“Trust me. You should see this—you should know the whole of it so there’s no room for doubt. And I would end myself before I would hurt you.” His voice is soft, tone almost pleading. Kaelis commands, demands, domineers. He rules with all the authority of a prince and headmaster. But pleading?
I swallow hard and nod.
He waits a moment, as if to make sure I’m not going to go back on my decision. To give me a breath to second-guess and leave. I don’t move.
Halazar is destroyed. Eza is dead, and his father is, too. If Kaelis wanted to hurt me, he could’ve a thousand times over. But he never has.He never has,I repeat to myself.
His hand trails down my neck, shoulder, and arm to lace his fingers between mine. Kaelis tugs gently on my hand before leading me to his office and straight to his desk. Locked within a drawer is a large collection of Majors—impressive for a man who isn’t a Major himself and can’t wield any of them without first having the Hierophant cast on him.
Speaking of…“Do you need me to cast the Hierophant for you?” I assume at least a few are somewhere in the stack.
“No, I had one cast on me a while ago and haven’t expended the blessing.”
The Hanged Man retrieved, he guides me out from the office and to his bed. Fingers still entwined with mine, he helps me onto the bed. The world has taken on a dreamlike quality, as though I am already under the influence of some kind of spell. The halo around the lamplight is a bit warmer. The shadows in the corners are darker. The glittering skyline of Eclipse City as dusk begins to settle on the horizon glows all the brighter.
Kaelis leans over the edge of the bed and kisses me gently. There is reassurance there. One more request for trust, wrapped in admiration.
He finally releases me and positions himself behind me on the bed.I lie back and place my head onto his lap as if I’m a lamb for slaughter. A ritual sacrifice—the bed is his altar, and he is my god.
I should be terrified. Yet, by some hypnosis, I am calm. All I see is him. The curtain of his dark hair framing his face and shadowing his void-like eyes.
Placing the card on the center of my chest and his hands over it, Kaelis takes a slow breath.
“Are you ready?”
“As I’ll ever be.”
There’s a surge of magic. The world tilts. The walls speed up and away from me as the bed pitches back. Reality folds in on itself, inverting.
The warmth of his hands on my temples is the last thing I feel before what’s down is up, and what’s up is down, and nothing is as it was.
Chapter 51
Light blooms in the darkness. Hazy at first, but then a new reality sharpens around it. I’m standing before the Arcanum Chalice. But the room it’s within is not quite the same as the one I know.
The stands and balcony aren’t there. The four pillars and the stained glass dome they support are. But the vertical walls between them are solid—almost oppressive. It feels as though I am in a vault.
On the opposite side of the Chalice are two men. A young Kaelis faces his father, pure loathing glittering in his eyes, hatred as blazing as the Chalice’s flames. King Naethor looks much like the man I know—strong, austere.
“The Chalice has always been here; it’s impossible to move from this spot, as though it was forged into the stone. The room looks different because I changed aspects of the fortress when it became an academy.”
I jerk in the direction of the voice. Kaelis—as I know him—stands next to me. Though his form seems less than completely solid. Almostslightly transparent. As if an artist created outlines that they forgot to fill in.
“What are you doing here?” I blurt.
He looks at me incredulously and lifts his brows. “It’s my memory I’ve allowed you into. I cast the card. Why would I not be here?”
“Eza wasn’t there the last time this card was used on me.”
“Wasn’t he, though?” Kaelis tilts his head to the side.
I heard him as I ran through the vision…Eza asking how I was altering the world he’d tried to trap me within. He was there, pulling the strings like some kind of puppet master. He just didn’t let me see him.
“Yes,” Kaelis says, as if he can hear my thoughts, “the one who casts the Hanged Man can see within the realm of their making.” Kaelis turns his attention back to his former self and his father. “I thought not being alone might be easier for you, given how disorienting this can be in the best of circumstances.”
“That’s surprisingly considerate.”
“I take offense to the use of ‘surprisingly,’ ” he says dryly.
