Sig watched the immortal go, not bothering to hide his smile now, looking quite pleased with himself for how irritated he’d made her. “She hasn’t changed.”
“Why won’t she invite you in?”
“She’s a little mad at me still.”
“Still?”
“I said something to her during the Italian Renaissance, and I gather she’s still annoyed about it.”
“What could you possibly have said to make her mad for more than four hundred years?”
He sat next to me, leaning back in the chair and looking up at the sky. “Who knows? To an immortal four hundred years isn’t that long. Calliope is much older than I am, but she’s still a woman, and even immortal women are capable of holding irrational grudges.”
“What did you say?”
He smiled at me. “I told her I didn’t love her.”
I stared at him, trying to process the meaning, but I couldn’t grasp the enormity of the two oldest, most powerful beings I’d ever met having once been a couple. “Oh,” was all I said. “Why did you tell Brigit I was going to be her liaison with the council? You have to be a warden to be a liaison to baby vamps.”
“You were promoted.”
“I’m not a vampire.”
“You are many things, Secret.”
We stared at each other. He’d combed his blond hair back so I could see nothing but his glacier-blue eyes.
“You know.”
“Yes,” he replied. “I know everything.”
“And the others?”
“Daria and Juan Carlos cannot know the truth. Not ever.”
I let out a breath I hadn’t realized I was holding. “Thank you.”
“I’ve given you this position because the rest of the council cares very little about the daily lives of wardens. When you just worked for us, you were constantly drawing attention to yourself.” He sighed. “If you are one of us, you will stop being considered an outsider, and it will be less likely for you to fall under serious scrutiny.”
“And that starts with me babysitting Miss Vampire USA?”
“She is a vampire because of you.”
“I didn’t make her.”
“Did you not? Really.” Sig arched a loaded eyebrow at me. “If you hadn’t taken Peyton’s fang, or killed his rogue spawn without permission, would Miss Stewart be a vampire today? It may be ripples in a pond, Secret, but your actions have their consequences.”
I looked at the stars so I didn’t have to admit he was right. “Brigit isn’t why you’re here. And I doubt you came to check on my health.”
“This is true.”
“So, what? Why come across dimensions just to get me out of bed?”
“Would you rather I came across dimensions to get you into bed?”
I frowned at him.
“No, then?” He chuckled, then rose from the seat so I was staring up the full six-and-a-half-foot length of him. It was a daunting view. “I came to give you your next job.”
His announcement reminded me of the last job he’d assigned me, and phantom pains stabbed through me at various key places.
“Peyton. What happened to him?”
“We are taking care of that.”
“He’s alive?”
“As alive as a vampire can be. Though I’m certain he wishes he were not. He will say nothing about what he learned of you from Mercy, I’ve seen to that. You did excellent work. Ingrid was very complimentary, which is rare for her.”
Apart from telling him how well I was able to bleed out, I couldn’t imagine what kind of compliments Ingrid had paid me.
“And my mother?”
Sig’s calm veneer flickered. “She escaped. Your wolf king sent someone back so she could be dealt with under the covenants of the pack, but she was gone. I’m sorry.”
I took a moment to think about that. Mercy McQueen, the mother who hated me enough to sell me out to her mate and his vampire associate, was still out there somewhere.
“What do you want?” I was exhausted, weak and so sore the slightest shift made me feel like I was being compressed by the Death Star trash compactor. What I wanted more than anything was to be in a bed with Lucas or Desmond beside me, and to feel whole again. I did not want a vampire protégée or more responsibility from the council. I certainly didn’t want whatever job Sig had felt the need to hand-deliver to me before I’d been given a chance to heal.
He withdrew a small black envelope from his pocket and placed it on the seat next to me. It looked different from the white linen envelopes I usually got from him. “I am so very sorry.” He bowed down and placed a hand on my cheek, staring at me for a long time with such intensity I was unable to turn away.
“She was never really my mother.”
“That’s not why I’m sorry.”
He dropped his hand and walked away. Before I could think of a proper response he had disappeared into the shadows and was gone.
I picked up the black envelope and flipped it over in my hands several times, tracing the outline of the wax seal with my fingertips. The seal was an engraving of a peacock feather.
Never in the six years I’d worked for the council had Sig met with me alone to give me the name of a target. I almost always received them from Holden. It felt too intimate to receive my orders straight from the hands of the Tribunal’s leader, and I was instantly suspicious of the envelope.
My heart was pounding inside my rib cage like a frightened bird trying to use its body to invent freedom where there was none. I took a deep, rattling breath and broke the seal on the envelope, but paused before opening it.
This was big. It was important. Sig wouldn’t have brought it to me this way if it weren’t. Something in me understood that when I opened the envelope the whole game changed. When I opened it nothing would ever be the same.
I released the breath and slid out the stiff white card inside. On it, in Sig’s sharp, looping scrawl, a name was written in mottled black ink.
That name was Holden Chancery.