“Sure.” Callia cast him a weak smile. “I’ll just be outside.”
Gryphon pushed off the bed and tugged the shirt over his head as the door snapped closed behind Callia. Every muscle in his body hurt, but he couldn’t relax until he saw for himself that Maelea was okay.
As he pulled the shirt down, he looked toward Orpheus, who was staring at him with a freaked-out expression. He dropped back onto the side of the bed, bent down to tie his boots. “I know you’re pissed at me. Just lay into me already and get it over with.”
“I—” Orpheus shoved his hands into the front pockets of his jeans. “When did you figure it out? That she was your soul mate?”
Gryphon froze. Looked up. How the hell did Orpheus know that?
His brain spun. And then he realized…Titus. He must have thought it when Titus was standing in the room.
No wonder the guardian had pulled Orpheus out into the hall.
He braced his hands on his knees, pushed up. Blew out a shaky breath. “Not soon enough.”
Anger raced back over Orpheus’s face. “Did you—”
“I didn’t hurt her,” he snapped, hating the burst of jealousy he felt at Orpheus’s obvious concern. He knew his brother was head over heels in love with Skyla, but there was a connection between Maelea and Orpheus. One that rubbed Gryphon the wrong way. She was his soul mate, dammit.
Still…he’d really done a fucking good job protecting her, hadn’t he? How many times had she almost been killed because of him? His anger dissipated. Morphed to guilt.
“I didn’t hurt her,” he said again, gentler this time, more for his benefit than Orpheus’s. “I… I…”
Shit. What could he say that would make any kind of logical sense? He’d kidnapped her, made her his prisoner, dragged her halfway across the country, then fallen for her. If he said that, he’d sound more insane than they already thought he was. And the longer he sat here trying to explain something he couldn’t, the longer it would be before he could see for himself that Maelea was in one piece. That she wasn’t hurt. That she truly was okay.
“Did you know before you left the colony?” Orpheus asked.
This one, he could answer. “No. I’d wanted to leave for weeks. Getting out of my room was easy, but I didn’t know how to get past the tunnels. I’d been watching her for a while and I knew she’d figured it out. So I intercepted her. I only planned to use her to get away, but then the tunnel crashed in and we ended up underground, and then…”
“Then what?”
His heart cinched down. “Then I figured out she was more than I thought she was.”
“Skata,” Orpheus said in a stunned voice. “She’s not just your soul mate. You’re in love with her.”
When Gryphon’s eyes snapped to his, Orpheus added hesitantly, “Does she feel the same way about you?”
Gryphon thought back to their last night together at the beach house. And his heart warmed when he remembered Maelea’s words. Words he was pretty sure he was going to remember for the rest of his life. I love you, Gryphon. Nothing else matters to me. Nothing from before can change that. This—you and me together now—this is all that matters.
“Yeah,” he said, unable to fight the curl of his lips. “She does. Crazy, huh?”
Voices echoed from the hallway before Orpheus could answer. They both looked toward the door. “Where is he?” One voice rang out above the others. “I want to see him.”
“Fuck,” Orpheus muttered.
Gryphon tensed and pushed off the bed. He knew that voice. Knew it well, because it belonged to Lord Lucian, the leader of the Council of Elders. His—and Orpheus’s—uncle. “How does he know what’s going on?”
“Beats me,” Orpheus muttered. “But that’s why Titus and I didn’t tell Theron when we figured out where you and Maelea were holed up.”
“You think the Council’s planted a spy at the half-breed colony?”
“You bet your ass I do. Otherwise they wouldn’t have known about your escape, about the fact you took Maelea with you, about those daemon remains you left behind. And before I forget, let me just ask…what the hell were you thinking, not destroying them? Lucian and the rest of the Council’s gonna use this as another excuse to try to get rid of the Argonauts altogether.”
Gryphon knew Orpheus was right. The Council saw the Argonauts as rogue warriors who weren’t needed. Even after everything Atalanta had done and was doing to try to destroy Argolea, they still didn’t think she was a big enough threat to warrant the guardians. They’d been trying to disband the Argonauts for ages. But underneath, Gryphon knew the Council’s hatred of the Argonauts had nothing to do with perceived threats or protection. It had to do with power. They saw the Argonauts as the monarchy’s personal warriors. And they couldn’t overthrow the queen until the Argonauts were gone.