Page 204 of Lady of the Drowned Empire

“Partner, please. Say something.”

I sniffled. What was there to say? We’d been betrayed by Aemon. And in the end, I hadn’t been able to save Morgana. Nor had I been able to save the shard of the Valalumir.

And Jules…Brockton had been telling the truth. All this time… She was alone, suffering…scared. Being tortured.

Meera shivered against me. “Are we landing soon?” she asked.

“I know a system of caves nearby. We’ll be safe there for the night,” Rhyan said. Then massaging my hand, he looked to me. “Partner. Please.”

“My, my, my,” drawled a feline voice.

I stiffened and looked up to see Mercurial balancing on one foot, standing on the head of the gryphon.

“Get off him!” Rhyan snapped.

“I weigh nothing, my not-lord,” Mercurial purred. “He doesn’t feel a thing. And…I do apologize for all the times I could not come when called. I was, as you know, a bit tied up. Thank you by the way, for asking after my well-being. I, too, was a prisoner of Moriel. But no, don’t ask how I'm doing.”

“Have you come to call in your favor?” I asked, my voice dull. It was the first thing I’d said since we’d escaped.

Rhyan's eyes snapped toward me.

“My favor?” Mercurial asked, his voice teasing. “Why, that would imply my remembered goddess, that you had fulfilled your end of the bargain.”

“Haven’t I?” I asked. “You said I was to claim my magic power. And I did! No thanks to you. I suppose not the way you wanted either, but I did it. So go ahead, call in your fucking favor. So I can be done with it.”

He switched feet, giving his hips a shimmy, the diamonds on his skin glittering, as he returned to balancing. “You got your wish, you could try to look happy about it.”

“What do you want, Mercurial?” Rhyan asked, his hand now rubbing up and down my back. He remained seated, but his entire body had tensed, leaning toward me protectively.

“Be careful, my not-lord. That almost sounded like a question.” His violet eyes fell back on me. “And no. I am not calling in a favor with you. Because you’re still not ready. You think an immortal would waste his time on the simple magic of Lumerians? I never meant for you to be finding your Lumerian magic to be the point of our deal. So basic." He wrinkled his nose in disgust. "When I said you were going to claim your magic—I didn’t mean Lyriana’s. I meant Asherah’s.”

“I found her tomb,” I shouted. “My tomb! I touched a shard. And I have her stave.”

“Which makes you not only a fine soturion, but also a mage. Congratulations. But no!” he snapped. “Neither is what I spoke of. What I intended. I meant for you to claim your power as a goddess. And now, because of your foolish, idiotic, stupid, mortal, rash decisions, you will have no choice in the matter.”

“Stupid? Rash! Moriel kidnapped my sisters! What choice did I have? Especially when you were gone!”

“You could have thought— you could have used your Godsdamned brain!”

“Enough,” Rhyan shouted. “Say your piece, and go! You’re not welcome here.”

“So rude, Auriel. As always.”

“Yes, well, some of my memories are coming back. And I’m not too fucking happy with you either.”

Mercurial bowed. “Then I’ll say my piece. I warned you not to do this! Ramia told you—this was a bad idea. Even yourself knew. Did not Asherah come to you? Speak to you when you called on kashonim? Tell you at her own gravesite, this was not the way?”

I balked, remembering when I heard her voice in Korteria.

“Do not head for the stars. What you seek is with the moon,” I said. “How was that a warning?”

“She was referring to the Afeyan Courts. The star court lies beyond Glemaria. You were heading for the stars. Heading north. You should have been going south. The secrets to your power—your true power—not this weak mage shit—is in the Moon Court. Ramia had made arrangements on my behalf. And you’ve ruined them all.”

The sun revealed my secrets, so I hid them with the moon. I groaned. The answers had all been there, but I hadn’t been able to see them.

“Fuck off,” Rhyan snarled. “You put the Valalumir in her, you made it painful, made it burn her. We had no choice. We had to act. And we did the best we could with the information available. Including the information you failed to provide.”

Mercurial vanished, reappearing before Rhyan, pulling him to his feet.