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I reach up to pat his cheek. “I’m sure you’ll get plenty of chances to end loads of them in the future.”
Another choked laugh escapes him, and then he’s pulling me to him, claiming a kiss so fierce I wish it didn’t have to end.
When he eases back just an inch, his low voice grazes my face with his breath. “The only reason I’ve made it this far is because I had you with me. Don’t you ever let a single one of those fools Tinom pulled together make you feel you haven’t earned their loyalty. You know you have all of mine.”
I bob up on my toes to hug him, even though his words can’t quite penetrate the uneasiness simmering in my gut. “And you have mine. Let’s take back some more of what the scourge sorcerers have stolen from us.”
We rejoin Rheave in the hall and slip down the stairs, donning our concealment charms as we go. Rheave sets his hand lightly on my back, and I hook my fingers around Stavros’s elbow so that we can still see each other fully.
We step out into the night. The windows around us have gone dark, the blackness only broken by the glow of the intermittent lanterns along the street.
Somewhere around a corner, a drunken laugh peals out, but no one’s wandering along this road at the moment.
We hurry across the cobblestones, take a turn, and come up on the grate Alek indicated. It’s wide enough that even Stavros should be able to fit without having to squeeze, and only secured by a single, regular padlock.
At the rap of determined footsteps, we pause. A middle-aged man in a thick cloak strides past us down the middle of the street—maybe an Order member on patrol, or maybe an ordinary citizen with some urgent midnight business.
My heart thuds faster with a jolt of my magic coming to attention, but he doesn’t glance our way. I don’t sense any sorcery emanating from him.
As soon as he’s out of view, Rheave kneels by the grate. With a faint crackle, the padlock falls aside.
Stavros hefts up the grate and motions for us to descend.
I find the rungs of a ladder just beyond the opening. Gripping them, I clamber down as quickly as I can manage, wrinkling my nose at the damp grit that sticks to my fingers.
To my relief, the passage below isn’t quite as awful as I imagined. It rained most of last night, which must have swept the worst of the collected refuse away. Still, the stink of urine and feces turns my stomach.
The men climb down behind me, Stavros shutting the grate in his wake so it’s not obvious someone made use of it. More than a few steps beyond the faint glow that seeps through the bars, the blackness is so complete there’s no need for our charms.
“Stay close to the walls,” I murmur, and start forward in the direction Alek indicated.
The sewage flows turgidly along in the wide channel at our right. I set my feet carefully to ensure there’s no chance of slipping into that noxious river.
After a few minutes, Rheave lets out a gagging sound. “Physical bodies do produce some unpleasant substances.”
I guess spirit creatures don’t shit. I glance back in the direction of his voice with an arch of my eyebrow. “That’s the price we pay for getting to eat.”
The daimon-man grunts in acknowledgment. “I suppose that is a fair trade-off.”
If I had a list of places I’d least like to spend time with any of my lovers, this sewer would be right near the top. But as we venture on through the putrid darkness, my spirits buoy me beyond the stench.
Here I am, in the middle of a scheme that all four of my men have set in motion with me. One that doesn’t require any of my unpredictable magic.
Like the old days… except now I’m no longer alone.
In this moment, it doesn’t matter what magic fidgets in my chest or what people like Tinom or the Black Talons’ bosses think of it. I can make a difference without being seen as any kind of monster.
We mark off the turnings with our hands against the stone wall, noting each passage until it’s time to turn. Thankfully the rickety maintenance bridges at the intersections allow us to cross without needing to risk a jump.
Stavros ends up taking the lead, the thud of his boots guiding me onward. Rheave stays close enough to regularly caress my back through my cloak, as if he needs periodic confirmations of my presence to reassure himself.
When we reach our destination, Stavros climbs up to the grate and peers at the street beyond as well as he can from the low vantage point. He swings to the side and motions for Rheave to join him. “I don’t see or hear anyone nearby right now. Give that lock a zap.”
In less than a minute, we’re scrambling out into the fresh if chilly air above. Stavros lowers the grate back into place, and we hustle down the quiet street toward the guardhouse.
It’s one of the largest in Florian, just outside the old city walls on the border between the inner wards and the middle. Stavros visited the Crown’s Watch here more than once in his capacity as general—and then after while investigating the conspiracy at the college.
He directs us around the squat stone building and down a side alley. There, he points up at a tall window on the second floor.
