“You’re like a feral animal, thinking it’s caught in a trap.” Azael leans back in his chair, looking down his nose at me with entirely too much amusement. “There’s no need to chew your own arm off to escape. You’re safe here.”
“Fuck off.” I hiss back.
“No. You owe me a favor, Kaelene. Tell me how you got out.”
This self-righteous asshole infuriates me so much, I feel the start of a migraine coming on. It’s easier to look at the walls than his face, so that’s exactly what I do. They have paintings in here, and unlike the Abyss, they’re absolutely normal. Instead of vanity portraits or biblical battle scenes, they’re just mountains and forests. Calming, even. Happy little trees, happy little clouds….
“I meditated. That’s how.”
Azael crosses his arms, not buying it at all. “So do you normally burst into the brightness of the sun and explode through highly runed containment cells every time that you meditate?”
I sigh, looking back at his obnoxious, sarcastic face. Lying to him is pointless; he’s too good at reading me.
How much could it really hurt if I feed him a few breadcrumbs? I have to win his trust somehow, after all. I’m pretty sure that’s a basic principle of spy work.
So I try for a rebuttal, “How did you manage to kill Michael?”
“A sword.”
“I saw that much, clearly. What was so special about that sword?”
“What was so special about your meditation?”
Okay, fine. He got me there. If he wants a one-for-one transactional conversation, then I’ll play his game. “I think the Power may have taken pity on me and unlockedthe Aether.”
Azael leans in with interest, resting his elbows on the table. I, on the other hand, am disgusted by the closer proximity, shirking away immediately.
If it bothers him, he doesn’t budge. He hangs close enough that I can see every detail of his multi-colored eyes. They might look green from a distance, but they’re really a mix of everything—green, brown, blue, and silver… Like the colors of the globe.
“Intriguing,” he muses. “And what was it like?”
I don’t skip a beat. “What kind of sword was it?”
“A miraculously enchanted sword, fueled by energy antithetical to Michael’s nature. And the Power?”
“It was… the most beautiful music… How did you enchant a sword?”
“Ididn’t.” Damn him and his damn riddles and loopholes, just like a genie. “Did the Power speak to you? Were there any words in the music?”
I close my eyes, trying to recall what I’d heard. It was unearthly, mesmerizing, and beautiful. But the words were unintelligible, used more for the way the letters sound than any particular lyrics. I could only make out a few words.
“Absinthium, amaritudo venit.” I try to say it slowly, but I’m sure I still butcher whatever language it is. “So if you didn’t enchant the sword, then I assume one of your advisors did? How?”
Azael looks at me for a beat, silent, with his eyebrows slightly lowered. Then, he shakes his head. “Tamiel can create celestial weapons, and Amezarak can imbue them. It is simply their specialty. The two of them together are worth more than an entire arsenal of weapons.”
Oh.Great. For the first time, I’m starting to worry that I might have picked the losing side.
Azael doesn’t ask another question. He just stares at me, making me uneasy with his strange, appraising look. In an effort to pretend I’m not disturbed, I take a sip of water, avoiding his eyes until I can’t stand it anymore.
“I take it you know what the words mean,” I mumble.
“I do.”
“Would you care to tell me?”
I swear, if he makes me strike another bargain for?—
“I think the Power is saying something that historically hasn’t translated very well for humans, which is curious in itself.” He leans back in his seat, crossing his arms. “But it’s also speaking our old common language, and I’m almost certain that you don’t know Latin.”
