Jessica Andersen - Nightkeepers

‘‘Not exactly what I said, but close enough for government work.’’ She rose, her expression guarded, as though she’d taken everything that’d just happened, everything they’d just said to each other, and shoved it deep down inside for later consideration. ‘‘I’ll tell them to meet you in the main room for an organizational sit-down, so you can come up with a plan for the days we’ve got left before the conjunction. I’ll give you fifteen minutes to grab a shower and mainline some coffee.’’

‘‘Thanks. And, Leah?’’

She turned back near the door. ‘‘Yeah?’’

‘‘I’m glad you’re staying. And I’m sorry. For all of it.’’ He was sorry for disappearing on her the night before and leaving her to look foolish in front of the others. More, he was sorry for not being the man who could give her the stars and the moon, and all the love she deserved. And he was sorry that, even knowing he wasn’t that man, he couldn’t let her go.

‘‘Apology accepted,’’ she said, though he wasn’t sure which part she’d agreed to. Sending him a small finger wave and a sad smile, she slipped through the door, out into the sun-bright day.

When she was gone he sat there for a moment, staring after her, feeling shaken and stirred up and far more like a man in the grips of obsession than the levelheaded leader he was supposed to become, or the king his people needed him to be. He wished he knew how to balance the two, how to be a better man. But at the same time, he was realizing that something had changed. He didn’t know whether it was because of Leah’s lecture the night before, the motto she’d given to Skywatch, or his trip into the barrier, but for the first time he wasn’t wishing for an escape or an out.

He was trying to figure out how the hell to get it all done without losing himself in the process.

Leah was feeling shaky and achy as she crossed the pool deck to the mansion, squinting in the too-bright sun.

A few of the twinges were from doing the sleeping-sitting -up thing while waiting for Strike to come around, but the vast majority were from that hell-and-gone kiss he’d laid on her, the one that proved she’d been lying to herself when she’d tried to say that being with him hadn’t been as good as she remembered, that she’d fantasized it into something it wasn’t.

Nope. It was all that, and then some.

Which was a problem, not only because he was determined not to let it happen again, but also because she couldn’t be sure how much of the connection was real and how much was a product of the circumstances.

It was a given that what’d happened in the sacred chamber during the solstice had been courtesy of a god, probably Kulkulkan, trying to gain a foothold on earth by going co-op with her gray matter. And perhaps the sizzle the day after the aphelion had been part magic, too. But since then she hadn’t shown a lick of magical talent, and the sizzle was still alive and kicking harder by the day.

Okay, so she was hot for the guy, magic or no magic. But what about him? There was no way she could separate the man from the sorcery or his upbringing, and if he believed the dreams meant the gods intended them to be together, that was the direction his brain was going to go, whether or not they were compatible. And aside from the whole save-the-world thing, she was enough of a girl to want him to want her , not just the woman the gods had shoved at him.

Though she’d ended her share of relationships, she’d heard enough of the old, ‘‘it’s not you, it’s me,’’ to know that it really was her most of the time. She was too much work for not enough payoff, too judgmental, too driven by the job and her own concepts of right and wrong.

Was it so much to ask for a guy who wanted those parts of her, too? One who was willing to fight for her, not just against their common enemy, but against the tenets that said they couldn’t be together?

And that brought her right back to the thirteenth prophecy and the whole, ‘‘I’d love you but then I’d have to kill you’’ thing, which just sucked beyond sucking.

Trying to banish the faint suspicion that his interpretation of the thirteenth prophecy was a cosmic version of, ‘‘it’s not you, it’s me,’’ Leah pushed through the doors leading from the pool deck to the mansion’s great room, intending to hunt up Jox and pass along Strike’s message.

The winikin was waiting for her just inside the door, wearing jeans, a light-colored long-sleeved shirt, a pair of rope sandals, and an expression that said he wished she’d just go away. Permanently.

‘‘Oh.’’ Leah stopped in her tracks, feeling off balance. ‘‘You’re here.’’

‘‘I was headed out to check on Strike.’’ The winikin moved to push through the door.

Leah blocked him. ‘‘He’s fine. Told me to tell you to assemble the trainees for a meeting.’’ Jox just stood and glared and she did the same, and though she hadn’t intended the standoff, she figured they’d been headed there all along. ‘‘Go around me or go through me,’’ she said evenly. ‘‘But I’m not moving.’’

The winikin ’s mouth went tight. ‘‘The barbecue was a good idea, as was the name.’’ It took her a moment to realize he’d actually said something nice to her, but he blunted the shock by saying, ‘‘That doesn’t mean I think you’re good for him.’’

That stung—especially given her and Strike’s recent conversation—but she didn’t let Jox see that he’d scored. Instead, she said, ‘‘The trainees, Jox. Now.’’

He held his glare for a five-count before he said, ‘‘They’re in the training hall. I’ll go tell Strike to meet you there.’’

Then he brushed past her, and even though he’d been the one to leave, Leah felt thoroughly dismissed.

Tears prickled at the backs of her eyes, but she refused to give him the satisfaction, keeping her head high as she marched through the mansion and out the other side, muttering imprecations under her breath.

Once she was outside and the double doors were shut at her back so he couldn’t see, she leaned against them and took a moment. ‘‘Damn it.’’

She’d tried to make friends with the winikin , knowing how important he was to Strike and the others. Failing that, she’d tried to negotiate a workable peace, and thought they’d made some progress in that department.

Apparently not, though she wasn’t sure what she’d done wrong. Probably something to do with Strike’s flying-serpent mark and her being human. And there wasn’t much she could do about that, was there?

Shoving away from the doors with a muttered curse, she strode to the steel-span building on the far side of the ceiba tree. Before she’d even entered the training hall, she could hear shouts coming from inside, and as she swung through the door she was figuring on a pickup basketball game. But the trainees weren’t playing, she saw the moment she was inside.

They were working.

Rabbit sat off in a corner, frowning as he kindled a red-orange fireball the size of his head and held it suspended between his hands. Brandt stood nearby, holding his palms up and out, as though he’d been frozen mid-mugging. Then Patience blinked back in, becoming visible standing opposite him with her palms pressed to his. Sven, Alexis, and Nate were war-gaming it in the middle of the football field-size room, spinning and feinting with blunted stone knives, three against one as Michael blocked the attacks with shield magic. The only one missing was Jade.

Holy crap, Leah thought, freezing in place. She’d seen bits and pieces of the magic before. Hell, she’d made a kitchen knife fly. But she’d never seen it all at once like this, couldn’t even begin to imagine what it would be when they reached their full powers and learned to link up, never mind what it must’ve been like before, when there had been hundreds of magi fighting as a unit.