“Urgh,” he muttered. “True Celestial power certainly packs a punch. Especially that perversion Ruxnoth wields.”
Ketheron threw his arms around Ambrose, holding him tightly to him.
“My gorgeous,” he breathed into his shoulder.
“I am well,treasure.”
Ketheron slid his hands inside the hood of Ambrose’s studded black cloak, and stroked his nape.
“I’m sorry for scaring you,” Ambrose spoke softly, as he stroked Ketheron’s forearms.
That was the extent of the physical display they’d ever show in a public setting. Ambrose was extremely private and he also didn’t like the idea of Ketheron being“put on display”in any way—a clear holdover from how they’d first met, something Ambrose was very sensitive about on his love’s behalf, sweetly mindful of.
“I also regret my return being punctuated by such a thing. Believe me, returning to you unconscious was not my intention.”
“It’s not your fault. Don’t apologize for something out of your control. There is only one being at fault here.” Ketheron easedhis hands away and clenched his fists. Dangerously. His power flared.
“Shh,” Ambrose soothed, grasping his hands. “We will see to it.” He smiled. “Also, I had been planning a surprise to celebrate my return to you, something that can most definitely still go ahead.”
Ketheron’s power calmed. “Surprise? What sort?”
“You’ll see later.”
“Okay,” he said, nodding along. “Later. Yes.” That reprieve was all too short-lived, and anguish played on his features as he told Ambrose, “I couldn’t recover Winter. Sylas couldn’t either. He’s… Ruxnoth took him.”
Ambrose blinked harshly, then addressed Sylas, “It’s my deepest regret that my attempts to defend your son were met with failure.”
“I know you would have tried everything to prevent him from being taken. Ketheron told me you even managed to intercept Ruxnoth tearing into Winter’s teleportation path.”
“For what good it did, yes.” There was a haunted look in his eyes that had me tensing, just as he revealed, “Winter also tried to stop Ruxnoth himself.”
“Winter won’t use his power as necessary even when he’s under threat. He’s afraid of hurting people, and it makes him sick to do so,” Sylas said.
“You don’t understand. He used it to defendme.”
All of us jolted at that news.
“What? I thought the eruption I felt from him was his attempt to overcome Ruxnoth’s teleportation from stealing him away.”
“No. It was him trying to protect me as Ruxnoth tore into me with the full force of True Celestial power.”
Ketheron growled low in his throat.
“I felt his necromantic power, Ambrose,” Sylas told him. “We’re not talking about his Wraith abilities.”
“I’m well aware.”
Sylas cocked his head to the side. “No. If he’d hit anyone with that, even a True Celestial, it would have significantly impeded them. The death magic against life… that alone would have—”
“Ruxnoth was protected. He even uttered those words. He referenced a‘they’.”
“That… the only thing that can protect against death magic—outside ofyou—has to be necromantic power.”
“Yes.”
Hades.Sylas and I exchanged a look. Ketheron started shaking his head in disbelief, clearly putting together the severe ramifications of a warped True Celestial having access to necromancers. And several by the sounds of it. One was serious enough.
“That’s where you’ve been. You sensed a disturbance to the balance that was linked to death magic,” Sylas accused.
