"Azriel," I said wearily, "right now I have a friend who may or may not die, another who is scared out of her wits, and I’m injured and tired. I just need it all to be finished. I don’t really care what you do or don’t think about Lucian. I think we need his help when we go get the keys, and I’m going to use him, whether you like it or not."
"Tao won’t die," he said. "And you must live with whatever consequences arise out of using the Aedh."
Knowing Tao would live didn’t relieve any of the tension still riding me, because living and remaining the man we’d grown up with and loved were two entirely seperate things.
"Azriel, I’ve been living with the goddamn consequences ever since you, the Raziq, and my father all decided to screw up my life!" I thrust a hand through my sweaty hair and sighed. Arguing with him wasn’t going to get me anywhere. "I’ll meet you back at the hotel. I’m gathering it’ll still be safe there?"
He shrugged. "It’s probably safer than your apartment."
"Then I’ll see you there."
He nodded and winked out of existence. I reached for my phone and called Lucian.
"Hey," he said, his vid-screen dark and voice brisk, almost edgy. I’d obviously caught him in the middle of something. Or someone.
"Hey, yourself," I said. "You interested in meeting me at the hotel for a little key-finding strategy?"
Excitement swelled in his voice but didn’t really lift the edginess. "You’ve read the book?"
"Some of it. Unfortunately, we were attacked before I could read all of it."
"Unfortunate, as you said." He paused. "But afterward?"
"Afterward we were attacked by elementals and the book was incinerated."
He snorted. "You’re not having a good run of luck, are you?"
"No, but we’ve got enough to at least find the first key. That’s a place to start."