Aimilia pulled her gaze away from Nikias, expecting him to be pulled up at any moment, but Clelia stayed where she was, one arm wrapped around her stomach and the other fiddling with her necklace. She watched the whole scene with the same marble expression she’d seen Nikias wear time and time again.
Nero was still coughing, slumped and horribly pale, and Aimilia wanted nothing more than to pour more of her poisonous variant down his throat because she hadn’t given him enough last time.
But what she had done was give him a tea that had given him strength enough for this. Aimilia stared at the blood on the ground. Nikias’ blood now on her hands.
Nikias slowly pushed himself up, rolling to the side and off the glass as he shifted to a sitting position. He used his palm to wipe some of the blood out of his eye as he looked up at Clelia.
Finally, the woman moved, cutting across the room and over to Nero’s side, helping him sit up, easing his coughing. “Look at what you’ve done.”
But her gaze didn’t stay on Nero. She looked back over her shoulder at Nikias… as if…
Nikias just took a deep breath, gaze fixed on her.
“Don’t look at me like that. You know better. Especially when he’s in this state.”
Nikias’ only response was to hide his face behind his hand before running his fingers through his hair. Then, he brushed the few pieces of glass off of his legs and stumbled to his feet. With a few quick movements of his fingers, all his injuries disappeared.
Behind an illusion. Not healed. Nikias was nowhere near skilled enough to heal himself of anything. He could barely heal anyone else.
His hand brushed over his chiton, gripping fabric right over his heart. Then he was gone.
Clelia didn’t look at him once on his way out, focused on Nero.
Aimilia’s palm slipped the first time she tried to wipe her cheek. She hadn’t realized how blurry her vision had become until she started blinking furiously to clear it. She didn’t stay a second longer either.
Chapter 23
NIKIAS
Nikias managed to at least wait until the bleeding stopped and actually clean himself up instead of hiding the bloodstains behind an illusion. He burned the ruined clothes and washed the wine and blood off his skin in his room. There could be no trace of it.
That was important.
The first time his nursemaid had asked him where the bloodstain on his chiton had come from, he hadn’t been able to sleep on his back for a week afterward.
He feared that less than he feared the questions. Or worse, the realization.
If anyone ever found out…
Aimilia rejecting him in front of the whole court would be nothing compared to that.
So that fear ensured he waited until the shallow cuts stopped bleeding, his hair was dry from washing the mess out of it, and the illusion over his face was perfect.
His scar…
Nikias stared in the mirror, looking at it for the first time in a long time. He looked anywhere but his heart when he changed.He cast an illusion over it if he was in the bathhouse, but it wasn’t feasible for him to constantly hide it under an illusion. His clothes covered it anyway. Unlike his injuries, it was always present. The harsh, raised lines were visible across his fair skin, his heart beating against them.
Hypatia’s voice echoed in his ears.
It was just one rune, not one for casting. One written word.
Inamatus.
He’d called Faustinaamataso many times, the last being while holding her in his arms as she died. The one word he had to bite his tongue not to say to Aimilia that would give his heart away in an instant.
Amatawas beloved, or to be loved.
The scar mocked him.
