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12
Bryce had gone still as death—so unmoving that Hunt wondered if she knew it was a solid tell. Not about her own nerves, but about her heritage. Only the Fae could go that still.
Her boss, the young-faced sorceress, sighed. “Is your 33rd so incompetent these days that you truly need my assistant’s help?” Her lovely voice hardly softened her question. “Though I suppose I already have my answer, if you falsely convicted Philip Briggs.”
Hunt didn’t dare grin at her outright challenge. Few people could get away with speaking to Micah Domitus, let alone any Archangel, like that.
He considered the four-hundred-year-old sorceress on the screen. He’d heard the rumors: that Jesiba answered to the Under-King, that she could transform people into common animals if they provoked her, that she’d once been a witch who’d left her clan for reasons still unknown. Most likely bad ones, if she’d wound up a member of the House of Flame and Shadow.
Bryce breathed, “I don’t know anything about this. Or who wanted to kill Tertian.”
Jesiba sharpened her gaze. “Regardless, you are my assistant. You don’t work for the 33rd.”
Micah’s mouth tightened. Hunt braced himself. “I invited you to this meeting, Jesiba, as a courtesy.” His brown eyes narrowed with distaste. “It does indeed appear that Philip Briggs was wrongly convicted. But the fact remains that Danika Fendyr and the Pack of Devils apprehended him in his laboratory, with undeniable evidence regarding his intention to bomb innocents at the White Raven nightclub. And though he was initially released due to a loophole, in the past two years, enough evidence has been found for his earlier crimes that he has been convicted of them, too. As such, he will remain behind bars and serve out the sentence for those earlier crimes as leader of the now-inactive Keres sect, and his participation in the larger human rebellion.”
Quinlan seemed to sag with relief.
But then Micah went on, “However, this means a dangerous murderer remains loose in this city, able to summon a lethal demon—for sport or revenge, we do not know. I will admit that my 33rd and the Auxiliary have exhausted their resources. But the Summit is in just over a month. There are individuals attending who will see these murders as proof that I am not in control of my city, let alone this territory, and seek to use it against me.”
Of course it wasn’t about catching a deadly killer. No, this was pure PR.
Even with the Summit so far off, Hunt and the other triarii had been prepping for weeks now, getting the units in the 33rd ready for the pomp and bullshit that surrounded the gathering of Valbaran powers every ten years. Leaders from across the territory would attend, airing their grievances, with maybe a few guest appearances from the ruling assholes across the Haldren.
Hunt hadn’t yet attended one in Valbara, but he’d been through plenty of other Summits in Pangera, with rulers who all pretended they had some semblance of free will. The Summit meetings usually amounted to a week of powerful Vanir arguing until the overseeing Archangel laid down the law. He had little doubt Micah would be any different. Isaiah had experienced one already, and had warned him that the Archangel liked to flex his military might at the Summits—liked to have the 33rd in marching and flying formation, decked out in imperial regalia.
Hunt’s golden breastplate was already being cleaned. The thought of donning the formal armor, the seven stars of the Asteri’s crest displayed across his heart, made him want to puke.
Jesiba examined her silver nails. “Anything exciting happening at the Summit this time?”
Micah seemed to weigh Jesiba’s casual expression as he said, “The new witch-queen will be formally recognized.”
Jesiba didn’t let one speck of emotion show. “I heard of Hecuba’s passing,” the sorceress said. No tinge of grief or satisfaction. Just fact.
But Quinlan tensed, as if she’d shout at them to get back to the murder. Micah added, “And the Asteri are sending Sandriel to deliver a report from the Senate regarding the rebel conflict.”
Every thought eddied out of Hunt’s head. Even the usually unflappable Isaiah went rigid.
Sandriel was coming here.
Micah was saying, “Sandriel will arrive at the Comitium next week, and at the Asteri’s request, she will be my guest until the Summit.”
A month. That fucking monster would be in this city for a month.
Jesiba angled her head with unnerving grace. She might not have been a Reaper, but she sure as shit moved like one. “What does my assistant have to offer in finding the murderer?”
Hunt shoved it down—the roaring, the trembling, the stillness. Shoved it down and down and down until it was just another wave in the black, roiling pit inside himself. Forced himself to concentrate on the conversation. And not on the psychopath on her way to this city.
Micah’s stare settled on Bryce, who had turned so pale her freckles were like splattered blood across the bridge of her nose. “Miss Quinlan is, thus far, the only person alive to have witnessed the demon the murderer summoned.”
Bryce had the nerve to ask, “What about the angel in the alley?”
Micah’s face remained unchanged. “He had no memories of the attack. It was an ambush.” Before Bryce could push, he went on, “Considering the delicate nature of this investigation, I am now willing to look outside the box, as they say, for assistance in solving these murders before they become a true problem.”
Meaning, the Archangel needed to look good in front of the powers that be. In front of Sandriel, who would report it all to the Asteri and their puppet Senate.
A murderer on the loose, capable of summoning a demon that could kill Vanir as easily as humans? Oh, it’d be precisely the sort of shit Sandriel would delight in telling the Asteri. Especially if it cost Micah his position. And if she gained it for herself. What was the northwestern quadrant of Pangera compared to all of Valbara? And Micah losing everything meant his slaves—Hunt, Isaiah, Justinian, and so many others—went to whoever inherited his Governor’s title.
Sandriel would never honor Micah’s bargain with Hunt.
