Page 8 of The Fallen and the Kiss of Dusk (Crowns of Nyaxia #4)

ASAR

H e’s dead. You killed him.”

“I didn’t kill him. He’s a god.”

“He’s not a god. He’s a mortal who stole some magic off a corpse. Basically a grave robber.”

“I hear his kind enjoy that kind of thing.”

The voices blended around me. A woman’s, soft and curious. An older man’s, rough but oddly melodic, and then a younger one, bitter with sarcasm.

“Hush,” the woman said. “He’s waking up.”

I was restrained again, though this time, I could tell immediately, not with god-forged chains. When I lifted my head, I was rewarded with a cacophony of pains. My left ankle throbbed fiercely, and when I moved, my shoulder made a cracking noise that didn’t sound altogether pleasant.

If the fall had injured me, it could have done far worse to Mische, who had already looked close to death.

I was in a small room that looked nothing like my Ysrian prison. It seemed more suited to be the home of some human farmer. Stone walls, dirt floor, modest wooden furniture, a fire in the hearth. A few sparse windows revealed only gray, hazy clouds. No doors.

Three people stood before me, gawking like I was a museum curiosity.

A young woman with enormous dark eyes, fair freckled skin, and copper hair.

Curiously, she had a plate of bronze metal bolted across one side of her jaw—some kind of prosthetic, perhaps?

Beside her was an older man with slicked-back salt-and-pepper hair.

Then a younger one, with a tall, svelte frame, bronze skin, and sharp features.

His eyes were completely black—no iris, no pupil. A white wolf sat beside him.

We were alone in this room. No Mische.

“Where is she?”

My voice sounded pathetically weak.

The woman shot the older man a questioning look.

“Asar,” Mische said. I blinked, and there she was—kneeling on the ground, burnt and bloody. “Why are you crying?”

Blink, and she was whole again, dressed in worn clothes from our travels through the Descent, giving me a broad smile. “What’s your favorite hobby?”

Blink, and she was wearing a gold slip and silk robe, extending her hand to me as she bit the lush curve of her lower lip in a way, I was certain, she had no idea had haunted me ever since. “Dance with me.”

Memories. They were memories.

I slammed my mental doors closed, cursing myself.

Gideon would’ve been ashamed of me for failing to recognize this for what it was.

I hadn’t even felt the invasion—maybe because I’d been desperate to believe what I was seeing.

I knew the strength of that firsthand. Countless times, I’d been the one plucking memories to use against my target.

Still, this was skillfully executed, and very different from Shadowborn magic.

Even now that I was looking for it, I only barely felt the touch upon my mind.

“Sorry,” the old man said, not sounding very sorry at all. “Can’t blame you, though. She’s a pretty one.”

I caught my possessive remark between my teeth.

The man looked human—he held the signs of age that evaded vampires, lines around his eyes, gray in his beard and hair.

Still, there was something odd about him that I couldn’t place.

He was tall, with a strong face and an elegant way of carrying himself.

Oddly elegant, actually, in ways that seemed to defy his appearance.

His eyes, bright blue, stared through me.

My gaze shifted to the other two. The woman fidgeted nervously with a plait of hair over her shoulder, and I noticed that her hand was constructed of metal, too—copper and bronze and countless gears, ticking with her every movement.

The younger man stared at me with his black eyes narrowed, stepping possessively closer toher.

I reached out for their minds, ready to rifle through their memories. But then my brow furrowed.

Instantly, I knew that despite their appearance, they were not human. Not vampire, either. I couldn’t quite push my way into their thoughts.

“Let me go,” I said.

“I’m sorry.” The woman sounded genuinely apologetic. “We cannot.”

“You couldn’t go anywhere, anyway.” The black-eyed man gestured to the mist-covered windows. “There is no path to Ysria here.”

“I have no interest in going back to Ysria. Let me go .”

I imbued my voice with the syrup of compulsion— Let me go. Let me go. Let me go.

Compulsion was easy to use once you realized that it wasn’t about force—the key was to sweeten your desires until your target lapped them up like sugar water. Still, my hold on their minds was slippery, and the movement of my own magic clumsy.

The woman stepped forward, eyes glazed, but the younger man stopped her.

“Careful.” Then, to me, “Rude way to treat your hosts, vampire.”

“There is no need to be rude to our guest, either, child.”

The voice came before her form did. Ageless, transcending mortality.

Acaeja emerged from the shadows.

All other thoughts and senses fell away but for her. The urge to fall to my knees consumed me like a wave of nausea. Her wings unfolded behind her, nearly stretching the width of the tiny room. Right now, four of them depicted fiery damnation. Two depicted pitch-black nothingness.

Aceaja’s large white eyes surveyed me.

“Forgive our accommodations, Asar Voldari, King of the House of Shadow, Warden of the Descent, and descendant of Alarus.” Her voice plucked through my titles with detached curiosity, as if rummaging for something useful.

“Understand that we must work with what we have. I could not intervene in freeing you from your cell. You needed to come here of your own accord.”

She turned to the three figures before me. “Well done, my soldiers.”

The older man’s eyes roved over me. I felt his fear and his curiosity, both equally powerful. “Is he one of us?”

“Let me go,” I said again.

The compulsion was stronger this time. All three of them started toward me.

Let me go. Let me go. Let me ? —

Acaeja lifted a hand. “There is no need for that. You are no prisoner. Release him, Kayeh.”

The woman hesitated before bowing her head. “Yes, Weaver.”

The vines around my arms and legs slithered away like banished snakes.

I fought a wince as my weight pressed down upon my injuries, bone scraping against bone.

It would heal fast enough. I touched my wrist and the marks on my skin where the vines had touched me—burns.

The touch of divinity, albeit not as strong as those of the chains in my cell.

I watched the woman—Kayeh—whose eyes were aglow with fading light.

The magic of Vitarus, I realized. But not just that of an acolyte, I was sure. Not even a very skilled one. It felt different than that.

“You’re demigods,” I said.

That was why my compulsion didn’t work well on them. Why their magic defied the boundaries I’d set up against it. Why their presence felt beyond mortal.

“He’s clever enough,” the older man said to the younger. Then, to me, he said, “Guess whose?”

I took him in for a moment—the confusing, ethereal grace about him, even at odds with everything else about his appearance.

“Kajmar,” I said. The god of art and performance, and alongside it, illusion and deception.

Then, to the younger man, I said, “And you are Ijakai’s.”

That one was easy. His black eyes. His pointed ears. The wolf that now wound around his legs. The sight of the creature, and the man’s hand rubbing its head absentmindedly, hit me with a stab of longing. Luce was not dead. I felt that, just as I felt it for Mische.

How convenient your instincts are, a familiar, cruel voice whispered in the back of my mind. Your woman is still out there. Your dog is still out there. Is that really what you sense, or is it just denial?

But those harsh words were met with softer ones—Mische, saying, We all need faith, Asar.

I blinked away the past, even though it pulled at me with open arms.

I had lots of questions, now.

If vampires were cruel when it came to succession, gods were downright vicious.

Vampires would at least carefully cultivate heirs to ensure their line lived on, but gods were true immortals.

Offspring were nothing but liabilities. This, of course, did not stop them from fucking their way across the mortal worlds—countless nubile, devoted acolytes were far too tempting to pass up.

But they swiftly dealt with the consequences of those trysts. Some more mercifully than others.

It was a miracle that these demigods had not only been allowed to be born, but allowed to live. I had to imagine that someone had gone through great lengths to make sure they did. Perhaps that was true of me, too. All of us, rare artifacts.

I was reminded of the collection I’d so carefully cultivated in my office in Morthryn. I could practically imagine us on a shelf on that wall now, neatly labeled: “Seed of Kajmar, demigod. Seed of Ijakai, demigod. Seed of Vitarus, demigod. Seed of Alarus, vampire and???”

I looked to Acaeja. “Am I to be added to your museum, now?”

But perhaps museum wasn’t the right word.

Perhaps a better one was armory .

Because demigods weren’t just rare curiosities. They were the deadliest weapons that existed against the White Pantheon. A piece of the power of a major god, without the restrictions that prevented them from killing each other.

Acaeja’s face was still. “I am a protector.”

What a joke. This was no sanctuary. But I couldn’t bring myself to care about Acaeja’s machinations. The longer Mische remained in the underworld, the harder it would be to bring her back, and the more of her I’d leave behind when I did.

I needed to go. Now.

My eyes moved past the row of demigods before me, past Acaeja. I now noticed that a single closed door stood behind her. Had it been there before? Did it matter?