Leaning my weight onto my spread thighs, I clasped my hands between them. The blood in my veins chilled at Jett's unstable stance, and I willed Sirro to hurry the fuck up. Jett looked as pale as death with bloodless lips and pain-glazed eyes. Dull morning light slipped through the solar's window and glanced over the sheen of sweat beading on his skin.

Jett's voice was tight and weary. "They swifted in. Not-quite-alive."

"Wraiths?" Sirro asked, linking his fingers and resting his hands across his stomach.

"No...corporeal," he rasped. "More like the dead brought back to life."

Sirro blinked. "Necromancy?"

Even the Horned Gods didn't have the ability to bring the dead back to life quite like those things I'd encountered. The dead could be brought back to life. But they were wrong—soulless, lifeless creatures.

"I'm not sure. They're nothing like I've ever encountered or learned about when it comes to necromancy."

I could barely taste Jett's lies.

I'd shared every single thing I remembered down in the catacombs below Ascendria. We went through it again and again during the ride here to Sirro's residence—Jett repeating it, twisting it until he believed it was him down there fighting to protect Nelle. And then he went through what happened when, supposedly, this faction attacked the tithe convoy, crafting a choreography of events.

"Nine of them. They had weapons like ours, forged of Adamere. Crossbows too." Jett paused, sucking in a deep breath. "It was fast and brutal. They'd split into three groups... Two took out the convoy of guards, the other one went for the tithe truck." He wobbled, his knees threatening to buckle.

My muscles bunched as I half-rose to surge forward and help him.

Sirro's enraged glare lashed across the room, pinning me back into place.

I gritted my teeth and sat back down.

Fuck you, Sirro!

My foot tapped a restless, furious beat on the floor, my knee bouncing up and down.

Sirro's features smoothed into a bored expression. He unlinked his hands, propping an elbow on the armrest, and swept an upturned palm in Jett's direction, his forefinger pointed. "And what were you doing?"

"I engaged in combat." The fine skin around Jett's eyes pinched into creases as he glanced down at his shaking hand, pressed to his side. His t-shirt was soaked in black blood and his fingers were coated in the sticky substance. The putrid scent of rotting flesh wafted from him.

Dread curdled in the pit of my gut.

How long was Sirro going to drag this out? The Horned God was enjoying every second of my brother's suffering. Like a wolf devouring the juicy hunch of an elk, there was a sated glow in his eyes.

"They're skilled. Better," Jett explained. His weakened voice was a dry rasp, like scraping sandpaper. He blinked sluggishly. Once. Twice. His mouth parted, and his limbs slackened. I watched in horror as his head rolled back and his legs went out beneath him.

He crumbled.

I moved without thought—grabbing hold of Jett before his knees hit the wooden floor.

His body was ice beneath my palms. My nerves were just as frigid, wondering how Sirro was going to react to my blatant disregard for his order to let Jett stand alone. Panic had my pulse palpitating—not for me, but for my brother. We needed this interrogation finished so I could administer the elixir from our treasure trove I had in my pocket.

I chanced a swift look at Sirro. The Horned God surprised me with a broad smile, full of warmth and admiration. Genuine. "Such loyalty... No wonder you Crowthers have survived the ages."

I couldn't linger on Sirro's unexpected response—fear for Jett consumed my thoughts.

I hauled Jett back up to standing, widening my stance and bracing his deadweight against me. "Jett," I lightly slapped his icy cheek with my palm.

Jett's shallow breaths skimmed over my neck.

He was alive but unresponsive.

I slapped him a little harder. "Jett."

His long lashes pried apart. He scowled, mouth curling downward. "Stop...fucking...slapping me."

I slapped him one more time, just because I could, and I wanted to check his response. His pain-glazed eyes slit and he snarled.

I flashed a quick grin, that faded into worry.

Jett slowly adjusted his stance but still leaned his weight against mine. He pushed the words out as fast as his racing heartbeat, which I could feel beneath my hand, banded around his chest. "They were human in shape, but bigger, taller, maybe seven feet tall. They wore grotesque masks, without any slits for eyes. They didn't speak to one another, yet they worked in coordination as if they were communicating. The masks were twisted human features." He cleared his throat, wincing, a shiver running through his body. "Maybe their true faces...I don't know."

"Human-looking you say?"

Jett nodded.

Sirro's eyes narrowed. "Was there... Was there anyone else with them?"

My brother shook his head, his lank, sweat-dampened hair swaying with the movement.

Down in the Catacombs beneath the city of Ascendria, those things had been after Nelle. And last night in our family room, she'd lied about Silas Boon. I didn't know if they were connected...I just had a feeling they were. I was going to have to coax the truth out of Nelle sometime soon.

"Were they looking for someone...something?"

Jett's brow furrowed and his mouth pinched as he grunted, pressing his blackened fingers harder against his side. "My attention was elsewhere," he tried to snark, which failed as his chest spasmed. He grimaced, biting back a bark of pain. "By the time I cut free from the unit pincering me, and got to the truck, the other two had already set it alight with wildfyre and burned all of Byron's guards, as well as the Tithes inside."

Sirro cocked his head and his tone sharpened. "Kenton said he'd sent you off to track them?"

Problem number one. The major one.

Jett was barely able to lift a shoulder. "It was useless and desperate. How can you track anything that swifts?" He drew in a ragged breath. "I called Kenton as soon as they'd finished their attack and left. I figured I'd sweep the area as I headed for the second convoy since I was closest to them, and that's when I got ambushed—a pair of them." He squinted as if thinking back to that moment. "Maybe they didn't want any surviving witnesses. I got grazed by one of their bolts..." He bit his bottom lip as a wash of pain rippled through him. "Fuck. I went down hard. I expect they thought I'd die straight away. They didn't even bother waiting to make sure. They just swifted out. But I didn't die, and they'd left behind the bolt."

Sirro leaned back in his chair with a relaxed grip on his armrests. Both his thumbs tapped a lazy beat and his brows were nudged together and drawn over eyes that had gone distant with deep contemplation.

I wasn't sure I was breathing while I waited for his verdict.

Had we pulled it off—convinced him of our House's loyalty?

As if waking up to the fact he had company, Sirro blinked, straightening. His gaze sliced to mine. Condemnation shot through his amber eyes like lightning cracking through a bank of roiling thunderclouds. "This is an act of war. You knew that when I asked for your opinion," he snarled.

Several nights ago at the Wychthorn estate, after a truckload of stolen souls had been intercepted by the very faction on which we were placing the blame to save Jett's sorry ass, Sirro had held an impromptu meeting with the Heads of Upper Houses. Sirro had urged me to agree with him—a trap Nelle suspected, and had warned me against agreeing with him.

I knew it was an act of war, as did Nelle, but she didn't like the way that Sirro had pressed for me to agree with him—to lend my weight behind it.

And now with this ruse—had we just created something?

Whoever, whatever, these things were, they had attacked earlier shipments... So no, this was where we were always heading, and it was war.

The words rumbled from my chest as I confirmed, "It was an attack on our empire. It is an act of war." But fucked if I was going to apologize for not backing him up earlier.

There was a hint of something on the Horned God's face I wasn't quite sure of. Just a flash of it. But I felt it as if some malevolent beast, as bitterly cold and ancient as the ice glaciers up north, their age unfathomable, was staring at me from behind those golden eyes. I felt it in my very bones, my marrow, and that strange, wicked thing that now was with me reacted—bared fangs and hissed.

Sirro blinked and it was there and gone again.

And I was left trying not to stare, and wondering if I'd seen even seen it.

For a heartbeat, I considered just how much Sirro did know or had pieced together. If we'd unwittingly provided him with the means to press for something he had tried a few days ago at the Wychthorn estate. War.

The hard lines of Sirro's features softened as he casually leaned back against the back support of his leather chair. His eyes slid toward Jett. He arched a brow and gestured with a curl of his fingers. "Show me."

I couldn't stop myself from releasing a pent-up breath in a long blow that was almost a whistle.

Jett lifted up the hem of his t-shirt, the wet fabric peeling away from his wound. 

Sirro eagerly leaned forward in his seat. He tilted his head, gaze gobbling up the sight of the wound. It was a mess of blackened, putrid flesh. The dying skin was raised in pustules, a sickly purple so dark it was almost black spider-webbing out from the weeping wound. It crept around his rib cage, mottling the tattoos and staining his wyrm brand, the fingers of it almost at his heart.

I couldn't say I didn't enjoy myself at the time, side-swiping the fucker. Now, I was regretful. But if I'd hit him any later, our subterfuge would've been obvious.

Jett pressed his middle finger into his wound, and his teeth bit down on his bottom lip so hard the soft flesh turned white with the compression. His features twisted in pain. He scraped his nail along the sickly flesh, the fringes of it dead. A low, wounded sound came from his throat. Golden light from the bronze Moroccan lamps overhead danced over his ashen, sweaty skin as his entire body shook. He raised his hand. On the tip of his fingernail was a tiny fiber of wood, so slender it could barely be called a splinter.

Pulling a cloth out of my pocket, I wiped the bolt's fiber clean from Jett's finger which already was bursting with blisters. Tossing the cloth away, I quickly palmed a syringe out of my pocket. The mossy-green concoction squirted from the needle, sprinkling the floor in a spray of fine mist as I gently compressed the piston.

Jett began to protest weakly. "I don't need—"

"Shut it," I hissed under my breath.

Carefully piercing his skin, I injected the painkiller from House Simonis into his upper arm. He flinched, grunting. The empty syringe clattered across the coffee table as I threw it away, swiftly pulling a second one, a centuries-old elixir gifted to us by a Witch, a concoction we hoped would assist Jett's unnatural healing to purge his body of this deadly curse. I stabbed the needle right into the revolting lesion.

Jett's stifled scream exploded through the room.

I injected the elixir, tossing the syringe away.

Jett's eyes rolled back, and his body relaxed. He sagged against me as the elixir flowed through his bloodstream. After a quick look at Sirro and the replying tip of his chin, I eased my brother into the chair nearest the Horned God.

Jett lay limply, his jean-clad legs spread wide, with one knee bent. He balanced the heel of one of his combat boots on the floor, while the leg was braced wide, keeping him on the seat. His violet eyes, now glassy and distant with pain relief, rested on mine. Strands of hair were plastered to his clammy, ashen forehead. He pushed them aside, tucking a sweaty lock of hair behind his ear. Relief swept through me to see my brother do such a simple gesture. The tight bands of fear constricting my chest eased.

It wasn't instantaneous, but after a while, as Sirro and I closely watched my brother in silence, Jett's quick, shallow pants became deeper, slower, and he wasn't shivering as much. A faint touch of color bloomed on his complexion, and the poison webbing across his chest slowly faded and retreated. I took what felt like my first breath when the frayed edges of dead flesh fell away, revealing fresh pink skin beneath, and the wound stopped oozing black gunk, red blood beading along the gash.

Jett exhaled a sigh that my entire body mirrored, the worry and last of my fear easing away.

Sirro's gaze greedily took in the healing flesh. "Your unnatural healing... Such a blessing, and rare, very rare." He leaned an elbow on the armrest, pinching his chin with his thumb and crooked forefinger. His rich, polished voice was low and distant with thought. "Astonishing. What is running through your mother's veins?" His expression became strangely somber as he turned to look at me. His words were spoken slowly as if he were carefully picking through what to say. "I'm sorry for your...loss..."

The air tightened in my throat.

Sudden fury whipped my blood into a frenzy. He must have read the demand in my gaze as my eyes slit and mouth parted to bark—Who the fuck took my mother?

Sirro knew I'd been there the night my mother was stolen. That my entire family knew my mother had been stolen—not killed in a car crash.

The words tumbled from him, unusually fast. "As I informed your family the day after your mother was taken—Lyressa doesn't know who the other Horned Gods were."

My fingers clenched. A likely story.

He held up his hand, apparently sensing I was going to protest. "Lyressa was ordered to accompany two of her brethren to assist with capturing Tabitha and..." he faltered, his voice lowering uncomfortably when he continued, "disposing of her." Because that was what Sirro had been led to believe—my mother had been captured and killed. "Lyressa didn't recognize either of her companions nor learn of their identity."

I couldn't hold it in—I didn't care if I was questioning a Horned God who could rip my tongue out for daring to ask. "And you believe her?"

His mouth quirked to the side, and one eyebrow rose. "Who am I to question one of my own kind?" There was a direct warning, glowing in his amber eyes, to leave it alone.

Whoever the fuck they were—if Sirro was to be trusted—wanted to keep their identity a secret as well as their reason for taking my mother and feigning her death.

"Not every Horned God is known to me," Sirro said, his unwavering gaze on mine as if he were assessing every nuance playing across my face. "I have my own superiors to answer to. There are hidden circles within my own world. Higher ranks and sects. Wheels spinning within wheels."

But was Sirro lying? Did he know who those Horned Gods were who came for my mother that night—the elemental being shaped from mist and shadow and wind, and that vile creature with red hair and a forked tongue who haunted my dreams?

And something else had always nagged me, always teased the back of my mind—why Sirro hadn't been the one to collect my mother?

I swallowed back bitter mouthfuls of anger, flexing my fingers and spreading them wide on my thighs. Now was not the time.

Sirro leaned a little sideways over the arm of his chair, toward his Familiar. He stroked her head like a beloved cat, his slender fingers sliding through the gray locks. His dark power caressed the wrinkled jowl and neckline of the crone. "Tabitha fascinated me. She really was someone quite special."

Jett and I shared a swift look, both of us wondering just where the fuck Sirro was going with this. The Horned God didn't look like he was toying with me, playing a devious game. He looked like he had when I'd disobeyed his order and went to aid my brother. Genuine.