We slip inside among the cluttered filing cabinets that no longer have the space to line the walls. I stand at the center of the angled cabinets with Isabella, and by the time Krave and Damien both come inside, there’s no room for our wings. Isabella’s feathers flutter along her back, scattering loose papers atop the cabinets but she calms and pulls them back in it seems. I shift on my feet until my big black wings fade away, settling inside myself like a comfortable blanket wrapping around me. Damien smiles slightly at the sight of my glamouring magic while Krave doesn’t much notice at all.
He’s used to it.
That and he’s nearly as powerful as I am in some ways, so I don’t expect the same impressed glance from him.
But there’s more room now, and that’s all that matters.
My hand presses to the old wooden door, but as it starts to glide shut, a shining black boot kicks between the frame and the door.
Sev.
Perfect.
“We don’t need you here for this, Sev,” the woman says to him on that calm but annoyed tone of hers.
He pushes into the room, his wings brushing Krave’s as they stand side by side. He closes the door behind him and looks up at us with a big smile. “I didn’t ask if you needed me. You’re my partner, and it’s dangerous to be alone with the second-most-watched person in this kingdom.”
My brow arches high. “I’m on your watch list?”
Sev’s smirk spreads harder across his obnoxious face. “Did you think you weren’t? After everything? After walking around with your dead brother’s crown on your head? After binding two demons and an angel to your soul? After standing watch during a fucking homicide?” His voice grows louder and louder, but all my attention catches on is that one little word.
“You knew he was an angel?” My throat dries. My stomach twists.
If others know what Zaviar is, he’s in danger. Not from us... but from the gods.
Sev shakes his head back and forth like he can’t believe that’s the one thing I have a problem with among all that other shit.
“What do you want, Aries?” His jaw grinds, and it’s hard for me to hear that tone in his voice.
Because before he was Isabella’s partner, he was mine.
He was the brother I always wanted—yes, I’m not counting Nathiale. I never will.
He and I, we found this maid’s room that was bricked over decades ago. We found this safe place for us and our friends who couldn’t stand to see the world the way it was around us. We created the Shadow Guard.
And now, I’m not welcome here.
“I want to dethrone the King of Roses.” My chin lifts, and I force the look of flawless confidence across my face as my wings quiver inside myself.
“Dethrone?” Sev says loud and spitefully. “We don’t want him dethroned. We want him dead, Aries!”
“Why do you want to dethrone him?” Isabella asks more rationally.
“Because killing him will only incite centuries of war. If I’m crowned after his assassination, it will win me loyalty from people like us. But people like him, they’ll never give us peace.” I tell them all of this, and it’s like an echo in my head now from how many times I’ve thought it through.
But Sev isn’t nodding along like Isabella is.
He reaches for me, venomous words curling back his lips before he’s even spoken, but he’s cut off when someone grips his wrist hard enough to turn his hand white.
Damien steps closer, clenching the other man’s hand so tightly that Sev’s lips snap closed with a twisting look.
“Do not lay a fucking hand on her,” the demon growls out. It’s eerily like his brother, but his face isn’t pained with hate. I know he means what he just said; he’s just not filled with cruelty the way Zaviar is.
Sev jerks his hand away from Damien, the two of them holding gazes for far too long in such a small space that’s not nearly big enough for all these masculine death glares. Meanwhile, Krave looks so damn happy. I can tell he’s just waiting for a fist fight.
“I think you three should leave. We can’t help you.” Sev’s words are flat and leave no room for argument.
I should have known better than to come back here. There’s too much between me and the friends I once had.
