Page 11 of Damned and Broken Gods (Labyrinth of Gods #2)

The Secret Storyteller

LEELA

W e’d taken to eating supper together, claiming the table we’d clustered around that first day as ours. The native demigods left it free for us now, but I caught them watching us from time to time.

Watching me.

The anomaly.

Still, it was beginning to feel like home here with Araz, Blue, Dharma, Joe, and Sylvie, and every evening Priti and Remi would join us around the hearth. Even Vick was beginning to feel like part of our circle.

And I could lose it all.

Any day now, I could be taken to the Shahee Kshetra and ensconced there.

Yes, a fast-track ascension would bring me closer to my goal of freeing Nani and Pashim, but only if Araz was wrong about the Authority’s control over the crown.

Time would tell, but time seemed to be determined to root me here and make me love it.

Forks and spoons scraped against plates as we finished up our meals.

“I’ll go get the fire going,” Vick said.

We started gathering the plates and cups and carrying them to the sink.

“Leela?” Araz gently gripped my elbow, and a buzz of awareness shot through me. He let go quickly. Had he felt it too? It was the first physical contact we’d had since our moment in his underwater sanctuary. “I need to go out for a little while. Stay in the barracks till I return.”

This wasn’t the first time he’d ducked out like this during our time at earth house, and heck, he’d probably done it in the newbie barracks too, except back then, he hadn’t told me he was off anywhere.

But now that I knew he was going somewhere, my curiosity was piqued.

“Where are you going?” It was the first time I’d asked him, and his mouth tightened.

I realized that my question sounded like a demand, that maybe as my drohi he would feel obliged to answer, so I followed up quickly with, “You don’t have to tell me. I was just curious.”

His lips relaxed into a smile. “I’ll be back soon.”

Okay, so he wasn’t going to tell me. Fine.

I watched him leave, my gaze flicking to the windows across the room where the sky was blood red.

“Hey, chickadee, I gotta go too,” Blue said, scampering up my arm and onto my shoulder to rub his whiskers against my cheek. “And don’t worry about buns of steel; ’ee’s not doin’ anyfin nefarious. The big lug likes to tell stories to the mini drohis in the cradle.”

“Wait, what?”

Blue canted his head. “I know, right? ’Ee don’t strike me as the paternal type eeva, but there ya go. It’s a fing.”

“How do you know this?”

“I may ’ave snuck into the cradle once or twice. The nibblets are adorbs, and they ’ave the best snacks!”

“Then why didn’t he just tell me where he was going?”

“Maybe cos of that look on ya face right now.”

“What look?”

“The swoony one. Look ’ere, you know the score. ’Ee knows the score. A little fun is one fing, but ya got to guard that tender ’eart of yours…at least fer a while. Least till we know what the deal with this royal stuff is. Araz is doin’ the same.”

But now that I knew about his little trips and his storytelling, I wanted to see him interacting with the young drohi, to hear his stories too.

“Nah-uh, bad idea,” Blue said, reading me easily. “And ya know it.”

I exhaled. “Yeah, yeah. You’re right. He’s doing his part, and I need to do mine.”

Blue gave me one more whiskery kiss before scampering down my arm and hopping to the floor. Most of the other anchors had already left, but Dharma’s hunting hound had waited for Blue.

My buddy hopped up on Ida’s back, and she bounded off with him.

In the sitting room, the demigods settled into their groups.

The tension that had been present our first day was gone, but the wariness remained.

I wasn’t one of them. Not really, and that fact was highlighted by the way they seemed to have warmed to my friends.

Joe stood by the bulging bookcase chatting to a stocky demigod named Faroz.

They’d been hanging out a little the last two days.

And Dharma received a few chin lifts as she wove her way to the hearth. A dark pit opened inside me, the echo of rejection, of being the outsider that I’d worked so hard to dispel. But seeing my demigod friends gathered around the crackling fire helped to shake off the feeling.

Here, among these people, I was accepted no matter what.

“Are you ready for the pareekshan?” Dharma asked Sylvie.

“We are.” Sylvie smiled up at Pylar. “No idea what it will be, but we’ll get through it.”

Pylar nodded. “We are ready.”

“So are we,” Remi said. “We’re gonna crush it.”

“Umbra wants us at the native barracks at dawn,” Sylvie said. “I’m not sure if it’s just a briefing or if we’ll be heading…wherever.”

I caught a flash of nerves on her face, but Pylar rested a hand on her shoulder, and she exhaled, relaxing beneath his touch.

“Asura Ione says we have another week before we get our next test,” Dharma said. “I asked her what it would be, but she was cryptic.”

“The sea test,” Vick said softly. “That’s what it will be.”

“How can you be sure?” Priti asked.

“It’s always the sea test after the first pareekshan.” Vick stared into the flames.

“You’ll be taking it again though this time, right?” Dharma nudged him with her shoulder. “You have us now.”

Vick looked up with a shaky smile. “Yeah, I do. I…What if I mess up again?”

“The storm was not your fault,” Chaya said. “We will all be there to guide you.”

“So tell us about this test,” Priti said. “What can we expect?”

He blinked sharply and smiled. “Sea, sand, and a shit ton of hard work. The primordial evil has made sure that its devouring force is?—”

“Leela!” Asura Ione strode toward our group. “A message has arrived from Guru Chandra. You’re to pack a few things and prepare to depart for Shahee Kshetra. An escort will be arriving shortly.” I sat up straighter, moths erupting in my belly as she glanced about the group. “Where is Araz?”

I stood quickly. “He’s had to step out, but he’ll be back soon. I can get him.”

Ione pressed her lips together. “The royal guard does not like to be kept waiting.”

“We’ll be ready.”

She gave me a curt nod. “See that you are.”

She walked away, leaving me with a weight on my chest and a flutter in my belly. What a clusterfuck of emotions.

Crap, crap, crap. “Does anyone know where the cradle is?”

“I do,” Vick said. “Why?”

“I need to go fetch my drohi.”

The cradle was in the depths of the complex, housed in a wing filled with starlight and moonbeams streaming in from its many windows. A stone arch led to a corridor hung with colorful tapestries ending in a set of wooden doors that opened into a dimly lit chamber.

I slowed my pace on approach and peered into the room beyond.

Lanterns hung on the walls, bathing the large chamber in gentle light.

In the center was a fort made of cushions and blankets where children of all ages huddled, their skin and hair the varied colors that identified them as drohi.

Their attention was fixed on the figure seated cross-legged in the center.

Araz.

His voice was a rumble, speaking the language I didn’t understand. His hands moved in the air, drawing patterns, the combination like a melody, the meaning just out of reach. The children were enraptured.

Araz paused for a beat, and the sweet voice of one of the children filled the silence. Laughter rippled around the circle, and Araz smiled, wagging his finger in a mock chiding way before continuing his story.

A hush fell once more. I lost myself in the rhythm of his words, the cadence and the rise and fall of his tone.

He was beautiful, hypnotic, everything I wanted. Desperately. Achingly. I took a shuddering breath and exhaled, hoping to expel the emotions that would cripple me if I let them.

“You okay?” Vick whispered close behind me.

Shit, I’d forgotten he was here. I nodded and whispered back, “I’m fine.

” I was more than fine; I was enraptured by Araz, by the fact that the sword-wielding, grumpy asshole that I’d come to know had this paternal side.

That he took time most evenings to come here and provide these children with a little magic.

Children that were being raised as weapons in a war that wasn’t theirs.

He was giving them a semblance of a childhood…giving them a little of something that he’d had, far away from here with his family before…

A vise gripped my chest. There were depths to Araz that I wanted to explore. Depths that I would never get a chance to dive into. The vise tightened, and I exhaled, letting go of the wanting that could never be fulfilled.

A figure broke from the shadows on the other side of the room. A drohi female with high cheekbones, eyes like starlight, and skin like sunset. She wore a flowing smock and flat sandals, and she moved without making a sound. She crossed to us, giving the story circle a wide berth.

“Can I help you?” Her gaze flicked between Vick and me.

“I…uh…I came for Araz.” I glanced past her at Araz, who had a finger to his smiling lips as he leaned in toward the children.

The woman’s brow furrowed a little. “You’re his demigod?” Her inquiring warm tone had gone flat. “I’ll tell him you came by.”

She reached for the door, clearly intending to close it on me, and irritation spiked in my chest. I stepped forward, over the threshold, and pressed my palm to the wood. “I can tell him myself.”

Her eyes narrowed a fraction, the echo of my irritation rippling over her strong features before she masked it and inclined her head.

“I understand. But I would respectfully ask you not to interrupt the story. The children do so enjoy Araz’s visits.

” She looked across at him, her expression softening.

Looked like it wasn’t just the children who enjoyed Araz’s visits. Nope. I didn’t like the way she was going all misty-eyed while looking at my…nothing. He didn’t belong to me. I had no right to act as if he did.

Still, the urge to poke her eyes out remained.