17. Leah
Leah
“H-how?” I ask, the words finding me at last. “You can’t get from Infernum to Aradis. The aether’s too thick.”
Rowan frowns. “It’s not impossible, though I’ve heard it’s very difficult, and you can’t open rifts that let through more than two or three people at a time. Anyway, they probably just came via the Mire. The bigger question is why the hell he’s here.”
Rowan’s wrong, I think blearily. Syrus didn’t come through Strata. Because he literally can’t physically go there. I’ve touched the runes carved into his skin that lock him out.
Snap out of it, and don’t be so fucking obvious.
I try to rearrange my face into a curious, bemused expression as Efram starts to explain something. I need to be projecting anything but the fear and shock and small, burning shard of hope in my chest.
He’s here.
“The demons sent him as an envoy. Apparently, they want to discuss a truce—maybe even start long-term peace talks.”
“It’s happened before,” Filippa says with a shrug. “Not that it ever lasted long. Interesting that they’re asking for it now. Maybe Kaliban’s death has hurt Infernum more than we realized.”
Rowan is shaking his head. “It doesn’t make any sense. Why would the seraphim even entertain it?”
“Things aren’t going well with the blight,” Filippa says, as if this is obvious. “A reprieve from the war might look tempting right now.”
He’s here.
I start moving through the crowd, my feet carrying me forward as if they have a mind of their own—as if I’m possessed. But I know very well that Syrus isn’t in my mind right now. No, this is all my own body’s doing, drawing me to him like a magnet.
I swerve around a small cluster of ephilium, each of them glancing up toward the center of the room every few seconds, something attracting their gaze. I think maybe someone says my name, but I can’t stop. I need to see him.
In that moment, it hits me. How desperate I am to have eyes on him again. How hungry I am for the sight of his face, the feeling of his gaze on mine. I’d been burying that need all this time that we’ve been apart, but now satisfaction is within reach, the need comes to feast on me with full force.
Ahead of me, I see the golden cowls of the seraphim, their heads tilted toward a dark-haired figure framed by a pair of leathery black wings.
I stop at the edge of the crowd, taking him in.
There’s a moat of empty space around him and the seraphim, as if no one wants to risk getting too close.
Then an officer steps forward, murmuring to Seraph Orelle, and the Lord of Malice lifts his head, searching the crowd.
He has hundreds of pairs of eyes on him, but it’s as if he can sense the specific weight of mine.
I’m right here, I murmur into my mind, even though he can’t hear me right now. Look at me.
Crimson eyes pin mine in place and promptly take me apart.
I’m peeled open, raw and exposed, and I forget how to breathe for a moment.
Everything is in that look—all the pain and lust and longing—and then it’s gone again.
His eyes sweep past me, having paused for only an instant, and now he’s looking back at the seraphim.
I study the carefully mannered look on his face, noticing the ghost of a different expression playing around the edges—maybe excitement? He hides it well though, listening attentively to Seraph Wyvier. After a moment, he lifts his hand and makes a beckoning motion to some figures behind him.
Viz and Aster.
I stifle a gasp of surprise. I’d somehow missed them before, standing a little back with a couple of ephilium officers, including one I recognize as Captain Pellery.
Aster looks as magnificent as ever, clearly taking a visit to Aradis as an excuse to show the ephilium how someone dressed for a ball should look.
Among the sea of muted colors and golds and silvers, she’s in a deep ruby red dress that brings out the luster of her purple skin.
Viz, meanwhile, has made some attempt at neatness, his bone-white complexion looking a little sallow beside his dark green jacket which, I enjoy noticing, still has a spot of ink on the cuff.
They look mysterious, elegant, aloof. And while the ephilium give them a wide berth, no one can tear their eyes off them. And all I want to do is run up and give them both a hug.
Instead, as Viz responds to Syrus’s beckon, I feel movement at my elbow.
“I don’t believe it,” Rowan breathes, having followed me through the crowd to see the demons for himself. “He’s really here. Ancestors, he’s a dangerous-looking fucker, isn’t he?”
Despite my shock, I stifle a smirk, remembering Rowan’s bravado as he talked about wanting to meet Syrus on the battlefield. Now I try to see the legendary Lord of Malice through Rowan’s eyes, to look past all the knotty, complicated feelings he throws up in me.
Syrus hasn’t made any attempt to disguise his true form.
His wings arc upward on either side of his head, as large as the seraphim’s, giving balance to the dark horns curling from his temples.
He’s wearing a formal black doublet, but the shirt beneath is open at the neck, probably on purpose to display as many of Ajax’s runes as possible.
If his height and muscled frame and the aura of power shifting around him weren’t enough to advertise Syrus’s strength, the scars would do the job well, telling the story of someone forged in violence and pain, who knows it like his mother tongue.
Except all that is just one version of him.
It doesn’t say anything about the city he saved with those scars, or how the power living beneath his skin can hold open a collapsing rift so his desperate, injured soldiers can make it home.
It doesn’t say anything about how that body can wrap around you and make you feel safer than you’ve ever felt before, except maybe once in a distant memory of your childhood.
My throat has gone tight, and I clear it.
“Yes, he certainly seems intimidating,” I say, like I haven’t told that man to go fuck himself, and stabbed him with sharp objects during training, and seen the face he makes when he climaxes.
You’re losing it, I scold myself. Syrus’s sudden appearance is unmooring me, and I’m in dangerous waters, my brain throwing all kinds of unhelpful thoughts and feelings at me.
Luckily, at that moment, the seraphim decide it’s time to make an official announcement, and I’m saved from saying something stupid to Rowan.
“Fledglings, soldiers, and friends,” says Seraph Wyvier, her voice rising above the hubbub of chatting guests, silencing them. “Now that most of you are here, we would like to introduce a special visitor to Aradis.”
At first glance, she looks calm and content, but there’s a subtle downward tilt of her mouth and a stiffness in her shoulders. Orelle keeps readjusting his wings, stretching them out and settling them back again, exposing his second set of eyes like it soothes him.
“Lord Syrus of Malice arrived this morning,” Wyvier continues. “He invoked the Sola Morator and will be acting as Infernum’s diplomatic representative here in Aradis for the foreseeable future.”
I throw Rowan a questioning glance as the crowd ripples with intrigue and fear and anger.
“Sola Morator is an ancient truce clause,” Rowan explains quietly. “It grants an ambassador safety in enemy territory as long as they are advocating for peace.”
“But there’s never been peace between the winger—” I stop myself, remembering I’m one of those wingers now. “Between the supernatural realms,” I amend. “Has there?”
“There’s been times when the fighting hasn’t been so bad,” Rowan supplies. “Mostly thanks to the Sola Morator.”
I glance up, feeling his gaze on me again. It’s a quick expression—gone in a flash—but Syrus looks between Rowan and me like peace is the last thing on his mind.
“Thank you for your words of welcome, Seraph Wyvier,” Syrus says, though it didn’t sound to me like there was much actual welcome contained in her speech. His tone is steady and commanding—a king’s voice, and very unlike the soft murmurs he purrs into my ears.
“I’m looking forward to the progress we’ll make together here in Aradis. To forging alliances, and perhaps healing some old wounds.” His eyes dart over me again, and I concentrate on keeping my face blank.
“You may know that just over a month ago, one of our number, Lord Kaliban of Rancor, was executed under unfortunate circumstances,” he continues.
“Yeah, because you circumstantially removed his head from his body,” Filippa has appeared on my other side, muttering under her breath so only I can hear. I hold back a smile.
“It is a new era in Infernum,” Syrus says.
“With Rancor under Kaliban’s successor, Lord Midane, our realm is ready to focus less on war and more on building a period of stability.
We’re proposing a scaling back of offensives on both sides.
Each of our realms has challenges to face right now, and our current state of war is to no one’s benefit. ”
Another ripple of reaction from the crowd.
I suspect people are wondering how much to read into Syrus’s words.
Is he making generalizations, or is he aware of the exact nature of the challenges Aradis is facing?
Of course, I can see his speech has done precisely what he intended it to—it’s ambiguous enough that no one will be able to agree about what Infernum knows and how much of a threat might lurk beneath his innocuous claims.
The reactions in the crowd soon swell into full-blown conversations.
As the seraphim and their entourage close in around Syrus, Viz, and Aster again, I turn away.
It’s too hard, watching them while I have to pretend I don’t know them.
I want nothing more than to snark with Viz, or share a glass of wine with Aster, or—well—who knows what I’d do with Syrus if I could get close to him again.
As I turn, I almost walk right into my grandfather, who is studying my wings with a faint line between his brows.