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He had never feared death, not for himself. But he would not permit Mahiya to be sacrificed on the altar of the bitter war about to take place. It was one born of old vengeance and old pain, twisted and rancid. Nivriti might love Mahiya, but she hated Neha more. Anyone caught in the middle of their conflict would be obliterated.
He thought of Mahiya with her wings broken, her face shattered, her eyes weeping blood, and knew he’d force her hand if need be, earn her hatred, but he would not watch her die. Not Mahiya.
“What are you thinking?” she asked softly. “You went away for a second. ”
He considered obfuscation, decided on truth.
Her response was instant. “I could never hate you. I’d sooner love Neha. ” Kissing his jaw with sweet, hot lips, she said, “All right, Jason. You are more experienced in matters of war—I will take your lead in this. ”
* * *
Jason had planned to approach Neha on his own, but Mahiya folded her arms, shook her head. “I know her in ways you don’t, that you can’t, especially when it comes to this one thing on which Neha is not rational. ”
“I want you safe. ” No one had ever been to him what Mahiya had become. “A single burst of anger from Neha and you will be erased from existence. ” And he could not imagine walking the world knowing he’d never again see the strange, dangerous hope that lived in those eyes bright as a jungle cat’s.
“I take your help because you are the stronger,” she said, raw emotion in every word, “but I won’t hide behind your wings. This is my battle and I will not act the coward! I won’t, Jason. ”
Before he’d reached this inexplicable equilibrium with Mahiya, before she’d staked a claim on him, he’d have incapacitated her and completed the task before she ever knew it was done. Her anger afterward would’ve mattered little. Now he understood who Mahiya was, understood what his action would steal from her, knew that to deny her this would be to take something from her that could never be returned.
So it was that she landed beside him in the gardens that overlooked the lake, as sunset lingered on the horizon—Jason having spent the intervening time narrowing down the probable whereabouts of Nivriti’s army, with Mahiya assisting by gathering any information she could through subtle questioning of the older servants.
Neha stood alone on the edge where the fort dropped steeply into the water, her gaze on the city beyond.
“I hear Raphael’s people now make free in my territory,” was her opening statement, her tone limned in frost.
“Aodhan had information that was of help to me in my task. ”
The folds of the sage green sari Neha wore today flowed around her ankles as she turned, her wings perfect arches at her back. “Must I beg this information from you?”
“I would never expect such,” he said, aware of Mahiya’s resolute presence and conscious that no matter what he’d instructed, she would not run if this turned deadly. “However, the stakes have changed. ”
Neha rubbed the skin of the thin golden snake coiled around her upper arm like a living armband. “I see. ” A dangerous glint in her eye. “You break the blood vow. ”
He would have done so without compunction if it would’ve saved Mahiya, but as it was, he no longer had to. “With my action, I protect the best interests of the family. ” Neha, Nivriti, and Mahiya were the last direct descendants of an ancient bloodline. With Neha and Nivriti about to go to certain war, Mahiya had become the family’s only hope for a future.
“You must seek something valuable indeed that you dare play games with me. ”
“Not valuable . . . but intriguing. ” He knew Mahiya listened to what he said, and yet he did not sheathe his words, having every faith in her intelligence. “My curiosity is not yet sated. ”
Neha’s gaze went from him to Mahiya, her smile as cold as the blood of the creature around her arm. “You do not need to bargain with me for her, Jason. You’re welcome to remain at this court as long as you wish. ”
“I’m one of Raphael’s Seven,” he reminded her. “I must soon return, and I ask that you release Mahiya to me. ”
Neha’s eyes were suddenly chips of ice. “Why would I give you my favorite toy?” A flick of her wrist and Mahiya was wrenched up into the air, her neck arched in a way that meant she had to be having trouble breathing.
Rage, black and violent, surged in his veins, but he held it in check. To show even a hint of care toward Mahiya would be to end this negotiation before it began, and unless the Cascade had altered matters, this aspect of Neha’s power was very weak. She could not hold Mahiya for long. “Because what I have to tell you will provide you with far more satisfaction. ”
“I can tear your mind apart like the rice paper of Lijuan’s lands. ”
“No,” Jason said. “You can’t. ” He felt it then, her mental touch shoving against his shields, clawing and hard.
Her eyes widened, anger replaced by fascination. “Incredible. It is as if your mind wears an onyx carapace. ”
Raphael had said something similar to Jason when he’d attempted to reach Jason’s mind in order to—ironically enough—teach him how to protect his thoughts from invasion. No one they’d consulted, not even Jessamy or the healer, Keir, had ever seen or heard of its like in an angel so young.
“Perhaps”—Keir’s wise eyes in that too-young face—“you created it before you ever knew it to be an impossibility. An instinctive defense. ”
Jason had always thought Keir had the right of it. Alone and scared when he’d been little more than a babe, he’d had to learn to protect himself from a world too big, too dangerous, too empty. “You can kill me,” he said, because that was true, “but in doing so, you lose the information I hold. ”
“You would make an enemy of me out of a frippery?”
Jason heard Mahiya drop behind him, knew she had to be hurt, but still he didn’t turn. “I do not think you’ll consider me thus after you hear what I have to say. ”
* * *
Mahiya sucked in pained breaths of air, at least three of her ribs cracked. Pushing up from her crumpled state on the ground into a sitting position, she took as deep a breath as she dared. It felt like knives stabbing into her liver, but the haze cleared from her eyes to bring Jason and Neha into sharp focus. The archangel’s face was cold, Jason’s a mask, his tattoo dramatic under the sunshine.
All at once, Neha laughed, and it was a true laugh, full of delight. “I knew I had chosen well. ”
Mahiya’s blood went cold, realization a chill rain in her veins.
“I can offer Jason something Raphael will never be able to match. ”
Jason wouldn’t realize, wouldn’t understand, but she knew that look on Neha’s face, had seen the calculation in it before, after quarrels with Eris. None of that had ever come to anything, but now Eris was dead.
Swallowing the pain that threatened to splinter her thoughts, she tried to reach Jason’s mind. She’d never before dared this, for it presumed an intimacy he did not wish to share, but he had to know what he faced.
When her thoughts hit the unyielding glossy black of his shields and ricocheted back, panic beat at her with fluttering wings, but she told herself to be patient, to be calm. If she didn’t succeed, Jason could inadvertently insult Neha and in so doing, forfeit his life.
I won’t let her kill you, Jason. I won’t.
Taking another deep breath, she tried to reach him again, realized with a dash of desperation that she was far too weak to have any impact on a shield so solid it was beyond adamantine. It was unlikely he even noticed her attempts, especially when from what Neha was saying, the archangel, too, was attempting to batter his defenses.
Retreating, she threw every part of her mind into coming up with some other way to either gain his attention or create a diversion.
Are you hurt? A voice, pristine as a bell . . . and inside her head.
The wonder of the fact he’d initiated a link might have p
aralyzed her had she not been so afraid for him. No, I’m fine, she lied, able to taste the gleaming obsidian of his rage. Jason, listen, there is something you must know.
Silence, but the connection remained open.
She cares nothing for me except as the toy she called me, but she wants you.
Neha isn’t the first archangel to want to poach my skills.
No. She held her breath, released it in a quiet rush as pain stabbed at her chest.
You are hurt.
A few broken ribs won’t matter if we both end up dead, so listen. She doesn’t want your skills, she wants you—for her new consort.
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Neha’s voice broke into their silent exchange. “I did not expect such a weak creature to intrigue you so, but it is undoubtedly a fleeting interest. ” That quickly, Neha dismissed Mahiya. “What I offer you is far more than you can imagine. ”
She’s mad.
Mahiya blinked at Jason’s flat assessment. No, Neha is sane. Coldly so. She knows you’ll be a strong, dangerous, intelligent consort. Jason was a man any woman would be proud to have by her side. And you are beautiful. Neha has always been drawn to beauty in a man. Though Jason was a naked blade to Eris’s pretty ornament.
Only madness would make her blind to the fact that it would be a very stupid man who’d accept the offer of a woman who imprisoned her last consort for three hundred years.
Mahiya’s mouth threatened to fall open. Well, when you put it that way . . .
“I need a consort,” Neha said, walking to the edge of the garden once more, her gaze on the lake, its surface a mirror of the blue sky touched with curling edges of red and orange. “I do not want you for a lover, so you may keep Mahiya as a diversion if you wish, but I am offering you power you will never gain in Raphael’s court. ”
Jason was quiet for a long moment. “I did not expect such an offer,” he said at last, as if Neha had caught him unawares and he sought time to get his thoughts in order.
Yes, Mahiya thought, watching Neha’s face as she turned back to Jason. That was the right tack. To refuse her outright would be an insult the archangel would not forget, never forgive.
“A consort must walk beside an archangel,” he added. “I prefer the shadows. ”
“My last consort was a creature of the light, shining and handsome, and he betrayed me. ” Brittle words.
Some assistance, Mahiya Geet.
Startled at the tenderness in his mental tone, something she’d never heard in his spoken voice, it took her a second to reply. She’s still in love with Eris, and you’re too proud a man to be with a woman who mourns another.
I am?
Her lips twitched. Jason’s laughter was hidden deep within, where the light did not often reach, but it was there. You are, she said firmly, taking advantage of Neha’s preoccupation with Jason to get to her feet.
“This time,” the archangel continued, “a consort who stands in the shadows would suit me well. ”
Jason bowed deeper than Mahiya had ever seen him bow, his wings spread to their full breathtaking width, the colors of sunset playing over the jet in a display that turned it into a canvas of black flame. When he rose back up, his expression was as inscrutable as always, but his voice gentle. “I am truly flattered. ”