{Reipon}
Triss’ eyes remained shut, never to open again, when Razor straightened Korac’s body from their kiss. He gingerly touched her arms where her elbows bent backward. The orange blood from the punctured bone stained the bed and filled the air with kerosene. The source of her fire.
One Korac didn’t mind seeing extinguished. When the thought entered their shared conscience, Razor glared across the black space between them. To which Korac offered a shrug. There was no love lost between him and Triss. Only tragedy remained.
“Show some respect to the woman who raised you, baby brother.”
Korac circled the shackled man and reminded him, “You’re no brother of mine, and if you hadn’t abducted me from my actual mother’s arms, I would never have suffered so much of Triss’ ‘tender care.’”
Razor ignored Korac and stared from his body down at her. “So beautiful even in her sleep.”
“You loved her? Truly?” Korac didn’t really care, but Echo may one day value that knowledge. He and Sagan both intended to keep their promise and tell their adopted daughter of her parents. This obsessive relationship they carried on for millions of years might provide the only positive anecdote about her parents to share with her.
In a voice deeper than a Gargantuan Tritan, Razor vowed inside this space, “I will find her in Eternity.” He stepped Korac back to let the doctor set her bones. Softer, in his usual voice, Razor demanded, “She agreed, and now she’s gone. Cycle me.”
“Not yet.”
Razor whirled on Korac, fuming in his narrowed eyes and clenched fists. It looked completely futile and unintimidating with him shackled in Korac’s conscience.
Xelan brought him back to the scene. “Razor, we want to ask you some questions. Would you like to talk in another room?”
Fuck, the Prince of Cinder was generous. Even Tameka rolled her eyes and crossed her arms behind him. A response Korac could get behind. It was Sagan’s response who worried him. Her eyes shifted from Atramentous black to mauve to normal. They never left Korac’s body, Razor’s eyes.
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Inside the mindscape, a terrible grin spread across Razor’s lips as he answered Xelan with Korac’s mouth, “I’ll answer any question you ask if the Seamswalker answers one of mine.”
No fucking way was Korac about to sit by and let this happen. “You miserable son of a bitch—”
“One question,” Sagan said in a voice of three pitches.
Razor sneered smugly at Korac inside the shared space before informing her, “I’ll know if you lie.”
“Ask.”
Tameka tossed her hands in the air and sat on the bed with a sulking huff, sharing Korac’s sentiments. Xelan narrowed those midnight eyes ever so slightly. He didn’t like it either.
Oh, but the Pain Curator enjoyed it. The terrible grin transformed into a wicked smirk when he asked, “Have you dreamt of me?” Sagan opened her mouth to answer, and he cut her off. “Sagan, have you dreamt of me the way I said you would?”
Finally, Xelan showed some sense. He shook his head and raised a finger to give Razor a good lecture—
“You know I have.”
Sagan.
Her voice trembled, and her eyes shifted. Her breath left her on a shaky sigh, and she squeezed her eyes shut. “Now keep your end of the bargain and answer their questions. You know you hate to go back on a deal.”
“There, you see? I’ll take her from you yet. Soon, she’ll request me in the bedroom, and I can put this inferior body of yours to good use—”
“You still can’t see it.” Korac frowned, incredulous and perplexed. “Any chance you ever had with her, and I’m not saying there ever was one, you lost the day you revealed your true nature. She will never want you, Razor, because her love, affection—everything about her—is founded in trust. And you shattered however much you developed between the two of you. Look at her.”
Razor gazed out at Sagan, and she looked away, swallowing hard, as if she found the taste of something bitter. Tameka rubbed comforting circles in her back. Pablo and Xelan offered her something to help with the anxiety.
Korac shook his head, aching to end this cycle and soothe her, but this interrogation mattered. Still, he continued, “You broke her heart, and I hate that you ever possessed enough of it to hurt her. She wanted a friendship with you, and you betrayed her. There is no coming back from that, and I think it strange you want to at all. I’m almost convinced, after spending this time with you in my bones, that you don’t pursue her to hurt me. I think you pursue her because you realized what you lost, and you’re desperate to get it back. Like with T.a.o. If that’s the case, do the right thing. Help them. Help Sagan save Rayne and finally finish Celindria’s game.”
Razor stared at him the entire while without an outward response, but Korac felt him in his bones. The genuine reactions. There was desire there for Sagan. Possession. And the bittersweet twinge of happiness. Sagan brought him some joy during their brief rapport, but same as T.a.o., Razor’s world punished sweet things for their innocence. Razor did little in life to correct that.
Without a word to Korac, Razor returned his body to the seat at Triss’ bedside. He made a show of straightening out Korac’s jeans and ripped t-shirt and spared one poignant assessment of his black-painted fingernails.
“Ask your questions, Prince Xelan.”