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I wasn’t so sure about that—his face, and more so his eyes, were memorable on their own.
“I don’t know how you carry him without growing tired,” I commented.
Scion looked offended. “I will not dignify that with a response.”
The raven made a forlorn sound.“This is the welcome I get,”he seemed to say.“Fine. I’ll go, as I’m clearly unwanted.”
I petted the bird’s head, and he nipped lightly at my hand. “No, don’t go. I didn’t mean that.”
Scion gave me a very strange look.
* * *
The thieves’den was far livelier than it had been last night, and I had to force my face into a blank mask so as not to betray my shock when we entered.
Every seat at the bar and the surrounding card tables was full, and the sparring ring was full of action, screaming spectators standing all around shouting jeers and encouragement in equal measure.
Scion and I stepped into the room, and nearly two dozen pairs of eyes turned toward us. For a moment, all movement stopped, and it turned deadly silent. I felt as though every member of the guild had their eyes fixed on me, analyzing my every move, sizing me up like a lamb for slaughter.
Then, all at once, the tension broke.
The thieves barely acknowledged us as conversation resumed, and the misfit army returned to whatever they’d been doing before our arrival: some sparring or else cheering the others on in the fighting area, some seemed to be eating breakfast, and still others were slumped against the wall like zombies, no doubt still exhausted from their night’s work.
Scion gripped my elbow and steered me through the center of the room, toward the bar and the card tables at the back where we’d sat with Cross the night before.
“What was that about?” I asked.
“You’ll see in a moment,” he said through gritted teeth.
I glanced around as we walked, both curious about what I was supposed to be seeing and trying to take in all the faces and commit them to memory. Were any of these on the ships bound for Nevermore? Or, perhaps more pressingly, were any of these faces those Scion had been so concerned might attack me?
I was so lost in thought I hardly noticed when we veered off to the left, parting with the crowd, to avoid something going on in the very center of the room.
I looked up, alerted by Scion tugging on my arm rather than merely steering. “What—”
I broke off. My horror was so absolute that I couldn’t even make a coherent sound. I’d not seen carnage like this since the days when King Penvalle haunted the halls of the obsidian palace, and those he took to his bed would come back injured or, worse, never come back at all. I turned slowly to stare at Scion, my mouth agape. “What the fuck did you do?”
Scion’s calm expression didn’t shift. “Nothing he didn’t deserve.”
“I thought…”
I tried to imagine what I’d thought. What had I thought Scion meant when he said hetook careof the incubus?
The scene spread out across the back wall of the thieves’ den was clearly what had caused the silence when we entered. Blood dripped down the walls, splattered so thick it was like red paint on the side of a barn in Cheapside. It all stemmed from a violent effigy nailed to the wall.
The incubus had reverted to its natural face—some sort of gray, leathery creature—but I didn’t have to think twice to know it was him.
Scion had not merely killed him; he’d destroyed him. He’d physically severed every limb, finger, toe, and other body part and systematically placed them back in order, nailed against the wall of the guild den like a warning to anyone who might think to commit the same offense.
The weapons rack,which last night had been full, was now empty. Every sword and dagger was poking out of the wall, holding the puzzle of bleeding skin and bones in place. I nearly gagged when I noticed that there was no sword holding the incubus’s cock to the wall and was afraid to ask what Scion had done with it.
I stared at the mangled figure before me, my heart pounding with dread and terror. My mouth moved without making any sound.
“Calm down, rebel,” Scion whispered, guiding me away from the small crowd surrounding Kaius’s mangled body. “This was necessary. Believe me.”
The crowd was not nearly as large as I thought it should have been, and I found it all the more eerie that the majority of the room was simply ignoring the situation.
Granted, had I not done that too? Had I not also stood by while King Penvalle lay in the blood of servants I knew?
