Chapter Thirty-Five
Milo
“As thrilled as I am to see you sleeping for once, you’ve missed breakfast.”
I blinked against the light of the morning sun as my wife tossed aside the curtains covering the giant wall of glass in our room and turned to me with a raised brow.
As her words sank in, I practically leapt out of bed, reaching for my glasses and sliding them on before marching straight to the closet, still yawning.
“Why didn’t you wake me?” I called out from the racks of clothes which now held both mine and hers.
“You were out so late last night I thought you could use the rest,” she answered, accusation heavy in her tone.
“I expected you to come find me after your meeting with the rebels and tell me what happened but instead I got Luca running into my room in a panic to say I needed to send Pax down to the Second at once. What happened last night, Milo?”
“I have no idea why Olympia sent Pax to find me,” I replied, still irritated with my cousin’s decision from the night before, as I slid myself into a new freshly pressed suit for the day. “I told her I was fine on my own but you know how they all are when it comes to my safety.”
“You’re the Heir. It’s their job.”
“I suppose.”
Isla appeared in the threshold just as I was tying my tie. She looked me over with that shrewd, wifely examination I was beginning to become accustomed to before stepping forward to help straighten my jacket and finish the tie my clumsy fingers had already begun to struggle with.
“That doesn’t explain why Luca was in such a panic,” she muttered. “You’re sure nothing happened last night?”
I frowned, considering.
“I was with Jude, inside Harlowe, until nearly daybreak this morning,” I told her. “If anything out of the ordinary happened, I’m not aware of it.”
She nodded, though I noted she still didn’t seem convinced. I couldn’t blame her. Isla was as close to her cousins as I was to mine. If she truly believed Luca had some concern he wasn’t sharing, she was probably right, but I couldn’t concern myself with that now. I had other business to attend to.
Jude and I had managed to go over both journals with a fine tooth comb last night, matching dates and events along timelines we were able to generate with the help of both journals as well as other records of the era.
Eximius’ madness had come on at the exact same time as the last uprising, the only one in our history that could be considered a success in any sense.
The mentions of the necklace had begun to occur only in the second journal which began after a break of a few weeks after the first ended.
When I’d read it at first, I hadn’t known what he was referring to since he’d called it ‘the jewel’ and I’d never seen it before.
But now that I had access to Jude’s library and the necklace itself, we were able to connect the dots easily enough.
Something had happened to Eximius of House Avus in those few weeks between his sane journal and his mad rantings and that something, we now believed, had everything to do with the necklace containing a voice claiming to be a god and where he got it.
It all seemed to be tied together somehow.
Eximius, the journals, his madness, the necklace, the rebellion.
There was something larger at play here.
Something, I dare say, divine. But I didn’t have the slightest idea how to find out any more information than that.
My only recourse, the only chance I had to discover more of the story which, it seemed, wasn’t recorded anywhere in this city, was to put that necklace on and ask the ‘god’ itself.
The very idea made me shudder. I couldn’t help the fear that coursed through me when I thought about speaking to that deity again, when I considered the probability that I might go and lose my mind as thoroughly as my ancestor had, but this was important.
“Cleo is finding you some breakfast in the kitchen,” Pax said suddenly and I looked up to find myself already outside of my study, having left Isla in our room and gone off to start my work.
I nodded in thanks before striding into the office he stood outside of. He followed me in, leaving the door open behind us, presumably for Cleo.
“I expect my wife to let me sleep in like that but you–” I began.
“You needed your rest,” Pax interrupted before I could properly scold him. “You can’t keep burning at both ends all hours of the day and night, Milo. You’ll wear yourself out and we need you at full functional capacity, especially now.”
I glanced up at the grim tone.
“Did something happen?” I asked him.
“Something did,” he replied, “but we’re not sure what.”
My brow furrowed in confusion as I reached my desk and glanced down at the papers arranged on top of it, the resource reports I’d requested and now had to review.
“What does that mean?” I asked when no further information was immediately forthcoming.
“There were…blood stains found outside the gates of the House of Harlowe this morning,” he announced and my gaze snapped up to him.
“There had been an obvious attempt to clean them up but a member of the House noted the discoloration of the stone and the red-tinge accompanying it. We probably would have seen it too if we’d waited until sunrise to begin the journey home.
It wasn’t there the previous evening but they found it this morning after we left. ”
“Which means something happened while we were inside.”
Pax gave a firm nod. I blew out a breath, running a hand through my hair.
“Were the Guardians called?” I asked. “Do they have any leads? If someone is injured–”
“The Guardians claimed they couldn’t determine if the stain was blood or not and they left without even taking a report,” Pax grumbled and I raised a brow at the reaction.
“You think Viper is involved?”
“Who else could manage such a thorough cover up?”
“Not thorough enough if the House of Harlowe saw it from within their gates.”
Cleo entered at that moment bearing a tray of cut fruit, fried bacon, and a generous helping of eggs. I eyed the plate with a frown.
“Deanna set some aside for you,” she explained with a grin before setting the food on my desk and heading back toward the door, closing it behind her.
“All I’m saying is someone died outside those gates last night,” Pax argued the moment we were alone. “The size of the pool of blood that stained the stones was such that no one could have survived the loss of it. Harlowe states–”
Pax was interrupted by a loud crash when the door nearly came off its hinges slamming into the wall as a familiar Third Ringer came storming into the room.
“—can’t go in there!” Cleo was shouting after him, but Harrison didn’t so much as glance her way.
His face was contorted with a fury I’d never seen on him before as he crossed the room to slam a glowing blue necklace covered in blood onto my desk.
I stared down at the object for a moment, my brain making the connections I’d been ignorant of all morning.
I only had long enough to inhale before Harrison exploded.
“They have her,” he screamed, leaning over my desk until his face was inches from mine.
Pax stood at once, reaching out to pull him away, but stilled at my raised hand.
“Who?” I asked slowly. I knew who he meant, of course. Who else could it be? But I had to be sure.
“Your cousin,” he snapped. “Or haven’t you even noticed she’s gone? The Vipers have Olympia, Milo.”
I leaned back in my chair, the implications of what he was telling me whirling through my mind.
“Tell me what happened,” I said carefully.
Anger flashed in his eyes but he answered, though he paced away from me to do so. That’s when I noticed the bags beneath his eyes.
“She came to my apartment late last night, really this morning, and actually what she did was collapse outside my door,” he spoke rapidly, as if he couldn’t keep any of it in.
I could hear the terror behind his tone and leaned forward as a feeling of premonition began gnawing at my gut.
“She was bleeding so much. I did what I could. I wanted to come for you or a priest or someone who could help her but she wouldn’t let me.
She just grit her teeth and walked me through making a tourniquet.
When she finally stopped bleeding, when she was conscious for a few minutes, she started panicking about that godsdamned necklace.
She said they’d be coming for it, for her, and she couldn’t let them have it.
She made me promise to give it to you myself and then practically stumbled out of my apartment to turn herself into the Vipers so I’d have the chance.
I tried to talk her out of it. I told her this fucking thing wasn’t worth it but she made me swear—“
His voice broke and my gaze slipped to Pax who was watching the Third Ringer in shock.
“Why was she bleeding, Harrison?” I asked slowly, carefully. “When she came to you, she was injured. Did she say how that happened?”
He frowned at me for a moment and stopped pacing long enough to glare at me.
“It was one of them,” he said. “The snakes. She told me she…ended it but not before he got her nearly as good.”
I stared at him, letting what he was telling me sink in.
One of the Vipers had attacked my cousin and she’d killed him before crawling back to Harrison who patched her up just so she could turn herself in to protect the jewel.
My gaze slid to Pax once more, wondering if he was putting it all together as well.
This had happened right outside the House of Harlowe while Jude and I had been searching through Eximius’ journals inside.
This was what had left the massive blood stain on the cobblestones I had no doubt now the Vipers themselves had cleaned up.
Olympia had almost died. She’d given herself up to our enemy to protect an object none of us even knew what to do with.
I rose to my feet, buttoning my jacket as I turned back to Harrison with a frown.