Page 42 of A Flame of the Phoenix (An Heir Comes to Rise #6)
CHAPTER FORTY-ONE
Izaiah
I zaiah’s whole body ached from the many practices with the ruin so far, but he’d be damned if he let it affect how good he looked sauntering down a hall. Especially when he felt a particular presence nearby.
Tynan appeared around the bend ahead, walking toward him. Izaiah wore his usual devious side-smile, which triggered Tynan’s familiar glower. He was beginning to enjoy the natural harmony of this tense greeting.
“Another suicide attempt today?” Tynan muttered under his breath when they stopped beside each other.
Izaiah hummed, mirroring Tynan’s cross-armed stance. “It’s likely, yes.”
Tynan cast his eyes up as if in a plea for sanity. “At least let me have breakfast first.”
“Meet me in the study in an hour. We can fit in some literacy lessons too.”
Izaiah made to leave, but Tynan caught his wrist. It was bold when accompanied with the heated stare that drifted to his lips.
When he heard shuffling and thumping down the hall, Izaiah retrieved a dagger, pushing Tynan to the wall. The dark fae was caught unawares, slamming into it with a grunt and staring with wide, pissed-off eyes.
“Can’t give anyone the wrong impression,” Izaiah said, scratching the point of the dagger under his chin while delighting in Tynan’s vulnerability under his blade.
When the person arrived within view, Izaiah stole a glance. Who he saw slackened his pressure against Tynan immediately. The dark fae pushed him off, and Izaiah caught his own stumble, too stunned and confused to care as he righted himself and faced down the hall.
“I can’t come up with a single good reason as to why you might be here,” Izaiah said.
Augustine, despite Izaiah’s accusing reception, smiled brightly, tipping his tricorn to reveal more of his blue eyes. His wooden leg tapped in a steady rhythm toward them. He’d long mastered his balance with it.
“Ah, my boy, pondering reason for other people’s motives is a sure spiral to madness.”
Izaiah’s expression flattened. “I’ve never been a boy.”
Gus came right up to him, patting a large hand to his shoulder as if they were old friends. No—in fact, Gus looked at him like he did see a child, though not in any condescending manner. He couldn’t figure out what had the pirate so high-spirited considering what he’d walked into.
“Who are you?” Tynan asked with an edge of hostility.
“Augustine. And you are Tynan Silverfair, Zaiana’s second-in-command.”
That only added to Tynan’s growing tension.
“You should really let people introduce themselves. It’s creepy when you do it,” Izaiah said. He added to Tynan, “Gus here is a pirate, and despite appearing human, he’s a centuries-old Oracle. Marlowe’s biological father.”
Augustine’s smile fell, and his blue gaze flicked over his shoulder. Izaiah realized too late he’d blurted too much, having not felt the quiet presence behind him.
Izaiah turned, finding Marlowe at the end of the hall, staring at them all with wide doe eyes as if she’d been caught somewhere wrong.
“Shit,” Izaiah muttered. “Marlowe?—”
She turned away, disappearing around the corner swiftly, without another word.
“Marlowe,” Augustine echoed as he stared after the ghost of her.
“You didn’t know she was here?” Izaiah asked.
Augustine drew in a long breath. He didn’t answer.
Tynan asked instead, “Does Malin know of your arrival?”
“I don’t think I would’ve made it past his threshold if he didn’t.”
“This castle isn’t his ,” Izaiah muttered under his breath.
“The pretense keeps you alive. Let me warn you, he’s hanging onto his sanity by a thread, and none of you are safe in his volatile proximity.”
Izaiah wasn’t afraid of Malin Ashfyre, but he couldn’t deny Gus’s warning shivered down his spine. He had noticed something different about the prince who was growing worse each day. He’d always managed to carry himself so composed and arrogant…but he was slipping. Izaiah couldn’t be sure if it was the Phoenix Blood he kept consuming when he couldn’t hold the conscious mind ability for more than a day, or if it was the weight of his stolen crown that was spiraling him to paranoia and madness.
“Why have you come?” Izaiah asked.
“To offer my ships and allegiance. Malin was most forthcoming to it, as he needs all the allies he can get with the resistance to his claim on the throne.”
He soured at that, slowly shedding his warmth toward the pirate that had barely been a trickle to begin with. Augustine was a fickle bastard. He played with his gift.
“He has all the nobles backing his claim,” Tynan pointed out.
“I know. Quite cunning, he was, to achieve that and pin Faythe as an outsider responsible for her father’s downfall. But the people are not led by politics and scheming but with their hearts and beliefs. They still spread the tales of Faythe Ashfyre, the human turned fae, Agalhor’s declared heir, the Phoenix Queen. They have not given up on their belief in her, and that is a power greater than nobility Malin is fighting against.”
That was a statement of inspiration at least.
Izaiah glanced down the deserted hall even though he couldn’t sense anyone nearby. He was beginning to grow uneasy talking about such things in the open.
“Where are you going now?” Izaiah asked.
“Well, it seems I have a daughter to meet.”
Izaiah winced, apologetic for that sensitive knowledge he’d let slip unknowingly when she was near. However, Gus didn’t seem fazed by it, as if he knew she would be there. Nothing was out of the realm of suspicion with this man.
Gus smiled pleasantly before shifting past him and making off in the direction Marlowe had gone, back to her area for making the potions, he suspected. Then he tensed, wondering if he should follow when he realized…did Gus have the same magick to spell the potions too? Had his offering of allegiance with his ship and crew been of the least interest to Malin compared to this skill that would rapidly advance the production of Phoenix Blood?
Izaiah didn’t know what to do if it were true. How to stop him without suspicion. He couldn’t kill Gus, though the thought crossed his mind.
“Change of plan for today?” Tynan pondered as if reading Izaiah’s contemplation.
“For now, no,” he said, still mulling over the possibilities—everything Gus could potentially do here that could truly work against them. “But we could use that little darkling of yours to keep an eye on him.”
“Since when did we turn into a team?”
Izaiah ignored that, clapping a hand to his back before walking off. “Study in an hour,” he reminded him over his shoulder.