Page 94 of Mantle

Before I could get a word out about it, Cassius was charging through the door, ripping it off its hinges with his currently unchecked strength and the raw intensity coming off him.

He was just two steps inside when he pulled up short.

I was right there in the next second, discovering the cause of his reaction.

Fuck.

There Sylas was on his front, clad just in a pair of boxers, sprawled out on his back amid the wreckage of a broken wooden coffee table and an upturned beige couch.

That wasn’t even the worst part.

Both his arms were desiccated, the lower half of his torso, and his right hand was just ash now, completely gone.

He was still conscious—somehow. Tough bastard to the core.

Glazed, pained eyes fell on Cassius in confusion, then settled on me. “Help,” he croaked.

I rushed to him with Cassius following and scanning all around the modest space.

I’d obviously assumed he’d been calling out for help for himself, but as I reached him, terror flickered in his eyes and he croaked again, “Help…her.”

My breath caught.

“Ariana,” he managed.

“What about her?”

“Corvin… he came for… my magic. Took more to—” He lurched, screaming as the desiccation spread up his torso and into his leg. “To cast a spell… to locate a death object.” He choked on a breath. “For her. To kill her.” Another gasp. “But first… he’s draining her Light. Using it… to control Ketheron… needs a better leash.”

“Death object?” Cassius questioned. “Against Ariana Martel?”

“The Wrath of Hades is here on this plane,” I told him.

It was what I’d found out through my investigation and what I’d planned to meet with Cornelius about tonight. He’d been the last one to see it two decades ago, the last time it had been in use.

Cassius choked, terror flickering in his eyes.

At this point, with how far things had come, I knew a great deal of that was for Ariana, not just fear for himself, and that a weapon that could kill a Celestial being was on this plane.

Not just on this plane now—in play.

Corvin was searching for it.

And he was going to use Sylas’ magic to do so. It would be able to fuse with a part of Ariana’s magic and create a link between her and that which could actually end her life.

“I need to go to Cornelius Martel immediately,” Cassius announced.

I grasped his arm. “Heal him first.”

He blinked, so caught up in his mission, that he hadn’t acted to do so on his own. For anyone else that would seem deplorable, but it was actually part of his growth. He’d come a long way from the Celestial Warrior doing the Celestial Plane’s bidding, to caring about others. He just needed more time to fully get there.

He knelt down opposite me before Sylas and examined his state.

He swept his hand over the length of him, his palm glowing.

And then he grimaced. “I can heal his body from the effects of this extreme desiccation, but I cannot cure this infection. It is… manufactured. Not of any pure magic.”

“Heal him, I’ll see to the rest.”

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