Chapter 26

~~Mia~~

Mia, Vinicius, Romakus, Julisa, Livian, Faust and the other incubi, and a bunch of other demons, stood in the big chamber. The primary chamber, with the biggest stalactites and stalagmites Mia had ever seen. Many demons sat on the huge rocks, or perched on them, and they watched with interest.

Vin stood, but he held a stalagmite, determined to not let his weight and wounds drag him down. It was strangely cute, in that boyish ‘refuse to show weakness’ kinda way. Then again, with demons, any sign of weakness was an invitation for a fight.

Julisa licked her lips, eyes constantly drifting Vin’s way, and even wearing her armor, she rubbed her belly with her claws a few times. Remembering what it felt like to be so full, probably. Her first time sleeping with a child of the Old Ones, maybe, considering how rare they were, and she’d enjoyed it.

She also looked Mia’s way and licked her fangs. So did Livian. So did Romakus, and the other demons. Faust and Gallius and the other incubi were a little more subtle, no blatant teeth licking, but they did look at her and grin. Only Yosepha didn’t stare at Mia’s naked body like she was a popsicle, though she glanced her way a few times.

Mia looked back at her, and her silk toga-like clothes. A rune pulsed in Mia’s mind, and it grew brighter as she took in Yosepha’s sandals and their laces that went up her leg, her gold jewelry, her gold tattoos on her dark skin, and her gold lipstick. The potram rune. Batlam and royam floated in the background, too, but potram glowed bright.

The rune recognized the angel. Or at least, it recognized what she was ... wearing? Or, what she was doing? Some combination thereof? When she’d seen the angels in their armor with their weapons, batlam had been the one to glow brightest. Something to do with armor, and weapons, and battle. Potram was what? What was Yosepha doing right now that was worthy of a rune to describe it? To embody it?

Not fighting?

“We are gathered here today,” Romakus said, and he pressed his hands together in front of him like he was praying, “to discuss the future of this unmarked soul, Mia. Mia ... Mia what, exactly?”

She frowned up at him and folded her arms across her breasts. Time to take a page out of Vinicius’s book. She said nothing.

“Alright. We’re here to discuss the future of Mia the Unmarked. We, the Damall—”

“Is this all the Damall in Death’s Grip?” Mia asked, tapping her foot. If she was going to do her best to be confident, not let her nudity bother her, and not show any weakness, she had to lean into it. “A couple dozen demons?”

The three tetrads grinned at each other. The other demons raised eyebrows. None of them were used to a soul speaking out of turn. Well, fuck them. She’d done the prisoner shtick before and she wasn’t about to roll over and take it again. She had a mission this time, one she might actually accomplish if she could get Vin healed up.

“There’s more of us,” Yulia the bat girl said from atop a stalagmite. “We can’t all just gather up in one place!”

Romakus held up a hand, blatantly mimicking a priest’s mannerisms.

“Do not entertain the unmarked’s questions. But, yes, it is true that there are far more Damall than present.” Romakus flared his wings with a flourish. “But here in Death’s Grip, they all answer to me. And if you do not answer me as well, I will—”

“Bring it.” Mia tapped her foot a little harder, earning some laugh from Julisa and Livian. Even Vinicius rumbled a quiet chuckle.

“Romakus, enough,” Yosepha said. “I don’t know if the unmarked are souls worthy of Heaven’s protection or not, but after seeing this girl and her brother myself, I am convinced she is to be spared. For now.”

Romakus rolled his eyes with the exaggerated motion of an awful actor. Too much scrying pool.

Yosepha flared her wings and pointed at the demons with a slow waving finger.

“If any of you so much as touch the girl without permission, I will deal with you myself. Understood?”

Holy shit, the demons actually looked scared. All except the tetrads reared their heads back slightly, or looked down, or did anything to appear a little meeker than before. And that was weird. Demons didn’t do that with other demons, even when facing a stronger demon.

“We’re going to exchange some information,” Romakus said, hooking his wings snug to his back as he squatted down in front of Mia. “So far, we know that all the unmarked are probably the same age, and all died on the surface at the same time. We know they, or at least a sizable portion, all showed up at the Gate of Heaven before the Hell portal scooped them up. You bypassed the Gates of Hell.” His tail snuck around him and pointed at her forehead. “Correct?”

“Correct.” Answering questions was a tricky problem. If she answered too many, they may decide they didn’t need her anymore, or maybe she’d accidentally say something Yosepha considered kill worthy. Where was David when she needed him?

“That has never happened,” Yosepha said. “In the history of existence.”

“The history of existence?” Mia stared at her, blinking. That was a powerful statement.

“Heaven keeps her records and keeps them well.” Nodding, the angel paced in place as she pulled her wings in snug to her back. “If I ask of the council for confirmation, I will. But never has there been mention of unmarked souls in Hell.”

“Heaven has records? How far back?”

Yosepha shook her head. “The council keeps the records. I cannot simply walk into the great library and acquire that information.”

“The council? The big angels, like the one I saw at the gate?”

“Yes. It is by their will that the unmarked have been sentenced to death. It is by their will the records of the ancient past are only shared piecemeal to those they consider worthy.” With an annoyed grunt, Yosepha folded her arms across her chest and scowled. Even her wings half fluttered in an angry kinda way. “As you can surmise from my words, we angels are often kept in ignorance. It is one of the reasons I am here, aiding the Damall, and not simply killing you as ordered.”

Mia smiled. Much as Yosepha was the angry sort, she was intrinsically different to the demons. No demon would be so forthcoming with information, but the angel had a desire to do the right thing, to make it happen, and it probably wasn’t even crossing her mind that every word she said could be used against her if heard by someone particularly manipulative. Or, maybe she did know, but trusted the demons to not exploit her.

Mia eyed Romakus, and he grinned at her, almost like he knew what she was thinking. Maybe he was. A sneaky, manipulative bastard like him, hooking up with a righteous and kind-hearted, but maybe a little simple angel? That was an ... oddly cute couple, assuming he wasn’t just using her.

Romakus spoke next. “Why the angels are killing the unmarked is a mystery, and it’s a mystery we’re trying to solve. Anything that screws with the balance is bad. A giant crack in Hell, and something ... something beneath it, something aware and maybe alive? Yeah, we’ve entered major unbalancing territory here, not seen since Lucifer created the vortex.”

“And you think I know what’s going on?”

“More than us,” Yosepha said. “You will tell us what you know, so that we can keep the balance.”

Sighing, Mia half sat, half leaned against a big rock, and donned her best frown again.

“So you can just kill me when you know everything?”

Romakus laughed. “We could always torture it out of you.”

“Bullshit. You know torture doesn’t work like that. I’d tell you anything to make the pain stop.”

“And I wouldn’t allow it,” Yosepha said. “Until I see otherwise, I will consider the unmarked deserving of some level of protection. She may not be in Heaven, but she is unmarked, and is perhaps worthy of the holy waters of her eternal embrace.”

Mia’s frown melted, and she beamed.

Romakus grumbled down at Yosepha in an exaggerated, almost playful way, and pushed her back with one of his colossal wings. Which she responded to by grabbing its membrane from underneath, earning an also exaggerated yelp from the demon as she yanked the titan to the side. They were a cute couple, if a bit volatile.

“Okay,” Mia said. “I’ll tell you ... some stuff. Because of her.” She gestured to Yosepha, and the angel returned it with a very serious nod. The woman was not the sort to relax, or even smile. Mia liked her. “My brother and I were sitting and eating breakfast when we died. It was completely random. Nothing happened to us. No one killed us. We just ... died. It was painful, like everything inside us decided to break at the same time, and ten seconds later we were dead. Both of us, at the same time.”

“Strange,” Yosepha said, “and unnatural.”

“Yeah. We stuck around for over two weeks to see what the coroner would say. They found nothing. When we finally entered the gold light we kept finding everywhere, we stepped out onto big stairs, taking us up to a big, gold gate. Heaven’s gate. We walked up, and when we tried to pass the gate, it blocked us. Like, full on, walked into glass, nearly broke my nose sorta block.” Sighing, she rubbed her arms, hugging herself. “Then the portal to Hell swallowed us up. We got separated the moment we hit the red river it dumped us over.”

Yosepha and the three tetrads all nodded, listening intently. The other demons, not so much.

“I got taken to Diogo, and he took me to Zel, expecting a reward or something for bringing an unmarked. They quickly figured out I had an aura that was—”

“Arousing every demon and soul nearby,” Faust said, smiling at her.

She rolled her eyes, but she couldn’t stop herself from blushing. Pale skin and all that.

“It’s not a sin aura,” she said. “I don’t know what it is.” And she had no intention of telling them how it worked. For all she knew, giving details about the music her inner fingers plucked would brand her an abomination that needed to be executed. “Zel realized the angels were out in numbers, looking for something. She guessed it was me and maybe other unmarked, and she tried to figure out what was going on. Then the rider attacked.”

All the demons, save for the tetrads, sucked in a breath. The rider was the bogeyman even more than Vinicius was.

“He wanted to kill you?” Yosepha asked.

“Yeah. But, my brother showed up, and we escaped, and—”

Romakus gestured to Vinicius. “You’re skipping an awful lot. What happened to Zel? How’d Vinicius get loose? And why do you have his leash?”

Mia looked Vin’s way. Lie? Vin met her eyes, but said nothing, and used no body language. It was up to her.

“I was with Vin in his cell when the rider attacked. Zel left for a moment, and Vin ... broke off a spike.” She gestured to his the spike on his shoulder, still missing most of its length. “Zel came back, and I stabbed her with it.”

Yosepha froze. Livian and Julisa. Romakus’s jaw dropped.

“You ... killed Zelandariel?” he asked.

“Yeah.” Moment of truth. Mia killing Zel upset the balance of Hell pretty bad, and the Damall didn’t like that, apparently.

“A little pipsqueak like you?” Romakus laughed, and soon all the demons were laughing, Livian and Julisa included. “You killed the bitch?”

“Got her through the eye.” Okay. If she was going to own this ‘killed a spire ruler’ thing, in hopes it’d earn her street cred or something, she had to be confident about it.

What would David have done? Probably said the rider killed Zel. Yeah, that might have been a better idea. But she sucked at lying, and David was worse.

“Vinicius?” Julisa asked.

The beast rumbled and nodded.

“Well, damn,” Romakus said. “I should kill you for that.”

Ah, fuck.

Yosepha rolled her eyes and swatted her lover’s giant chest with a white wing.

“Spire rulers dying is not unheard of.”

Her lover disagreed. “Pretty rare, and power vacuums like that cause problems.”

Shaking her head, Yosepha stepped a little closer to Mia, entering the circle of demons.

“The Damall,” she said, “are concerned with keeping the balance. But spire rulers fighting and killing each other is not a threat to that balance. Heaven allows it, and continues to allow it. What threatens the balance”—she flared out her wings hard enough hair and demon dreadlocks shifted—”is anything that forces confrontation between Heaven and Hell, or allows Hell to affect the surface.”

“Hell, but not Heaven?” Mia asked.

“Heaven can already affect the surface. But we do not. That would defeat the purpose.”

Oh. Oh! Finally, an opportunity for answers!

“What—”

“I am not answering your questions about the purpose of life and death, unmarked. Regardless, that is a question for the council, and they would not answer you.”

Double fuck.

“Okay,” Mia said, doing her best to look Yosepha in the eyes. Her onyx eyes were beautiful, and inhuman. “So, the Damall are interested in me because you think I’ll do more than just ... do things like kill a spire ruler?”

“Correct.”

“Like cracking Hell like a piece of glass,” Romakus said.

Mia sighed and shook her head. “I don’t know anything about that.” A half lie. “But I do know the rider showed up to kill me. We escaped.”

“With the help of a woman in aera armor,” Yosepha said. “The rider appears randomly and has for millennia. He brings destruction and slaughter whenever he appears, on a scale only ... a child of the Old Ones could appreciate.” Everyone looked at Vinicius. Vinicius made the tiniest little smile, and said nothing. Yosepha continued. “The woman, on the other hand, hasn’t been seen for at least a thousand years.”

“Jesus,” Mia said, and snapped her hand up to her mouth. “Sorry.” Yosepha raised a brow. Okay, using Jesus as a curse didn’t bother the angel. Good to know. “Do ... you know who they are?”

“We do not.”

“Not even the council?”

Yosepha glared at her. “I do not know. And I do not know why the woman saved you.”

“Do you know why they have flame wings? Like, wings of fire.”

The angel sighed and shook her head. Apparently, the fact the two strangers in aera armor had fire wings bothered her.

“You’re supposed to answer our questions,” Romakus said. “Why did she save you?”

“I...” Fuck. Fuck fuck fuck. What to do? What to say? She wanted to lie, but the Damall had not only saved her life, but if she told the truth, maybe the angel would help her. Angels could fly. Demons could only glide. Maybe Yosepha would take her straight to the Forgotten Place?

There was always the chance Yosepha was tricking them all so she could use Mia and find the other unmarked. Just because she seemed like a stalwart, ethical, simple angel didn’t mean she was.

Mia sucked in a breath. Time to risk it all.

“Whoever that woman was, she saved my life, and then she ... she told me ... I had to get to the Forgotten Place, or...” Mia forced herself to look Yosepha in the eyes. “Or everyone dies.”

The demons laughed. Yosepha didn’t. After a few seconds of pain, Mia squirming in place, Yosepha snapped out a wing and set her glare around the room. Every demon shut up on the spot.

“Everyone dies?” Yosepha asked.

“Y-Yeah. I couldn’t see her face or anything, so I don’t know if she was lying. But...” She gestured to Vinicius.

Every demon, still half smiling, obviously not believing her, all looked to Vinicius.

“I know her,” he said, deep voice rumbling in the stones. “She’s always serious.”

“You know her?” Yosepha marched up to Vinicius, fearless, practically stomping her sandals with each step.

“Yes.”

“What is her name?”

“I don’t know.”

Yosepha flared her wings as she got within several feet of the titan, glared up at him, and put her hands on her hips.

“You don’t know her name?”

“No.”

“But you know her?”

“She and the rider have fought many times,” Vinicius said. “And you know my history with the rider.”

“I do.” Yosepha gave Mia a glare. “I assume you know of his history as well?”

“Um, only some vague stuff, that him and the rider used to go around on slaughtering sprees. But now they’re enemies?” She jingled her chain necklace and the small amber stone hanging between her breasts. “I freed him because of the leash. I know Vinicius is a ... a...” Careful. You have to work with Vin. Choose your words carefully. “A—”

“Bloodthirsty demon,” Julisa said, chuckling. “A monster with a kill count in the hundreds of thousands? Perhaps millions? A mindless beast addicted to slaughter and murder?”

Vinicius rumbled and eyed the big demon lady who’d just milked him of a couple orgasms only moments before. Either that was a ‘I’m going to kill you and eat you’ rumble, or a ‘I’m going to fuck you until you can’t walk’ rumble. Maybe both. They were too similar with Vin.

“How can you know so little about them?” Yosepha asked.

Vinicius shrugged with his one good shoulder. “Have you ever stood in the presence of the rider?”

“No.”

With a sinister grin on his dragon snout, he nodded toward Mia. Everyone looked at her.

“The rider,” Mia said, shivering, “he’s ... got this aura. I don’t think it’s like mine, but it’s different from sin auras, too. It’s just ... just a constant thing around him. It’s ... not cold, or hot, but ... violent. Violent in the murdery kinda way. Not violence for violence sake, but ... but like, he actively wants to ... I don’t know, make sure everyone is dead, you know? He didn’t delight in killing, like a certain someone.” She glared up at Vin, only to get a teeth-lick back from him. That tongue ... Mia scrunched up her nose. “There was no joy in the rider, or his aura. It was all just ... death.”

The demons looked between each other. They didn’t understand. Violence for violence’s sake was something they understood, and delighted in, but wanting everyone dead purely for the desire to spread death, was not.

“We used each other,” Vinicius said. “Nothing more.”

Silence settled on the giant chamber, the only sound the distant wails of remnants.

“And the woman?” Yosepha asked.

“She and the rider avoid each other. Or they used to,” Vin said. “We’ve talked before. She’s warned me about angels in the past. I trust her.”

Frowning, Yosepha paced in front of him, before setting her eyes on Mia again.

“She really told you everyone will die?”

“She did.”

“Her exact words?”

“Exact words? She said ‘or we’re all doomed’. Scarred into my brain.” Sighing, Mia hugged herself and looked down at her toes. “So now I’m doing all I can to get to the Froz ... Forgotten Place.”

Yosepha paused, eyed Mia for a moment, and continued pacing.

“That explains the direction you were heading,” Livian said, and she tapped a hoof on the ground. “It’s a good thing you told us. We’d planned to kill you if you refused to tell us the real reason you were heading to the Black Valley.”

Well, gulp. But apparently Yosepha hadn’t known that, because she turned and glared at Romakus with enough rage, the demon winced and put up his hands.

“Livian, you traitor,” he said, earning a chuckle from the Zel look-alike. The other demons chuckled, too.

“The facts demand analysis,” Yosepha said, and she flared her wings. “Be silent.” Everyone shut up once again. The smaller demons might have looked up at the tetrads like they were the apex predators, and maybe role models, but they were directly afraid of angels. Afraid, or maybe respected them? After what Noah, Azreal, and Shir did to Vinicius, she didn’t blame them. Giant holy beams and colossal walls of light that could block Vin’s fire? No demons were doing that.

“Mia is unmarked,” Yosepha said, “and there are others like her. The council wants them dead. So does the rider, if he truly came to you to kill you, Mia, and you do not know him.”

“Never met him before, or did anything.” Except for touch a book written by Lucifer. Hopefully, that had nothing to do with it.

“But the woman, the rider’s counterpart, saved you.”

“Y-Yeah, she did. I asked if she could take me to the Forgotten Place herself, but she insisted the rider would track her down if she did that, and kill me. So, yeah. I’m trying to get to the Forgotten Place, which means...”

“Getting to False Gate first,” Romakus said. “You think the war state will have the means to get across the red sea?”

“War state?”

Romakus shook his head. “False Gate is a mess, little soul. It hasn’t been the same since the angels took down Belor. Something happened there after that, something involving the rider, and now we avoid it.”

Oh god damn it. Why couldn’t things just go smooth?

“Your plan,” Yosepha said, “to journey across Hell to the False Gate, with this ... creature, on your leash, is a courageous one.”

Mia winced. “But...?”

“But foolish. The Black Valley will not make for easy crossing, for many reasons. Angel’s Spine will be worse.”

“Then, can...” Okay. Be brave. Just ask. “Can you ... take me?”

“Take you?”

“Take me to the Forgotten Place. Fly me across the sea.”

Yosepha shook her head. “While only a small scouting party discovered Vinicius yesterday, make no mistake, there are thousands of angels searching for the unmarked. Tens of thousands. If we took to the sky, they would spot would us in a matter of minutes.”

“Tens of thousands? How many angels are there?”

Predictably, the angel didn’t answer.

“And,” Yosepha said, “I am not entirely convinced you should reach the Forgotten Place. I have no reason to trust the woman in aera armor. I have no reason to trust any of you.”

Sighing, Mia rubbed her face and shook her head, too.

“I can’t prove anything to you. So ... what now?”

“Now,” Romakus said, “the rest of us are going to have a chat. We’ll decide whether or not to kill you.”

Vinicius growled and stood up straight, but Mia gestured to settle down.

“They won’t kill me,” Mia said, “for the same reason Zel wouldn’t kill me. I might be valuable.”

“You might be,” Livian said, “but Vinicius?”

“Aw, do we have to kill him?” Julisa asked. “I’d rather keep him around.”

“Of course you would,” Romakus said, rolling his eyes. He enjoyed doing that. “Either way, give me the leash, and leave us.”

“W-What?” Mia clutched her necklace. “But—”

Romakus held out a hand to her. The playful look in his eyes was gone, and a dangerous demon with a dangerous grin was looking at her instead.

Mia looked up to Vin behind her. He didn’t like the idea either, and he took a step toward the giant-but-much-smaller demon. Of course all that got him was every demon nearby stepping in, particularly Livian and Julisa, and the two demonesses grabbed him by his wrists.

“Don’t!” Mia said, to the women and to her bodyguard. “Just ... don’t. He’s wounded. He needs to heal.”

“You are our prisoners,” Yosepha said, “both of you. You will do as we order until we come to a decision. Give Romakus the leash, and depending on what we decide, it may be returned to you.”

So much for them trusting her. Or was it, they didn’t trust her to keep Vinicius in line once he was healed?

“You won’t be able to make Vinicius do what you want with that leash,” she said.

“No,” Romakus said, “but he’ll be hard pressed to stop us from killing him when we decide to. Now give us the leash.”

She looked to Yosepha with pleading eyes, but the angel looked away. While the angel had some empathy, something in short supply from the demons, she would not stop Romakus, either. Mia looked back up at Vin, and the giant traded a quick glance with her before setting angry eyes on Romakus while practically ignoring the two four-armed ladies holding his wrists.

If he wanted, he could probably break free of them and fight. He’d rip open his wounds, bleed everywhere, get bitten and torn open by the other demons and get a bunch of new wounds, and then probably die. But he’d kill many of them before he went down.

And then he’d be dead, and Mia wouldn’t have her bodyguard.

With a slow sigh, she slipped the chain off, and gently set it in Romakus’s palm.

“Don’t ... hurt him, okay?”

Romakus raised a brow, glanced at Livian and Julisa, and then to Yosepha, as if they could explain Mia’s behavior. Fucking demons didn’t understand basic empathy!

She missed Adron.

Vin growled down at Mia. Upset. Well, fuck him. If this was what she had to do to keep him alive, then she would. Even if she shouldn’t have, even if she shouldn’t care, she would, and she did.

Yosepha glared up at Romakus and bat him in the chest with her wing.

“Do not use that unless absolutely necessary, Romakus.”

“Aw, Mom, come on.”

Yosepha rolled her eyes. They both did that a lot.

“I am serious. Mia will not be touched, and as much as I do not like it, this arrangement she has with the ragarin has kept her alive. Do not use the leash unless you have to.” She aimed a wing, straight up at Vinicius. “And you, creature, are not to give us a reason to use it. It was an angel that killed Belor. Do not make this angel kill you.” Again, every demon shut up quick, and more than a few of them backed up a little. Even Vin looked impressed. “Now, I will speak with Mia privately.”

“Oh hell no,” Romakus said. “That was not part of—”

Yosepha half turned with a stomp of the foot, and every demon simultaneously pulled back more as if an explosion had hit them in the face.

“I will speak to the unmarked. Alone. You may speak to Vinicius alone.”

Romakus glared down at Yosepha, snarled, looked at the leash in his hand he wasn’t allowed to use, and then up at the rumbling titan.

Yosepha didn’t wait to find out what he’d do. She took Mia’s wrist, and marched them out of the cavern. Not a single look back. She even flared her wings once before hooking them snug to her back, like some sort of smug ‘stop me if you dare’ gesture.

Eventually, she let go of Mia’s wrist, but her stance didn’t change from powerful, upright, stern, and all that imposing stuff. The fact Romakus had had his dick in her ass recently, and that Mia had seen it, didn’t bother her at all. Or she just didn’t let her embarrassment show.

“So, um, what’d you wanna talk about?”

“Wait.” Yosepha nodded down at her before guiding them down another tunnel. Lots of remnants, screaming in their constant agony, grabbing and tearing at anything they could get their hands on, sometimes even each other. They covered the floor, the ceiling, the walls, everything.

Mia looked away from them. “I hate remnants.”

“Hate? Why?”

“Hate’s not the right word. I just ... I feel so bad, but there’s nothing I can do. It just, it really sucks, seeing them like that.”

Yosepha looked down at her again, her expression softened, and the tiniest smile emerged, before she slipped an arm around Mia’s waist, and hugged her to her side.

“Hold on.”

“I—wha!”

The angel took off, and air blasted Mia in the face as Yosepha’s gorgeous, enormous white wings spread and flapped. She didn’t have to flap often. Each stroke of her wings summoned enough air the angel catapulted forward, and Mia squeaked and hugged her close. The cave walls and the remnants flew past, a blur she couldn’t focus her eyes on, and their screams disappeared into the roar of air hitting Mia’s ears.

A second later, it was over. Yosepha set her down, and Mia summoned her senses back enough to let go. Behind her, the tunnel went on for a good while, and the remnants were distant and quiet.

Wait. That wasn’t just behind her. That was below her. Mia stared down the huge hole before looking back up at the angel, and unless she was going crazy, Yosepha was quick to wipe away a proud little smile.

“No demon is coming up here,” Yosepha said, “not easily. Demons can climb, and they can kill remnants, but doing both at the same time is not so easy.”

“I can imagine.”

“Now, come.” The angel gently unfurled a wing and gestured down the tunnel. It opened up into an alcove, and judging from the lack of remnants, either she’d been clearing them out, or chose the place because it lacked them. And it was a safe place to rest where demons wouldn’t get you.

If Mia could fly, finding a high place she could rest safely would be the first thing she looked for.

In the alcove, a big room with smooth walls, Mia sat down and pulled her knees up to her chest.

“So, um ... yeah.”

Yosepha, face unreadable, slowly paced in front of Mia, wings settling snug to her back as she put a couple fingers to her chin.

“The Frozen Heart.”

“W-What?”

“That’s what you were about to call the Forgotten Place, before you caught yourself. The Frozen Heart. Where did you learn that name?”

“I ... heard—”

“You did not hear it from a demon. The name has long been forgotten by their kind, lost to the annals of time since the barbarians are not interested in recording their history.”

It took effort to not make a comment about the things Mia had read. They were written in the ancient language, something no one could read. Maybe angels could? She’d have to ask, and asking that meant revealing yet another weird quirk about her.