Page 96 of A Serpent in the Garden

Valic was so weak he had trouble blinking us to the meeting spot to wait for Finn. It took him two attempts to get us there. I hovered around him nervously, charting all his injuries, watching them steam beneath the weight of a full and heavy sun as he staggered through windswept grass. He slumped to the ground, like his bones had gone loose. I bit back another are you okay? and sank down beside him.

It took a long time for his chest to stop heaving, and when it did he lay so still he seemed half-dead, sprawled like an injured panther.

“Your eyes look like a stormy day,” I said when he finally opened them. Clear and cool and slightly pearly, like rain against a window. Their contrast to his light brown skin was stark, especially in the beat of the sun, though now they had a frost of suspicion.

Valic squinted up at me, his blisters drying and slowly knitting back together. “Your shell is coming onto me, I think,” he said, while Remy let out a laugh that sounded more relieved than amused.

“I only meant they’re pretty.”

“Pretty?” Valic said, as if the word tasted bitter.

“They look nice with your skin. Have you never endured a compliment before?”

“And yet I remain uncomplimented,” a voice said from behind as a shadow flowed over the grass.

Valic lifted his head from the ground and I turned to find Finn looming over us, the sun at his back, his exposed skin a luminous gold.

“What news?” he asked.

“Services at midday.” Valic lowered his head back to the grass, red patches of nearly-healed blisters still decorating his face. “Priest swears he’ll show. A great treat for the city to look upon divinity,” he scoffed up at the sky.

“They don’t seem too fussed about security,” Finn said mildly. “I suppose they’ve decided they don’t have much use for it when they have a guardian angel. Did you pay their entrance fee or just blink past them?”

“Blinked.” Valic rolled onto his side, peering up at his brother through sunrays as the last of his welts faded. “How are we going to do this?”

“I can cage him in fire. You can use him as target practice as the flames grow hotter, the cage tighter.” Finn rolled his head upon his neck in a languid circle. “I can smother him up to the neck in fire and you can hack his head off slowly. I can trap him with a dome of flame and you can take him hand-to-hand. I’ve never tried flame manacles before. I can snare his wrists and ankles and you can open his throat with one of our father’s blades.”

“As if the seraphim would just allow that,” Remy said sarcastically, climbing up into my skin. “The instant they hear his call they’ll be on us with fire of their own, not to mention if even one of those stupid humans”—he waved my hand toward the towering church, which was barely more than a white speck in the distance— “loses their life by our hand and the council catches wind, we’ll all be banished to the fucking wood, and no offense, Finn, but you’re not exactly the roughing-it sort.”

“Thank you for your very obvious, helpful input,” Finn said courteously into the pause that followed. “Let’s hear your plan if all of my suggestions leave so much to be desired.”

“I don’t have a fucking plan, I didn’t have any time to dream one up. If you could have given us more lead time—”

“I gave you everything I could.” Finn’s ever-present smile turned cold despite the heat rippling off him. “For months I’ve wandered around out here, planting seeds, asking around, making contacts, and when one finally has something for me, all you can do is sneer that they didn’t get news back quickly enough? I can’t help when the information comes in. The person who lit the fire doesn’t live in this city. They didn’t catch wind of this celebration until about five minutes before you did, so I’m very sorry if the timing displeases you, but I’ve done the best I could with what I’ve been given. Should I have shrugged it off? Should we have waited for a better moment that might very well never happen? Over six years he’s made himself scarce, and that’s entirely your fault, by the way, all your schemes and antics were about as subtle as the Noachian Flood, so I must admit I’m very surprised by all this newfound restraint —”

“I don’t want her to die.” Remy slapped my hand to my heart. “If you’d waited ten more seconds my mother might have let me out and she wouldn’t be involved.”

“Well, there’s little to be done about that right now.” Finn narrowed his eyes down at me. “Obviously I would prefer nobody but Luceric died, either. Which is why our time now would be better spent planning than arguing. Valic had a point earlier.” Finn gestured to the empty field around us. “We ought to do it here. Draw him away from his humans, like you said.”

“How?” Remy climbed to my feet. “He’s not going to come charging over just because we ask nicely. He’s not going to be flagged down by a pair of demons. Playing with him, torching him slowly, torturing him like some damned soul, isn’t going to get us anything but dead if the seraphim come screaming down from the skies to save him, which they will, the second he calls out for them.”

“I can set the field on fire, let him look the hero trying to quench the flames. He wouldn’t be able to, not even if he harnessed the ocean, but—”

The word hero sparked something in my mind. It seemed, from what little I knew of him, to be something Luceric valued. Saving those damned souls, visiting blessings so freely upon this city, handing out boons to these citizens who I currently looked just like, in my barely-there white dress, with my respectably clean hair, my milk-white, unsoiled skin.

If Remy hadn’t been too busy arguing with Finn, he might have heard my thoughts.

“Look at me,” I interrupted, caught in the sudden glare of two sharp demon glances. “I’m human. He wouldn’t hurt me, would he? I’m something that needs his saving, not something to fear. Maybe Finn can act like he’s attacking me to draw Luceric near if he shows. Hasn’t everything he’s done, stealing souls from the In Between, blessing this entire city, been because he styles himself as some sort of savior? He wants to be beloved.”

Finn and Valic exchanged looks, but if they said anything I didn’t hear it over Remy’s objections.

I don’t want you getting involved.

I’m already involved.

I don’t want you getting hurt.

I don’t either, but would Luceric really harm me? I allowed a pause for him to answer, but he didn’t. I don’t think he would, not from all I’ve heard.