Page 173 of A House of Gold
It's in my head.
Seven distinct threads of awareness, each one connecting me to a different fallen angel. I can feel them, not their thoughts exactly, but their presence. Their locations. Their general emotional states.
Croesus is close. Somewhere in the house, awake, and his emotions are a tangle of relief and exhaustion and watchfulness. Still monitoring me through our bond even from a distance.
Seraph is further away and his emotions are...complicated. Irritation mixed with reluctant concern. Like he's annoyed at himself for caring whether I survived.
The others are scattered at various distances.
They're all there. All connected to me. All feeling me wake up just as I'm feeling them.
It's overwhelming. Like having seven extra senses I never asked for, seven additional layers of awareness pressing against my consciousness.
"Breathe," a voice says from the doorway.
I turn my head, slowly, because even that small movement makes me dizzy, and see Croesus standing there. He looks rough. Hair undone, shirt wrinkled, dark circles under those blind gold eyes. Like he hasn't slept since the ritual.
Through our bond, stronger now, clearer than before, I feel his desperate relief at seeing me awake.
"How long?" My voice comes out as a rasp.
"Two days." He crosses to the bed, sits on the edge carefully like I might break. "The ritual took everything out of you. We weren't sure when, or if, you'd wake up."
"The bindings," I say. "I can feel them."
"I know." His hand finds mine, warm and solid. "I can feel it too. Not as strongly as you, you're the center of it. But there's something there. A connection to the others that wasn't there before."
I focus on the threads, trying to understand them. Seven distinct presences, each one unique. Croesus's is familiar, comfortable despite its intensity. The others are newer, stranger. But all of them are there, constant, unavoidable.
Croesus brings my hand to his lips, presses a kiss to my knuckles. "And before you get too upset about the invasion of privacy, remember, it goes both ways. They feel you too. Which means they all know exactly how terrified you were. How brave you were.”
Through the bonds, I feel echoes of agreement. Distant, faint, but there. The other angels acknowledging what I did. What it cost.
"Can they hear this conversation?" I ask.
"No. They can feel emotions, general impressions, danger. But not words. Not unless the feelings are extremely strong." He pauses. "Though our bond, our original binding, is different. Stronger. I can feel more of you than they can. And you can feel more of me."
I test that, focusing on our bond. He's right, his emotions are clearer, more detailed. I can feel his exhaustion, his relief, his love.
Oh.
Oh.
He can't hide it anymore. The binding lays him bare, makes his feelings as obvious as the sunrise. He loves me. Desperately, completely, with an intensity that takes my breath away.
And he knows I can feel it.
"Yes," he says softly, reading my realization in our connection. "I love you. I have for a while now. And before the binding, I could at least pretend otherwise. Could hide behind my curse, behind greed, behind possession. But now?" He meets my eyes, those blind gold irises somehow seeing straight through me. "Now you know. And there's no point in denying it."
My throat tightens. "Croesus."
"You don't have to say it back. I don't expect, " He stops, laughs without humor. "Actually, that's a lie. I'm the angel of greed. Of course I expect it. I want it. I want you to love me back with the same intensity I feel for you. But I also know that's not something I can take or buy or steal. It has to be freely given."
I feel his conflict. The greed warring with genuine feeling. The hunger for reciprocation fighting against the knowledge that forced love isn't really love.
"I do," I say quietly. "Love you, I mean. I've been fighting it, trying not to, because I knew it would make everything more complicated. But I do."
The emotion that floods through our bond is overwhelming. Relief and joy and possession and something almost like pain. Like my admission hurts him as much as it heals him.
