The Silent(43)

“If I could. But my magic doesn’t work that way.”

“Rules, rules, rules,” Vasu muttered. “That is another reason. Too many rules.”

“What about rules?”

“Nothing.” Vasu sat up. “So you want me to give her twin brother some more life?”

“Jaron was giving it to him, but Jaron is gone.”

Vasu pursed his full lips. “Interesting.”

“Will you do it?”

“I will… think about it.” Vasu grinned.

It was likely the best answer he’d get out of the troublemaker.

“I’ll let Kyra know you’re thinking about helping her brother,” Leo said. “I’m sure she’ll be grateful.”

Vasu disappeared and reappeared as a cat that jumped in Leo’s lap.

“You try to create obligation in me. It’s an interesting theory. I told them you were smarter than you appeared,” the cat said, curling up on Leo’s lap. “Now pet me.”

“Are you serious?”

Narrow claws dug into Leo’s leg.

“Ow! Fine.” He put his hand on the back of the cat’s neck and stroked down over and over again. Eventually the cat started to purr. Then it seemed to fall asleep. Leo sat that way for hours, watching Kyra sleep and petting a black cat who wasn’t a cat as it slept and purred. A server came in and set up a small table for tea, but Leo didn’t move. The sun hung heavy in the afternoon sky, creeping across the floor and warming the cat, who only purred louder.

Someone tapped on the door.

“Come in,” Leo said quietly.

Sura walked in with Alyah at his side. “We were curious how…” His eyes drifted down to the black, furry lump on Leo’s lap. “That is not a cat.”

Alyah said, “What do you mean it’s not a… Oh.” She frowned. “Why are you petting it?”

Leo rested his chin in his hand and leaned on the side of the chair. “Because he asked me to.”

Sura sat at the low table. “I suppose that’s as good a reason as any.”

Alyah glared at the cat as if willing it to wake. Leo kept petting it. Any time he slowed, the claws dug in. He didn’t know what would happen if you angered a Fallen angel who was sleeping in the form of a cat, but he decided he really didn’t want to find out.

Minutes later, the cat must have felt Alyah’s glare, because it rose, arched its back and yawned, then deftly jumped out the window and into the waning afternoon.

Kyra sat up in bed, her hair tangled around her face and her cheeks flushed. “Leo?”

“Are you feeling better?”

“There was a black cat in my dream,” she said, rubbing her eyes. “He told me Prija was in a place called Bagan. Does that make sense to anyone, or am I finally going crazy?”

Leo grinned and turned to Alyah and Sura. “And that is why when the cat asks you to pet him, you do.”





Prija V





It was hot and dry in the place they called Bagan. At night it cooled off, but only a little bit. The cell—because it couldn’t be called a room—had a single window that only let in a faint puff of air. But Prija had privacy.

Except for the Fallen.

He whispered to her mind—seductive, powerful whispers that made her head buzz. His voice was everywhere on the mountain. She dreamed of gold and silk. She dreamed of cool water and fresh fruit. When she woke, she was in her cell and the black shadow had become a dense fog that surrounded her.

Her captors finally presented her to the angel. They dragged her to the temple where the creature was lying on a low bed, surrounded by his sycophants and lovers. Prija had never seen anything like it.

He didn’t look like her own father, who had appeared as a beautiful and powerful king. This creature was a monster. His skin was red and his eyes were bulging. Two horns adorned his head, and his muscled arms had wings growing from them. Snakes wrapped around his wrists, and human women curled over and around his naked body, massaging and pleasuring him as he spoke to Prija’s captors. He was like one of the deities the humans worshipped, but all the goodness had been stripped away and perverted. There was only power and greed in Arindam’s bearing.

“We have a gift for you, our father.”

The Fallen looked her up and down. “What is it?”

“A powerful daughter of Tenasserim. She is a weapon for you, my lord.”

“How?”

Her other captor, who was usually the quiet one, spoke. “She killed her own father.”

A Grigori on Arindam’s right side said, “What kind of female can kill one of the Fallen?”

“She killed one of our brothers in Mandalay.”

A troubled murmur around her.

Prija forced herself to look at the horrible eyes of the Fallen.

He was measuring her with calculation. “Why does she live?”

“We told you, she is a weapon.”

“A weapon turned against me.”

Her captor didn’t like that, but Prija forced herself to keep looking at Arindam. She had the creeping suspicion that the minute she looked away, she’d be lost forever.

Little one, you are more powerful than they.

His whisper was seductive.

Show me your power, and I shall make you my queen.

It was a lie. She could hear it in his voice. But she showed him anyway.

The black fog helped her. It was malleable in her mind, and she narrowed her power to a pointed stick. She jabbed at the talkative Grigori, imagining his temple pierced by a black spear. She heard him cry out and crumple beside her. She jabbed at him over and over. By the time her first captor was silent, the whole temple had grown still.

Arindam was smiling. “Now the other.”

Prija didn’t once look away from the Fallen. She kept her eyes on him when she heard the other Grigori go running. There was a scuffle, and he didn’t get far. Arindam’s attendants brought him back to Prija, who slowly wrapped the black fog around her second captor’s neck. She squeezed and wrung it out in her mind, keeping her eyes on Arindam while he watched gleefully as his child twisted before him.

When the second captor was dead, he asked her, “How do you feel?”

Prija said nothing.

How do you feel? he asked in her mind.

Empty.

Hollow.

Nothing. I feel nothing.

But Prija didn’t tell the angel those things. She wiped her thoughts, concealing them from the Fallen. Instead of words, she sank into the black fog. She sank into it and let it fill her mind.

“Take her away,” the Fallen said. “I’ll decide what do to with her tomorrow.”

Arindam’s sons took her away and locked her in a different room, away from the others. When the fog reached out, it felt nothing.

The Grigori had learned to keep their distance.

The next day, no one came for her.

Or the next day.

Or the next.

Prija was silent.





Chapter Twenty-One





The city of Old Bagan was a hot, dry plain dotted with sparse trees and a thousand ancient temples and pagodas. It sat in a curve of the Irrawaddy River, the slow-moving tributary that ferried passengers, cargo, and small fishing boats north and south in the central plains of Myanmar. Kyra watched from the comfort of a shaded horse carriage as wooden boats moved on the river. According to Sura, they were passing time and distracting themselves while Niran, Alyah, Rith, and Leo surveyed the compound in the hills where Arindam was keeping Prija.

Kyra’s own temples throbbed.

“Is it the heat?” Niran asked.

“A little bit. Mostly it’s the noise.”

From the time they’d descended from the Shan Hills and onto the central plain, a low, discordant resonance had begun in Kyra’s mind. There were no spells that erased it. Even Alyah’s skills had done nothing to block the noise. It was a constant, low hum that scraped against her mind and wouldn’t let her rest unless she maintained skin contact with Leo.

It was one of the Fallen.

“Arindam,” Sura said. “It is said he was a messenger in heaven.”

“Which means he uses spoken power,” Kyra said.

“Which means you will have little way of blocking his voice should he choose to turn it against you,” Sura said. “You must be careful.”

“I’m no one to him.” She closed her eyes and put a hand over them to block the vivid sunlight. “He won’t know I exist.”

“If his sons have reported hearing you—”

“They can’t hear me.”

“But they can feel your presence. They tried to hold your mind in Mandalay.”

“Maybe.” She was short-tempered. “Perhaps. I doubt they consider me a threat. I’m a radar, Sura. Nothing more. Nothing less.”

“You sell yourself short.”

“I’m a well-bred antenna. That’s hardly something for an angel to worry about.”

“Why not?”

“Because,” she snapped, “even if I can hear him, what can I do? Nothing. I don’t have any useful magic. Not for combat. Not that would frighten a Fallen.”

“Hmm.” Sura closed his eyes and leaned back against the padded seat.

Kyra sat and stewed in the growing heat.

“Are you liking the pagodas?”

She took a deep breath. “If I wasn’t very hot and very irritated, I’m sure I’d appreciate them more.”

“We’ll go back.” He whistled at the driver and spoke to him. The cart began to turn and Kyra felt churlish.