“Your cover story to Ryker that will have spread throughout the higher echelons of the supernatural world by now offered an explanation for my loves feeling this suddenly being‘offline’. They would’ve believed the ring was struck, temporarily shorted out, any number of things. With my power, Ambrose’s, Ketheron’s, Winter’s involved, it’s believable enough. But they also know me.”
“You would have found a way to fix it swiftly,” Ketheron spoke.
Sylas nodded. “Which is why we need to hurry. Keeping Winter’s abduction from them is not sitting well with me as it is. He’sourson, they deserve to know, but—”
“This is beyond just a family matter,” I cut in. And thankfully hewasrecognizing that.
He winced. “Yes.” Shifting his weight, he told us, “Due to the constraints involved, it took longer than I would have liked to determine some actionable solutions.”
“Excuse me? You’re telling us that you were meditating on it, performing a Ruminat, while raging with your magic?”
He lifted a shoulder. “Yeah. Why?”
Ketheron’s lips quirked. “Uncanny.”
“Winter’s necklace that his mom made for him is a form of a Nexus Band. When I first arrived at the dark sands beach, after finding no magical signature—neither Ruxnoth’s nor Winter’s, meaning that motherfucker is now also glamoring that as well—I attempted to pull on the necklace’s essence. But there was nothing to latch onto. Given what the Nexus Band is capable of,it’s clear Winter has muted it. He’s been muting it for a while now. I’d just hoped that he would have undone that limitation in time before his capture.”
“You knew he was muting it?” I asked.
“Yes. We all did, as it’s something we can all feel—or were supposed to be able to feel. To ensure his wellbeing when he left the family home for Loxley Academy. But Winter… he’s been suffocated by our protection his whole life, so we let it go, hoping he just needed time and distance. Obviously, that was the wrong decision.”
“You didn’t know about Ruxnoth,” Ketheron said. “And I only just determined his involvement—and even his presence—myself. I swear it, Sylas. I would have come to you. It was why I’d called Winter to me earlier. And to cleanse any residue of Ruxnoth’s infection from his system. Following that, I was going to convince Winter to bring this situation to you and the family.”
Sylas laid his hand on Ketheron’s shoulder. “I know, K. I don’t doubt it. I also know Winter put you in a difficult position.” He winced. “Because he was in a difficult position himself. He didn’t want to be pulled back under our protection so intensely again. He wants to be free.”
“More than that,” I spoke. “He wants you to be free. Of the burden of his protection. What he sees as a burden, anyway. Of course, in truth, it is not. But he is only viewing things from the vantage point of a son. Not a parent.”
Sylas gave a nod of acknowledgement, then asked Ketheron, “Did you destroy the substance Winter asked you to research? That which we now know was Ruxnoth’s attempt to both mentally bond with him, and to extract his necromantic power for his own use?”
“I still have it.” Ketheron tensed. “Why?”
“The means to track Winter are very limited. But there are still options available.”
Ketheron started shaking his head. “No. Not that.”
“Ruxnoth used this to also tag Winter, yes?”
Ketheron winced. “Yes,” he admitted with great reluctance.
“The substance was inside my son. It tried to influence him. With its purpose also as a deeply insidious magical tracker, I’ll reverse engineer it to locate Winter.”
I grasped Sylas’ wrist. “Ketheron has informed us that Ruxnoth is a True Celestial wielding a perversion of that extreme level of power. If you do this, you’d have to make yourself vulnerable to that.”
“You’d have to take it into yourself. He could takeyournecromantic power,” Ketheron added.
“I can nullify what he takes. It’smypower, connected to me. Even when it’s, for want of a better word, loose… out in the world.”
“How quickly, though? What if Ruxnoth uses it immediately? On Winter?”
“Or he could infuse it into Winter,” I pointed out. “Given his intent to form a bond with Winter, he believes him to be corruptible, able to be influenced at his young age, with his inexperience, especially because he refused your teachings of higher-level Necromancy. You are not able to be turned. That’s been proven several times over and it’s well-known throughout the supernatural world. The downside of it for Ruxnoth, however, is that Winter’s power does not currently compare to yours. He’ll need time to remedy that. If he was provided your power, though, and infused it into Winter, that would be another thing entirely. Alas, the ramifications would be catastrophic—an inexperienced necromancer having access to your supreme power that he does not know how to wield….” I scrubbed my hand over my face. “The outcome would be apocalyptic.”
Sylas ground his jaw and tugged at his hair.
“Then I need you to supercharge this ring,” he told Ketheron, touching the gold ring encircling his thumb. It was something Ketheron had gifted him so Sylas could invoke Celestial-level protection briefly in order to safeguard himself during his work with Requital. Ketheron had insisted on it after the true nightmare of Morien where the megalomaniac had channeled Celestial power—and black magic—alongside Necromancy, which had nearly destroyed Sylas and us all.
Sylas eyed me. “And I’m going to need to ingest your blood if this takes a turn.”
“To what end?” I asked. “What’s your idea?”
