“Treyu Orion, you’ve been charged with irresponsible conduct leading to the death of a human child,” Luella says.
I know that’s serious, but it sounds so much more so when she says it in front of everyone like that. For the third … or is it the fourth time? I don’t know, but I check the door again.
He’ll come. He’llcome. He always comes.
“The Guild demands one hundred lashes, your marriage into the Centaurus family where you will abide by your husband’s word as law, and for you to submit your sunstar,” she continues.
“Wait, what?” I say. That last part was never mentioned. My hand covers the place on the right side of my neck where my sunstar sits. Arguably, it’s an Orion’s right to wear one, but I still earned it. Father won’t let any of us get a sunstar if he thinks we don’t deserve it.
From Gemini’s reaction, it wasn’t mentioned to him either. I get to see one of the reasons my brother loves him. He becomes razor-sharp, from his eyes to the rigid way his shoulders straighten. “That wasn’t part of the negotiations,” Gem says.
Madame Luella casts a glance to her fellow member—new guy who could pass for an accountant on Earth—that can only be described as “wants to set him aflame”.
“What in the name of the Goddess is going on?” she says.
Accountant-looking-guy is appropriately ashamed. Luella’s not someone you piss off. “It was there when we voted, Madame.”
She rubs her forehead in an exhausted way, probably remembering that, yes, it was there, but still wondering why the fuck the royal family was not informed. “Who put it there?” she asks.
A set of black wings opens, shadowing the entire assembly. Merrick lands like a hammer with his fist to the ground in what some would call a bow, but I know better. He’s issuing a threat. When he stands, he stretches his wings before closing them. They disappear and all that’s left is him in his long black jacket with his stupid gorgeous hair and his stupid onyx eyes.
He shakes his head so that his long black hair fans around him. Fucking preening bastard.
It works. Every member of the Guild stares with fascination glinting in their eyes. Angels have a way of attracting attention, but Merrick especially. I think it’s because he’s actually a demon. Some demons—like that shadow demon that seems to have sealed my fate—are ugly, but others possess breathtaking beauty.
“I put the order there,” he says.
I’m not supposed to talk, but fuck everything right now. “Why would you do such a thing?”
Before he can answer, there’s pounding on the ginormous doors.
He’s here. He came. I knew he’d come.I hold my breath and wait to see his red flyaway hair as butterflies pound like battering rams against the walls of my stomach.
My father storms through the open stone entrance. I can’t recall a time when I’ve ever been disappointed to see my father. My face falls, but only for a second. He’s enraged and he’s here to fight for me.
“This is absurd. My boy is an Orion. His sunstar cannot be taken away because it’s in his DNA. It’s his birthright.”
“Not anymore,” Merrick says as though it’s meaningless.
I won’t let everyone see me fall apart. I won’t.
I force myself to meet my father’s face. He might be even more crushed than I am. “Explain yourself, angel.”
Father doesn’t give a fuck that Merrik’s an angel, and I’m here for it. If I’m ever half the man my father is, I’ll die happy even if it’s without my sunstar.
Merrick doesn’t allow Father’s condescending tone to dim his arrogance one bit. He spreads his arms as if this is a fucking musical and we’ve reached the climax of the plot. “I bring a message from the Gods. They want their price for this, too. I don’t make the rules,” he explains. “But I do have to follow them.”
His tone implies we all do. Even my father, who doesn’t look like he has any intentions of doing so.
“If it helps, I agree with you, War General Orion,” Merrick says. “I voted against this since my vote was still allowed to be my own opinion, but as son of the former archangel Daniel, I had no choice but to obey the orders he was told to give me.”
Father’s rock-like hands clench. His chest inflates, and I know that stance. He wants to fight something. He might take on the Gods themselves and then …
I think of Trinket. He lost his mother like I did. The Gods would rip my father apart and then Trinket wouldn’t have him either. But we are Orions, and it would be just like one of us to challenge them anyway. Maybe for something more important, but not for this.
I check the door.
Yes, again.
