The other fourteen were lost. For now.
Once we were all out of here, they would all be given a good chance to be rehabilitated, to recover from Ruxnoth’s corruption.
There were two sets of loyalists down here. Those who saw Ruxnoth as a holier-than-thou messiah sort of figure who they’d bend to no matter what. And then those who wanted to remain in Sanctus apart from the world due to their trauma. Those ones didn’t want Ruxnoth raising it, connecting it to the mortal plane, nor conquering anything. But they also wouldn’t work to stop him, or say a word. They’d just go along with it because they didn’t want to lose him as a powerful force. As a protector, as they saw it.
He'd really done a number on a lot of them.
And I knew well how that felt, unfortunately.
But I also knew the relief, grief, and anger of coming out of it, and the need to make it right—to stop the motherfucker, come what may.
“He’s not gonna break his word,” I heard Philip assuring Rex as he’d noticed him pacing up and down my chamber, getting more stressed by the moment.
Philip’s shock of thick black hair was a sharp contrast to Rex’s blond, the two of them in jeans—Philip’s gray as opposed to Rex’s being blue.
“Yeah? You sure about that?” Rex said, fingering the collar of Philip’s white dress shirt, which was slapped away in the next moment.
“Save the touching for your‘Sire’.”
“Shut the fuck up. You know I had to do that.”
Fiona stepped in, her gold blazer glinting under the lights of the room, just like the crystal buttons. She grasped Rex’s shoulder and drew his attention away from Philip—also protecting her surrogate little brother in the process. The bond they’d formed since being down here reminded me a lot of Evira and Torvek’s sweet relationship. “He does know. That’s why he’s calling you out. He’s recognizing what a loss it’s going to be for you once all this goes down and you’re separated from Ruxnoth.”
“Worse,” Philip cut in. “When he finds out you, like the rest of us detractors, were working against him.”
“I knew the risks when we allied with Winter. I’m gonna lose my mind—it’ll fracture again.”
“For a time. Sylas is working on a way to fix it permanently for you, remember?” Fiona said.
“Yeah, I… if it was Winter, I’d be settled knowing that. But Sylas and me… our history isn’t exactly stellar.”
“Because you fucked his boyfriend once?” Felix Coulter’s voice came, as he walked on into my chamber too, his spiky mermaid hair bold as hell—and a breath of fresh air honestly. As was his purple shirt with the pastel blue and green geometric print untucked over a pair of cargo pants.
Aliya Marques slid in with him and shut the door. She hastily tucked her white tank into her jeans, then ran a hand through her short brown hair. I caught a sly look from Felix at her. So they’d been fucking in the narrow window they’d had before coming here. Well, I understood that. It could take the edge off in many situations.
Right now, though, it was the last thing I wanted to entertain or hear about.
For myself, let alone now this thing concerning Dad.
Jeez.Why?
“Yeah, you know that hot sorcerer he was seeing?” Felix went on, walking over to where the three were gathered, as Aliya headed over as well, giving me a chin lift on her way, while Felix was too immersed in his conversational track. And I’d also noticed that when he was stressed, he liked to tease.
“Kai?” Aliya asked.
“Nah, that wasn’t really a thing. This guy was somebody Sylas indulged his exhibitionist kink with. Big time.”
I grimaced at his words.
Wesley, who was standing with me in his blue tweed suit, the two of us trying to finalize something vital to what was about to go down, shook his head in dismay.
I’d been trying to maintain concentration through all of this, them being here, all wanting to check in with me, because they were nervous—aside from Wesley, as he was an absolute rock—yet that had just clinched the break in my focus.
“That was years ago,” Rex snapped. “And they were broken up when that went down. It was Tate Willowby.”
“Oh, yeah!” Felix cried. “That pretty boy.”
“Boy?” Philip questioned. “Sylas was half his age.”
