said, pointing at our pack.
“Don’t worry about it,” Lumi shot back, scowling at him. Oh, she was angry with him, too. At least I wasn’t the only one.
He tried to talk to me again, but I walked away, choosing to focus on Veliko. “Come on, let’s stay close to him. He might use death magic to teleport himself and a small crew straight into the imperial city.”
“Yeah, we need to stay close to Veliko if we’re to piggyback on a teleportation spell,” Sidyan said. I understood he had a way of following Veliko even across time and space, since the Darkling had no idea how close we were at this point. I doubted it would be easy, and I braced myself.
We’d been at this for what felt like forever, and Seeley’s confession had not made things any easier. Keeping my mind busy was the best way I could think of to actually heal and maybe even forgive him—after all, he’d chosen honesty over secrecy. And… he liked me. He liked me enough to do questionable things in order to save me. That had to mean something. It did mean something.
Lumi
I was mad at Seeley, sure. But hindsight helped no one where Acantha was concerned. She was gone—dead and buried—and I’d lost Nethissis, too. It all hurt, and there wasn’t much I could do to change what had already happened. To be fair to Seeley, I did understand how he felt… and why he’d influenced Acantha in her choice.
Far be it for me to hold him to a higher standard than my own. Had I been in his shoes, I probably would’ve done the same, and so would Nethissis. Neither of us would admit it, of course… but the thought lingered, and so I chose to focus on what we could do, instead. The past was gone, and Seeley was a friend and an ally. I’d find forgiveness for him. Eventually.
“I’m sorry,” Seeley said while we watched Veliko pick out a few Darklings to join him in the imperial city.
Nethissis remained closer to Rudolph and Maya, sulking with her arms crossed. She had a lot to process, including survivor’s guilt—which stung with bitter irony in this case, since she had also died. I looked at Seeley, keeping a straight face.
“You did what you had to do. Let’s leave it at that,” I replied. “We have too much on our hands to argue over moral codes. We’ll talk about Acantha another day.”
He nodded slowly, but I wasn’t sure he was ready to let it go. He opened his mouth to say something, so I cut him off.
“I’ll punch your lights out when this is all done and over with. And if I lose Nethissis for good, I’ll beat the life and death out of you. How’s that for a resolution, Reaper?”
Seeley froze, knowing I was dead serious. Nethissis was a spirit now, but she could still be saved, and I dared hope we’d manage it somehow. If Seeley wanted to make up for his transgression with Acantha, he would have to do everything in his power to save Nethissis. He was in love with her, whether he wanted to admit it or not. He’d barely copped to liking her, but I knew his feelings went much deeper than that. They were written all over his face whenever he stole glances at her.
“Sidyan, what do we do?” I asked, considering my conversation with Seeley over for the time being. “How exactly do we piggyback on Veliko’s teleportation spell?” Peering at the Darkling, I could see him huddling with his henchmen at the center of a modified pentagram, which he’d drawn in the mud with the tip of his scythe.
Sidyan smirked, taking out his own blade. “We rarely do this, because we don’t have to,” he said. “But it can be done. Check it out.”
He dashed forward and drew a line on the ground, linking Veliko’s pentagram to one of our own. Sidyan was fast in his design as Rudolph and Maya brought the ghoul pack closer. Within minutes, we were all standing in the middle of this symbol, with Sidyan grinning like the devil and Seeley working hard to hold back a chuckle.
“We used to do this with Reapers in training,” Sidyan clarified. “Just to mess with them. They couldn’t see us unless we wanted them to. It’s a special symbol. A hiding word is whispered prior to drawing it, so they cannot see it. Only we can.”
“Why would you follow trainee Reapers