25. Leah
Leah
Dear Leah,
Your news has given me more joy than I can possibly express.
I agree that it isn’t wise to be too direct at this time.
Doing so could ruin our hopes for a successful return.
Until then, I must trust the friends of friends.
But please do come see me when you can, so we may discuss your news further, and so that I might properly thank you.
Gratefully,
Your Aunt Ghola
I read the letter over again. It was delivered to the academy just before I was due to slip out and sneak into the Seraph Seat.
I’m glad I didn’t miss it. I was starting to get nervous about not getting a response from my aunt.
I sent her a letter over a week ago, after I got a message from Hodges delivered via inter-realm messaging without fanfare.
I suspected at the time from the slightly curled edges of the paper that some ephilium guard might have read it, but Hodges was smart enough to keep the message brief and coded, promising that our scavenger friend “Fiona” is following the directions Martha gave her, and that her “allergy medicine” has been working wonders.
I’d tried to read between the lines to see if Hodges resented the responsibility I’ve dumped on him, but any signs that he’s regretting doing me this favor were surprisingly absent.
Maybe Filippa is healed enough to be mostly taking care of herself.
It’s good news—it means Filippa might be coming back of her own accord soon, and in the meantime, I don’t have to try to work out a way to get back to Strata to see her.
Now, seated in the rooms of the Infernum delegation, my heart swells even more.
I’d not been entirely sure what kind of reaction I’d get from Filippa’s mother.
She wasn’t exactly warm the one time I met her.
So I deliberately downplayed my role in getting Filippa off the battlefield, in case she was the sort who’d hold it against Filippa for not being able to save herself.
But her response tells me I didn’t need to worry about that, and maybe she’s guessed what I did anyway.
It’s a relief, honestly. The first bit of familial approval I’ve gotten that isn’t Garion bragging about me bringing the Illidore bloodline glory—and him status points—with my trial performance.
This feels real, genuine, like I’ve built a bridge into a deeper connection with my family.
Ironic, though, that it would happen on a day when I’m about to cut a set of ties I once couldn’t imagine severing.
I fold the letter up and put it on the table.
“Good news?” Syrus asks, watching my face carefully. He’s seated across the table from me, and it feels weirdly domestic.
“Yes. My aunt knows about Filippa. I told her she probably shouldn’t send any message directly to Strata yet—not until Filippa thinks it won’t complicate things, but she’s pleased with the news.”
I don’t know why I’m overexplaining. Maybe because I don’t know what else to say to Syrus. I’m not sure I ever really thought we’d get here, and now, as Viz double checks his list of runes, the tightness in my stomach betrays my nerves.
“Aster will definitely be back by the time we’re finished, right?” I ask. The little purple demon just left to take a rift to Infernum via Strata, complaining all the way.
“Yes, she shouldn’t be more than hour,” Syrus says. “The seraphim want to send a new set of conditions to the lords, and we have to at least make a show of taking them to Infernum.”
“How are you keeping from the seraphim that they’re not talking to the lords at all?”
He shrugs. “It’s surprisingly easy. Everything is done through messages, and we just draw out any replies with long-winded logistical discussions that won’t really get us anywhere.
To be honest, just pretending to write like Liege Damein is enough to keep the negotiations at a crawl, given the way Damein uses riddles. ”
I nod, though I’m too on edge to absorb what he’s telling me. “Hopefully Aster doesn’t get waylaid in Strata,” I say. “Or I’m stuck here.”
“She won’t,” he says, confident, and it soothes me more than it should. “Will you visit your sister, once the trials are over?” he asks then, taking his own stab at shifting the conversation. “The ephilium will trust you then, yes?”
I keep my brows from rising in surprise. He hasn’t asked me about my future life in Aradis before.
“That’s what the seraphim said,” I reply. “And I would love to see Evie again. I left a letter for Hodges to take to her, telling her I’m okay, but I know she’ll still worry. Not to mention, she’ll be due soon.”
He dips his chin. “Ah yes, I’d forgotten you’re going to be an aunt. You’ll have to be sure to teach them all the important things—like how to break into places and swear like a sailor.”
The words are casual, fond, but he’s watching carefully as I smile, and I flush at my own reaction.
I’d want you to spend forever murmuring stupid jokes into my mind, if things had been different.
My thought is clear and inescapable. Something I have to fight to tuck back away or risk it spilling out of me.
“All right,” Viz says, clapping his hands together and gesturing to Syrus and me. Something flickers across Syrus’s face, then it’s buried again. He nods a little stiffly, but his eyes are bright when he looks at me.
“Ready when you are, vulture,” he says.
Again, I can’t fight the stupid smile that spreads across my face, even if the feeling that comes with it is bittersweet. “You haven’t called me that in a while.”
Viz looks between us and shakes his head. “You two are strange.”
“Where do you need us?” I ask Viz, ignoring his comment.
“Here’s fine. Better you stay away from the rugs; this could get a little messy,” he says as he pulls a knife from a bag.
“Whoa,” I say, eyeing the sharp edge.
“Don’t worry. It’s for Syrus.”
I straighten up. “What? What are you going to do to him?” I demand. I didn’t realize this was going to involve hurting him.
“Relax,” Viz says with an eye roll. “I’ll keep the cut as small as we can. But we need his blood for the runes.”
Syrus thumbs one of the scars across his cheek. “It’s nothing I’m not used to.”
I shake my head. That doesn’t make me feel better. “Why do we need his blood?”
“Inversion of the ritual, remember?” Viz says. “I mean, the runes still go on you, but that’s because you’re the host.”
I hadn’t considered that part either, but it makes sense. I nod. “Okay,” I say, mentally preparing for the bitch of a rash I’m about to get.
Syrus offers Viz his forearm, and Viz carefully places a bowl beneath it before slicing a small, shallow cut into Syrus’s flesh. I wince, but Syrus seems unmoved beyond a slight tensing in his jaw.
He tilts his arm, letting gravity help with the flow of blood into the bowl. When Viz is convinced he has enough, he hands Syrus a cloth which he presses to his arm for a minute or two as Viz fetches something else from his bag.
When Syrus lifts the cloth, the cut has already stopped bleeding, now just a red line of flesh starting to knit back together.
I gape at it. “You’re already healing?”
“Yes, I heal fast even for a demon. Another gift from Ajax,” he says, as if he’s surprised I didn’t know this already.
Viz dips a brush into the blood, consulting his scroll of runes. “Right, this is the complicated bit. Syrus, I’m going to need you to possess Leah while I paint these on.”
The familiar prickle runs up my neck, and with it comes a sudden, crippling pain at the awareness that this will be the last time.
But this is what I asked for, isn’t it? This is how it has to be.
I try to savor it as Syrus settles into my mind—the familiar weight of his presence, the way my body reacts to him, opening up as my nerves tingle under the ghost of his touch.
Viz makes me roll up my sleeves and starts marking out the runes.
“If there was anything you didn’t want to say out loud to me, now would be the time,” Syrus murmurs. His consciousness brushes up against multiple places in my mind, as if he too is mapping me, trying to commit this moment to memory.
He sounds half-joking, but he has a point. Still, I glance away and back again, unable to think of anything. Every possible word would just open up a door that should probably stay closed.
“All right, I’ll go then,” he says to my silence, crimson eyes never leaving my face. “I should’ve understood that what I did in Infernum would be impossible for you of all people to bear. I knew you better than that, and it shouldn’t have taken me so long to see it. I regret it.”
I exhale shakily. All these weeks I’ve been waiting for that acknowledgment, and he gives it to me now? He always had terrible timing. Nevertheless, something releases inside me.
“I wish you could tell me why,” I say, without anger or accusation. We’ve been over this too many times for that. Now I’m just sad.
“Me too,” he says, the sadness weighing on his words as well. “Maybe one day. When you aren’t…” He glances around at our surroundings, as if that says something in itself. “When things are safer,” he finishes.
One day. As if this isn’t the end of things. Could he see a future where I’m ephilium and he’s a demon lord and we still find each other? It’s like a daydream—too fragile to speak even into our minds.
“The blood doesn’t seem to be bothering you,” Syrus says, and I nearly move in surprise, almost ruining Viz’s handiwork. Luckily, I remember at the last moment to stay still.
“You’re right,” I say, staring at my skin in astonishment. There’s no hint of red or itchiness. “I must not be allergic to your blood. Maybe because of the bond?”
He nods once. As Viz finishes painting a rune on my wrist, the realization hangs between us.
We’ve been entwined together so closely for so long now, and yet it’s still not enough. There’s so much we still have to discover about each other. It’s a different kind of loss than what I was anticipating. Why did we waste so much time?
“Maybe when the bond is broken, it will start irritating you again,” he says.