Blessed Monsters (Something Dark and Holy #3) - Emily A. Duncan Page 0,117

uncanny ability to always put him at ease being explained by magic did make him feel better. He liked when things had rational explanations.

“You dodged the question of what we’re supposed to do if you snap,” she pointed out.

“I sure did,” he said brightly, setting the tea on the side table and standing up.

She groaned dramatically, standing to wrap her arms around him. After a beat—he didn’t know what to do with all this affection—he returned her embrace.

“I’m glad you’re alive,” she whispered. “Leaving you on that mountain was the worst thing I’ve ever done.”

“Truly. It was incredibly cold when I woke, the least you could have done was drag my corpse down from the summit.”

She pressed her face against his chest and wheezed a laugh. “A nightmare, that’s what you are.” She let go.

“Where’s Rashid?” he asked, taking the tea back up.

“In the kitchens.”

He kissed the top of Parijahan’s head. He didn’t understand why she was friends with him. He didn’t understand why any of them were. He didn’t deserve them.

He poked his head out of the room, finding a short hallway. “What is this place?” he asked. He’d arrived only the night before with Nadya, the past three days spent getting her here in one piece. The others had gone ahead after he’d gotten her out of the city.

He would be haunted for a very long time by the expression on her face when he’d seen her on that pyre. The cold resignation.

“A monastery? Maybe? Converted into a stronghold and left abandoned. I’m not really sure. There are a lot of rooms. There’s a sanctuary and a library up in the tower.”

He eyed icons on the walls as he passed. The gold leaf held up remarkably well, though the rest of the icons were faded and almost indecipherable. Parijahan wandered away, saying something about finding Nadya. He made his way into the kitchens. He was starving. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d eaten anything, and it made him feel better to know it was a normal human feeling.

The kitchens were small. Rashid glanced up when he entered, his face breaking into an expression of such relief and joy that Malachiasz nearly bolted.

There was a knife in Rashid’s hand, and he jammed it down into an apple. “I should put that in you.”

“Honestly, that would be easier to take than another hu—”

Rashid slammed into him with an embrace. Malachiasz had to swallow back the surge of hunger at Rashid’s proximity. Oh, no.

“Do me a favor. Enough with the dying, all right?” Rashid said, letting go.

“I’ll do my best.” Malachiasz’s voice came out strained. He picked up a withered apple and bit into it, sitting down at the table. “Where’d the food come from?”

“Ask Katya.”

Never mind, then. Rashid filled a bowl with kasha and put it in front of Malachiasz. He let out a grateful breath.

“So,” he said around a mouthful. Rashid’s sleeves were rolled up to his elbows, his markings visible.

Rashid sighed. “When did Parj tell you?”

Malachiasz blinked. “Wait, what?”

“About my magic?” Rashid cocked his head.

Malachiasz lifted his eyebrows. “I … no one told me outside of what I’ve discovered in the last few days,” Malachiasz said. “I rather hoped it was a conversation we could have?”

“Are you going to be insufferable about it?”

“Probably.”

Rashid laughed. Malachiasz took another mouthful of kasha, listening patiently as Rashid explained, in bits and pieces—while slicing a loaf of black bread and actively not making eye contact—what he could do.

“Rashid, that’s incredible,” he said.

“Your reaction makes it all the more terrifying. I never wanted to be considered incredible by someone who’s entire life was spent pushing the boundaries of magic.”

Malachiasz considered the danger he was posing by being there. The danger he was posing to Rashid because Rashid’s power was sparking something in him that he wasn’t sure he could fight against for long.

He didn’t want to hurt his friends.

“Thank you for telling me,” he said. “I want to help, if you need it.”

“Mmm. You’ll be condescending.”

He grinned. “Fine! Keep having magic lessons with Ostyia! She’s fine.”

Rashid returned his grin and something in Malachiasz’s chest shifted. Like a piece of his broken heart had slid back into place. He held out his bowl and Rashid spooned a little more kasha for him.

“I’m going to go find my brother.”

“Did that feel weird to say out loud?”

“Profoundly.”

It took him a bit of wandering before he found Serefin in the great hall. It was a wide room with a long table in the center, benches on