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Flat words without anger or reproach, but her irises had vanished, her eyes obsidian.

“He sent me a time-delayed message, a last note. Said he’d always been scared of death so he’d done what they’d asked, but now he knew there were things far worse than death.

He told me not to mourn him, and that he was proud of me for living my life with honor. ”

No open grief in her voice, nothing but the track of that single tear, but Adam knew his J now, understood that this loss had devastated her. “I’m sorry you lost him,” he said, and it was a truth.

She meant more to Adam than his rage.

“I wish he’d lived to this time.” Eleri swallowed. “The Es say that Js with that facility might be able to help trauma victims by—with their permission—altering their internal memories so the horror doesn’t haunt them night after night.

“It’s not something anyone has ever done—we take memories and morph the imprint, not the actual internal memory—but there are young Js working with Es to figure out whether it might be viable.

Wouldn’t that be astonishing, Adam? To have this ability be a healing tool and not a leash used to manipulate? ”

“Yes.” He fought back his own tears at the dull wonder in her at the idea that she might’ve been a gift had she been born in this time. One day, she’d understand that she was a gift to him—the best gift of his life.

He didn’t know how long they stood there swathed in the losses of the past, but when they moved it was as one, their hands linked. He plucked a wild berry for her, watched her taste it with a deep concentration.

“My mom taught me about the berries,” he told her, “the other edible plants in the area. She was born to this land, my father the handsome stranger who won her heart.”

“I was born as a result of a fertilization contract,” Eleri said in turn. “I know who my father is—it’s part of my medical history—but he had no hand or say in raising me.”

Adam didn’t wince at the cold-blooded nature of Psy procreation under Silence; that same system had created his mate. “You lived with your mom?”

“Until I was six. Then I was placed permanently in boarding school—a J, even a 9.2, wasn’t much use to them in terms of the family’s bottom line.”

“So they just let you go?” Adam couldn’t process the idea; he’d fight tooth and claw to keep Ollie and the other babies close, where he could protect and shield them. To just eject a child from the nest? No.

“I was scared at first,” Eleri admitted. “But then I met Bram, Saffron, and Yúzé, and I understood happiness for the first time.” Her words ended in a gasp, her eyes trained forward.

The Green Grotto opened out in front of them, a paradoxically secret space created by the way the canyon walls touched at the top high above, while allowing in spears of light that made the water below glow a luminous jewel green.

“Tell me what you feel,” he said, because he knew she could feel to a certain extent. That single tear, the way she’d fought for Jacques, the way she’d stared at Ollie with such silent wonder.

His Eleri’s heart was damaged but not destroyed.

She turned to him, her face pristine in its false peace. “It’s as if I perceive emotion through a thick layer of smoky glass.” Dropping his hand, she walked forward to the edge of the water and sat down.

When he came down next to her, the side of his body pressed to hers and she didn’t pull away.

“Js feel too much,” she said, the words sounding like a confession inside this place distant from everyone, a cocoon where they could pretend they were just another couple who wanted to steal a romantic moment.

“That’s always been the problem. We can’t be Silent when our literal job is to walk in the minds of monsters.

“Each reconditioning attempted to re-create Silence by scraping away the weight of emotion, and if that didn’t work, overwriting it,” she explained.

“But we also can’t forget, so the technicians added what they call ‘obstructions’ in our neural pathways.

Like a circuit that never quite closes, it was meant to allow us to remember without the emotional impact of remembering. ”

“It sounds like bullshit,” Adam snarled. “A way to use you like machines.”

“Yes.” Eleri continued to stare at the water as green as glass. “I think sometimes, that if they’d let us read good memories in between, we might’ve done better, might have been balanced, but that was never on the table. Only the monsters. Only the evil. After a while, it seeps into you.”

She shook her head when he would’ve spoken.

“I don’t regret the people I executed. Especially not the ones who beat the system and got out—had they remained alive, they would’ve destroyed countless lives.

But the girl I once was would’ve felt regret, would’ve questioned who she was becoming.

That’s what I regret—losing her.” Her next words were a whisper. “In losing her, I lost you, too.”

“No.” He took her jaw, made her look at him with those eyes become obsidian pools. “ You are who I want. You as you are today. I’m not that boy anymore, either.”

Eleri couldn’t fight the compulsion any longer.

“Can I touch you?” she said to the angry falcon in front of her, because she would allow herself to be selfish this day that would be the only one they’d ever share.

“Even through the smoky glass, the fog, I’ve always reacted to your physical presence like I have a hunger within. ”

His pupils expanded, the yellow ring bright with grim satisfaction. “That’s the call of the mating bond.” Lifting her hand to his face, he said, “Do what you will. I’m yours, Eleri Dias.”

His jaw was hard and solid under her touch, his skin lightly bristled. When it grazed her palm, she wondered what it would feel like on softer, more delicate parts of her.