Page 39 of Demon Touched

“I can ask around here. Maybe the fledglings are familiar with the oracle. I’ll have to be careful though; I don’t think I’m supposed to know that it’s involved in the trials,” I say.

“Just be careful in general,” he says, his voice softer now. “Please.”

I close my eyes as the word slides through my mind, the emotion in it startlingly painful. Every time he sounds like he cares, it’s a slap in the face. Because if he really cares for me, why did he do it? Why was he controlling me, keeping me reined in on the path he chose when he knew it was the last thing I wanted?

I take a moment to harden my heart. Seeing as I can’t protect my mind, it’s the next best thing.

“I agreed to let you help me,” I begin, working to keep my voice neutral.

“Very generous of you,” Syrus cuts in.

“Yes, okay, I get something from it too. So selfish, accepting a favor to keep myself alive,” I reply.

Goddess, it’s easy to slip into bantering with him again. There’s a masochistic part of me that enjoys it even now. Still, I pull back the moment I realize what I’m doing, flattening my tone again.

“But that’s all, Syrus. I don’t want you barging into my mind whenever you like, and I don’t want to go over the past again. There’s no point. We stick to discussing the trials and my training. That’s all. Or I’ll have to try and get by without your help. Understood?”

Though I’m only speaking in my mind, my voice turns strained toward the end, wobbling pathetically. It says everything I can’t verbalize—that he’s making this too hard, and I can only do this if he’ll at least try to make it easier.

“All right,” he says after a long pause. He stops prowling around my mind, and I feel him settle in place. “But I have one condition.”

I grit my teeth, expecting the worst. “What?”

“I won’t possess you whenever I feel like it, but I will check in on you each evening, when you’re alone. It will be quick. We don’t even need to talk if we don’t have new information for each other. But I need to know you’re all right—alive, safe. Or safe enough, anyway. That’s my offer.”

It’s not terrible as compromises go. It’s better than worrying about him catching me out at all times of the day. And maybe I hear that hint of strain in his voice too. I need him to make things easier, and he needs this.

“Deal,” I say.

There’s a flare of emotion from him—vaguely like relief. “Then I will say goodnight for now.”

“Goodnight, Syrus,” I reply as his presence slips from my mind.

He keeps his word. Every night, usually when I’m already in bed, I feel a prickle up the back of my neck and he slides into my head. He stays for a minute or two, during which time I can feel him scanning my body, searching for any injury or discomfort. Then, when he’s satisfied that I’m not imminently dying, he leaves again.

Maybe it’s not easier, necessarily, being so close to him on a regular basis and anticipating his arrival with a mix of eagerness and dread. But at least it’s not for long—those few minutes only give the ache in my chest a little time to spike before it’s over.

Each day, the ridges on my back are a little more prominent, a little more uncomfortable. Filippa says that’s normal—just growing pains—and I try to focus on our training, praying that they finish developing before the next trial. Filippa is more stressed by the day, likely because our lessons are getting more complex, moving slowly onto things that seem new even to my fellow fledglings. And though I feel for my cousin, it’s nice not to be the only one who has no idea what’s going on for a change.

At least, until we get to one particular lesson.

“Listen up, hatchlings!” Baxir says, striding across the field as we hurry to keep up with him—one of his giant strides is about three of mine. “We’ll be going over runic protections today, what they look like and how to neutralize them.”

He stops at a chaotic pile of metal and leather. When I get closer, my little scavenger heart leaps.

Demon loot. Masses of it. Armor and weapons and kelaryn harnesses and shadow shields. This haul would sell for enough coin to feed a family for a year, maybe longer. And every item has at least a handful of Cyrax runes etched into it.

Ephilium speak the common tongue, just like Stratans, though they’d say humans took it from them. Everyone prefers to conveniently ignore the fact that the language everyone uses to open and close rifts is Cyrax. Ephilium definitely don’t speak Cyrax, and as far as I can tell, the runes are the only way they’ll touch demon magic. But then rift runes are kind of outliers. They’ve been in use so long I don’t think anyone ever really associates them with Infernum anymore, and they’re different enough in style and shape that there’s little crossover with regular Cyrax.

Like I say, convenient.

But as much as that allows the ephilium to mentally separate out rift runes from the rest of demonic culture, they’re ultimately shooting themselves in the foot. My pet theory is demons’ extra powers are tied up in Cyrax—their magic is more versatile than the ephilium’s, and one of the places that’s most evident is their use of it on their weapons.

“Demons are good at protecting themselves,” Baxir says, pulling objects at random out of the pile as we line up and shoving them into our hands one by one. “You won’t always have time in battle to unpick those protections. But when the opportunity presents itself, and with some time and focus, you might be able to strip them of some of their sneaky tricks.”

“Isn’t this a little advanced for fledgling trials?” Efram asks, staring at the saddle he’s been handed. “This seems like cadet stuff.”

Baxir turns his huge head and gives Efram a look like he just spat on Baxir’s shoe. “Are you saying you don’t want to learn something that might save your ass on the battlefield, Fledgling Odais? You’re that sure you won’t live to see the Brigade, are you?”