room and cracked open her window. The large eave below her window blocked her vision, but Sam couldn’t speak softly if he tried.
“Explain why you were hours late,” Lauren demanded.
“I was at the Lux Palace,” he replied, loud enough for the dead to hear.
“Why would you be there?” Lauren asked, reining back her attitude. “You hate that place.”
“Caius wants us to spy on Gedeon during our shift changes,” Sam explained.
Caius and Gedeon? As in the Lux and Umbra Kings? No one in Erdikoa knew what the Royals looked like, but they studied them in school. Everyone knew their names.
“I tried tonight, but I was intercepted.” Something about his demeanor suggested there was more to that story.
She heard one of them shift before Lauren asked, “Intercepted by whom?”
“A maid,” Sam replied. Why did he sound uncomfortable? “I shifted into a cat, hoping to move around undetected, and she caught me and tried to take me home.”
Lauren laughed loudly. Rory slapped her hand over her mouth to keep from doing the same.
“We will cover more ground together,” he replied in a gruff voice that made Rory want to laugh again.
“Next time, shift into a rat,” Lauren suggested, trying to hold in another laugh. “No one will touch you then.”
It was impressive how calm he sounded after telling someone he almost became a domesticated pet. “You must shift, as well,” he said, all business. “We cannot chance being seen because the king is hiring other mystics as guards, not just Aatxe, and paying for their loyalty.”
Rory swallowed the urge to yell, ‘What?’ at the same time Lauren asked, “Why?”
“He hired them to spy and report back with anything pertaining to his siblings,” Sam answered, sounding tired.
Nothing they said made sense. Why would the king spy on his own siblings?
“We can’t leave her unprotected,” Lauren said, grabbing Rory’s attention.
“Patrick can take off those nights,” Sam reasoned. “You will wait to leave until after she is asleep.”
Rory heard rustling. She hated not being able to see them. “Someone can attack just as easily at night,” Lauren pointed out.
Sam grunted. “No one knows about this house, and I am more worried about her sneaking out. It is better if she does not know.”
How stupid did they think she was, and why did they think she had a set bedtime like a toddler? The coddling was driving her insane. Sam’s words offended her. She understood the gravity of her situation, and unless an emergency arose, she wouldn’t sneak out.
“Fine,” Lauren conceded. “I’ll see you at the bunker next shift change.”
The two fell quiet, and Rory heard the front door open and close. She stared in a daze, trying to make sense of what she had heard. A shadow crossed over her face as Lauren appeared on the eave with her phone pointed at the open window, and Rory muffled a scream.
The Angel laughed at her phone and tucked it away in her pocket. “I knew you were listening.”
Rory pursed her lips and tried to look like she didn’t almost shit her pants. “I don’t appreciate being treated like a child.”
“Sometimes you act like one,” Lauren replied immediately, making Rory scowl. “You don’t understand the danger you’re in, and I know you’ll figure out our schedule soon enough. I am asking you to stay here.”
“How selfish do you think I am?” Rory asked incredulously. “I know what is at stake, and I know my family will hurt the most if something happens to me. Don’t pretend to know anything about me.”
“I do know you, and I know you still want to avenge your sister.” Lauren’s wings appeared and spread wide. “I am asking you not to.”
Without another word, Rory watched as her guard disappeared into the night sky.
Despite being restless, Rory refrained from gulping down her sleeping potion after crawling into bed. It was late, and she didn’t want to sleep the next morning away.
Instead, she mulled over the Angels’ conversation. Why would they spy on the Lux King, and why would the Lux King spy on the Scales of Justice? As with everything else in her life since she returned, she felt like she already knew the answer but couldn’t reach it.
Sighing, she tugged on her comforter and berated herself for worrying about things out of her control. Her mother would return in a year, and everything would go back to normal.
Unless Rory’s soul was trying to warn her about something.
“Fuck it,” she muttered and grabbed the potion from her nightstand, hoping she found answers in her dream.
Wildflowers tickled the bottoms of her feet as she meandered through a garden. There was no sign of Not-Bane yet, and she walked faster along the winding path.
The walkway opened to a small pond, and the sight made heat pool low in her stomach. The closer she got, the more aroused she became. She really needed to get laid.
Did she have a pond fetish now?
“Hello, Miss Raven.”
The silky voice sent a sensual shiver down her spine, and she cursed her body for betraying her. Without turning, she said, “Hello, whoever you are.”
The heat from his body caressed her back as his breath fanned over her hair. “Are you still on that?”
Lifting a shoulder, she feigned nonchalance. “You say you’re not Bane, yet you tell me nothing about yourself. How would you feel?”
She felt his hesitation and held her breath, hoping her mind was conjuring up another memory. “You can call me Caius.”
“You’re named after the Umbra King?” Another thought occurred, and her eyes widened. “Are you the Umbra King?”
His lip tugged to the side. “I imagine many people name their children after the Royals.”
He was right. She’d gone to school with a Gedeon and an Atarah. “Where do you live?”
His breath against her ear made her shiver again. “Not close enough to you.”
She tried to put much needed space between them. “Did we know each other in Vincula?” If he still lived in the prison realm, what were the odds he wasn’t the king, and why would the king look like Bane?
He stuck a hand in the pocket of his sweatpants, drawing her eyes down to a prominent bulge. At that moment, the desert had more moisture than her mouth, and she licked her lips before returning her eyes back to his devious grin.
“Do you see something you like, Miss Raven?”
Crossing her arms to cover her hardened nipples, she huffed. “Don’t avoid the question.”
He raked a hand through his messy blonde hair, and Rory tried not to watch his muscles flex with the movement. If someone had asked her that morning if the oblique muscles turned her on, she would have said no. Her answer had since changed.
The amusement in his voice suggested he knew what she was thinking. “Why do you think we met in Vincula?”
She stepped closer to him, hoping her proximity would muddle his mind like it did hers. “One of my guards said there was a man in Vincula I thought was Bane.” He stiffened, making her smile. “So, it’s true.”
“You need to stop digging,” he commanded tersely. “Forget your past and enjoy your future. It’s all that matters now.”
Her face twisted indignantly. “Our past matters because it put us where we are, no matter if it was good or bad. We learn from it, grow from it. If it didn’t matter, we would forget it without magic, but it does, and it always will.”
He reached out and touched a piece of her hair, letting it slide through his fingers.
“If you focus on the past, you will never move forward. You will obsess over what you did wrong.” His imploring eyes met hers.
“You don’t learn from your past because you learned your lesson as it happened.
” The muscle in his jaw fluttered as he looked away. “And then you learn to let go.”
“What if I don’t want to let go?” she whispered. “What if I left someone in the past I was supposed to bring with me to the present?”
His golden gaze met hers again. “What if they purposefully pushed you into a future without them?”
Pain struck her in the chest at his harsh words. The same pain reflected in his eyes, and in that moment, she knew he was important to her, and she to him.
“Who are you?” she asked, barely above a whisper.
Reaching out a hand, he tenderly ran his thumb across her bottom lip. “I am a man who dreams of you, even if you don’t dream of me, and when you forget me and move on with your life, I will dream of you still.” He dropped his arm and backed away with a resigned expression.
The room shimmered, and she lurched forward, reaching for him. “Wait!”
Rory sat up with tears rolling down her face, knowing, without a doubt, that Caius was the missing piece. Nothing about it made sense, and despite him looking like Bane, she knew he wasn’t.
Just as she knew colors without being told, she knew this too.
That only meant one thing: the real Bane was still out there, and despite everything in her telling her to find him, Caius’ words echoed in her mind. “You learn to let go.”