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Not wanting to voice my insecurities, I turned toward the sink and, noting only bandages there, and frowned. “Do you have antiseptic? I’m pretty sure that wound will need stit–” I turned back to face him, eyes wide on seeing a flickering light beneath his palm where he held it to the wound.
The flickering died out, and he removed his hand to reveal smooth, flawless skin. As if the creature in the water hadn’t so much as scratched him.
“Wow. I didn’t know you could do that at will.” I leaned forward, studying the perfect, intact texture of his skin, and ran my finger over its surface.
“I didn’t know I had enough juice left in me to accomplish it, either.”
“I swore I was going to have to sew this up. Can all demons and angels heal themselves?”
“No. Not all. The Fallen, in particular, lose their ability when their power is stripped from them. Mine is weak, but apparently still present.”
“So cool.” Twisting back toward the counter, I lifted the bandage set out there. “What’s the point of this?”
“Maintaining appearances.” He swiped the bandage out of my hand, and his eye seemed to catch on something, the abrupt way his movements came to a halt. The moment his brows pinched together, I knew what it was. The ache at either side of my throat bore the ghostly echo of where his fingers had dug themselves into my flesh back in the bathtub. “How did this happen? The Dzaglion?”
No. I recalled the ache there before the scuffle with the serpent, and it had only grabbed my ankle before releasing me. “When you grabbed my throat in the tub. It feltslightlyaggressive.”
A shocked and remorseful expression claimed his face. “I grabbed your throat?”
“You don’t remember that?”
“I must’ve been lost in the moment. I hurt you?”
Touching a hand there pulled me back into those moments, when all I’d been able to feel was intense pleasure. “I didn’t register any pain at the time. Of course, I was drowning and freaking out, so maybe I was numb to it all.”
With quick hands, he tipped my chin back, further examining what must’ve been small bruises left behind. I was glad for the robe so that he couldn’t see the ones left on my back and ass. After a whisper-soft stroke of his finger across my skin, he flinched and released me, the confusion on his face pinching to a look of absolute misery. In lowering his arms, he must’ve caught sight of something, as he examined his flesh.
Along his forearm were four long black markings that looked like scratches. How it was possible for his frown to deepen even more than before was a mystery.
“Did the serpent do that?” I studied the clean edges of the markings that almost looked like he’d tattooed them there.
“No. The markings on my neck were clearly different.”
It was true. The marks on his neck had bled and oozed, their edges much more lacerated as with claws. “What would leave behind black markings like that?”
“I’m not entirely sure.”
“There was one other thing.” I hesitated to say anything more, as agonized over it as he looked. Particularly since I hadn’t quite worked out whether or not I had hallucinated it in my panic of drowning. “I thought maybe it was just light reflecting off the water, but you had horns. And black skin. And your eye turned red.”
Staring off, he ran a finger along the perimeter of his eye. “Red?” His hand curled into a fist, and he looked away, as if he were trying to hide it right then. “Fuck.”
“What is it?”
“While I was trapped in Ex Nihilo, I was plagued by visions.”
“What kind of visions?”
“Of turning.” Staring off, he seemed to lose himself in thoughts, his one eye unfocused. “Without my wings, the strength of my vitaeilem declines. I become more susceptible to the demon half of me. Myfather’shalf.” Jericho rarely, if ever, spoke about his father.
“Did I know him in the past?” Given the many coincidences and memories that’d unlocked in recent months, I no longer hesitated to claim Lustina’s existence as my own. Unfortunately, mention of his father didn’t jog any recollection of him.
“You met him on a few occasions. He was there the night of your murder and played just as much a part as Bishop Venable.”
“And was he also burned by the fire you set to Praecepsia?”
“No.” Jericho rubbed a hand down his face and shook his head. “He and his sister mistress escaped.”
“To where?”
