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LUCIAN

“ N o clue who you could possibly mean,” I blatantly lied.

Her was five foot six of smooth, lightly freckled skin and easy smiles, wild fiery curls and those eerie blue eyes, the shades of the varying waters in the deepest ocean.

Her was my opposite. As light as I was dark, her very presence tasting of sunshine, while they call me the prince of darkness—to my face, in any case.

I knew they had other names for me behind my back.

Kleos Valesco. Sweet, big-eyed, kind-smiled, infant-kissing, puppy-cuddling darling of the vale.I was certain that was what her badge would say, if archivists received them.

I found it fascinating that she genuinely kept that image, when all I felt around her was pressing, imminent danger.Why didn’t anyone else feel it?

It was inherent to my core power to feel the living energy of anyone, any living thing around me. My ability reached for it, tasting, testing, assessing all potential prey.

Kleos was a wall. Shielded, reinforced, impregnable.

I only had a chance to analyze her from up close once, last year, but one little probing against her and I was certain.

I’d met gods easier to read than her. I had no clue what she was exactly, but one thing was certain: between us, I wasn’t the freak of nature.

A lesser man, with that knowledge in mind, would have fled. Instead, I watched. From a safe distance.

As a trainee, aiming to work in the archives, she worked on the lower floors, while I was on the seventh level. I believed there was little to no chance our paths should ever cross. Frankly there was no reason at all we should ever stand within spitting distance.

Then I learned my mistake. Gideon was her cousin .

There was no reason why I would have guessed: the colossus and the dainty little witch neither looked nor felt like the same species, let alone actual relatives. With Gideon, what I saw was exactly what I got. Kleos? Not so much.

I didn’t know her, and I didn’t want to.

The one instance we’d exchanged a word was when she, her friend, and their mentor turned up at my door at the crack of dawn—all right, noon, but it was the night after a revel—escorting a client for a demon summoning.

It should have been a typical Thursday, but her presence in my home made it… strange.

I warned her my cat might bite. That was it. Twenty-something years in the same city, and we never addressed another word to each other.

In the last six months, Kleos joined Gideon for lunch, came up to our floor for a cup of tea if we weren’t on an assignment, and we’d never spoken.

How did Gideon notice the girl was a problem for me? I supposed it was proof that he wasn’t the complete himbo he appeared to be, despite the ripped muscles, long blond hair and general surfer looks.

My partner laughed in my face. “Right. And if I told Kleos we’re throwing you a goodbye party and invited her, you wouldn’t turn up, huh?”

I hesitated.

The situation he painted was an alluring one. Drinks. People let their guards down around alcohol. I could lurk and observe her some more. I could even, if a copious amount of wine was involved, ask her what the hell was wrong with her, and finally put the mystery to rest.

Unsolved riddles irked me.

In normal settings, Miss Valesco, daughter of the high magistrate and the white witch presiding over all priestesses in the city, did not speak with the likes of me. It was a miracle Gideon took to me despite our respective families. Kleos was wiser; she stayed away. I stayed away.

But with alcohol…

The evil light wizard smirked. “She asked about you, you know. Wondered how you’d ended up here. The first dark sorcerer to ever work as a protector.”

I feigned indifference. I was not bothered by what I did to end up here. If I got the chance, I’d murder the guy all over again, never mind the fact that it earned me months of filing paperwork for at least four mind-numbing hours a day, and getting hexed at occasionally.

The hexes were fun.

“If the pay was better, I wouldn’t be the first,” I retorted, avoiding his point.

“Posh git. The pay’s fine.”

I let out an undignified cackle. “A hundred gold a day for risking my skin is fine ?”

“Two thousand gold a month is tons of money,” Gideon argued. “If you went out in the outside world, you’d know. A gold is, what, ten dollars? Eight euros? Six pounds? Portal to any city, and ask the first hundred people you see if they make twenty thousand dollars a month. Go on, I dare you.”

I shook my head. “My other jobs don’t pay any less than a hundred golds per hour—or minute, depending on what I’m doing.”

Gideon seemed to have lost his ability to speak, which was an improvement. But he regrouped quickly. “Well, if your wallet is suffering so much, why not let me buy you a drink?”

The idea that my wallet could be affected by drinks was laughable. Before I could point it out, I stilled and bristled, my spine straightening.

Oh, sweet darkness, no.

“Knock knock!” a crisp, cheerful voice as sweet as morning dew called.

She was here.

Kleos walked in, smiling as she held a metal tin up, shaking it a little.

Naturally, she made a beeline for her cousin.

“I heard you were coming back today, so I baked your favorite. The tyrant finally gave us a break so I figured I’d bring them up to you.”

She baked. I bet she hummed while she did it, and some bloody birds started singing with her.

I dared a glance and her inner light froze me all over again.

Back to my report. My fascinating report. Yes, five-point hexing ? —

“You know you can call Mom Auntie Hilda. Tyrant is a little vague in this place; it could apply to, like, twenty different people I can name off the top of my head. Our boss is making us duplicate our reports.”

I wasn’t missing a word of the exchange, and my fountain pen wasn’t moving to add a single word.

Fuck .

“She made us run around the training arena twice . No one else deserves the title as much as her. As for the duplication, let me help. Which pen do you use for your reports?”

I could not help myself. I glanced up.

I'd seen her cast minor spells from a distance, like warming her food, cooling her drink, levitating an object slightly out of reach. It wasn’t anything spectacular, but I hoped seeing her magic in action would give me a clue.

Gideon handed her a clear, mass-produced ballpoint pen, a bit chewed on, and she held it for a second, golden mist gathering in her palm.

She didn’t use words. Only kids and third-rate sorcerers needed to. Kleos was neither.

“Go on, try it! Put a blank page under yours.”

Gideon did as he was told, scribbling a few words. “Crikey! I didn’t know that enchantment.”

She shrugged. “I crafted it. The archives are also fond of duplicates, and triplicates . I wish they would finally work out a way to digitize spells that won’t make computers explode already.”

I glanced down at my own pen—a gold-tipped, monogrammed instrument far more worthy of being imbued with beautiful, useful magic.

“You and me both. Thanks, coz.”

Catching a quick look from Gideon, followed by a smirk, I could practically read his mind. Go on. Ask her, you dolt.

Never mind. If she wrote an enchantment, I’d be able to do it, too. I already saw the logic behind her work; I only had to figure out the right elements to invoke. If I hadn’t been distracted, I would probably have already cracked it.

“You can thank me after one of these. I tweaked them!” She opened the tin and I caught a whiff of butter and softness and happiness and I would literally have killed for a bite.

Of the cake, just to be clear. I did not go around biting random chicks. Unless they begged me to.

“Blimey, Kleos! Almond and vanilla?”

“You know it.”

“Gosh, this batch looks so cute.”

The fucking sweetheart beamed at her equally affable cousin. It was sincerely disgusting how damn nice they were, openly, for all to see. Compliments and niceties and baked goods ought to be reserved for special occasions, behind closed doors. I bet they hugged all the time.

“Do you have time for tea?” Gideon asked, waving toward the kettle tucked between a pile of reference books and one of the artifacts we brought back, safely locked in an iron box.

“Oh, yes please. Your mom gave us an hour. I’m not bothering you, am I?”

Yes. Yes, you are. Please go away.

“No, we just got back from that stakeout in Vienna a couple of hours ago. Paperwork time.”

From the corner of my vision, I caught a certain glint in the blond hulk of a man’s blue eyes.

“In fact, that man right there just saved my bloody life,” he told her, pointing straight at me.

By all hells, why was he bringing her attention to me?

To torture you, you imbecile.

For the first time in six months, Kleos turned to look at me, forced to acknowledge my existence. We had a good thing going on, a status quo, where we didn’t speak, and I only looked when no one noticed. That was over.

My eyes meeting hers felt like a challenge. I refused to look away first. It was a matter of principle. A Regis did not bow down to anyone.

Oblivious, Gideon continued his tirade, seemingly unaware he’d just shattered all rules of engagement.

“We were in pursuit of a stolen artifact trader—you’ll get fun stuff from our loot to put away!

Anyway, I didn’t notice a five-mark trap.

When you’re in a marked hexagon, triggered, you can’t get out until whatever spell is trapped in there is done.

That one was a slicing curse—it would have fucking cut me into pieces. ”