Chapter 28
Cyra
I opened a portal back to my bedchamber at Tide’s End, and we all stepped through. Surgeon and Serise continued to glare at Axenus, but he ignored them.
“What do we do now?” the merman asked gently.
“We figure out how to rescue Bressen,” I said. My entire body seemed numb except for my heart, which was twisted in knots in my chest. I could barely breathe now that I’d regained some semblance of myself.
Samhail? Are you here? I called into his mind. He normally left a sliver of his shield open for both me and Bressen in case we needed to send him a message, and I hoped that was still true.
I opened my mind to search for a response and jumped when Samhail’s voice boomed through my head.
Cyra! Where have you been? Where are you?
I’m in my room, I answered.
Don’t move, he said.
“Samhail’s on his way,” I told the others.
I went into my closet and stripped off my wet clothes as Axenus went down to his own room to change. I put on a dry pair of pants, a sweater, and some shoes. I was trying to run a brush through my damp hair when Axenus returned, and the rustle of leathery wings sounded from out on the balcony.
Something big landed hard on the stone, and we all turned to see Samhail stalk into the room.
He tucked his wings back against his body, but he didn’t fully dispel them.
He’d obviously been out looking for me, and I now felt guilty for leaving without telling him.
Not only was Bressen gone, but then I’d disappeared on him as well.
I frowned as some kind of mark glowed gold on his forehead like the one I’d seen on the twins’ foreheads.
This time I was able to get a better look at it.
It appeared to be three interlocking triangles above three radiant lines that extended down like sunbeams, but it was again there and gone before I had time to consider it.
I remembered seeing the interlocking triangles on the altar in the Priory just before Bressen and I had made love on it weeks ago – a symbol of the Trinity, I assumed – but I wasn’t sure what the radiant lines meant.
“Where the fuck did you all go?” Samhail thundered, looking from the twins to Axenus. He stopped in front of me and grabbed my arms. “Are you alright?” he asked as he looked me over.
I didn’t know how to answer that. Physically I was unharmed. In every other way, I was half a second from either disintegrating into smoke or exploding into fire.
“I’m fine,” I said finally. “I…went to Revenmyer.”
Samhail went still, and his expression grew serious as he searched my face. I took the opportunity to look for the symbol I’d seen on his forehead before, but there was no trace of it.
“Why did you go to Revenmyer?” Samhail asked warily.
I gave him a very abbreviated version of what happened, then had to spend several minutes calming him down as he admonished me for being so reckless as to go to Revenmyer without Bressen.
I apologized, but he only turned his attention to Axenus and spent several more minutes laying into him about taking me below the water while the merman stood stoically with his arms crossed.
“Feel better now?” Axenus asked when Samhail finally wound down.
The answer was apparently no, because Samhail then turned to Surgeon and Serise to unleash his rage on them, the merman’s casual dismissal of his displeasure renewing his fire.
While Samhail wouldn’t touch Axenus, I knew he had no such boundaries where his siblings were concerned, so I finally put a stop to his rant when he stalked toward them, seemingly intent on thrashing them both.
“Samhail,” I said, taking a page from Bressen’s book when it came to an authoritative tone.
To his credit, Samhail stopped immediately, although his face remained a mask of fury.
I considered letting him get into a fight with the twins, only because I knew they could handle themselves, but I decided against it.
I felt like a hypocrite, given that venting my own rage earlier had involved Clarice’s death, but I needed my gargoyles healthy and whole on the chance we got news of where Bressen was.
For that matter, it was unusual for Samhail to show quite this much anger.
His rage usually simmered just below the surface, and it was cold and calculated when he did release it.
To see him storm around like this with his emotions so close to the surface wasn’t something I’d ever seen before.
Was he as worried about Bressen as I was?
Or was his lack of control a consequence of something else?
…Like strong feelings of another kind for the fiery assassin who’d betrayed us. Betrayed him.
When Samhail finally calmed down enough that I was reasonably certain he wouldn’t attack anyone, we moved into Bressen’s study, and the five of us spent the rest of the day fruitlessly trying to figure out a way to find Bressen.
I could usually find him through our bond, but something was blocking it now.
My seeker power couldn’t locate him – I knew it wouldn’t, but I’d tried anyway – and we eventually called in Phaedrus to see if there was anyone at the Priory who could help.
No such luck. Not even the priestess who I’d originally syphoned the seeker power from could find Bressen.
We stayed awake late into the night until Axenus gently suggested we all needed to get some sleep so we could start fresh the next morning. I agreed reluctantly, although I was sure I wouldn’t be able to sleep.
Cyra
I laid awake in bed for at least an hour as my mind juggled thoughts of Bressen, Revenmyer, Clarice, and Magdalene.
I wasn’t truly sorry I’d killed Clarice, only sorry my actions had upset Axenus.
He was right that I’d gone too far, and he was right to stop me from hurting Glenora, but the one light spot in my world right now was that the woman who’d kept him as a slave was gone.
He’d never thank me for it, but I didn’t need him to.
I’d caught glimpses of Axenus’s past a couple times in Clarice’s mind, and I knew I’d killed a monster today.
When I couldn’t stand being in my own head any longer, I swung my legs out of bed, put on my robe and slippers, and left my room. It was too empty without Bressen, the bed too large and too cold.
I walked down to the third floor, hesitated, then knocked quietly on Samhail’s door.
I wasn’t completely sure if I wanted him to hear me or not, but I was relieved when he opened the door a few seconds later wearing only a loose pair of black pants. He and I looked at each other for a few long moments.
“Couldn’t sleep either?” he asked, and I shook my head.
Another long pause.
“Do you want to come in?” he asked.
“Just to sleep,” I assured him. “I…just don’t want to be alone. I need to be near someone.”
A shorter pause before Samhail opened the door to let me pass.
I’d thought long before deciding to come down to Samhail’s room. My other option had been to open a portal to Gendris and wake Raina, but I didn’t want to drag her into all this, no matter what she’d said earlier.
I also couldn’t deny I found something especially comforting about being near Samhail.
He’d been my friend and my protector for less than a year, but we’d grown exceptionally close in that time, and there was something about him that always made me feel safe.
I also knew Bressen trusted us together.
I removed my robe and kicked off my slippers before climbing under the covers on the side of his bed that looked less slept-in.
Samhail climbed back in on his side, still in the pair of loose pants he’d worn to answer the door, and I wondered if he actually slept in them, or if he only wore them now for the sake of propriety.
I’d never actually been in his bed when he slept.
He’d always come to me and Bressen’s bed, and it suddenly felt strange to be here.
We lay on our sides looking at each other for a while before I spoke.
“Are you alright?” I asked him.
I saw his frown, even in the dark.
“Why wouldn’t I be?” he asked.
“I’ve never seen you quite as riled up as you were today.”
“My best friend is in the hands of our enemies, including two sadistic bastards with a grudge and one bitch who likes to ra-”
He cut himself off before finishing the thought. I wasn’t sure if my horror showed in my face or not, but he shook his head.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “I’m just worried about him.”
I nodded. “And…what about Talyn?”
His scowl was again easy to read in the dark.
“Am I worried about Talyn?” he asked incredulously. “The woman who deceived us and took my friend?”
“I’m not asking if you’re worried about her. I’m asking if…” I trailed off, not sure how to say it.
Samhail lifted himself up on an elbow. “If I’m what?”
I shrugged against the mattress. If you’re heartbroken, I wanted to say, but he’d scoff at that.
“It just seems like you and Talyn had grown close,” I said. “I was wondering how you felt about her betrayal.”
He grunted and turned onto his back. “Talyn is nothing to me. I don’t feel betrayed. I feel stupid for having trusted her, and angry at myself that my lapse in judgement put Bressen in danger.”
I was the one to sit up this time, and I let a small flame flare to life in my hand. The red ‘glow’ I usually saw when someone lied wasn’t a real glow, so I couldn’t see it in the dark. It was more of an aura, and I could see it now clinging faintly to Samhail’s skin in the light of my fire.
“You’re lying,” I said. “You care for her.”
A muscle twitched in his jaw. He wanted to deny it, but I’d see the lie.
“It doesn’t matter,” he said without looking at me. “She was probably working for Sandrian the whole time.”
I closed my hand to extinguish the flame. “She tried to save me when I was fighting Magdalene,” I pointed out.
He didn’t say anything, and I laid back down. Even with his mind shield up, I felt the conflicting emotions roiling within him. He wanted to believe Talyn hadn’t been working for Sandrian, but he couldn’t reconcile her actions today.