Happy Wednesday everyone!
This weeks chapter marks a mid-point of this novella. For anyone who has been patiently waiting for Constantine to turn up, don’t worry, I got you, he’s on his way I swear (hehehe)
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Chapter Eleven
On the tenth night, Alexis sat alone in the hull of the Eos and stared at the casket. Finally, he prayed to Poseidon and opened it.
The fragment was smaller than his palm. It was the shape of a broken wedge, with two smooth original surfaces and two rough broken edges where it had been shorn from the body of the altar by whatever force had taken it in the last days. It was a color that didn’t exist in any other substance in the world, and which his eyes hadn’t seen for thousands of years.
The moment the lid came off, the deep, underwater-bell note struck Alexis again. He had braced for its impact, and it didn’t help one bit.
The grief that hit him filled every corner of him. It was in the marrow of his bones, and the taste at the back of his tongue. He let it come, and he didn’t try to stop it. He had been outrunning this grief for nine thousand years.
He wept for his mother, who had drowned, and his grandmother, who had taught him a two-handed ward and always left offerings to the clay figure of the goddess Asasarame in her kitchen. He wept for the green-blue of the sea outside the temple doors, for the boy he had been, and for the altar that had sung for thousands of years and that was now a shard.
Eventually, his tears stopped falling, and he held the fragment against his chest, to the place where the old song of his magic lived.
The fragment stopped screaming its anguish and instead tuned into his Atlantean blood and magic. It would now sing to him when he needed it to, and he would sing back to it of his memories of home, and how they had both survived. Maybe the grief wouldn’t be so bad for both of them if they did that.
He would make sure that the fragment was kept safe in a new home in Venice, where it would never have to be separated from its people again.
* * *
The following evening, the hold of the Eos was now an overstuffed horde of treasure and protective wards. Alexis had laid seven preservation spells over the contents, and Arslan had added two of his own, at Alexis’s invitation.
They sat on the deck of the Eos, ate simit with cheese, drank good wine, and watched the city.
Alexis had heard, from a sailor in a Galata tavern, that Dandolo’s fleet had been four days out when last seen. The sailor was drunk, but Alexis believed him.
“We are out of time, and you were going to sail tonight without telling me,” Arslan commented, not taking his eyes from the city across the water.
“I was going to leave you a note and the statue of Hermes to keep you company,” Alexis replied, and topped up his wine. “We don’t do goodbyes at our age, my friend. We do, ‘until we meet again’ because we will.”
“I suppose you are right,” Arslan admitted. “I have never been one for goodbyes, but thank you for the gift. I’ll keep him safe.”
They drank their wine, and the Eos rocked quietly beneath them.
“What will you do after you get home?” Arslan asked.
“I plan on dropping off this load before returning to lay in wait around Corfu, so when Dandolo tries to bring all of his looted treasure back to Venice, I can inspect what he has in case anything else needs…preservation,” Alexis replied with a wink.
Arslan stifled a laugh. “Piracy? At your age?”
“I have to keep busy somehow,” Alexis replied. “Besides, I’m young at heart.” It wasn’t exactly true, but there were many treasures that would be a shame to let Dandolo keep.
“Arslan? I don’t suppose I could convince you to come back to Venice with me,” he said finally. “You can meet the family, see the Archives, and there is always room in the villa.”
A look of longing passed over Arslan’s face before he closed it off. “The city will need help when the fleet arrives, and I can’t be in Venice while it is burning. People need someone to try to protect them, because the powers that rule them won’t care. The Order is here. My home is here. I can’t leave it, even knowing that I can’t stop what’s about to happen.”
“I understand more than you know,” Alexis replied and patted him on the shoulder. “There will always be room at our table for you. The offer is for any night you choose to take it up. You can come to me in ten years. You can come to me in a thousand. It won’t expire.”
“Thank you for asking, Alexis. I do appreciate it more than you know.”
Alexis looked at the man beside him and found that, like Constantine, he was going to worry about Arslan. “We might be immortal, Arslan, but we aren’t meant to be alone. You have been alone too long.”
“I promise when the city is quiet again, I’ll come to Venice,” Arslan assured him.
“Please do. When you visit, Zo will cook you something elaborate and complain that your poetry is better than his. Phaidros will flirt with you, and Galenos will want to lock you in the Archives for two weeks to show you all the best books. Lyca will assess you for threat, and she will mostly ignore you until she presents you with a blade she made herself. Aelia will pretend not to care, then contrive to sit next to you at dinner for a week. As for Nereus…”
Alexis paused and thought just how much she was going to love Arslan. “Nereus will probably look you over and nod in approval right before she tries to mentor you.”
“I look forward to the nod and the mentoring,” Arslan said, laughter rolling up out of him. “Try to come back and visit when you can. My door is always open, just like yours is.”
Alexis clasped Arslan’s forearm, and Arslan did the same. “If this city is ever in worse trouble than it is now, and you need me, send a word. Any word. Anyway. I will come.”
“I promise I will,” Arslan said, his fingers gripping Alexis tighter.
“And think about what I said about being alone. You are a smart man, and you know where the elixer went wrong last time. It wouldn’t happen again the same way,” Alexis said, holding on when Arslan tried to shy away. “I’m not condoning making just anyone immortal, Arslan, but if there is one who is worthy, don’t hesitate. At least recruit some humans to your order. The Lord of the Duat knows mortals need help, or he wouldn’t have sent you back. This is not a task to be done by yourself.”
“I’ll think about it,” Arslan nodded, and Alexis released him. “Stay safe.”
“You too,” he replied. “Try not to get yourself killed, and don’t sleep with Akamos again.”
“I didn’t—” Arslan began.
“Whatever you say, piccolo mago,” Alexis laughed and patted Arslan’s head.
Arslan batted his hand away. “Mind your own business, or I’ll let him shoot you next time.”
“He’s welcome to try any time. I like the exercise.”
“A good thing you’re leaving, this city has enough problems,” Arslan said with a smile he couldn’t hide.
At midnight, when the Eos slipped out into the waves, Alexis didn’t look up at Galata as he went. Arslan had left the docks with a new spell for sending messages and would write often.
Alexis turned his face toward Venice, his new home, carrying a piece of the old one with him.
He couldn’t imagine what the others would say when he told them about his adventures, the new immortal he had found, and that there was a fallen angel ruling in the city. It would do them good to know that there were still things walking the world they had never encountered before.
Neither he nor Arslan could have predicted that the next time Alexis came to Constantinople, it wouldn’t be for a friendly visit or a mission to save treasures. It would be in the middle of the collapse of an empire, to rescue a friend from himself, and to save another who would be found worthy of Anubis’s blessing.
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Thanks so much for reading this week’s instalment. Want to catch up on the other chapters? Click here for where I’m compiling them every week.
If you haven’t read Alexis and Penelope’s adventures yet, you can check them out here. Or if you are curious about who Arslan is, then click here.
Also, a final reminder to make sure you enter this PNR and romantasy giveaway I’m in with 20 other PNR and Romantasy authors. It closes in two days, and you can win all of their books plus a new Kindle. Enter here.
Hope you have a great week!
Ames xx