13. Syrus
Syrus
“You’ve lost your mind,” Viz says, tossing down a scroll of parchment for emphasis. “You got it stuck one time when you were in Leah’s head and just left it there.” He gestures to his silver hair. “There’s nothing going on up there now. You’re just walking around, empty.”
“Yes, Viz, I think you’ve made your point,” I say, with enough of an edge to my tone to make him snap his mouth shut, cutting off whatever he was about to say. “But I really have thought this through. I know it’s drastic—”
“Drastic?” Viz interrupts, not able to contain himself for more than a few seconds. “You might just start a damn war, Syrus!”
“Aren’t we already at war?” I say, just to be annoying.
“I’m trying to avert a civil war. And might I remind you it’s not been that long since you nearly triggered the last one.”
“Well then, we know how to defuse the situation if it comes to that.”
I rise from the table, moving to the tapestry hanging on the far wall of the dining room.
It shows the old story about Aphelion and Hekate, the Son of the Light and Daughter of the Dark.
I remember telling Leah the tale as we walked through the streets of Malice, her skeptical voice cutting through the story with its usual, beautiful sharpness.
It feels like a lifetime ago, but I’m not willing to accept that that life—the one I shared with her—is over. It can’t be. I won’t let it be. Even if it means taking some…unusual steps.
Last time we spoke, she pointed out that there was nothing I could do about the wretched maggot who attacked her in Aradis—whoever they are.
And she was right. What can I do against the threats she’s facing?
I can guide her, maybe channel some of my power through her, but short of taking control of her and forcing her to walk out of Aradis one step at a time, my hands are mostly tied.
And I won’t do that. I may be a desperate fool, but I know enough to realize I would lose her forever if I even tried. Not to mention that the ephilium are already suspicious of her, and I’d probably only end up putting her in more danger.
Which leaves drastic, unprecedented plans that make Viz tear his hair out with his bony fingers.
I turn toward Asterim, who’s several pastries deep into afternoon tea.
“Aster? Are you going to tell me to reconsider too?”
She delicately dabs at her mouth. “It’s a bold idea, darling.
Romantic. Brave. Very stupid.” She sips a glass of something golden and sparkling.
“But I’m not sure we’re really living if we don’t do something very stupid from time to time.
I’m sure I’ve done at least three very stupid things just this month. ”
Viz makes a strangled groan. He knows he’s losing this argument.
“You just have to be willing to accept the consequences,” she continues, her voice hardening a touch in a way that tells me she’s serious. I go to stand by her seat, crouching down so our heads are level.
“And will you be by my side when I do?” I ask.
She shoots me an insulted look, as if I shouldn’t need to ask. “My dear, you know I’d follow you into the eternal darkness if you asked me to.”
I put my hand over hers, and she pats it fondly.
“Now let me finish this cake before this conversation gets so sickly sweet I lose my appetite,” she says.
I release her and turn back to Viz, who’s staring at us both, looking betrayed.
“You know I can’t do this without you, Vizmodeus,” I say. “You are my chamberlain, my right-hand man, and the cleverest person I know.”
“He means the cleverest book-smart person he knows,” Aster corrects under her breath. “In terms of street smarts, you’re a moron.”
“And I’m afraid that if I don’t try this, nothing we’ll have built over the last hundred years will matter,” I continue. “I know that seems selfish. But unfortunately, when I pulled that woman here from Infernum, I became irreparably selfish.”
Viz chews on his lip. “I don’t want you to go back to the person you were before.
You were a good ruler, but…” He sighs, like admitting this pains him, not wanting me to think he’s giving my plan any credit.
“But I think maybe you were better with her. The whole Kaliban situation. Well, it could’ve gone very differently if you weren’t so decisive.
She makes things…clearer for you, I think. ”
“And aren’t I being decisive now?” I ask.
“Yes,” he says reluctantly. “I want to see you happy, of course. But this is dangerous for everyone, Syrus. Are you sure this is the only way?”
“Can you think of another?” I reply, which only silences him.
At last, I turn to the third demon in the room, the one who’s been waiting in characteristic silence until he’s called upon.
“I need a commitment from you too, Quill. I won’t force you to take this on if you don’t want it.”
My head guard dips his bald pate. “Your chamberlain is right, my lord. Sometimes what is best for you is best for the kingdom.”
It’s the most expressive thing I’ve ever heard him say.
“And if this isn’t one of those times?” I ask, surprising myself with my willingness to voice my doubts aloud. But this is the biggest of my misgivings—that what I’m about to do just might doom us.
“Then I would still live and die by your command, my lord,” Quill says.
These military types, always so black and white. But I’ll happily take undying loyalty when it’s coming from a man as honorable as Quill.
“I also won’t ask you if you feel up to the task, Quill. I know you are. I just want you to brace yourself.”
“Consider me braced, my lord,” Quill says with a sharp nod.
The rest of the day stretches on. Even if there’s lots to do to set my plans in action, none of it fills the gaping space that’s opened up in my life.
Since I made my deal with Leah, I’ve found myself impatient all day, waiting for the evenings, for those few, brief minutes when I have permission to slip into her mind.
In those moments, I’m close to her again and can enjoy the familiar sensation of settling into her body—feeling the soft brush of her hair against the nape of her neck, the flutter of her eyelashes against her cheek.
I lose myself in the steady, comforting thud of her heartbeat.
Each time I hold my breath, hoping, intensely and fruitlessly, that she might speak to me.
But she just lies there in silence, until I can’t reasonably linger any longer and have to force my awareness back to Infernum.
Tonight, however, I break.
She’s lying on her side, because these days her back is too tender to sleep on, and I can feel the ache of her emerging wings radiating through her.
It makes her restless, and the hours struggling to fall asleep are wearing her out.
I can feel all this and more, just by reaching out a tendril of awareness and sweeping through her body, and I want to help her.
“Can I ask you something?” I murmur and wince when I feel her stiffen. There was a time when she welcomed me, rather than flinching away.
“Only if it sticks to the rules,” she replies.
“If there was a way for you get out of the trials, would you take it?” Technically, this is still allowed. We said we would discuss the trials and her training only, and this is perfectly on topic.
It apparently passes muster, because she pauses to think about it.
“There was a way out,” she says. “The captain who brought me to Aradis, Pellery, offered to help me escape before I came to the academy. I didn’t accept.”
“Why?” I demand, shaken by the thought.
“Because of you,” she says, her voice low and strained in her mind.
“What are you talking about?”
She shifts her head on the pillow, tucking her hands under her cheek and sighing. “It doesn’t matter. I just felt I didn’t have any other options.”
“No,” I disagree, my anger flaring at the way she so easily lays the blame at my feet and then walks away. “It does matter. I want to know how you justified doing something so extreme, so dangerous, so...” I run out of words that won’t cause more damage than they’re worth.
She pounces on this, as if she’s been waiting for me to say something similar this whole time.
“Maybe I will tell you, if you tell me how you justified trying to hide my power from me.”
I grimace. She’s too good at this—tying me in knots.
“What happened to not going over the past?” I say, even though I know very well I started it.
She huffs and sits up in bed, too agitated to lie still.
“I’m so sick of you using vague excuses about circumstances beyond our control, and people not being safe. How can you expect me to stake my whole life—my heart—on something you refuse to share with me?”
The words come out in a rush, but I don’t miss the mention of her heart. It lights something in me, sending me pressing up against the inside of her mind like I’m backing her consciousness up against a wall.
“I could have told you once,” I say, unable to temper the intensity of my voice. “I would have, probably. But then you had to go and do the one thing—”
I stop and swear in Cyrax, a stream of curses to try to stem the other words that want to spill out of me. It half works, and I’m a little calmer when I speak again. “You had to go to Aradis and become a tool of the enemy. That made it impossible. I can’t trust you anymore. Not with this. Not now.”
She barks out a loud, bitter, disgusted laugh. “And I’m just supposed to believe that? Ancestors, you must think I’m such a na?ve idiot.”
“No, but I think you’re starting to become more like them than you realize. I…I care for you, Leah,” I say, catching myself before the full messy reality comes tumbling out. “Very much. But I also have a lot of people who depend on me. And I will cross a lot of lines for you, but not this one.”
The spikes of her anger blunt into confusion and hurt.
“Then I have to draw my lines too,” she says simply, though of course nothing about this is simple.
She lies back down and turns toward the wall, as if that will somehow shut me out. “Goodnight, Syrus,” she says, flat and cold.