Page 18 of Horns of Wicked Ebony (Deathcaller Duet #2)

Inhaling deeply, I tapped into my magic well again, calling on my magic to carve them, to shape her regal nose, and to plump her delicate lips. At least her foggy hair was easy to pull into existence. When I finished my form, she hardly even blinked, even as she stared in her own reflection.

“Impressive,” she stated without a hint of emotion in her tone. “You need to point the ears more.”

She turned her head to the side to give me a better look. The light fell perfectly over it, and so I did, noting the placement of the four studs in the uppermost corner, resembling a starburst.

“Why are you helping me?” I couldn’t help but ask as I tried to mimic her voice. There was a huskiness to it, and it was harder to capture while I also clumsily spoke their language.

She lifted one shoulder and dropped it. “Perhaps I want to see you succeed.”

I snorted. “I highly doubt that.”

“I am a Sensor. I have mastery over all kinds, including invisible ones. Sight, smell, hearing, those are all at the surface. Intuition runs deep,” she replied, switching to the common tongue.

For which I was grateful, because I wasn’t certain I would have understood otherwise.

Reaper, I wasn’t certain I understood anyway.

Her words were cryptic in a way that I knew they’d tumble through my mind long after this, wondering what she truly meant.

Shaking it off, I asked Faeya to step forward next, honing my skill on weaving her features around me. Once I was certain of my ability to impersonate both of them, I grabbed Faeya’s clothes from my bag and pulled them on.

Her breasts were bigger than mine, though my rear was bigger than hers, so I had to change my form to fasten everything properly around me.

“You are me,” Faeya breathed, her mouth slightly parted. “Why? What is your purpose?”

Rokath had explicitly forbidden me from sharing specific plans with them. Again, we couldn’t trust them; they were our enemies. They’d likely feed us false information to ensure our failure.

And if we failed, the Angels could use Banand again to wipe us out.

I said nothing as I paced the length of the room, trying to get accustomed to the feel of another’s body over mine.

My magic was more like an outer shell than anything, though I still saw through her eyes and spoke through her mouth.

It was an odd sensation, really, though after spending a month in Vagach’s skin, I hardly noticed it anymore.

Satisfied, I switched to Araquiel’s clothing and pulled her form around me. “Do you have any army specific greetings?” I asked while studying all of their faces for a sign of deception.

Esha said no at the same time Araquiel said yes. I arched an eyebrow and turned my attention to the female I was impersonating. “You are a Padisa, yes?”

She nodded. “Lower ranked soldiers greet their superiors with a hand over their heart and a dipped head. They use the words, ‘Goddess save you,’ at the same time.”

I practiced the movement and the words.

“It is blasphemy that she speaks to the Goddess!” Esha snapped, fingers curling around the bars. Her shackles clanked against them as she shook them.

I rolled my eyes and ignored her. “Anything else?” I asked Faeya and Araquiel.

“If you see Banand, tell him a flame waits behind a wall of glass,” Araquiel stated in the common tongue.

I had to clench my teeth to prevent my mouth from falling open. Ice skittered down my spine as she continued to hold my gaze—her gaze. Was Araquiel truly a Sensor? Because it felt to me like she might be a Seer.

If she knew Banand, and knew him well enough to have a specific, albeit cryptic, message to pass along, then she must have had close contact with him. Which meant, I needed to use her form to get to him.

But how could she have possibly guessed what our plans were?

I needed to talk to Rokath.

Dropping my magic, I changed back into my leathers.

“I’ll ensure the guards bring you food,” I told them as I secured the ties around the tent again, bathing us in darkness.

Then, I hurriedly stuffed everything back into my bag.

The mirror went last, securely tucked against the flat side so it wouldn’t break.

“We’ll see if the Fates favor you,” Araquiel said before sinking back into the position she’d been in when I first arrived. If she knew she unnerved me, she didn’t display any sign.

My blood pounded in my veins as I departed, Araquiel’s cold turquoise eyes searing into my mind. What did she know? And why wasn’t she afraid? Something was off with her, with the situation, and the worry knotted my stomach.

In a blink, I slipped through the curtain and into the map room.

“Araquiel knows Banand,” I blurted out. Thankfully, only Rapp, Trol, and my mate were present.

Rokath looked up from his stack of papers, brow furrowed. “What do you mean?”

“She told me, ‘if we see Banand to tell him a flame waits behind a wall of glass,’” I repeated, hands twisting in the strap of my bag.

“What does that even mean?” Rapp asked aloud, thumbing the ring in his lip.

I shrugged. “I don’t know, but what if she could tell us more about his location in the camp?”

“What if it’s a trap?” Rokath shot back. “What if she is playing on your sympathies and guessing at our strategy? ”

“I don’t have sympathy for Angels,” I snapped, fingers tightening over the leather.

“You have sympathy for other females,” Rokath said, the hard edge to his voice gone. I opened my mouth to protest, but slammed it shut.

He was right about that, even if I hated admitting it to myself.

“Fine. But what if she is sincere? What if we could save lives, more than just Banand and Zurronar?” I sighed, bracing my hands on a chair and leaning into it for support.

“She has a point, Rokath,” Rapp said. Trol, rightly, remained silent during the exchange. From what I’d seen, Trol was more of the follow orders type, whereas Rapp pushed back on Rokath with more force.

Rokath tossed his papers casually on the table in front of him. “We’ll get her alone and see if she’ll talk. If she does have anything to say, it certainly won’t be in front of the other two. That spitter is a true sycophant.”

Esha, I had to agree, was never going to be swayed to offer anything without force. She’d called me a whore plenty of times and sneered at Rokath more than once with false bravado.

“When?” I asked.

Rokath glanced at the clock beside the pitcher of water. “After we make a sacrifice,” he growled, rising. Rapp and Trol did too. “If the Fates have chosen to weave a path where Araquiel does intend to offer us insight, then we must thank them for it beforehand.”

Shrugging off my pack, I left it in an empty chair and followed my mate into the sunlight.