Page 23 of Angel in Absentia (Light Locked #2)

FRACTURES

YSON MATERIALIZED IN the healing temple of Ruedom.

He was seated on a windowsill against a column, looking down at a small Veilin woman arranging scrolls and taking notes on a clipboard.

The healing temple of Ruedom was beautiful and grand, built at the very center of the city and older than the walls that protected it.

“Hi, Tenida,” Ryson greeted, and the woman jolted so hard and fast she dropped her clipboard and spun around to see him.

Eyes wide, she inspected him as he hopped off the ledge and strolled over, hands behind his back as he did a somewhat playful loop, inspecting both her and the temple in contrast. The temple hadn’t changed a bit since his last visit, but Tenida had aged greatly.

“Glad I caught you before you died. Temple is beautiful as always. Are those carvings new?” he asked.

“What are you doing here?” she said, bending down and gathering her things to her chest before placing them on the platform next to the scrolls. “You’re supposed to be—”

“Asleep?” he offered. “I’ll admit the clash with Oliver did rather put me out of sorts. I had a little rest, and honestly thought it could be my last, but by sheer miraculous fate, I found the will to wake up again. A muse, as it were.”

Tenida watched him with peppered hair, and despite her age and small stature, he recognized the same will and fire in her eyes as her predecessors. He could feel her power stirring and wondered if she’d risk using it. He wanted to dare her. Maybe, under other circumstances, he would.

The door started to open at the opposite end of the temple, but Ryson extended out a hand and froze it in time, not caring to look as he kept his eyes on Tenida, who watched the action tensely.

If she was considering using her power, she’d just changed her mind. Her students were nearby.

Ryson folded one arm under the other, inspecting the intricate silver claws that covered his fingertips.

It was a known and common practice for sifted Venennin to wear such adornments on their hands, allowing them to touch Veilin without the risk of reversing their sifting and sending their bodies into a state of agony.

Tenida seemed to understand this, watching the tipped silver claws that were engraved intricately and made with a master’s workmanship. They were almost ceremonial in nature, and he watched her mind process the possibility that they were used for ceremonial sacrifices of Veilin under the full moon.

They were. But not these. Ryson considered it a silly practice carried on by extremists claiming their own version of the Insednian religion, though he did nothing to staunch the rumors. The rumors, he quite liked.

“I need your help,” he offered, tipping his open palm toward her and allowing her to eye the claws and the silver plating beneath. One cut from cursed silver was all it would take to make an Insednian out of her. Sometimes he bore the claws only as a reminder of that.

Tenida said nothing for a while, and he continued to stand over her, patiently.

“Your predecessor warned you I might show up from time to time, didn’t he?” Ryson said.

“Yes, and that you were the scourge of the healing temple of Ruedom.”

Ryson laughed. “Oh, please.”

“You are a ghost who visits, a poor reflection on the Veilin we might have revered. You are a reminder of what we failed to do, of all that still needs to be done. An alien to this world. Death. Be gone.”

“Well, that was a mouthful of cruel proclamation. Death? I thought we established I’m right here. Alive,” he said.

“You’re a mimicry of life. A mirror,” she snapped back.

Ignoring the proclamation, he walked past her.

“I need your help,” he reminded her, moving a hand over the platform where the scrolls were and causing them to neatly roll up and assemble themselves back in their container on the floor.

He moved around the opposite side of the platform, reaching into the air as if pulling on a thread and then gathering something as it softly fell into his arms.

He laid it out on the platform, a faint glowing image flickering with gaps of light.

Tenida had started to object but soon seemed to recognize the form. She walked up to the platform and inspected it before looking back up at him in horror.

Ryson rolled his eyes. “It wasn’t me. Can you restore her? Her body is back in Loda. Her mind is around, passively watching all of this. It found me in the Belgears and led me back to her mangled soul. I’ve gathered the pieces, but I can’t do anything else.”

Tenida moved her hands over the platform, placing a hand on the flickering forehead of the figure, barely able to make out a face. She shook her head in horror. “What happened?”

“It seems she had an encounter with the Ashanas in their cursed lands,” Ryson said, arms crossed as he inspected her gravely.

“What you’re saying is impossible,” Tenida whispered darkly.

“Rather unbelievable she’s not in worse shape,” Ryson said.

“And she beckoned for your help? Who is this?” Tenida continued, looking at the flickering figure from head to toe as if still struggling to understand any of it.

“Clea Hart. Rising Queen of Loda,” he explained. “And I’m helping, aren’t I? You act like it wasn’t a good choice.”

Tenida rested her hands on the platform, releasing a long breath. “So, the princess of Loda knows the truth then?”

“No,” Ryson said. “She doesn’t know who I am. Only has hints of the past and what really happened, but she is putting it together. Since her mind is passively experiencing all of this now, there is a fair chance she will remember it later. In fact, I hope she does.”

Tenida moved her hand through Clea’s hair as if she could feel it. The shape of Clea’s soul was only a vague reflection of the body it had inhabited for so many years.

“Dear girl,” Tenida said. “Yes, I can help her, though I’m not sure what your intentions are behind asking.” Her eyes flickered up to his suspiciously. “But I need all of the pieces here.”

“One moment,” he said, opening a dark rift and stepping through.

He was soon standing in her room. Covers were tucked around her body on the bed with intention.

Clea’s long caramel-colored hair spilled over the pillow, and she was so still she almost looked dead, perhaps angelic under the morning light.

This light was different from the ones he’d once found her in.

He’d saved her the first time under the glow of the fire and moon, but the morning was perfectly ethereal.

It suited her better, though he loathed the circumstances.

He exhaled in slow contemplation, sorting through a myriad of unsettling thoughts. Only Venennin near his own caliber would be capable of doing so much damage to a healer of her ilk from such a distance, and he could count them on one hand.

“You,” he heard on a breath and looked up to see a woman sitting on the other side of Clea’s bed.

“Oh,” he said, eyebrows raised. “Iris. I didn’t see you there.”

Iris shot up and scrambled for the door, but he flicked a hand and locked it. Flicking his other hand, he yanked her back to her chair and bound her there, her legs to its legs, her arms to its arms.

“Charmed you remember me,” he said, circling the bed. He sat down on the end of Clea’s bed, moving a long leg to scoot Iris’s chair out with his foot so that she faced him.

“You threatened to kill my cousin,” she said, glaring. “And my cat,” she added, lower.

“I don’t care about your cousin or your cat,” he replied as if her reaction were overdrawn. “I only threatened to do that because they were clearly things you cared about.”

“You act like that makes things better,” she argued back.

He nodded his head back and forth as if considering if it did or not. Glancing over at Clea, he started, “So, how is she?”

“She’s fine,” Iris barked.

“Clearly,” he replied. “I’m going to handle this, despite the—” he paused, leaning over Clea. He reached a silver claw forward, and fished it under the golden necklace she wore—“this thing she still wears. She still hasn’t mentioned me?”

“Once,” Iris said sharply. “And she seems intent on forgetting any sign that you knew each other.”

He folded his arms, looking back over at her. “Seems unnecessarily cruel of you. What is it with people being so cruel today? I did this continent a rather grand favor less than an hour ago, and the reception is abysmal.”

He glanced back over at Clea, and his expression softened.

Iris sighed after a few minutes of silence. “I thought I’d never see you again. So, it is true? You really were telling the truth about your journey together? What you said about Salanes was true,” Iris admitted.

“See? This could be useful.” He gestured between them. “I help you as a historian, you help me keep an eye on her.”

“And you don’t kill things I love,” she added.

“You keep bringing that up.”

“I think it’s relevant,” she said flatly, “especially as I’m bound to a chair.”

“You ran for the door.”

“Because last time you were here, you threatened to—”

“Yes, yes, I get it. I get it. Cat. Cousin. On and on.”

They settled into silence for a moment.

“You’re an Insednian,” Iris said, “no matter all of your promises. Even if you did everything you did for one another. Why do you want her?”

“Need her,” he said evenly, still watching Clea calmly.

He took a steady breath, brows knit in a rare expression of concern. “You and I,” he started, his eyes flickering to hers, “have some things in common. You go to her for many of the same reasons I do.”

Iris leaned back obstinately as he leaned forward.