And he couldn't rescue me, either. For some reason, earth inhibited a reaper's ability to track souls, so being this deep underground meant that not only would Azriel be unable to find me, but our chi connection wouldn't work.
If he'd been frantic when I'd been confronted by the hellhounds, I could well imagine his state right now. And he'd no doubt blame himself for my capture. But even if he had been close, he wouldn't have been able to stop this kidnapping. They'd wanted me, and one solitary reaper could not have stood up to the number of Raziq currently in this place. No matter how fierce a fighter Azriel was, it would have been six against one, and the death I'd feared at the train station would have been real and devastating.
"Look, my father sensing your damn device was not my fault. I didn't warn him. I did what you asked."
"We realize this. The device placed within you was somewhat hurried in its creation. I plan to rectify this now."
Horror crawled through me. "Rectifying" was surely just another word for pulling me apart to adjust the thing in my heart. I'd lived through that once. I wasn't entirely sure I could do so a second time.
"My father is no fool, and he's managed to remain one step ahead of you lot all along. He'll expect changes to be made to the device."
"Undoubtedly."
"Then what is the point of making the adjustment?"
"It will provide a nice piece of subterfuge. He'll see what he expects to see, and will not go looking for any other changes."
Any other changes? I was not liking the sound of that at all. My voice shook slightly as I said, "Meaning what?"
"Meaning I plan to interweave the strands of our beings."
I could only stare at the flame-lit shadows in horror. Weave her being through mine? What the hell did that mean? How the hell was something like that even possible?
"When you can pull apart the atoms of a being as easily as a human might a tapestry, such a task is relatively simple."
"But—" The rest of the sentence got stuck somewhere in the thickness of my throat. I swallowed heavily and tried again. "But what does it actually mean?"
"It means that not only will you carry the threads of your father's heritage, you will also carry mine."