Page 18 of The Mirror of Beasts

The sharpness of the air promised snow. A chill rolled down his back, not from cold but from the green scent of holly adorning the impressive marble steps. Two stone hounds guarded the landing. He sneered at the sight of them.

Black candles shuddered in their sconces on either side of the iron door, then went out, extinguished by some unseen wind.

The cold seemed to coil around his stomach as he neared; that same feeling of receding, of shrinking, came over him. His steps slowed.

“Whatever is the matter, my boy?” His master’s voice was silk in the air, soothing even his most shattered edges.

“I should wait out here,” Cabell said. He was a stain that would only tarnish his master in the eyes of the men inside. “I can stay with the Children.”

Their chittering always set his teeth on edge, and something about the way they moved, that essence of human still left in their spidery bodies, unsettled him. He felt their glowing eyes on his back, watching from the line of trees at the edge of the estate, but didn’t look, even as his instincts screamed for it. He wasn’t a coward, but sometimes, at dusk, he thought he could see an echo of the human faces they’d once possessed.

“Hmm,” Lord Death hummed, wearing another’s face himself. A king’s. “Have these men treated you poorly?”

Cabell ducked his head. “No, my lord. They didn’t care enough to.”

“Then shall we show them their mistake?” his master said. “Being underestimated has its advantages. Or do you think I wouldn’t pick a worthy knight to stand at my side? Do you believe I would choose a fool to be my seneschal?”

Cabell straightened as the tension in his gut eased. He stared at his master, not daring to hope. “Your seneschal?”

“I shall need someone to run the household, here and in Annwn,” Lord Death said. “To be my most faithful and loyal companion. Will you accept such a role?”

“Yes,” Cabell breathed out. He couldn’t let himself forget that again. Of all the apprentices his lord had trained, it was Cabell who had been chosen.

“Remember who you are,” his master said. “You are where you belong.”

Cabell had thought he’d understood what it was to belong before, but there’d always been a part of him, some feeling, that he was at the edge of this world and not part of it. He’d spent years staring down through the cracks of the library’s attic floor as a child, watching as the members of the guild left to seek relics, returning with the most priceless treasure of all: pride.

All from having dared to try.

After he claimed his membership, it hadn’t mattered how hard he’d worked, the curses he broke, or the miles he traveled. To his sister and the man who had raised them, he was worse than different—he was wrong. The others seemed to sense that about him too. Most days, he was barely tolerated. A source of amusement, maybe, but little better than dirt tracked in on Endymion Dye’s boots.

Now he knew his worth, and there was no greater power than that.

His lord had supplied him with a heavy coat of the deepest black, the sort that absorbed all light. The silken quality of his new clothes and the soft leather of his boots were unlike anything he had ever worn, far too fine to be the product of mortal hands. He straightened the coat one last time, smoothing his hands down over wrinkles that weren’t there.

“It is time you know your true name,” Lord Death said. “Bledig.”

The word resonated in his chest as his soul recognized the truth of it. That was his first name. Cabell belonged to a life he needed to shed like a hound’s summer coat.

Lord Death lifted his hand, signaling to the Children of the Night. Several broke away from their pack, moving around the house to scale its rose trellises and walls, settling along the rooflines, where they would remain, guarding Summerland House against all enemies.

The door opened. Endymion Dye’s pale face hovered in that slit of darkness. Lord Death stepped forward and lowered his hood. His face—the face of the man who had once been Arthur Pendragon—was cold as he took stock of the mortal man.

Cabell smirked at Endymion’s groveling look of veneration and pride to find the King of Annwn standing on his threshold. The pleasure he took from it, however, was nothing compared to the satisfaction that purred in his chest when Endymion’s eyes shifted over to him.

A flicker of shock passed over Endymion’s sharp features as he recognized Cabell—a no one, a nothing in the hierarchy of his world—standing beside the god.

“You have summoned me here through ritual and smoke,” Lord Death’s baritone voice began. “And yet you do not invite me in. Tell me, Endymion Dye, are you so ungracious to all your guests?”

Endymion bowed, opening the door wider and backing into the shadows of the house with a nervous flourish.

Cabell almost laughed. The rush that pitiful display gave him was intoxicating, spreading an almost dizzying warmth through his whole body. How snakes turned to worms when a bigger predator arrived. Lord Death glanced over, arching a knowing brow.

“I’ve never seen him so … agreeable,” Cabell said. “Allow me, my lord.”

He stepped through the door first, knocking his shoulder into Endymion to push past him. In life, you were either the person who charged forward or the one who stepped aside. Cabell refused to step aside ever again. He would never need to.

Once inside, he surveyed the grand foyer, letting his gaze skim over the handsome oak staircase curving up either side in perfect symmetry. A dazzling chandelier sent candlelight sparkling down upon the cold marble floor.

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