3. Leah
Leah
Everyone, including me, turns toward the ephilium who spoke. He’s a tall, leonine man with gray hair down to his chin and a dark beard shot through with silver.
“General Garion?” Seraph Wyvier says.
He strides over, offering the seraphim a neat salute. I examine his face more closely, looking for traces of my mother there. His heavy brow frames a square, serious face that doesn’t seem like her at all, but there’s some resemblance in the eyes—green, like hers and my own.
I don’t miss that he studies me too, his gaze hard and calculating.
“You say you are the granddaughter of Leah Velanah?” he demands, every word clipped and precise, though his voice is gravelly with age.
“Yes,” I answer, meeting his gaze steadily, refusing to be intimidated.
“She had a daughter? When?”
His tone gives away nothing as I try to do the calculations in my mind, working out how old my mother would be if she were still alive.
“Fifty-four years ago.”
Something sparks in his eyes. “Then you are indeed my blood, Leah Illidore.”
I internally wince at how easily he claims me, placing what must be his own last name over my father’s. Not that I feel any great loyalty to my father at this point, but still—shouldn’t it be my choice which name I carry?
“Care to elaborate, General?” Seraph Orelle asks, annoyed to be left out of the conversation.
“Leah Velanah was a midwife I hired to deliver my second-born, your honor,” Garion says.
I try not to gape. Neither my mother nor my father ever mentioned my grandmother working in Aradis.
But then maybe my mother never knew, either?
There are only ever a select handful of humans invited to work for the ephilium—the wingers are very picky, and most humans are too chicken to go to another realm.
“Ah yes. For your first wife, Thalis?” Seraph Wyvier presses a hand to her chest, briefly closing her eyes as if praying. “May she shine in the Everlight.”
“Thank you,” Garion says, though he seems unmoved by the oath. “She was a good wife, but her body was weak. It’s why I resorted to help from the Mire.”
“If there’s one thing Stratans know, it’s babies,” Seraph Orelle says with a smile, as if this amuses him. “They seem to spend most of their lives pregnant.”
I frown, not pleased with the dismissiveness.
Yeah, we humans pop out a baby more than twice a century, but that’s hardly a bad thing.
Frankly, the only advantage we have over the wingers is that there are so damn many of us.
As far as I’m concerned, the more human babies the better.
Our numbers are just about the only thing they respect.
I keep that to myself, though. No need to go around ruffling any feathers.
“That was my thinking,” General Garion says, much less amused. “She lived in my house for four months, during which time we had a relationship. It must’ve produced a child, though I never heard from Leah again after my wife’s baby was born and Leah returned to Strata.”
“She hid the nephilim from you,” Seraph Wyvier says, sounding disapproving.
But not of Garion. I blink, wondering if the ephilium do anything normally.
This man just admitted to a room full of people that he cheated on his sick wife while she was pregnant, and he doesn’t sound the least bit embarrassed or ashamed.
Meanwhile, the seraphim seem to think my grandmother was the real villain of this tale—the human with the audacity to hide her own child from the wingers who definitely would have stolen my mother away back to Aradis if they’d known about her.
“And where are Leah and my daughter now?” Garion asks me.
“Dead,” I say. “My grandmother before I was born, my mother nearly twenty years ago.”
As I’m coming to expect, there’s little reaction from the general. I find myself hoping my mother grew up thinking her father really was the quiet clerk my grandmother ended up marrying and not the distant, imposing figure standing in front of me.
“Well, this changes things,” Seraph Wyvier says. “The Illidore line is an illustrious one. With your blood, General, this woman is likely to be a great warrior. An asset to our realm.”
Hope buds inside me, stronger than my fear for the first time since I set foot in this building.
Syrus said the pale-bloods were like this.
Ephilium worship the Everlight—the shining force lit by the souls of their ancestors—which means that bringing glory to their bloodline is what matters most to them.
These people know so little about me, but as long as I’m linked to some big, important general, apparently that doesn’t matter.
“We would be taking a risk with her, Wyvier,” Seraph Orelle says. “Captain Pellery’s sight is good, and I’m inclined to trust her suspicions. There’s no reason this woman couldn’t be nephilim and an Infernum spy.”
Damn it. Okay, so maybe it still matters to them a little.
“And yet we cannot sense any overt demonic magic on her,” Wyvier replies.
My hope sprouts another few inches. My mental defenses must be working to keep Syrus separated from me, and it seems no one’s picking up on my bond with him otherwise.
“If I may, your honors,” comes a melodic voice from the gathered muster—I turn to see a blonde ephilium woman with a bow and quiver of arrows strapped to her back.
“Why not simply imprison the nephilim and question her as we would any suspected demon agent? Release her if she reveals nothing, and execute her if she’s found guilty. ”
Panic stirs in me again. If I’m locked up in Aradis, no one is coming to get me.
No one even knows I’m here except for a small group of demons I’ve just burned my bridges with.
I didn’t want to risk the time it would take to see Evie in Strata and tell her where I was going.
If this goes badly, she’ll never even know what happened to me.
“That’s not necessary,” Garion snaps. “I would think the Illidore bloodline deserve a little more respect than being treated like some creature from the pits of Infernum.”
For the first time, I can hear real emotion in his voice. My grandfather is genuinely annoyed by this suggestion. It’s not much, but it’s nice to have someone edging toward my corner, if not actually standing in it.
“It’s not a matter of respect, General,” the woman replies, unimpressed. “But whether we should leave discussions of Aradis’s security to those generals who haven’t yet retired.”
Garion’s hand goes to the sword at his belt, resting on the pommel as his green eyes flash dangerously. Suddenly, I can see the fearsome warrior he must have been in his younger days. Pellery discreetly reaches a hand out to pull me away from my grandfather, clearly anticipating trouble.
“I’ve seen more battles than you’ve had hot dinners, child,” Garion snaps as the woman’s hand twitches toward her bow. “And if you think I’ll let a daughter of Rogin speak to me that way—”
“That is enough, both of you,” Seraph Wyvier interrupts, her voice booming through the room with unnatural force as her wings flare open threateningly.
Garion and the woman drop their hands to their sides.
“Our sight is unclear where this nephilim is concerned,” Seraph Orelle says, his eyes falling on me once more. “The future is yet to reveal itself. She could be a great ally…or an enemy.”
“There must be something I can do to prove myself,” I say, wondering if I’m going to regret it as soon as the words are out of my mouth.
“I mean, something that shows I’m loyal to the ephilium.
” Rather than something that involves withstanding a bolt of lightning running through my body, I think grimly.
“Test her,” my grandfather says, jumping on my suggestion. “Torture is no guarantee of getting the truth, and we have ways of measuring a person’s worth that run much deeper. Test her,” he repeats, “and you’ll see that even a nephilim with Illidore blood can bring glory to this realm.”
“You’re talking about the fledgling trials,” Seraph Wyvier says, tilting her head with interest.
“Yes,” Garion replies. “They are about to begin anyway, and she is around the right age in human terms. Let her prove her worth like any other ephilium youth. And if she is a demon spy, then the trials will eventually purge her of any lingering ties to Infernum anyway.”
Seraph Orelle meets Wyvier’s gaze and slowly nods. “It’s a wise suggestion—one that both honors the Illidore line and keeps Aradis safe. Very well.”
He turns to me. “You have a choice, Leah Illidore. Imprisonment or the trials. Whether you have something to hide or not, both risk your life, but only one could bring you glory.”
And only one keeps me from being locked up.
I’m not a fool. I have no clue what these fledgling trials are, exactly, but whatever tests the ephilium put their kids through are probably utterly brutal, and in my current state I don’t know if I stand a chance of surviving them.
But I can’t face having my freedom snatched from me again.
And I’m done with letting people take it from me.
I have been since the day my magic burst out of me and killed the ruler of Infernum’s army.
Actually, when I think about that, maybe I have a shot at getting through this after all.
“I’ll take the trials,” I say.
“Excellent,” Seraph Orelle claps his hands together. “Captain Pellery, you will escort her to the academy? And you can probably uncuff her now. She’s going to need those hands very soon.”
Garion leans toward me as Pellery releases my cuffs.
“You made the right choice, Leah,” he says, and his gruff voice sounds pleased. “You have potential, I can sense it, and the trials will be sure to draw that out of you.”
“And if they don’t?” I ask quietly, massaging my wrists once they’re free.
His green eyes harden. “Then you haven’t inherited as much of the Illidore blood as I’d hoped.”
He straightens up, looking down at me from his full, imposing height. “But I’m rarely wrong. Find your cousin at the academy—Filippa. She’s also a fledgling this year. Perhaps you can be of use to each other.”