Chapter 63: His Dangerous Ally

Raziel was in his room but he couldn’t sleep with the parasite beating inside his chest.

His eyes were glued to the ceiling when the silhouette entered.

The smell of blood came first.

Raziel sat up instantly and his hand sought the dagger under the pillow.

“Relax, it’s me.”

Arawn Rivers closed the door with his foot.

The moonlight coming through the window hit his face and Raziel felt his stomach turn.

He had blood on his hands, on his forearms, splashed on the collar of the scribe uniform that wasn’t fooling anyone anymore.

His blond hair was stuck to his forehead with sweat and something darker.

“Whose blood is that?” Raziel asked.

“Marius’. Mostly.”

Raziel gripped the dagger tighter.

“Did you kill him?”

“No.” Arawn let himself fall against the wall, sliding down until he was sitting on the floor.

He flexed his fingers and his joints cracked. “He’s alive, well broken, but alive and I need him like that.”

[ALERT: SUBJECT “ARAWN RIVERS” — HOSTILITY: LOW / INTENTION: NEGOTIATION]

Raziel didn’t lower the dagger.

“What do you want?”

“To give you good news first.” Arawn wiped the blood off his cheek with the back of his hand and just smeared it more. “Marius sang, said your parasite wasn’t an accident but that the Shadow who attacked you in the chapel planted it on purpose, direct orders from the hooded guy meeting Marius in his studio.”

Raziel already suspected it, but hearing it confirmed sent a chill down his spine.

“Who is the hooded guy?”

“He didn’t spill that even with what I did to him.” Arawn paused. “And I did a lot.”

“Now the bad news,” Arawn continued. “I know you have thirty days left with that thing inside and I know because I saw the symptoms before, in another case. The parasite feeds on your spiritual core until nothing is left and then turns you into a husk.”

“Tell me something I don’t know.”

“I can give you more time.”

Raziel went still.

“How?”

Arawn raised his right hand.

Silver threads sprouted from his fingertips, thin and bright, moving with their own will.

“My threads don’t just cut they can also seal. If I encapsulate the parasite with a containment net, I isolate it from your core. Doesn’t kill it, but puts it in quarantine. Sixty days instead of thirty.”

Raziel did the math.

It gave him a margin to get to Santa Sofia, find the Purifier and come back.

“And in exchange?”

Arawn smiled.

“The Council of Exarchs. I need in and you’re gonna help me.”

“What for?”

“To burn the people who gave me orders to watch you.” The smile vanished. “I’m sick of being the Inquisition’s dog, Celeste and I want to bite those holding the leash.”

[EVENT DETECTED: EXORCIST’S PACT]

[RISK: EXTREME]

[POTENTIAL REWARD: CLASS-S ALLIANCE / COUNCIL ACCESS]

Raziel answered him, “I don’t trust you.”

Arawn didn’t flinch.

“I understand trust is for those with no options. You and I have something better which is mutual need.”

The parasite pulsed inside his chest.

Raziel dropped the dagger.

“Do it.”

Arawn got up from the floor and the silver threads came alive, sliding through the air until they surrounded Raziel’s torso.

They dug through the tunic, through the skin, not cutting the flesh but penetrating something deeper.

SHIIING!

Raziel gritted his teeth until they ground together and his vision filled with white dots.

He felt the threads wrap around something cold and rotten inside him, squeezing, isolating, locking up.

The parasite shrieked.

A wave of rage and hunger that shook every nerve in his body.

And then, silence.

[SHADOW PARASITE: ENCAPSULATED]

[TIME REMAINING UPDATED: 1,440 HOURS]

[STATUS: TEMPORARY QUARANTINE — UNSTABLE]

Arawn pulled his hands back and stumbled.

“Done. Sixty days.” He locked those gray eyes on him. “Now you owe me one, saint.”

Raziel took a deep breath.

“I’ll pay you,” he said. “But if you betray me again, I won’t need sixty days to pay you back.”

Arawn turned toward the door.

“I love doing business with you, Celeste.”

Arawn turned the knob.

“Ah, one more thing.”

He stopped with the door half open and the hallway light cut his face in two halves, one lit and one dark.

“I heard in the halls that your friend, Prince Aerion…”

Raziel felt fear before he finished the sentence.

“They captured him last night in the Lantern District.”

“Who?”

“The necromancer.” Arawn said it like someone commenting on the weather. “Apparently the Prince went looking for his younger brother without royal escort because he wanted to avoid the scandal. The necromancer was waiting for him.”

[CRITICAL ALERT: FORCED EVENT — “THE PRINCE’S TRAP”]

[SUBJECT: AERION VALERIUS — STATUS: CAPTURED]

[TIME LIMIT: 48:00:00]

The red letters floated in front of his eyes and Raziel read them three times because his brain refused to process them.

Aerion.

The only ally with real power he had in all of Phaedra.

The guy who had believed him when he said he came from the future.

Captured.

By Seraphina?

’No. No, no, no.’

“If you don’t get him out in 48 hours,” Arawn tilted his head, “the necromancer kills him to send a message to the King.”

Raziel took a step forward.

“And you tell me like this? In passing?”

“I tell you because I can’t go.” Arawn pointed at his bloodstained hands. “I just tortured the Director of your academy, I have half the Council looking for me and my original orders were to watch you, not rescue princes.”

“Then why do you—”

“Because you can.” Arawn opened the door fully. “You have Duke Nyxian’s son, you have the Paladin who owes you a favor and you have sixty days you didn’t have five minutes ago.”

Arawn stepped out into the hall.

“Good luck, saint.”

The door closed.

[COUNTDOWN INITIATED]

[47:59:58]

[47:59:57]

[47:59:56]

Raziel stood there staring at the closed door with the red counter bleeding into his retina.

Forty-eight hours.

A parasite encapsulated in his chest.

A prince in the hands of a necromancer.

And somewhere in St. Celeste, Lucian slept without knowing his world was about to break again.

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