Page 80 of The Song of the Void

“Don’t listen, Rei,” I told him. I could feel the temptation writhing inside Reiven to make this worse, to throw a punch and find out what happened next, but all I wanted was to escape. I tugged on his arm, and we moved past Vaetrik silently, until he spoke again.

“Do you know why you won't have a Siren lover after tomorrow?”

Reiven froze, and so did I. He tightened his grip on my hand, like all the fire buried inside him was desperate to come out to play. I felt like a mere statue built of loosely packed sand, ready to blow away at another word from Vaetrik's mouth.

He laughed, soft and condescending. “Because she will either be my pet, or she'll be dead.”

“Let me make something perfectly clear to you, Human,” I snarled before I could stop myself. Reiven started beside me. I threw a glance over my shoulder, an odd confidence flooding through me when I saw the shock on Vaetrik’s face, just like when Rei blew up his cannons. “Before you met me, you were nothing. I made you what you are, Captain Vaetrik Tynedall. And tomorrow...I will unmake you.”

Stillness and silence reigned over the hallway.

Until Ash burst out laughing and limped over to us to grab my hand with a huge smile. He cast a look at Vaetrik. “Oh, I should pause time for a few minutes so I can commit that face to memory.”

He nodded at Vaetrik's open mouth and furrowed brows. I had never spoken to him like that before, and he clearly wasn't taking it well. He sputtered, trying to come up with something to say. But there was no refuting the truth.

Ash said, “Now, I think she just told you to fuck off, so why don'tcha go on and do that?”

“Ash!” I hissed, but Vaetrik just growled a quiet curse at us and stormed down the hallway. If it weren’t for Tamayo’s words about not causing trouble, he probably would have taken on all three of us right then and there, but with those two at my side, it didn’t sound so frightening.

Reiven picked me up and spun us in a dizzying circle, pressing a wet kiss to my cheek as he followed Ashkade into his room.

“Perfect,” I snapped. “As if you two weren’t already on his list, you just had to make things worse.”

“I’m so proud of you, Zephra!” Ash said, and Reiven echoed his sentiment and set me down.

Ashkade’s room was almost identical to the other guest rooms, although instead of a window, this one had a huge glass door that led out to a stone balcony, overlooking the flickering lights of the cityscape. There were also three others in his room, sitting on the bed, playing cards.

“Zephra!” Calinia jumped up and embraced me, checking me up and down for injuries.

Reiven’s siblings cautiously made their way over to greet us.

Akina bowed at the waist at first, then flung her arms around me just like Calinia had. “Thank you for taking care of our brother. I’m sorry I ever thought he’d hurt you to—to…” She bit her lip, and Jin jumped in to save her.

“Spilling Siren lifeblood is an ancient self-worth quest for Mourners, like slaying a giant shark or something. No sane person nowadays would do that.” Intelligence and defiance shone in his eyes. “Old people are so weird.”

“So you’re…Jin?” I looked him up and down.

“What, did Rei tell you he killed me?” Jin slapped his scarred hand to his forehead. “Flames Below, can’t stop breathing for a few minutes without people crying about you being dead. The healers brought me back. I was just unconscious for a week or two after someone let me get crushed by a building he set fire to. I got these awesome scars though—you have no idea how many dates they’ve gotten me.”

I had to smile at his laid-back, overconfident air. He reminded me a great deal of Reiven.

Apparently Calinia and Ash had been teaching Jin and Akina the card game “Deception,” but they made Rei and I take over their hands while they wandered over to the worktable Ash had brought to the castle. All his tools and platinum jewelry littered the surface, just as chaotically organized as his room on the ship. They seemed to be working on something together. I tried to focus on the game and not them, but Jin was an excellent strategist and liar. He beat us soundly within a few rounds.

“I was always smarter than you two,” he said, waggling his eyebrows at his siblings.

“Even without my power, I’d still kick your ass without breaking a sweat,” Rei said. His brother made a face and mockingly croaked at him, like a raven might.

No wonder he doesn’t like being compared to a bird…

They tussled for a minute, and Rei had just put Jin in a headlock when a harsh rap at the door startled all of us except Calinia. She rolled her eyes and flung it open, glaring at the person she found on the other side.

“It’s about time! I told you to come here an hour ago!”

“Oh, shut up. You’re lucky I even decided to grace you with my presence.” Shaddan stepped into the room, golden eyes flashing as he marked every single one of us. His gaze lingered on Akina for a moment before he returned to Calinia. “What do you want?”

“I want you to ally yourself with us,” Calinia said. “That pirate has a grudge against Reiven and Zephra, and I won’t have you helping him to kill them, especially not if he’s only going to stab you in the back.”

Shaddan threw back his head and laughed. “I’m not stupid enough to throw in with that Human. Especially now that I don’t need him or the merchant ship we took over after you destroyed ours,” he said pointedly to Reiven. “I can just take your ship and crew when I locate the Voidtome. I have no interest in joining hands with you now, down there in Hell, or afterwards.”