28. Syrus
Syrus
Istir sometime in the early hours, unsure what woke me.
After sleeping alone in this bed for the last three centuries, it takes me a moment to understand the wonderfully soft, warm presence beside me.
It all slides into place when I see the waves of red hair spilling over my pillow.
My heart lurches and swells at the same time, absorbing the memories of a few hours ago.
I decided, somewhere between telling her about Sideria and finally understanding why she hadn’t yet removed that wedding ring, that Leah was worth taking the risk. If I’m honest, a part of me has felt that way for a long time, even if my fears were louder until last night.
My thoughts are interrupted when I hear Viz’s voice in the hallway.
It must be what woke me, and I immediately slip from beneath my blankets and find a pair of pants.
There’s only one reason he’d be out of bed at this hour—he must have news for me that can’t wait.
I throw a look over at Leah, making sure she’s still sleeping soundly, before crossing to the door.
I pull it open just as he’s about to knock. One of Quill’s guards, Telchor, hangs back behind my chamberlain, breathing heavily like he ran here.
“What is it?” I ask Viz, already pulling on a doublet and a pair of boots.
Viz’s eyes dart from me to the room beyond. The way his eyebrows rise tells me he’s caught a glimpse of the redhead in my bed. I yank the door shut behind me, giving him a look warning him to keep his opinions to himself.
“Erm.” Viz tucks a pencil behind his ear, which helps him center himself. “The patrol caught some snares trying to sneak water from the Morphos,” he says. “It’s gotten ugly.”
I sigh, ducking back into my room to grab my sword and belt. The snares need a little bit of water—just a vial—to seal their deals with humans. If they’re here, then they’re trying to break my order to suspend deals for now.
“One of these days,” I say as I return and follow the pair down the hallway, “you’re going to come to me about a crisis that doesn’t involve that damn lake.”
“We’ll see if we can rustle one up for you, my lord,” Viz says lightly. “Perhaps a natural disaster or minor insurrection.”
“There’s a promotion in it for you,” I say as we reach the courtyard.
Viz pulls a face. “Chamberlain is already the highest position in your court,” he points out, his voice fading as I spread my wings and take off, rising into the dark sky.
“They’re on the southern shore,” Telchor says. “About thirty when I left, though Captain Quill might’ve made headway since then.”
I can see the torchlight flickering in the darkness before we descend, shouts and the clash of weaponry rising up to meet us.
I send one of the snare’s torches flaring before I even land, the flames exploding, engulfing his arm. He immediately drops to the ground, rolling to try to put the fire out.
His shrieks are quickly drowned out by the roar of another snare diving toward me through the air, sword outstretched. I swing my own blade up, blocking his blow. He tries again, and I have to admit he’s good with his weapon—strong too. But his shadows are no match for mine.
Darkness pours down my steel to the point where our blades connect, engulfing the meager whisps of shadow dancing along his sword edge.
He retreats, trying to shake the shadow from his body as it crawls up his torso and wraps around his head, blinding him until he loses all sense of direction.
He dives toward the ground with no idea he’s heading the wrong way until he collides with the shore, bones crunching on impact.
With no other immediate attacks on the horizon, I can land at last, straightening up to address the snares clashing with my guards.
“You are trespassing in my domain!” I roar. “This is your only warning. Leave now or face execution.”
The smarter snares take one look at me and take flight, soaring over the mountains.
A few stragglers remain, too angry or foolish to heed my warning.
Quill throws me an appreciative grunt as I help his men and women finish most of them off until only one demon remains.
By the time the snare is kneeling on the shore surrounded by his dead comrades, the rage seems to have gone out of him, and he holds his shaking hands up to me, eyes wide.
“Please, my lord, have mercy,” he says, a sob catching in his voice.
“But I’m not your lord, am I?” I say, taking in his clothes and the roughness of his accent, which match those of his fellow thieves. “You’re Rancorite.”
The demon closes his mouth abruptly, too afraid to say anything more.
I tip the point of my sword toward his chest, letting a shadow curl around the blade menacingly. “Who’s your ringleader? You didn’t all just decide to take a trip to my domain at the same time. Who planned this?”
But his mouth stays tightly closed, even as tears bead at the corners of his eyes. He thinks he’s done for, and still he won’t talk.
I slide a look toward Quill, and he lifts an eyebrow. I believe we’re thinking the same thing. I could try to torture answers out of this fool, but I suspect I already know what he’ll say.
“Go,” I say, my voice a low snarl. “Crawl back to Rancor, and tell whoever sent you that the next thieves who darken my shores will wish they’d died as quickly as your friends did today.”
I lower my sword. The demon doesn’t hesitate to obey, scrambling to his feet and taking off into the air without another word.
“Someone make sure he crosses the border,” I say as I turn and clap Quill on the shoulder. “Well done. This is precisely the kind of incursion I was hoping the patrol would catch.”
“You’re welcome, my lord,” he murmurs, inclining his gray head respectfully before issuing a concise order to one of his guards to tail the snare.
Quill has never been a man of many words, which I like about him. My chamberlain, on the other hand…
Viz is still there waiting for us in the courtyard when we return.
“Don’t tell me you hung around to get the details of that promotion?” I joke, sheathing my sword. “I’ll need some time to think about it, Viz.”
He rolls his eyes, then holds up the piece of parchment in his hand, pencil poised.
“Report?” he asks.
“They were Rancorites, all of them. At least thirty. Quill?” I say, turning to my head of guard for confirmation.
“I’d say thirty-five, my lord. We killed twenty, but about fifteen more got away,” Quill says.
Viz winces. “Twenty is…a lot of dead snares, especially from one domain. I think Lord Kaliban might have something to say about this.”
“Yes, and when he does, it will surely be to acknowledge that execution is the standard punishment when a demon lord catches someone trying to steal from their territory,” I say firmly, unbuckling my scabbard.
“I’m pretty sure he’s the one who sent those idiots here.
None of the other snares have gotten desperate enough to try something like this, and it’s not coincidence the Rancorites are the only ones who haven’t respected my embargo.
I’d bet all the remaining water in the Morphos that their lord put them up to this. ”
“It occurred to me, my lord. But do you really think he’d disrespect Malice like that?” Quill asks.
“I think he was the angriest about me suspending the soul deals,” I say. “He wants to grow the army as quickly as possible, and this has put a nice big pothole in his way.”
“Should we send a message informing him of their crime anyway?” Viz asks.
“Yes. I sent my own message with one of the thieves, but let’s play nice for now and pretend we don’t know what he’s been up to. We’ll send it tomorrow though. Right now, I want to get back to my bed.”
And the person in it, I don’t add, even though Viz gives me a knowing look.
As I leave the courtyard, I make a mental note to be careful with Kaliban. I thought the help we offered him during Rancor’s coup bought us some good favor with him—but apparently not enough to protect Malice from Kaliban going after whatever he wants.
Leah
I wake with the purple light of the brightening ourani streaming through the window, telling me morning has arrived. I blink and stretch, luxuriating in the soft blankets and the wall of hard, warm muscle wrapped around me.
Goddess, he smells good. I inhale Syrus’s rich, masculine scent as I turn my head to see his sleeping face tucked beside my shoulder. I’ve never seen him asleep before, and there’s something vaguely intoxicating about all that power and strength slumbering peacefully beside me.
I drop my head to the pillow again, my eyes falling on the wedding ring he tossed to the floor last night.
After everything that happened yesterday, it’s easy to forget what Hodges told me at the market, but now, as I lie in bed with a man who is manifestly not my husband, I wonder if the man who was asking questions about me was Hathwell.
Was it him trying to find me? Or, if it happened before the marriage, was it him trying to uncover my secrets?
I can’t help but remember how Hathwell seemed so confused when I first turned up in that drawing room.
He thought my father only had one daughter, but he was quick to pay me plenty of attention once it was clear who I was.
Maybe after that, he kept asking questions about my identity, tracing my alias to the market…
Of course, it could be that the man from the market was totally unconnected to Hathwell and was one of the sorcerers.
But if it was Hathwell, then it would mean he was priming me to be their sacrifice from the beginning.
It would explain the rush on the ceremony, the lack of witnesses from his side of the family—even his finding an excuse not to sleep with me on our wedding night.
Either way, Hodges’s information makes me suspect the sorcerers deliberately targeted me. The why, however…
I don’t want to think about that too hard, not when looking down that road feels scary and unpredictable. And especially not when I’m lying so comfortable and happy in Syrus’s arms.
One of those arms is currently slung over my hip, curling up across my stomach and holding me tight as if he’s afraid I’ll leave.
But I don’t feel confined by it. Quite the opposite. I shuffle back, closer to his body, moving my hips so I’m nestled right next to him.
“If you keep rubbing against me like that, I’ll have to do something about it,” his voice drifts sleepily from behind me.
“Promise?” I ask, the hope in my voice only half put on.
He shifts, and I can feel his morning erection, but he doesn’t immediately pounce on me.
Instead, he lifts his head, eyes blinking drowsily as he presses a kiss to my shoulder, then another to my neck.
I roll over so we’re face-to-face, and he cradles my jaw, drawing me in for a series of long, languid kisses that make my body melt.
“Where did you go last night?” I ask before those kisses cloud my head entirely. Which wouldn’t be the worst outcome.
“I thought you slept through it,” he says with a little note of accusation in his voice as he tilts my head up and brushes his lips across my cheekbones, kissing my freckles. “There was an attack on the lake.”
“What?” I pull back, suddenly alert. “What happened?”
He frowns. “Nothing to worry about. Just some soul snares trying to take water from the Morphos. I think Kaliban put them up to it. He’s not happy about the soul embargo.”
“You seem very relaxed about all this,” I say, a little breathless as he kisses along my jaw.
He makes a noise in the back of his throat, something between a purr and an admonishment.
“That’s because I have more important things to attend to right now,” he says, pausing to study my face. “You, on the other hand, seem tense about something.”
“I’ve been thinking about Hathwell,” I admit, and Syrus’s eyes flare a little brighter.
“Talk of your husband is not exactly what a man wants to hear when you’re lying naked next to him,” he growls.
I flush, the possessive note in his voice doing interesting things to me. I shake my head.
“You know I don’t mean it like that. It’s just, more and more I’m thinking Hathwell was the one who handed me over to the sorcerers. Everything about our association was strange.”
Syrus moves, disentangling himself from me and sitting up against the headboard, a serious look on his face. “Tell me,” he says.
I explain how Hathwell got my father into debt, how he accepted a bride as payment and rushed through every step of the process.
Syrus listens intently, though I hold back my suspicions that maybe Hathwell wanted me specifically.
I don’t even know if it’s true, and I can’t imagine why it would be.
But if my link to the sorcerers isn’t coincidence…
something tells me that theory could drive a wedge between Syrus and me, given his suspicions about me working with the ephilium.
And right now, all I want is to bask in the new closeness between us.
When I’m reaching the end of my story, Syrus brushes my hair out of my face, a gesture so gentle it makes my heart swell a little.
“What I don’t understand is why you went through with it,” he murmurs.
“You must have had enough money from scavenging by then to strike out on your own, and I know you won’t be pushed into something you don’t want—not without a fight, anyway.
” His eyes gleam with amusement, obviously recalling all the times I’ve argued with him.
I inhale, preparing to take the biggest leap of faith I have yet with the Lord of Malice.
“It wasn’t meant to be me he married. I stepped in to take my sister’s place.”
“Your sister?” he repeats. Understanding floods across his features, as if suddenly everything slots into place.
“Yes. My younger half sister. She was the one my stepmother intended to marry off, but she’s only nineteen.
I couldn’t let her go through that. And thank the goddess I did step in, knowing what those fuckers had planned for her.
” My voice hardens at the thought. While I’ve been mostly recounting the tale lying half in Syrus’s lap, I sit up now, alert.
“I hate thinking about the fact I’m still married to someone like that,” I say, shaking my head. “What kind of monster marries a woman just to lead her to the slaughter?”
“So let’s make him pay,” Syrus says. His voice is nonchalant, yet I know he’s deadly serious.
I look up and see my own anger reflected back at me in his dark, crimson eyes.
“How?” I ask, unable to hide the intrigue in my voice.
“We’ll hunt him down, and then you can take the revenge you’re owed and make sure he can never do the same to anyone else again.”
I bite my lip. He makes it sound so logical, so right. Even if I did know for sure that Hathwell was guilty, I don’t know if I’m ready to stand up to him like that. But I also want answers—and the only way to unravel the truth is by finding him.
“All right,” I say, leaning over and kissing Syrus hard. “Let’s go find my husband.”