Seduction (Curse of the Gods #3)(78)

“I have no idea who those two people are, but the strange thing wasn’t to do with what was happening around you, it was your power. Your Chaos … wasn’t actually Chaos.”

“What are you talking about? You set a building on fire and disfigured a bunch of people.” I had meant the statement to come out sounding matter-of-fact, but the image of Evie flashed into my mind as I was speaking, and it ended up coming out as an accusation.

“It was pure power,” he told me, his expression openly curious. “I have been the Neutral God since before Abil’s sons were born—believe me, I know what Chaos feels like. Your power is not it.”

I blinked at him, trying to process that information. “But I do have a power? I mean … Topia isn’t going to realise that I’m not a Chaos Beta and kick me out, right?”

He grinned, but once again, the motion was without any real warmth. “I felt your power. It was connected directly to Topia. You belong here more than all of us.”

“Is that why you shoved a knife in me and let Rau give me a death-cuddle?” I was back to my biting tone as I narrowed my eyes on him. “Because I belong here?”

“No.” The answer hadn’t come from Cyrus, but from the doorway. Coen was standing there, staring at me. “Apparently, Rau had planned to hit you with another curse, like a back-up curse, just in case the first wasn’t enough to make you strong enough to enter Topia. He had embedded it into the knife he tossed at you, and Neutral was supposed to make sure that the knife hit you in the exact same place as the previous curse.” Coen strode further into the room, stopping beside me, his hand raising to my chest and pressing against the scar through my robe. “Instead, Neutral pulled the curse into himself and gave you the knife without the enchantment.”

I stared up at Coen, who wasn’t meeting my eyes, until another figure appeared in the doorway. Siret. He was staring at the place where Coen still touched me, and I watched as one-by-one, the rest of my Abcurses appeared. None of them approached me, or even looked at Cyrus.

They’re still in shock, I realised.

“We didn’t know if you would wake up,” Coen whispered, so low that I almost didn’t hear him.

My head snapped back to him, and I quickly pushed his hand down from my chest, wrapping my arms around his neck and pulling him down far enough that I could hug him properly. He wrapped his arms around me softly—too softly, as though he thought I would snap in half if he squeezed any tighter.

“I’m here,” I assured him, loud enough that the others could also hear me. “I’m not dead, I’m just on Round Two.”

“Technically, it’s your final round.” Cyrus spoke from the other side of the room. “There are no rounds after this one.”

“I refuse to die,” I snapped back, still angry that he had stabbed me. “I’ll have as many rounds as I want. And you still haven’t explained yourself properly. Why the hell do you care if I die from Chaos, die from a knife, or not die at all?”

Coen released me, almost reluctantly, and I turned as the others moved to surround me. Aros linked his fingers through mine, and Siret claimed my other hand, while Rome planted himself almost directly in front of me and Yael moved beside Coen. I could still see Cyrus, even though Rome was probably trying to block him out—and he looked annoyed.

“We tortured him for a really long time,” Aros murmured to me, somehow sounding seductive even though he was talking about torture. “And we eventually listened to what he had to say—but if you want us to do it all over again so that you can watch, just say the word, sweetheart.”

“How sweet,” Cyrus noted dryly.

I squeezed Aros’s hand, but shook my head in a little no, my lips curving up at the corners.

“Why do you care?” I repeated, flicking my eyes back to Cyrus.

“I felt the power,” he explained. “If that amount of power became too absorbed in Chaos, it would destroy both worlds completely. You could say that I was just in it to save myself, or you could say that I was in it to save every single person or creature that you hold dear.”

“I’ll go with the first option,” I returned. “So if Rau thinks you helped him, then why isn’t he here, demanding I destroy the worlds with Chaos?”

“Because of us,” Rome announced, his voice booming around the room. He was still pissed, apparently. “Neutral didn’t tell us his plan, so we stormed out of the cave and started raining hell. Apparently, that was the plan all along. That was why Neutral didn’t tell any of us that this was going to happen. He wanted it to be believable.”

I broke away from Siret and Aros, moving in front of Rome and standing before Cyrus, looking him over very carefully. There wasn’t a single hair out of place; not a single wrinkle in his robe.

“You took on Rau’s curse?” I asked for clarification.

He nodded: his only answer.

“And you took what I’m assuming was a very major beating from these five?” I nodded my head toward the Abcurses.

“Yes.” This time, Cyrus’s lips twitched in a smile.

“So why do you look like you’ve been spending the sun-cycle luxuriating in a bathing chamber?” I asked suspiciously.

“Because he’s the damned Neutral.” Yael said the words like an accusation. “We can’t destroy him. The bastard just kept healing himself. It was a nightmare. Eventually, we were too exhausted to keep killing him, so we listened to what he had to say.”