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That noise pulled the most guttural sob out of Aeris’s mouth.

In the corner of his eye, he saw Malakai brace a hand on the wall, the other pressed against his stomach in what could only be described as spine-numbing relief.

And Ikarus … The ground, the world it seemed, was swaying beneath his feet.

Alive. Ikarus clung to that word like a rope lowered into a crater. Emelda was alive, because the human had saved her. The woman who’d sworn to end him so many times, who’d threatened him and the life of every creature down here, had saved Emelda’s life. His sister’s life.

She could’ve broken him with this, body and soul. This would’ve been the perfect opportunity to completely destroy him from the inside out like she so desperately wanted to—and instead, she’d shown mercy. Compassion.

Aeris crawled across the bathroom floor, blood and water from the shower quickly soaking through his clothes. Ikarus watched the human tense as he knelt before her. Watched her eyes widen briefly as she palmed her thigh as though reaching for a weapon strapped there. Watched every muscle in her body go rigid as Aeris took Emelda’s hand and kissed the back of it.

“Thank you.” He kissed her knuckle. “Thank you.” Then each of her fingers. “I’m here, my love. I don’t know what I would have done if …” He cut himself off with another sob, too scared to utter the words and risk breathing them into existence.

Aeris gathered Emelda in his arms, and as he vanished, Ikarus swore tears were gathering in the human’s eyes too.

43

Soraya stayed with Ikarus in the bathroom while Aeris phased Emelda away, Malakai quickly following.

She’d never seen him like this before. It was like watching a tightly woven ball of wool come apart in someone’s hand. She could see him desperately trying to cling to some semblance of calm and control, but the threads were unraveling too quickly for him to grasp.

As he stood with his eyes closed in front of the mirror, she watched him drag a hand through his hair and draw a deep breath through his nose. She watched him do it again and again, the words breathe deep to calm the mind and breathe deep and all will be well spilling from his lips like a prayer.

She hated what it did to her chest to see him like that.

Enemy. He was her enemy.

He stilled the moment she stepped toward him, spine straightening as though he’d been struck.

“What do you want?”

To see if you were all right. The words were right there on the tip of her tongue, dying to crawl free. Soraya swallowed them along with the strange thickness in her throat and glared at his back. “You seemed off your game. Distracted. Thought I might take advantage. Stab you in the back while you aren’t looking, so to speak.”

Ikarus loosened a bitter scoff. He pinched the bridge of his nose, but his lips twitched slightly.

“I shouldn’t have expected anything less from you,” he said, though the viciousness in his tone felt a little forced. “I suppose it’s silly of me to think the God Killer herself would have the compassion not to strike when her prey is distracted.”

Good. These barbs between them were good. Safe. But she had to know.

“Emelda has the Bane, doesn’t she?”

Ikarus winced, then gave a slow nod.

“What stage?”

“Advanced. She takes herbs to help with the symptoms, but they don’t seem to be as effective anymore. This is the worst episode she’s had for a while.” He took a deep breath, then another. “I promised Varena I’d keep her safe. I promised—fuck.” His hands flew into his hair, his knuckles turning white. “She can’t stay down here much longer.”

Soraya’s mind was racing a mile a minute. She’d always thought all the Dar’rak such monsters. Emelda, though … She seemed sweet. She didn’t deserve this. There had to be a way to save her. “What if you got her a helmet and took her to the surface? You could do it in small increments—”

“Oh, would you just fuck off,” Ikarus snarled, teeth bared. “Do you think we haven’t already thought of that? That we haven’t tried everything we can think of to stop her from dying?”

Soraya stepped back, anger burning through the coldness in her chest. “Fuck you! You were in pain, so I was trying to help, you narcissistic arsehole! Why do you always have to do this? Why is it whenever I think there might be a sliver of something decent in you, you go and do this? Why do you always have to be so cruel?”

The moment she’d said the words, Soraya wanted to take them back. Not because she hadn’t meant them, but because of the change they incited in him.

“You want to see my demons? Then so be it.” He phased across the room, and there was no time to react before he grabbed her face, his nails biting into her skin, and she was dragged into his mind.

Soraya’s head was throbbing. Curling over, she braced a hand on the cold wall to keep from falling.