Binding the Shadows (Arcadia Bell #3)(29)

He smiled with that mouth full of sharp, metal teeth. It was freaky. And kind of cool. “Are you as happy to see me as I am to see you?”

“I . . . umm, Jesus! How are you here on Earth? In the flesh, I mean?”

“I am as surprised as you. My species does not travel corporeally between the planes. Perhaps your magick is stronger. Or perhaps my new body is special. I have only had it a short time.”

“If it’s really you—”

“Of course it is. How could you not know me? I died saving you.”

I grimaced. A terrible pang of guilt clinched my roiling stomach. But I still wasn’t convinced. This could be the Æthyric equivalent of an Internet stalker. Maybe bird-boy had hijacked Priya’s identity.

“How did you die, exactly?” I asked. “I need proof.”

“I was eaten alive by hundreds of lichen insects that a Pareba demon sent after me.”

My pulse pounded in my temples. “Anyone might know that,” I said shakily. “Tell me something no one would know but us. Priya and me.”

“You sent me to find a spell to change your hair color when you were young and vain. I told you it was a waste of my skills, but you insisted.”

“I wasn’t vain.”

“You were vain,” he insisted.

“You never found the spell.”

“It doesn’t exist. But that didn’t stop you from stripping the color from your hair anyway, did it?” He reached out with one arm, silver-skinned and corded with wiry muscle, to snag a lock of the bleached section of hair behind my ears.

A small sob escaped my lips. “Priya.”

“Yes.” He touched my cheek again, and this time I placed my hand over his. I was astounded. Shocked. Reeling. And totally, completely humbled. It felt like I’d just brought an old friend back from the dead.

And in a way, maybe I had.

It felt strange to touch him. Him—I still couldn’t believe it. He looked young. Maybe twenty, maybe older. It was hard to tell with Æthyric creatures. They tended to age slower than humans. I let go of his hand and swallowed hard, trying to hold back tears.

“I heard your call,” he said. His feathery eyelashes fanned as he blinked. “I knew it was your Heka. Unmistakable. And the magick was so strong. It made a tunnel of light through the sky. I stepped in the tunnel and your Heka pulled me right through the veil.” He made a descriptive gesture with his hands and blew out a whoosh! sound.

“Holy shit,” I murmured.

He glanced around us for a few moments, surveying the twinkling city all around us, as if he just noticed where he was. He lifted his face and inhaled, breathing in the night air, then turned back to me and smiled. “I am so happy that you did not call another guardian to replace me while I was gone.”

“You told me to wait for you.”

“And you did.”

“Well, I waited as long as I could. I wasn’t sure you were alive yet.”

He nodded thoughtfully. “You called me because you need me. You are in trouble?”

I shifted my legs and glanced at his wings, the tips of which were softly bent where they met the roof behind him. “Umm, yes. Maybe. I’m—my Moonchild power is changing.”

“You are getting stronger,” he agreed. “I could tell that from your call. And your Heka smells rich.”

I made a face. Maybe he was smelling the blackberry bar vomit. “Anyway, I’ve been able to do crazy things with it. Slow time, make a weird silver fog trap out of my halo—”

“And pull your guardian through the veil. You are powerful,” he agreed. His lips quirked up. “It is exciting.”

“Anyway,” I said, “I’m worried about my power getting stronger, but I’m mostly worried because I saw a projection of my mother.”

His dark brows lifted. “And that is strange because . . . ?”

Oh. Right. Priya died before I found out my parents were guilty of all the ritual killings, handed them over to the White Ice Demon, and let her whisk them away to the Æthyr as her war prize. It took me several minutes to tell the story, but Priya listened intently, crouching before me with his silver arms wrapped around his legs, his chin resting on his knees. He was barefoot, I noticed. And his toenails, though not as long as the talon-like nails on his fingers, were glossy black.

“I will admit, I never liked your family,” he said when I was done.

“Why didn’t you say anything? Did you know they were guilty?”

He shook his head rapidly. “Of course not. If I thought you were in danger, I would have warned you. But I did not understand the workings of this world, and it was not my place to give opinions about your personal life.”

“You don’t seem to have a problem with it now,” I noted.

He shrugged, black eyes gleaming. “I am different now. But let us return to your problem. You thought the White Demon would kill your mother and father in the Æthyr.”

“My parents tricked her. Used her. I just assumed she would take their lives.”

“But now you are worried that she didn’t.”

“I heard my mother whispering to me. I saw her—it was like a projection, you know, how you used to appear to me. I’m worried. I want to use the Moonchild power. But if she’s alive, could she find a link through my Heka signature?”