Amaya flared brighter, her flames a furious swirl. I could've sworn that just for a moment she moved.
I hugged my arms a little tighter. I knew what was coming. Knew, and feared it. And part of me needed to delay it for as long as I could. Maybe if I did, Azriel might find me. Save me.
A false hope was better than no hope.
I swallowed heavily and said, "What is it you want?"
He paused, as if that was a question he hadn't been expecting. "We wish your help in finding your father."
"That's not exactly true. You want the keys."
"That is our ultimate objective, yes. To achieve it, we need Hieu."
"My father might know the general direction of the keys, but he can't actually find them for you. Which means you need me, as well."
And that meant that no matter what they did to me, they couldn't actually kill me. It wasn't much comfort, however—not given what they'd already done.
"Your father knows the location of the keys, so actually finding them should not present a problem for him. You are not so much of a concern."
"I beg to differ—if he could find the keys himself, he would have done so by now. But only one of his flesh can find the keys and, thanks to you guys, he can no longer take on flesh. So, logically, that leaves me."
Of course, it was a statement that presumed he was actually telling the truth when it came to the keys, and I had a vague suspicion he wasn't. Not entirely, anyway.
"What has been undone can be redone," the disembodied voice said evenly. "That is not a concern."
I was betting it was, because otherwise I'd have been dead. "You held my father prisoner, so why didn't you force him to help you then?"
A slight shimmer of energy snagged my attention, simply because it wasn't the darker energy belonging to the Raziq. I frowned, my gaze scanning the little cavern before coming to rest on Amaya.