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Pretending like I hadn’t, I replied, “I’m not an open book like you, Razai. Maybe I don’t want you to know anything else.”
He tilted his head, assessing me. Peering right into my soul. “Everyone is an open book in their own way. Once you learn their language, people are easy to read. But I don’t know your language at all. Tell me something. One thing. Doesn’t even have to be important.”
“You know what? You go first,” I said. “You’re always asking me shit and digging into my brain, but you never talk about yourself.”
To my utter shock that nearly sent me to an early grave, he relented.
“Good point. Where should I start? My childhood? My hopes and dreams? My deepest, darkest lies? My browsing history? How deep do you want to go?”
I massaged my temples, already regretting this.
“How about my biggest regret?”
I stilled. “That sounds serious. And you look serious.”
“It is, and I am,” he shrugged it off.
“Okay. Tell me.”
“I killed my best friend.”
My fingers tightened on his calf. Wait… when had I even started touching his legs?
He gave an empty smile. A ghost of his typical humor. “Yeah. That’s something you’d regret too, isn’t it?”
“What… what happened?”
“He was a… let’s call him a revolutionary. Thought the Gate was a conspiracy, something meant to keep one great race of magical people separated for the sake of keeping the public scared and controllable. He wanted to reunite the Territories.”
“Didn’t anyone ever tell him about attainable goals?”
Razai asked, “Is it impossible, though? He had a plan and an entire fleet of people ready to follow him.”
“You sound like you admired him.”
“I did. The sheer reckless stupidity of it all was mind-blowing. Vang was always like that. Dedicated to his morals and beliefs. Unwilling to back down.” Razai’s piercing green eyes glinted. “He even convinced me.”
I leaned forward. “You were a part of his group?”
He touched his pointer finger to his lips. “If you tell anyone, I’ll lie and call you a crazy ex.”
I crossed my heart.
He grinned. “At first, the group was meant to study the actual differences between Demons and Divine. To recognize that we’re not so different after all. He called it a study of disillusionment. Pretentious, brilliant prick that he was, he convinced a lot of people. Changed a lot of minds. Including mine, but only after dozens of arguments. Him and his fucking persuasive ass…” Razai trailed off, mesmerized by his nostalgia.
“So, what went wrong?” I prodded after the seconds ticked by—and I just got impatient.
“He became more and more radical. A few years in, his supporters had accepted the small things he offered, and that only made it easier for him to introduce slightly more intense viewpoints. They already trusted him, so why should they question him now?”
Razai stared into the past, lost in the memory. A thousand miles away and in another lifetime. “He made a plan to overtake the Gate and Barrier Island.”
Whatever I’d been expecting, it certainly hadn’t been that. “He… he what?”
“I know, I know. I called him crazy too. My love for Vang was deep, but I was reaching my limit of what I was willing to support. We had our friends to consider. People that learned with us and grew with us. I knew their families and their children. And he wanted to set them against the forces protecting the Gate. The highest-trained elites.”
“So, what did he do? I don’t remember any stories about a group of angels infiltrating the Gate.”
“Easy. That’s because it never happened. Someone snitched. Our friends started getting arrested. Three were killed. Killed, Gray. All because they fought back like idiots instead of biding their time and staying silent. Vang taught them to fight. That insufferable, outspoken hero of a man. Fucking idiot with a heart of gold and about a million blind spots. And none of that was enough to stop him or his plans.”
