If Eden succeeded, Xander died, a fact he didn't learn for many years after she left him writhing in agony on the roof of a tavern.

No, he didn't hate Eden.

"You move on," Xander replied.

"Not exactly the answer I sought."

"It's all there is."

"There's no greater purpose?" Eden asked. She ran a hand through her short, dark hair. "I mean, what do you do?"

"I make sure ambitious people like you don't fuck up this world."

"You? A white knight?" Eden laughed.

"More like the black knight everyone hates but won't piss off," Xander said.

"Very fitting."

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"You're free to do whatever you want here."

"Free," Eden murmured. "Interesting take on it. Never considered myself enslaved to my cause."

"I avoid attachments of any kind," Xander said.

"Here we differ. You are happy having nothing and living alone in the shadows. I am not."

"Having nothing?" Xander repeated, irritated. "I think of it as remaining invulnerable, something you taught me."

"I guess I did, didn't I, boy?"

Xander rolled his eyes. Eden's smile was genuine, the first Xander had ever seen. The driven woman was different than Xander remembered; this Eden had no vamp-army or grandiose plan of destroying a world. She seemed … lost.

"Darian," Xander called.

The Grey God approached. The Original Human eyed him.

"Darian, meet Eden. Eden, Darian," Xander said and rose. "Good luck."

He walked away, Traveling back to his condo.

You are happy having nothing.

Of all the things Eden might've said to him, this one actually stung. Xander didn't exactly know why. If he wanted something, he took it.

His cat nuzzled one leg as he stood, thinking hard, in the middle of his bright condo. After the months he spent making sure no one killed the new Black God before Jonny found his footing, Xander began to think he might've …forgotten something. He went from ten thousand years in exile to Jonny's camp to here.

He didn't have nothing: he had what he wanted.

Why, then, did he feel a familiar stir of deep-set anger?




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