The bishop tilted his head, staring at Scaeva hard. Summing him up in a blinking as he’d always taught Mia to. The man was in pain, that much was obvious. His muscles rigid, his skin gleaming. It seemed Tric had spoken true—taking the godsblood had pushed Scaeva very close to some hidden edge. The tapestry of him unraveling almost before Mercurio’s eyes. The old man wondered how many threads he might pluck loose before he ended as another stain on the floor.
“Having trouble holding it in, are we?” he asked.
“Whatever do you mean?” Scaeva replied.
“There’s a tithe to be paid for power,” Mercurio said. “Sometimes it’s measured in conscience or coin. Sometimes we pay with pieces of our own souls. But whatever we owe, this much is true—sooner or later, the debt always comes due.”
“You do think an awful lot of your own prose, don’t you?”
“Do you even know what you’ve got inside you?” Mercurio shook his head, lip curling. “What you’ve become?”
The shadows in the room seemed to darken at that, to tremble like water with a stone dropped within. A murmur rippled among the guests, and for the first time Mercurio noticed the fathomless black pooled about Scaeva’s feet. A chill spread over the gala, all the life and breath sucked out of the ballroom. The orchestra fell silent, notes dying as if someone had slowly choked them. The fear on the old man’s shoulders seemed a leaden weight, trying to force him to his knees.
Scaeva blinked, and Mercurio saw his eyes had become a complete and bottomless black, edge to edge. The veins at the imperator’s throat were corded as he closed his eyes, his jaw clenched tight. Jonnen looked toward his father, lower lip trembling. Liviana Scaeva placed a hand on her husband’s shoulder, fear and concern in her gaze. But finally, the imperator hung his head, breathed deep, summoning some hidden reserve of will. And when he opened his eyes again, they were normal—dark as his daughter’s, aye, but edged once more in white.
“I know full well what I am,” he said, turning his eyes to the mezzanine above. “And I said keep playing!”
The musicians picked up their tune again, strained notes ringing in the chill.
“Enough of this,” Adonai snarled, stepping forward. “Where be my Marielle?”
Scaeva turned toward the speaker, swallowing hard. His posture straightened, his pain seemed to ease a little. That handsome smile curled his lips once more.
“Your sister is an honored guest of the Itreyan Republic.”
“Thou shalt bring her unto me now,” Adonai glowered.
Scaeva smirked at Adonai with faint amusement. “You break into my house. Murder my men. Attempt to steal my son and assassinate me among my guests. And then you have the temerity to beg favor of me?”
“I beg nothing,” Adonai spat.
Scaeva shook his head sadly, glanced to his elite.
“Your position seems unsuitable for making demands, Speaker.”
Adonai narrowed crimson eyes, seemingly helpless in his restraints and surrounded as he was by Scaeva’s thugs. But behind his back, Mercurio saw the speaker had reopened the slashes at his wrists by working his flesh against his manacles. His blood was flowing free from the wounds now, thin ribbons working at the bolts that held his bindings closed, the locks that held them tight.
“I warn thee, Julius…,” he said.
“You warned me once before, if memory serves.”
“No third time shall there be.”
With a tiny click, the manacles at Adonai’s wrists slithered loose. With a fluid, poetic grace, the speaker flung his arms out, blood streaming from his self-inflicted wounds, humming beneath his breath. Long whips of gore flowed from his wrists, glittering sharp. They sliced through half a dozen Luminatii throats in as many seconds, the men clutching at their sundered necks as jets of crimson fountained into the air.
The crowd screamed, surging back, pressing against the sealed doors. Even Sidonius and ’Singer retreated a few steps, eyes wide in horror. Adonai wove his hands about himself, singing a song of ancient magik beneath his breath. The blood from the murdered legionaries rose up off the floor, scything and arcing through the air in a crimson storm at the speaker’s command.
Adonai glared at Scaeva, lowering his chin.
“Thou shalt bring my Marielle unto me,” he spat. “Now.”
The smile on Scaeva’s face never faltered. He glanced at another of his elite, nodding slightly. A small bell rang somewhere distant, and soon enough, a fresh cohort of Luminatii marched into the ballroom, a sagging figure between them. Mercurio’s jaw tightened at the sight,