Abaddon's Mark

Chapter Thirty

Graydon stood outside Theon's study, counting the seconds as he waited for his father and Theon to finish their private conversation. He figured it probably had something to do with Lugh keeping Shorel as a shield. There was no other way to explain the spell mage's presence the night Theon received word that he had to start teaching classes.

No other reason for Shorel to follow Lord Lugh like a well-trained puppy dog.

Shorel hated everyone and everything. He didn't follow, he didn't even lead. He simply made his own way and enforced his beliefs with sharp words and tones.

A bit like Naena.

Graydon's throat did a little flip. That was the second time since he had stepped into the hallway. Swallowing, he felt a sudden watering at the back of his throat, a constriction as he turned.

Bolting into Theon's room, he was met with shouts. Voices raised up over the sound boiling up Graydon's throat, threatening violence and bloody curses, but he went straight to the waste bin. As he vomited, silence fell over the study.

"Something's wrong," he managed before he vomited again. His stomach heaved, but he swallowed, aware that he wouldn't repeat the action, though barely so. "With Naena."

And then he vomited.

Staring into a bucket of his own sick, Graydon felt several things. The first and foremost was that he had vomited because Naena was in trouble. Shields and swords didn't do that. Otherwise he would have heard stories from his father.

Then, he knew, one of them would know.

If it was Theon, he had a chance. If it was his father, Naena would die a quick and painless death.

The second was that all that shouting when he entered the room?

Hadn't been at him.

He put together something about Luk should have told Theon, and Luk wouldn't be spoken to like a delinquent by his shield who ignored basic responsibilities, all interspersed with curses.

Graydon pressed a hand against his lips and looked up.

Theon looked furious. His father appeared startled.

He didn't dare give any outward sign. Instead he just stared back as red coloured the war mage's cheeks. Graydon had seen that look only once before.

Theon knew. His father was just... baffled.

"You could be more vague, but I fail to see how that might help us," Luk snapped.

"In the salon with a glow," Graydon snapped back.

"That's strangely specific," Theon muttered.

"You introduced the girl to glows?" Luk asked.

"Naena!" Graydon shouted at his father.

"You aren't running!" his father shouted back.

"Because I don't want to be in the blast radius!" Graydon shouted back.

Another frightening, cold silence filled the study. If his father didn't know before, he figured that would have given them away. But then what he said caught up to him.

"By the dragons, the girl is one of the shield families," Theon got out.

Before he was rushing around the desk and out the door. Graydon and Luk stared at one another.

"Shield families?" Graydon asked.

"A little more advanced than you are, each of us has three Magi families we kept alive during the genocide," Luk said quickly.