Victorious, Aereus lifted his arms above his head, his muscled body glistening with sweat. “Victory is mine once again! The angel of war reigns supreme!”
I suppressed the urge to roll my eyes, instead forcing myself to clap. Honestly. I’d never expected ancient angels to act like such children.
Kur pushed himself off the ground with a groan. As I crossed back to the table, still clapping, Kur shot me a withering look that spoke of his resentment. Even if we’d all agreed to the plan ahead of time, it killed him inside to let Aereus win.
Without uttering a word, Kur collected his shirt and jacket from the human servants, sullenly dressing himself.
Still shirtless, Aereus dropped into his chair, breathing heavily. Sweat slid down his chest.
One of us would need to get up close to him, to block his line of vision. I gave Tanit a nudge.
I was pretty sure her groan was audible only to me as she rose from her chair. “In the shadow kingdom, the high lords never told us about the angels.” She sat before him at the edge of the table, her dress riding up. Given what she’d said about underwear earlier, I was pretty sure Aereus’s eyes wouldn’t be leaving her body anytime soon.
She ran a fingertip over his bare chest. “I never knew you had inspired so many heroes in human history. Genghis Khan, Alexander the Great...”
“You see, my little shadow demonesses? Your males can’t compete with me.”
“Amazing,” said Tanit, a little too deadpan. “Such power. Tell me about the wars you’ve fought.”
Aereus stared up at her, transfixed, and began to launch into the tales of his historic exploits. With every word, a little more of that primal rage began to seethe in my blood. Now that Adonis had left the room, I had no one here to calm me. I gripped my wineglass tightly, taking out my anger on its stem, until a smooth presence kissed my skin once again.
It took me a moment to realize Adonis had already returned, shadows darkening the air around him. My clenched thighs and fingers began to relax once more. I met his gaze, and he shook his head—nearly imperceptibly. But it was enough to tell me that our plan hadn’t worked.
My heart sank. Our death warrants may have been signed, and we were no closer to protecting ourselves from the archangel onslaught.
Chapter 29
Wordlessly, two cherubs led us back to our room, while I restrained myself from asking what, exactly, Adonis had seen in the war room.
At last, when we reached our room, I rushed inside and closed the door hard behind us.
I gripped Adonis’s arm. “You gave me a head shake. What did the head shake mean? Please tell me there is a chance the head shake meant ‘I found the stones and everything is fine.’”
“Unsurprisingly, the head shake meant ‘no.’ I did not find the stones. Just a book I already have, and Aereus’s relics.”
I wasn’t letting this go. I’d been certain something lay hidden there. “What’s in this book?”
His steely eyes betrayed nothing. “It’s about the Bringer of Light. When you caught Aereus looking at the bookshelf, it’s likely what he was thinking about was this text. But the book doesn’t contain any information we don’t already have.”
I studied his chiseled features, so beautiful I could hardly think clearly around him. “I need specifics. What do we already know, exactly?”
“It’s merely a description of the stones’ origin.”
“Please tell me you took it with you.”
“I didn’t need to take it. I have my own copy. I bring it with me wherever I go, searching for clues in its text.”
I thrust out my hand. “Show me.”
A dark power rippled off his body. He wasn’t used to being ordered around. “You won’t be able to read it, but if you must see it…”
He turned away and lifted up the mattress. He pulled out a thin, dark volume—one with no lettering on the front. “I don’t think you’ll discover anything I haven’t already.”
I took it from him and sat on the bed. The spine cracked as I opened it, and I began scanning the yellowed pages. I couldn’t read the text, wasn’t even entirely sure if it was Greek or Phoenician, but luckily for me, it came with pictures. Images of vines coiled around the edges of the pages, and artists had depicted page after page of flowering plants, each one labeled in that ancient language.
“What does it say?” I asked.
“It gives an account of the Old Gods, of the gifts they provide to combat the angels. The Devil’s Bane that grows where archangels walk the earth, the sacred rowan tree that channels the power of the Old Gods. And the Stones of Zahar, mined from gleaming blue gemstones.”
I turned another brittle page, uncovering an image of a grotto—one I was sure I’d seen before. A river carved through a rocky landscape, its banks dappled with blood-red anemones. I’d seen it in a dream, I thought, when I’d flown in Adonis’s arms.
“This looks familiar.”
“Does it?” Surprise tinged his voice.
“I’ve dreamt it.” I studied the gentle curve of the river, the myrrh trees growing by its banks. “And it’s not just that I dreamt it. The garden outside your castle is a version of this place. The red flowers, the river carving through the center.”
“It’s where I was born.”
“Afeka. Right. Why is your birthplace in a book about the Stones of Zahar?”
Adonis leaned in to me, pointing to the cave. “Some say this cave is the entrance to the underworld, the realm of the Old Gods. I was born in their presence, surrounded by the stones that could kill me.”
“Right…the seeds of destruction thing.”
“This cave is where life mingles with death. It’s where Aereus found the stones in the first place.”
I traced my fingertips over the picture. “I didn’t know the Old Gods had anything to do with an underworld.”
Adonis’s magic caressed my body. “That’s the first thing you need to know about gods. All gods rule the realms of the dead. All gods demand sacrifices for their gifts. Even the Old Gods.”
Frankly, that didn’t sound ideal. I was about to reap a metric ton of power from the Old Gods. “A sacrifice. And what sacrifice will they demand from me for using their stones?”
He considered it, a concerned look in his eyes. “I honestly can’t tell you that. I think they’ll want you to change, to become something new. That’s how the gods of nature work, isn’t it? They sacrifice the old to make way for the new. Death gives rise to new life.”
Among the plants by the mouth of the cave, the artist had painted a few shimmering blue stones.
I pointed at them. “This must be them. The Stones of Zahar.”
“I remember them,” he said quietly. “The color of the sky over Afeka.”
I breathed in his exotic scent of myrrh. When an angel like him looks at a garden—he sees a place of death. No wonder Aereus’s garden had unsettled me so much. From an ancient immortal’s perspective, it was already dying.
My gaze trailed over Adonis’s breathtaking, masculine features—then lower, over the pendant he wore at his throat. I touched it, gripping it gently between two fingers. He nearly flinched at my touch. Candlelight glinted off the amber.