Page 78 of Garden of Poisoned Delights

Iason Ellas was not a particularly attractive man. The scars that covered half his face twisted his mouth in a perpetual sneer, and he held himself stiffly when he wasn’t around Levi or Sophie, as though he were a soldier at attention. Still, power was a lure, and Iason was brimming with it. It didn’t matter that he spent most of his time tending to the gardens of Mislia and raising his adopted daughter—Lazaros could almost taste the magic burning inside him, and he knew the others noticed too. If Iason were so inclined, he could have a wealth of submissives to pick from.

As it was, he wasn’t so inclined in the least, and Lazaros felt guilty enough for asking for his help with the spell-breaking. He pulled out a chair for Iason and leaned against his desk, arms crossed tight over his chest.

“I won’t be offended if you decline,” he said.

“I’m aware.” Iason didn’t sit. “But I admit that I am curious—why did you ask me and not Levi? He wouldn’t be opposed to the prospect.”

Lazaros suppressed a shiver. “You’re mortal,” he said, “or you used to be. There wouldn’t be a risk of…” he gestured vaguely, “breaking me.”

Iason’s mouth pulled at the edges, but Lazaros wasn’t sure if it was a smile. “You worry he might turn into a dragon?” Lazaros shrugged. “He knows the limits of a mortal body. Would you feel more secure if I were there as well?”

Lazaros knew Iason didn’t mean it as a slight, but he still looked down. “Only if you approve, and if you’re sure he won’t be too much.”

“He’s always too much,” Iason said. “Not physically, don’t worry. You can handle it, I’m sure.” He tilted his head as though in thought. “You might want to prepare yourself, though. You’ve seen him before.”

Lazaros felt heat rush to his face. Even in a human form, Levi was formidable. Lazaros wasn’t afraid of that, exactly. He wasn’t even afraid of Levi shifting into his dragon shape, and that was truly worrying.

The Library had nearly every book Lazaros could dream of, and some of them were highly informative. Lazaros had read of demons with fleshy, probing tentacles that pulsed hot with a substance that was more liquid darkness than anything known to mortal-kind. There were demons with barbed phalluses and knots that locked them to their lovers, beings so enormous that they could split him in two without a thought, and Lazaros craved them so fiercely that he thought there might be something cracked in his mind. Surely humans didn’t want to be swarmed by demons. They befriended demons. Sometimes, like Summer and Tanis, they fell in love. They didn’t dream of being spitroasted between a tentacle and a dragon’s cock—or if they did, they didn’t act on it.

When he thought of being shared between Levi and Iason, feeling scales under his palms and his body jerked about like a toy…

He cleared his throat, trying to banish the image. “Are you saying you’ll do it? I mean to say, if Levi serves as the divine element in the spell?”

Iason rubbed at his mouth with a hand, and his expression went back to his stern half-sneer. “Yes. We’ll do it. When would you like to arrange the spell-breaking?”

Lazaros thought of the toys he kept in his bedroom, some ridged, others formed into a shape that wasn’t human, locked in a secure chest in the closet. “Sunset? That should give us time to prepare. Here, you’ll find it at the crossroads by White Street and Ridge.”

”I’ll meet you there.” Iason nodded to Lazaros and turned to go. Lazaros waited until the door closed to let out a heavy sigh, then raked his hands through his hair.

“I’m in control,” he whispered. “I’m in control.”

Oh, darling, the Library said fondly. You are most certainly not.

* * *

There were altogether too many caverns in Mislia.

Iason knew there was a reason for it, something to do with volcanic eruptions long ago—Sophie had learned about it recently, and spent several days probing Levi for what he remembered of when the country was formed. When Levi admitted he hadn’t noticed much aside from the sudden influx of giant jellyfish off the coast, Sophie had scowled in teenage disapproval and had started forcefully writing notes in one of her workbooks with the occasional disgusted glare in their direction.

“She’s becoming more like you,” Levi had pointed out, which Iason found ridiculous, given that Sophie was acting more like one of Levi’s storms at sea these days. Her teacher among the sirens said they were both wrong, and teenagers were just like that for an indeterminate amount of time.

Regardless, when Iason had seen just how many caverns supposedly ran under the island in one of Sophie’s maps, he felt that it didn’t matter how they were formed. They were simply excessive. Sometimes, he wondered how Mislia didn’t collapse like a soap bubble and become a nation of sinkholes.

Someone had marked the entrance to what Levi had started to call the fuck cave with chalk, and when Iason and Levi crossed the line, magic tickled the edge of Iason’s awareness. He was much more attuned to magic now than he’d been before. He could see it without adjusting his vision, blinking spots from his eyes as charms glittered and demons glowed with the warmth of their humans’ magic. Lazaros, who was getting up from the edge of a collapsed hole in the rocky ground, gleamed with protective magic in his clothes and earrings. Several were wards against poison, likely to protect against the old mage council’s supporters.

“Thank you for coming,” Lazaros said, adjusting his shirt collar as Levi and Iason approached.

“We haven’t yet,” Levi whispered, and Iason stepped on his foot.

If Lazaros heard, he didn’t mention it. His face was slightly flushed, though, and he kept his gaze down as he gestured toward the rough wooden steps that someone had wedged into the cave entrance.

The walls of the cavern were made of a dark stone he couldn’t name, altogether different from the crypt that ran through the other side of the city. The air was cooler there, but Iason’s skin warmed as he walked down the steps, and his chest ached in the way it did when he had Levi beneath him or digging sharp teeth into his shoulder.

“Oh, that feels nice,” Levi said.

“It must be weaker on you.” Lazaros’ voice shook slightly. He raised a hand as though to take it through his hair and stopped. “You can’t see the sigil in this light, but it’s on the floor there. That’s where we’ll need to—where the ritual should happen.”

“I can see it,” Iason said. The stone was smooth, almost polished, and the sigil glowed faintly as Lazaros stopped just outside one of the pointed stars in the circle. Lazaros was breathing harder, and his eyes had gone glassy.

---