Page 1420

‘Are--are you okay?’ said Garovel, sounding surprised. The reaper was on the other side of an icy dome.

‘Of course I’m okay,’ said Hector. ‘I’m undead.’ He said that, but the right side of his face still felt like it was on fire. Not quite as on fire as it had been a moment ago, but still on fire nonetheless.

‘I--well, I know that, Hector. I just meant...’ The reaper growled and looked at Zeff. ‘Would you please get rid of this ice, now?’

The icy dome vanished into nothingness, and Garovel reached for Hector’s shoulder.

The young man recoiled away from the reaper’s grasp. “I’m fine,” he said.

‘Are you serious? That looks like it hurts A LOT.’

It did. Sweet goddess, it did. But that was kinda the point.

“I’ve had worse,” said Hector. He looked over at Zeff, who seemed to be in the middle of a silent argument with Axiolis.

‘Hector, c’mon. Let me numb the pain for you. That burn looks awful.’

“Just the regen, then. Don’t numb the pain.”

‘Hector...’

“It’s fine, Garovel. The pain will just come back later, anyway. I can deal with it right now.’

The reaper still looked reluctant but said, ‘If you say so.’

He was still shaking, Hector realized. His head was fine, more or less, but the rest of his body was still pretty damn cold, even with the misty armor gone.

He could probably fix that now.

Hector clapped a fresh suit of iron armor around himself. Sure enough, it was as warm as he’d intended it to be.

Well, maybe this was a little warmer than he’d wanted. Okay, it was kinda too hot, actually.

He nailed it on the second try.

That was better. Nice and toasty. Like a cozy metal blanket. That didn’t make much sense, he supposed. Iron was not at all soft, much less cozy. Yet that was still an accurate representation of how he felt. Somehow, his iron seemed more like his than ever before.

It was a familiar and altogether welcome sensation, wearing his own armor again. He planned to leave it on, even after his body warmed up completely.

Zeff finally looked over at him, and Hector was ready to meet the Lord Elroy’s stern gaze through the visor of his iron helmet.

“I will not make that armor for you again,” said Zeff. “From now on, protect yourself from the heat of the Undercrust.”

‘Are you fucking kidding?’ said Garovel. ‘You’re really not going to apologize for what you just did?’

“He doesn’t need to,” said Hector. “Zeff was just trying to give me the push I needed. And it worked, didn’t it?”

‘Bullshit. That was way out of line.’

Zeff snorted. “You expect your enemies to be more considerate than I?” He glared at the young man harder than he ever had before. “Do you even realize how many people look up to you now? All of my kin. They don’t see your weakness. They think they can depend on you.”

Hector just listened.