Page 38

CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

R onin laid on his bed, his hand behind his head and his knee bobbing with restless energy.

He needed something to do. Something to distract his overactive mind.

Cassandra had left with Silas about forty-five minutes ago to head to the Kennel. Ronin had offered to accompany them, but she’d waved him off. Said one hulking male bodyguard was suspicious enough.

Then had made some smarmy comment about Ronin helping Mireille down in the shop instead.

But today’s training session with Mireille was the source of his restless energy. Sensations overwhelmed him: her soft body pressed against his chest, her tortuously perfect ass grinding against his cock, her silky hair gliding over his shoulder.

Not to mention the confession he’d wrung from her when he’d had her pinned beneath him.

Because I was still in love with you!

She was so fucking cool and collected all the time. Even back when they’d been at the Otto estate together. Getting her to admit to any vulnerability was a challenge.

So for her to admit that she’d still loved him, despite what they’d done to each other…

It was the most vulnerable thing she could have said.

And he had no idea how to feel about it.

Didn’t even know what in the name of the Creator had inspired him to ask the question in the first place. It was like the touch of her skin and the scent of her arousal combined with the sight of those terrible new scars had short-circuited his brain.

He’d scrambled out of that training room like a coward. He’d avoided dinner with her and Cass like a coward. And now he was hiding in his room.

Like a coward.

Wanna go for a run? he asked his wolf

No, thanks. The creature licked at a paw. Why don’t you take Cassandra’s suggestion? Go downstairs and help Mireille. That must be more interesting than running circles around the city wall.

Ronin grunted. More interesting for who?

Exactly.

You’re worse than Cassandra.

His wolf hissed out a laugh. She and I have similar objectives.

Ronin groaned, then rose from his bed.

And clomped down the stairs to Mireille’s shop.

Ronin leaned a hip against a shelf, arms crossed, and watched Mireille wipe down her mortar and pestle with a white cloth.

Her confession hung like a poisonous fog between them, gathering in the shadowed corners, ready to strike.

“Need help with anything?” he asked, trying to keep his tone bored. Disinterested. Nonchalant.

He hoped she couldn’t sense his pounding heartbeat.

Focus glued to her cleaning, Mireille jutted her chin toward an iron pot at the end of her work table. “That’s cooled and ready for bottling. Vials and corks are in the cabinet behind you.”

He nodded, then turned around and opened a wooden door to reveal a gleaming row of glass bottles. “How many?”

Mireille assessed the liquid in the pot. “Ten should do it.”

Ronin grabbed his supplies, then settled in beside her. The table was small, barely enough space for one person. As they worked, their elbows bumped, heat simmering his veins at each and every touch.

He ignored it as he ladled the liquid into a funnel. Once the vial was full, he brought it to his nose and sniffed. Lavender. “What does this one do?”

“Calming draught.” Mireille didn’t look up, but she didn’t move away from him either.

“Where do you get the ingredients to make all this?”

Mireille’s eyes glazed over, and his protective instincts flared. “The Brethren put in special requests with the Koenig for me.”

Ronin went preternaturally still, his fingers stilling on the vials. “Like Jonas? That dark-haired Brethren who was bothering you on Harvest Night?” He failed to keep the bite out of his tone.

So much for nonchalance.

She slammed down her pestle. “You have no interest in me anymore. So I don’t know why you care.”

He steeled his spine. He didn’t care. Of course he didn’t fucking care. He’d had plenty of females since they’d parted. It would be hypocritical of him to assume she’d been celibate while he hadn’t.

Still, he couldn’t stop the surge of intense jealousy. The thought of that disgusting beast—fucking Jonas —putting his meaty paws on Mireille, rutting into her, using the body she’d taunted Ronin with today…

The body that had once belonged to him.

He smothered his possessiveness. If he involuntarily shifted right now, his wolf would wreak havoc through Mireille’s tiny shop. The creature was already howling and scratching at his insides. He attempted a few deep breaths to calm him.

He reached across the table and clasped her hand in a silent apology. He ran his thumb across the back of her knuckles, and she shuddered, then pulled away and gave him her back. He could’ve sworn he heard a small hiccup. Like she was choking back a sob.

“Don’t,” she whimpered.

“Don’t what?” He stepped up behind her. Not touching, but close enough to feel her heat through the black silk of her robe. Close enough to lean down and sniff her hair. His eye nearly rolled back in his head at the sweet, floral scent.

“You ran out of that training room today like you were on fire,” she whispered, seething.

“Mireille, I?—”

“I don’t need your fucking pity , Ronin!” she roared, rounding on him. “I didn’t say I wanted to still love you. It’s been the worst burden of my fucking life. If I could claw this feeling out of my chest, I would have done so two centuries ago.”

She charged forward, backing him into the work table and clattering the vials. His wolf was a howling cyclone within him, and he clenched the edge of the table to keep himself under control.

She dipped in closer, and the table edge groaned under his hold. “Or better yet,” she crooned, her petal-soft lips ghosting over his flesh, “I never would have made the mistake of you in the first place.”

He couldn’t handle it. He wanted to bend her over the table, rip up her robe, smack his palm across her perfect ass. One blow for every single lie she’d just thrown at him and a few more for good measure.

He was about to snap when the shop bell jingled and Silas and Cassandra barreled in.

Ronin and Mireille careened away from each other and Cassandra gave them a knowing look before Mireille barked out a sharp, “What?”

“You two need to come upstairs,” Cassandra said.

“I have something to show you.”

“It was like I was in her mind, seeing through her eyes,” Cassandra said, fiddling with her mug.

Mireille had brewed a pot of chamomile tea while Cassandra told her and Ronin what had happened at the Kennel.

“It was similar to when I was upset the other night and you touched me,” she said, nodding toward Mireille, who’d finished stirring her own tea and had taken a seat on the couch. As far away from Ronin, who was seated at the dining table, as possible.

Cassandra had no idea what the two wolf bi-forms had been up to when she and Silas had burst into the shop. For a split second, it looked like they were on the verge of devouring each other. But they’d bounced apart faster than opposing magnets, and hadn’t said a word to each other since.

“One minute, I was in Silas’s memory, looking upon his pregnant wife, and the next second, I was in his daughter’s mind. In the present.” She took Silas’s hand. “I think she might be a member of the Teles Chrysos. Her friend mentioned something about rebels? About a meeting?”

Silas himself had lost a touch of his calm composure when Cassandra had told him his daughter’s name. He hadn’t known it. Hadn’t even known that Penelope had given birth to a female. He’d been dazed and quiet for the entire walk back to the shop. Some color had finally returned to his cheeks, thanks to the tea.

“She was in a large city,” Cassandra said. “Tons of Fae, streets packed with cars. The buildings were so tall I couldn’t even see the tops of them and the window she was looking in had a golden sheen. It was still warm outside, so I’m guessing she was somewhere in the southern part of the continent?”

Ronin tapped the table. “Sounds like Rhamnos. The Teles Chrysos leadership, not to mention a majority of their forces, are stationed in Lebaedia, not too far from there. They often journey down to the city to recruit new members. What did you say her name was again?”

“Sofia,” Silas said, testing out the syllables. Like he might never stop saying it. “Sofia Hershon. Her mother’s name is Penelope.”

Ronin shook his head. “Sorry, I don’t recognize the name. Doesn’t mean anything though. The movement is growing rapidly. She could have joined after I left for the colonies.”

“It’s okay,” Silas said with a soft smile. “Just to know that she’s alive, that she exists.” He squeezed Cassandra’s hand. “Thank you.”

“You’ll meet her,” Cassandra said. “As soon as we get out of here.”

“Well, there’s something to look forward to.” He pulled his hand away and scratched at a bushy brow, overcome.

Cassandra turned to Ronin. “I want to try it on you.”

Ronin startled. “Why?”

“Because I think the jumping occurs between blood relatives. Mireille’s father. Silas’s daughter.”

Ronin’s face paled.

“Maybe we can find Selene.” Cassandra reached a hand across the table, palm up.

“Okay,” Ronin said, glancing toward Mireille who offered a sympathetic nod. “What do I… Is there a specific memory I need to conjure?”

Cassandra shook her head. “Any memory will do.”

Mireille pushed up off the couch and ambled over, reaching into the pocket of her robe and placing a chess piece on the table.

The white queen.

He shot Mireille a rueful smile as he said, “I’ve got a few that might work.”

Ronin’s memories of his sister did work.

They were sweet. Playful, even. Cassandra could tell how deep their bond ran, even in the few memories where the twins had been at each other’s throats.

Yes, the memories worked fine.

What did not work was the mind jumping.

They’d tried recent memories. Like the last time Ronin and Selene had seen each other before she’d been arrested. That one was a tense affair at Ronin’s sleek, modern, and very official-looking townhouse in Delos. They’d been arguing about Selene’s work with the Teles Chrysos. She was getting in with some of the more unhinged factions of the movement, taking unreasonable risks. According to Ronin, at least. Lethaphyll-powered trips to the Halfway. Studying chronomancy, that long-suppressed seer’s practice. Attempting to commune with the Fallen Goddess. And distributing Teles Chrysos propaganda throughout Imperial-leaning northern Nephes.

After that memory, they’d gone back further. Selene tending to Ronin’s wounds when he’d returned to their family cottage in Denevrae after he’d acquired his injury. Mireille had gotten up to make more tea during that one.

Then even further and further back until they reached one of Ronin’s earliest memories. Two fluffy white wolf pups napping together, the smaller resting her black-nosed snout atop the larger’s neck after an exhausting morning of shifting practice.

But every time Cassandra attempted to leap into Selene’s mind, she was jolted back into her own by a solid white wall. As if something was blocking her entry.

“Shit.” She slammed her hand down on the table, making Ronin and Silas jump. “I don’t understand why it’s not working.”

Ronin dipped his head into his hands, rubbing at his patch, his voice quaking. “What if she’s dead?”

Cassandra pinched the bridge of her nose. “That can’t be it. Mireille’s father has passed, but I was still able to travel into whatever part of his mind remains in the Halfway. If Selene were dead, I’d be able to see her there, too.”

“Unless…” Mireille piped up from the kitchen, walking over with another steaming mug of tea.

“Unless what?” Cassandra asked.

She shot a nervous glance at Ronin. “Unless she was killed in the mists. And her soul is still trapped there.”

Ronin heaved out a shuddering sigh. Mireille placed her hand on his shoulder and he clutched it tightly. As if her touch were the only thing tethering him to this planet.

Cassandra frowned. “I don’t know. I’m not… I don’t think that’s it either. Whatever it is that’s keeping me from penetrating her mind feels intentional. Like someone has put up a barrier.”

“There’s one way to know for sure,” Silas piped up from beside the fireplace. “Wormwood keeps ledgers in his office above World’s End. Records of every single prisoner—their name, number, and sentence—that has ever breached the wards. The wards themselves provide the information.”

“What are you saying?” Mireille asked for Ronin, who was currently incapable of speech.

Silas looked to Ronin, compassion glowing in his moss-green eyes. “If we can get a look at those ledgers, we’ll know whether you need to keep searching the city and the mists.

“Because if her name isn’t in there, then she never passed through the wards.”