“Sitri!”
I called down the hallway, and though Bronwen didn’t bother stopping, Sitri froze in his tracks.
“When will you be back?” I asked.
Sitri looked over his shoulder and slotted his hands into his pockets. He kept his gaze trained on the floor.
“A few days, probably. Perhaps a week.”
“And you will be back, right?”
The question hung in the air for a long, uncomfortable moment. His hesitation, thick as fog, stagnated between us.
“You’ll know if I’m not coming back,” Sitri said. “If the Prince falls, this little war of Vapula’s will end. And we can’t have that now, can we?”
He gave a half-hearted smile, then turned to follow Bronwen down the hallway. As I watched them go, I couldn’t shake the feeling that this might be the last time I saw him.
It was strangely bittersweet. I’d grown reliant on Sitri over the past few days, but there was something else mixed up in it as well. There was an inkling of longing, spurred on by primal jealousy and fueled by tangible need. He had become somewhat of a safety blanket; a force that kept me grounded in this dark, deadly reality.
And now, some red-haired siren wanted to drag him to his demise.
I knew better than to trail them—I’d just get in the way. That frustration alone made me reconsider Sitri’s offer.
What would it feel like to become a demon? Would I still be me, or would the transformation change who I was? My body reacted to the thought with a deep, primal revulsion. Sitri’s ominous warning wasn’t helping my nerves, either. I didn’t want to be like him, or like Vapula… and I’d always been unsure if that choice was mine to make.
Once again, Sitri had suggested that it wasn’t.
I shook my head. That would be a problem for later. Right now, Sitri was leaving me in a house of demons, with only his legates for company. If I wanted to get my answers, I’d have to hold my ground until the Prince returned.
