Bereft: Foretold

2 | A Bleak Man

The knocking continued as I retrieved my shirt and reentered the living room, snapping at my unwelcome visitor to wait. The rapping didn't pause, and so I yanked open the door and glowered at the person standing on the porch. 

"Took long enough."

A man of average height with unkempt hair and unshaven jawline leaned upon the door frame where his straight, blunt fingers pressed to the wood. His build was strong but round-shouldered, his temples liberally streaked with silver, and there was a collection of hairline scars on his right cheek a less keen observer would miss. 

A silver ribbon meant for a woman's hair was looped about his throat and tied into a lopsided bow. 

"What do you want?" I asked without bothering to conceal my displeasure. "How did you know I was here?"

I'd met the man briefly when I'd first awoken in Amoroth's apartment two months ago. He'd declined to give a name, but in my subsequent interrogation of the Sin of Lust, I'd learned the man went by the name of Cage and was, in fact, a mage. 

I concerned myself little with the affairs of mage syndicates or witch covens, but even my ears had heard rumors and remarks about the black mage Cage before. He was notorious among the others of Terrestria, though I was unsure of the exact nature of his crimes. Last I'd heard of him, he'd been captured by the Blue Fire Syndicate and was being held in Cuxiel's dungeons to await proper transport.

During that internment, he'd somehow become acquainted with my shadeborn. I wasn't sure how such a meeting had come about when the man had been sequestered in the manor's deepest reaches—but I'd long since learned it was foolish to underestimate Sara Gaspard. Simple things like locks or bars or mass murder hadn't deterred her. 

"That's quite a greeting," the mage quipped as he leaned off the door's frame. Quicker than I would have thought possible, his arm shot forward and two of his forefingers thumped against my chest. Arcane energy zinged through my nerves as the unnatural, iron-like scent of the man's magic burnt in my nose and ached in my teeth. I was physically moved two feet from the door, my shoes screeching on the hardwood as they were dragged the distance. 

The mage crossed the threshold as a smirk played across his lips and the door swung shut of its own accord.

"Get out," I demanded as I touched the spot on my chest where he'd struck it and found the skin burnt beneath the shirt. I willed the injury to heal. Nothing happened. 

"Hmm, it's not exactly what I expected." He craned his neck from side to side, his wild hair settling upon his brow. "I thought it'd be messier." The mage straightened the cuffs of his dark duffle coat as he came to stand at the coffee table's edge. He moved his hands with a rapt, unconscious precision and ignored me utterly as he inspected Sara' home. I rubbed at my chest to dispel the sense of unease rising within it. 

"And cleaner." He swept his fingers along the top of a book abandoned on the mantle and grimaced at the dust that came away. "Have you not been cleaning at all?" 

"I've only just arrived." I stepped forward when the mage tried to take the book and slide it into the inner pocket of his coat. Snatching the volume from his hand as I glared, I almost crushed the book in my fist. "Which begs the question as to how you're here at such a...convenient time."

The mage scoffed and was seemingly unconcerned with how I loomed above him with naked affront in my eyes. "Here I thought I was going to be late. Amoroth told me she was going to relocate you last week, though I guess her hesitancy is to be expected. The woman must be lonely after Sloth was killed off."

His casual disregard for Cuxiel only served to further stoke the growing fire of my anger and irritation. 

Cage sunk into the armchair—my armchair—and kicked his feet onto the coffee table. At least, he tried to. The mage was shorter than myself and could only catch the base of his rough shoes on the tabletop, so he bent at the waist with an inelegant grunt to pull the table nearer.