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Chapter Seven

Brakes hissed slightly as Niko brought the car to a stop. The stuffiness of the interior—or perhaps their conversation—had left her needing an exit, and Jade was out of the door before he had a chance to open it for her. He followed her to the gardens.

Greenery overflowed between towering white columns and hung from potters. Flowers, lush and fragrant, bloomed everywhere Jade looked. In the soft evening light, it was spectacular. Niko strode beside her, taking in the sights.

“Thank you, Niko,” she said softly. “I appreciate you giving me that peace of mind.”

“It’s the least I can do.”

Jade wasn’t convinced. The least he could’ve done was ignore the request or kick her out of the building before the acquisition talks even started.

He’d given her the opportunity to remain on staff during the transition, and then made a promise to honor her people and treat them fairly.

It’d taken a great deal of humility from him that he’d sat through her questions without lashing out.

As he’d said, respect was earned, and he’d just secured hers.

“I can see why you like it here.”

“It’s quiet. Peaceful.” Jade’s whisper harmonized with the subtle sway of a willow’s feather-light branches.

“And absolutely gorgeous.”

As they walked beneath the willow trees, Niko’s hand found hers. A small gesture, one that she should’ve shied away from if she was thinking clearly, but her fingers tightened around his.

They’d walked for almost ten minutes before they were entirely out of earshot of the few humans in the park.

“Do you come here often?”

“When I have the time. Not as often as I’d like.”

Niko’s expression tightened at the sadness in her tone, and questions lingered in his darkly shadowed gaze. He studied her for a minute, seeming to weigh his next question.

“Why are you here in Chicago when your legion capital is hundreds of miles away on the southern border of Illinois?”

The question was unexpected. Though they’d spoken at length about the company and his acquisition, they’d seldom discussed their immortal lives.

From the moment Julian had sent her away from the capital—the place where every single one of her kinsmen lived—she’d questioned the reason.

It’d made sense at the time he’d explained it—to make the legion money and give her leopard a chance to settle—but being away from her legion had bound her soul up in knots.

Before the queen had been murdered and the princess vanished, primes had direct blood bonds with royalty.

Those bonds were reaffirmed every century, but in the monarch’s absence, they’d destabilized.

As a consequence, they dealt with the decline of their magic as they aged, the growing rogue problem, and species infertility.

With the labyrinth deteriorating, the distance between Jade and her legion had become painful, the connection growing more and more strained and fragile. Julian could no longer support her as he once had.

Like all other Sagani, every time she used her magic, she ran the risk of magical corrosion.

Shifting was the only magic that didn’t deteriorate but unfortunately, Jade couldn’t even do that right.

She’d lived this way for decades, isolated among mortals, trying to ration her magic and feeling disenfranchised from her prime.

Perhaps it was a good thing she’d be returning soon.

She couldn’t admit any of this to Niko. She went so long without answering that she nearly dismissed the question, but his steadfast gaze never left her.

“My prime needed an incoming cash flow,” was her hesitant answer. “I volunteered, and he found me most suitable. I started McArthur Vegas, and I’ve been here since.”

The words tasted funny, but she couldn’t remember it any differently.

Trying to recall the conversation, she frowned.

The memories surrounding it were fuzzy—it’d been a point in her life when her headaches had been debilitating.

She’d been losing hours at a time, and her leopard had been off-the-charts aggressive.

Thumbing her temple where that familiar headache seemed to throb again, she continued walking.

“For twenty years?” Niko was in disbelief. “Surely you visit often, right?”

Even well-established legion bonds needed regular interaction to secure their viability. The greater the distance, the greater the strain on the prime and the kindred. If they went too long without contact, the psychic bond could shatter, and the kindred would become an exiled.

Those without the safety and security of a legion were thrust into the spaces between territories, often fighting tooth and nail with other immortals to secure a space of their own.

Commonly, they turned rogue, giving into magical corrosion and losing their sanity and higher reasoning along with it.

Twenty years ago, she’d worried that her cat’s uncontrolled behavior and her own unstable magic would force Julian to exile her for the good of the legion.

Her shifts had become painful, exhausting, and neither Quinn nor Julian could pinpoint the cause of her cat’s distress.

No one had been able to help her, and she’d worried that her cat was either taking control or her magic was destabilizing.

It’d been one of the many reasons she’d come to the city. In Julian’s words, a new environment and time away from whatever was causing her cat’s discomfort and the gaps in her memory might do them both good.

“I visited a year ago, but it’s been too long.” Her fingers, whether by intention or need, cinched tighter around his.

“Jade, I’m obviously no fan of your prime, but speaking as an outsider looking in, that’s no way to live,” Niko warned. “How could he have cast you out here and not reinforced ties with you often?”

“It isn’t like that,” she insisted. “He’s busy and so am I.”

“Doesn’t matter.” He slashed his free hand through the air. “Risking exile is foolish.”

Something about the comment made her bristle. “Why do you even care, Niko? Thanks to your acquisition, I’m out of my company, and out of a job. My life—my legion—shouldn’t be your concern. I’m not a fool. If I thought my bond with Julian was breaking, I’d do something about it.”

“You have to know that being away from your legion for decades isn’t good for you.”

“And what, you’re suddenly concerned about my welfare?” She scoffed. “We shared a meal, Niko. We’re not friends.”

“All I’m saying is that something doesn’t add up. It’s not like Julian is hurting for money. He still takes dues from every legion under the guise of keeping the crown afloat—and we all pay through the nose for it.”

“Ah, you must think that maintaining the palace and its staff is free?” Jade gave an accusatory laugh. “The Anchoria need a place to live. What would you have them do, shack up in a motel somewhere? The only hope of our species, left to fend for themselves?”

Niko’s gaze darkened. “No, but I’m certain Julian isn’t housing them out of the goodness of his heart.”

“You’re ridiculous,” she growled. “Julian is singlehandedly saving our society from extinction. He’s the saint we needed when our princess abandoned us.”

The anger that had built beneath Niko’s features shifted to suspicion. He tipped away from her, distancing himself from where they’d both leaned in. His every scrutiny seemed to settle fully on her, making her immediately uncomfortable in her own skin.

“That is the third time you’ve said that exact phrase, Jade.”

“What?”

“You’ve used that exact same phrase three times. Three different conversations.” Suspicion shifted to something close to concern. “Why do you keep repeating it?”

“Because it’s true.” There was no other answer.

“Is it?” Niko softened, his shoulders loosening as he explained, “Think about it. It’s the Anchoria and their efforts to synthesize what we lack. They are singlehandedly saving our race from extinction, not Julian.”

As she tried to digest the words, pain yawned awake behind her temples.

“Julian may house them, but they are the ones who pay the price for keeping our people alive. They are the ones who give of themselves so that we may live. So that we can still have children,” he insisted. “Julian is just the one who holds their schedule.”

It was true—all of it. The Anchoria had been trying to keep their race alive for centuries.

It was a losing battle, and they were desperate to delay the final defeat.

Try as she might, she couldn’t seem to connect the two disparate parts of thought that Niko had called out.

One side of her argued in Julian’s defense, while the other was frantically pulling away.

She pinched her temples. A persistent throb beat inside her skull, and though she longed to speak up on her prime’s behalf, she couldn’t seem to battle through it.

The man who’d brought about her discomfort stood opposite her.

The immature fool mask had shattered. Whereas everyone believed Niko was a billionaire playboy with too much money to spend on fancy cars and merely a lucky streak of business decisions, there was far more to him.

It’d taken his concern about her to shatter that illusion.

“Are you okay?”

The sound of his voice made her wince. “Headache. I’ll be fine.”

“I can call for a mender?”

She shook her head—then immediately regretted it. “No, I get them all the time. It’s not worth it.”

Opening her eyes, she caught sight of the way he looked at her. His antagonism had suddenly dissolved in the face of her pain. Though it looked like he wanted to say more, he hesitated.

“What can I do?”

“It’ll go away soon,” she whispered. “Distract me?”

When he pulled her against his chest, coaxing her into a gentle sway, Jade tried not to dissolve into him like melted chocolate. She tried not to notice the powerful contours of his body, or the way the soft puffs of his breath tickled along her neck.

Her spine straightened, but she didn’t pull away. “What are you doing?”

His smirk returned. “Distracting you. Dance with me.”

“There’s no music.”

A deep, rumbling plume of laughter began in his chest, vibrating through them both. “Of course, there is, dove. Listen .”

Resting her head back against his chest, her eyes closed.

Into the space around them, a tune became clear. The gentle rustle of the whispering pines played a melody that encouraged the soul to unwind. It was mirrored by the lullaby voiced by drumming flowers, and the whistle of wind through leafed trees. They were dancing under the stars.

Jade’s soul stirred in response. “Beautiful.”