Hang on. A relief?
How worrisome. Since when did I get so invested in the welfare of these pricks?
“Fuck.She's bleeding. Why is she bleeding, and why the hell isn't she waking up?” Frost demands as ice spreads across the floor toward Maven and me on the marble ground.
Damn it all, he’s right. Blood drips steadily from our keeper's nose, rolling over her cheek to drip onto the temple floor. I've seen that strain before in other casters who pushed themselves too far—Crane in particular.
Looking pointedly at the encroaching cold, I pull Maven’s siren-like unconscious body into my arms and off the cold ground.
“Keep that away from our goddess. She’s overdone it and desperately needs rest, not frostbite.”
Frost’s attention flicks from Maven to me briefly, scrutinizing. “Look who finally checked back in. Good timing, because I need at least one semi-functional psychopath to help me get us out of here. Those two deadweights don’t qualify at the moment,” he tips his head toward Crane and Decimus.
Decimus is prowling toward a statue of Arati as if about to attack it, wholly animalistic in his blissful ignorance of this conversation.
Crane, however, grips the blood amulet around his neck and glares at us. “I heard that.”
“Good,” Frost and I say at the same time.
“A few more just arrived,” a voice calls down from one of the vaulted windows high in the temple. “Two Voids are with them.”
I realize the redheaded mercenary who Frost hired months ago has climbed up to sit in the stone sill of one of the ornate windows, using a gun to scope through a crack in the stained glass. Whatever he’s seeing out there, it makes Frost swear and drag his hands over his scarred face.
“What mess are we in now?” I demand, gently adjusting Maven’s oversized dark clothing in hopes that she’ll be less cold.
Agony flares through my limbs as my markings light up several times, but I ignore it. That’s been happening long before Syntyche got to me. With Limbo in tatters, my body is paying the price.
“Hostiles are outside waiting to capture us,” Frost replies. “Meaning, my family knows we’re here.”
I narrow my gaze at him. “It was here in New York all along?”
“Apparently,” he grumbles, cranky. “Wouldn't be surprised if they've been moving the damn thing now and then.”
I wasn’t paying much attention to anything beyond the urge to kill in the months before I wound up trapped in my dark memories. However, Frost made me aware that one of the etherium stones Maven used to trap the life forces of the Immortal Quintet went missing just after they figured out how to use them for powerful shielding spells.
Since his entire elite family of pompous pricks also vanished during the Upheaval, along with much of the former Legacy Council and a few dozen other “high society” legacy families, he theorized that they were all together in a secret safe haven for the cowardliest of cowards, so to speak.
Finding it months ago would have been a treat. Even now, the thought of slipping into the minds of those spineless prats and flooding their pampered safe haven with mania is tempting. I’ve no doubt they’ve been sipping champagne while the rest of the world has gone to shit.
But if we’ve accidentally drawn their attention…
I look at my muse, resting deeply in my arms. Her bloody nose has slowed, so I use the corner of my ripped T-shirt to carefully wipe her face as well as I can.
She never minded blood, but I can't stop touching her even for a moment.
“Tell me who knows,” I mutter.
“Us, the Baird quintet, Douglas…and the fae who got away and informed my family that she’s back and she’s here.” Frost begins to pace, glowering at the double doors at the end of this temple. “The muscle they sent can’t get in, so they’re just waiting. Maven sealed this damn place with holy magic, and transportation magic doesn’t work on hallowed ground, which means we can’t get out.”
“Douglas can help with that,” Crane slurs, having to correct a couple of words mid-sentence.
“Shut up,” the redhead snaps from up above.
“Thatscútrácheis either a saint or highlyfabhar–blessed,” Crane corrects. “Whatever rare circumstance, he uses holymaghikae.”
Frost pauses, figuring out the last word before calling up, “Wait. You can use holy magic, and didn’t tell me? What the fuck have I been paying you for this whole time?”
“You’ve gotta be kidding me. Your quintet is a fucking pain in the ass, you know that?” the mercenary gripes as he climbs back down from his perch. Once he’s down, he casts me the quintessential look of disgust before squinting accusingly at Maven. “Your weirdo-ass girlfriend ratted on me, didn’t she?”
