I swallowed hard, the truth of it hitting me square in the chest with a hope strong enough to nearly blind me. “What you’re saying is, you’re stuck with my ugly emotional baggage and I’m stuck with yours, and we’re just going to knit a really weird cuddle cardigan out of it?”
Angel didn’t miss a beat. “Is that another PBS thing? Muppets or whatever?”
“Something like that,” I said, a real smile finally breaking through. “Think less Miss Piggy’s dramatic evening wear and more of something Oscar the Grouch would wear.”
The sound he made was half laugh, half sigh, all affection. “You mean fuzzy and green?”
I couldn’t help my grin. “You do know the Muppets!”
He tugged me out onto the roof. “Yeah, well. Even a grouch needs a place to belong.” The door clicked shut behind us, sealing us in a world of swirling, impossible colors. The Veil’s sky churned above, a breathtaking canvas of amethyst and emerald light on a midnight canvas. “And for the record,” he added, his voice dropping as he pulled me close, “I’ve always had a soft spot for the weird ones.”
His lips found mine under the electric stars, and as I kissed him back, I thought that maybe our weird, patchy, Oscar the Grouch cardigan of a bond was the most beautiful thing I’d ever hope to weave.
39
The roof deckspanned half a football field in length. A hidden oasis beneath the churning chaos of the Veil sky. Glowing moss, populated with a fairy-tale amount of mushrooms, carpeted the space in bioluminescent light. For a dizzying second, I felt like I’d tumbled down the rabbit hole, but with Angel’s hand in mine, Wonderland felt less like a trap and more like our next adventure.
An impossibly large pool of clear water reflected the turquoise bottom near one edge. Not an infinity pool, thankfully, as that would have been terrifying as it dangled over the edge of the building, hanging into the pulsing dark heart of the otherworld. Beside it was a small set of deck chairs, tables, and even a cooler. The chilly evening air gave rise to steam wafting off the top of the water. A heated rooftop pool? How was that even possible on this side of the Veil?
“Wow,” I said, dumbstruck by how eerily beautiful the space was. And while the static buzz of the world across the Veil never completely vanished, the silence of the space rolled over me in a wave of something unnatural, and yet calm, a ward.
“Luca spends a lot of time up here with his husband, Skye,” Angel said. “Skye’s an oceanid. He was swimming at the community center that first time we went in to play.”
I blinked at him, sorting through the memories and having registered that I’d seen a fin. “Is he a merman?”
“Something like that,” Angel agreed. “Do you want to swim?” The question was simple, but the look in his eyes was anything but. It was an invitation and a promise all at once. My breath caught in my throat as he reached for the hem of his shirt.
I’d do a lot to see him naked. Was it love that made me stupid? Or my default setting unlocked? I worried it was the latter as he pulled his shirt over his head in one fluid motion, and the air left my lungs in a silent rush. The churning Veil light played over the planes of his chest and the sleek, powerful muscles of his shoulders and back. My gaze, as if dragged by a magnet, dropped to the sprawl of ink across his skin. Some new, he had said, to break the old binding spells, but beneath the blaze of the bruise-colored sky, the threads said otherwise. Without trying, the clarification of the weave solidified, showing me every strand.
I gasped, hand up, reaching for him, half horrified and half fascinated. He paused, waiting for my touch, unwilling to turn away, even as I sensed he feared my reaction to the scars he’d worked hard to hide. A thousand tiny knots formed in the threads leading to the old runes. As if burying them beneath roadblocks could slow down the pull, and maybe they did.
“What are you seeing?” he asked softly.
“You said the new ink stopped anyone from controlling you.”
“I don’t think anything is foolproof.”
The knots represented trauma, a roadmap of pain to reduce further pain, and I hated it. Snags muted the vibrant colors, as if dampening his power to keep anyone else from getting hold of it. The threads were soul deep and ran off into the distance asif something, or someone, could once again latch onto them and make him dance like an unwilling marionette.
My breath caught at the horror of that realization. “Angel…”
“Tell me,” he said.
“Could Nat have fixed any of this?” I wondered, studying the layout of strands, finding some of the worst, one of which felt like a death knell, binding his body to rise and fight even after his soul left this plane. How I knew? I could only say it was instinct. In fact, I could look at every thread and read not only their intent but the steps to activate them. “Holy fuck,” I cursed, finding a half-dozen nightmarish rune patterns woven into his soul.
“Most Reapers are more a hammer and nail solution. They can do minor weaving,” Angel said, “but most of the time they cut threads and see the soul beyond.”
My hand rested over the zombie sigil. The name felt right for that cold, dead knot in his weave. I traced its edges with my thumb, wondering if I could follow its path back to the caster, unravel its purpose, or simply snap it. Was the caster even alive? If they were dead, why did the thread still feel like it was stretching into a hungry, waiting darkness? What would happen if I cut that thread? My gut flipped over, instinct telling me it was dangerous.
Why?
I knew in general a cut thread left a snarl and a loose weave. What did that mean for a living being? A pulse of warmth bloomed between my shoulder blades, and a small, familiar weight settled around my neck. Nox.
“Ah, the little dragon finally shows himself,” Angel said, a soft smile in his voice.
Nox was too close for me to see much, but I caught a glimpse of a tiny, scaled snout, now shaded in deep amethyst and smoky gray, a far cry from the hairless pink creature I’d pulled from that jar.
“Can shifters have familiars?” I asked, the thought striking me as I felt Nox’s presence grounding me, much like Angel’s did, but through a different kind of bond.
