Page 56 of Spring Guardians & Songbirds

A small smile twitched in his full lips which died shortly when he noticed the graze on my temple. One moment we were in Amaris city streets, the next we were in the meeting room.

While I tried to steady myself, he went to a side table, filling a glass with the amber liquor he usually drank and another with water. He took a sip from the water glass before handing it to me. “Safe to drink.”

Dipping two fingers in his drink, he put them atop the graze on my temple. When I pulled away, he gripped my jaw tight. “Stay still, little brat.” He took out a handkerchief from his inner pocket and wiped the blood and liquor mess before blowing on the cut.

My knees might have gone a little weak.

After tossing the bloodied cloth away, he drowned back his whole glass of alcohol, which from how it burned my cut was surely only meant to be sipped. Then, he went and filled another before sprawling in his chair like a mad king. There was a halo over him, one that I worried my brain hard to understand how I’d never noticed it before. A halo of might. Dark might. One earned by sheer power not by epics and tales of his doings. The man didn’t need to do much, anyway. Not one being in this realm wasn’t aware of what he could do.

“Sit, love,” he said with a hard edge in his voice.

I drank my water and sat down. “There was no need for interruption. I had it handled.” It was under control. My head often played nasty games with me sometimes, but it never failed me, not in the worst of times.

He cocked his head back and unbuttoned a couple neck buttons on his shirt. “I knew you had that handled.” What was the mad man trying to do? Have me crawl on his lap? Because it was exactly what I wanted to do right before the sting on my palms grounded me to reality.

“But you see, I’ve come to realise something,” he said, taking a big sip of his drink before continuing, “I've come to realise that I've gained an urge to kill. Anyone that breathes too heavily near you.”

“Sharpen your blade, darling,” I said, shakily reaching for his drink and taking a sip. Letting the burn of the alcohol soothe me without making my palms bleed any more than they were. “Many breathe heavily near me.”

His attention on me turned dark and stern, and when it dropped to my hands, his jaw ticked and that little dip in his chin became visible.

I’m not afraid. I’d not been afraid. Not a day in my life after that night had I been afraid. It wasn’t fear. I’m sure of it. It was something worse—a remembrance of when I’d been most afraid.

The meeting room door opened. Larg, Triad and Mal strutted in all deep in deadly concentration. “There was no breach in the Highwall.”

“That is because they were already inside Adriata,” I said. “Either from when we came for the Ianuris agreement or even before. The trace craft stone was a trick, a distraction. A pretty cute one.” Pulling the book from my lap, I dropped it on the table. “An Umbra and two Canes were after this in a library close to one of the blasts. Now tell me, why would my father need to plan that whole charade for a book?”

They all sat around the table, their attention on the metal cased book.

“They were after the Esmeray diaries?” Triad asked.

The what?

Mal held it in his hand, running a finger over the Darsan inscription on the metal. “Ahmes Lore. Why would they want Ahmes Lore? No one is able to read it.”

“Who is Esmeray?” I asked.

“A human Henah befriended in her time in Adriata. The woman was even granted permission to Cynth. She travelled back and forth to Numen and Cynth. Transcribed all her travels in intimate detail,” Triad answered. “Without Henah knowing.”

What? There was such a thing? “Why would my father want that? Could you open it?”

Mal rested a palm over the lock, and it clicked open not a second later. When the metal folds peeled back, it revealed a white leather-bound book with gold inscriptions atop.

Gooseflesh rose over my skin. The air sang somehow and every sense I possessed hummed with warning. For a second my vision dizzied and my breathing grew laboured.

“Love?” Kilian’s call echoed from a far distance along with a piercing ring. “Snow!”

When my attention returned, Kilian stood kneeled before me, a palm resting on my forehead. “I’m fine.”

“Did anyone touch you?”

I pushed his hand away. “No.” When my limbs no longer felt like a gelatinous mass, I picked up the book and flipped through it.

Endless pages were scribbled in black ink in a language I could not recognise. It didn’t look like one of Numen, nor that of the old gods. “What language is this?”

Kilian frowned at me and then down at the book. “What do you mean?”

I pointed to a line. “I don’t recognise the letters.”