3. Syneca #2
“Two weeks,” Pip said, wiping at her eyes with the back of her hand as she flew back toward the window to look outside.
“I’ve been exploring. There are these creatures called grimmies that carry messages, and they’re so fast, and I tried to catch one but they’re kind of small and they don’t like it when you touch their ties.
” She gasped, her whole body going rigid as she spun to Silas.
“I forgot to tell you. Demons are coming. I saw them on my way back.”
The room went unnaturally still.
Silas moved to the window, sweeping a heavy, draped curtain to the side.
Pip hovered just over his shoulder. “You can’t see them yet.”
“How many?” Dez asked.
She counted on her fingers. “Um. Maybe twenty?”
“Uniform color?” Silas asked.
“Purple and black. With a crest that looks like—” She made a vague gesture with her hands. “Swords? Or maybe keys? I couldn’t tell.”
I crossed the room before I realized I was moving, drawn to the window like something in my chest needed to confirm this was real.
All of it. The Underworld, the demons, the reality that I was no safer here than I’d been in Fuerlis.
The city stretched beyond, cloaked in twilight, wrought iron balconies and floating lanterns flickering against a sky that couldn't decide if it wanted to be dusk or dawn.
And there, moving toward us, twenty figures marched in tight formation.
“Darius’s,” Lore breathed, coming to my side.
Silas yanked the curtain shut. “Dez?”
“On it,” he said, grabbing a cloak from a rack.
“Wrong one,” Lore said without looking.
He put it back and grabbed a black option. “Better?”
“Much. Gray is far too dreary.”
Dez tossed it to me. “Put it on. Hood up.”
I caught it, unprepared for the heavy weight. “What’s happening?”
A knock echoed through the manor. Not polite. Not a request. A command.
“No time.” Lore was at my side, her hand on my arm. “We need to move. And you need shoes. I’ll be right back, Dez.”
He was already moving before she finished the sentence, like they’d prepared for this.
I pulled the cloak on, fumbling with the clasp as Lore spun and raced down the hall. Silas rushed toward me to help, his hands reaching for mine, and when our fingers brushed he jerked back.
Like touching me was repulsive.
I stared at where his hands had been. I couldn’t help it. For so long, those hands had been claws. Curved and deadly, capable of shredding through bone. Now they were just... hands. Long-fingered and rough with scars, knuckles that looked like they’d been broken more than once.
The same hands that had carried me through fire.
Part of me was still trying to wrap my head around the griffin being a demon. I didn’t know him at all. Maybe he’d resented this connection as much as I was beginning to.
I jerked my gaze away as Lore came racing back, dropping a pair of boots at my feet. “They might be too big, but they will do. The cloak will cover the pajamas.”
Stepping into the oversized boots, I leaned over to tie one while Silas quickly did the other.
I wanted to scream at him that I could tie my own damn shoes.
That I didn’t need him. But I still hadn’t acclimated to a world where I didn’t need my griffin.
I could do without the man though. Literally all of them.
“Pip.” Dez’s voice was gentle but firm as he pulled a book from the wall of bookshelves. “You staying or going?”
She tightened one of her buns, scoffing. “I’m staying.”
“If things go badly, if he needs help, find Pook.”
She nodded. “Who’s Pook?”
“A Grimmie. He’s bigger than the others. He wears a blue bow tie with a gold-leaf pin. Remember the Bellworks beneath the city?”
“Yes. Next to the Bone Market.”
“Pook lives inside the maintenance passages nobody visits. He’ll know how to find me and Lore.”
She rubbed her small hands together, eyes wide. “Okay, Dezzie.”
Then the demon did something that took me by complete surprise. He bowed. Formally and respectful, like Pip was royalty instead of a sprite barely bigger than his forearm. Her face flushed, her wings fluttering with surprise. She bowed back, before giggling and darting under the couch.
The next knock was harder, making the door rattle in its frame.
“Now,” Silas said. Not to Pip. To Dez.
Dez dropped his book on the floor and whispered something over it. The words began to glow gold. Lore grabbed my arm, pulling me toward Dez.
I tried to dig my heels in. “Why are we—”
“Syneca.” Silas’s voice cut through everything else. “Go. Now.”
I looked back at him.
Just for a second.
He stood alone, facing the door. Facing whatever was on the other side of it. Twenty demons coming for... what? Me, most likely.
He was putting himself between me and danger.
Again.
The way he always had.
I swallowed whatever emotion that truth had conjured. Not forgiveness. Just the horrible, traitorous recognition that seven years of protection hadn’t been a lie, even if the form he’d worn had been.
And my body remembered safety even though my mind knew better.
“Syneca.” Lore’s hand tightened on my arm. “Now.”
Silas’s eyes met mine across the room. For one second—one impossible second—I saw the griffin in them. The way he used to watch me in the mornings when he thought I was still asleep. Like I was the only thing in the world worth protecting.
Then his expression went cold.
“Go,” he said.
And I hated how much that hurt.
Lore pulled and this time I went, letting her guide me toward the book. We jumped at the same time, the Scrivener magic taking us out of the study, away from Silas, away from everything but the faint voice we’d left behind.
“It’s been too long, Si.”