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  In five minutes, Cade was inside the palace, slinking along the crystal sides, invisible to the maids and footmen circulating in icy white and sapphire—Edward’s royal colors, exactly as crimson red was Alana’s.

  Three minutes of the jackal’s steady lope, and Cade reached an empty chamber that held a walnut four-poster bed, several matching pieces of furniture, and little else. He shifted in a burst of sparks, padding naked toward one of the tall walnut armoires on the south wall. A few days after Edward had sent for Shade, Cade’d stashed clothes in case he’d needed to sneak in. An example of how his pain-in-the-ass, overthinking-everything human side served him well.

  He dressed on automatic pilot, donning the silk mask that had become Shade’s trademark. He looked like a damn bandit in the getup, but his handler had insisted that a merc had to hide his identity. This was the best idea that didn’t include wigs.

  Lastly, he slipped a backup dagger into the specially designed sheath he’d built into his boots. Tucking his trousers over it, he straightened and sauntered out of the door.

  Taking the air into his nose, he identified Edward’s particular too-sweet scent, the thought intruding, as it always did, that the human must wash in sugar water to mask the more common human scent of soap, blood and bone. He began tracking it with the stealth both inherent to his kind and born of training with fellow Blades.

  His nose led him to Edward’s private office. A guard waited out front, naturally, but Cade dealt in information. He knew another way into the sanctuary of the Southlands’ high ruler.

  Backtracking to the previous chamber—a disused sitting room—Cade strode up to the white brick fireplace in the center of the far wall. It sat opposite cloth-covered furniture that watched like waiting phantoms. Dust was not allowed in Edward’s palace.

  Eyeing his masked face in the large polished mirror that hung above the fireplace, he muttered to himself, “Stand and deliver.”

  Shaking his head, he reached out and, with both hands, tugged on the gleaming golden candelabra that sat at either end of the mahogany mantel. There was a solid crack before the entire fireplace swiveled around.

  As it rotated, Cade knew a similar fireplace would appear on the other side to hide its secret. Handy if a ruler had to leave in a hurry. Disaster if an invader knew. Good thing for Edward that Cade wasn’t swayed by a pretty face and a shared past, or Edward would be buried in a shallow grave before the sun rose to its full height.

  Taking a moment to negotiate the darkness, Cade examined his surroundings with the keen eyesight of a jackal. The walls were concrete, a studied opposite to the outer palace. Condensation slid down the walls in a way that made him shudder, his animal disliking the cold and damp atmosphere.

  Moving with haste down the narrow passage, he paused next to the small rectangular window that peered into Edward’s private office. It nestled in a bookcase, the spines of genuine books carefully arranged on the prized wooden shelves. The bookcase itself was mirrored in Edward’s office.

  Cade tugged on the spine that read Revolution: The History of the Kingdom, grinning at Edward’s choice. Revolution, revolving. Ha.

  The wheels spun with oiled ease, clicking into place with barely a sound. A fire crackled in the copper grate to Cade’s left, despite the early hour. Bathed in light, the walls of the office, painted a regal russet and decorated with gold filigree around the topmost edges, glowed as slick as the day they were first painted. Precious objects littered the room in ruthlessly organized fashion. Real wood, rich rugs, gleaming floorboards, precious paintings. History swathed this room, speaking of a past that the poorer populace of Edward’s territory barely knew.

  A niggle rested between Cade’s eyebrows. Alana was already influencing him. Poverty didn’t disappear overnight. Edward did as much as he could, as Cade had seen firsthand, and continued to work so that one day people would no longer starve.

  He’d first met the human when working a case, eight years previous. Cade had been tracking a ’Napper, a member of an evil group that stole powerful kids and sold them to the highest bidder in private auctions. He’d received word that the Champion of the Peace, the official who oversaw the trials after the Prosecution squad was finished, knew more than he’d revealed to the Treaty’s officials. Cade had stalked him to a gala, then to a back room, where the Champion had ordered him seized by guards. And he’d known, staring into cold gray eyes, that the Champion had been the one orchestrating the ’Nappings.

  Cade had been poised to shift. Flash-guns had cocked everywhere, their high-pitched warning spelling Cade’s death. And Edward had barreled around the corner. Drawing his ceremonial sword, he had begun to fight—on Shade’s side.

  Masking his shock, Cade had nevertheless made his way to the Champion, insisting he tell him where the kids were being held. A flicker of something out of the corner of his eye had caught his attention, but he had turned almost too late.

  A guard wanting to prove himself a hero had flung himself at the merc. Cade had raised his weapon, throwing the other man off. He’d heard a flash-gun retort, felt the laser bolt pass by his ear.

  When he’d turned, he’d seen the stark fact that Alana could never alter: Edward, human as he was, had saved Cade’s life by stabbing the Champion through the heart. If he hadn’t, that flash-gun fire might have hit its target.

  Cade had run when other soldiers had poured into the room, but had tracked the high ruler to the palace that night. Standing in the middle of Edward’s private office where a fire had blazed in the grate, he’d stabbed his sword into the floorboards as he’d demanded to know what the human was after.

  He still remembered Edward’s cool regard, his helpless shrug. The answer that had struck a chord with Cade’s soul.

  I will see justice done, no matter who might be behind the blow.

  One week later to the day, Edward had found and released the stolen children.

  He was a good man. He had to be.

  Cade scanned the room, slipping away from the bookcase directly to the grand desk that was overlooked by a crystal window. The high-backed throne Edward had moved into his office tucked neatly into its allotted space. The throne had been intended for his royal consort, but since the nymph queen had died from complications after an attack many years ago, Edward had taken no woman as consort. Not since his botched engagement to Alana, in any case.

  Something his twin sons, Gable and Garrett, both in their early twenties, were no doubt pleased about. It was no secret how passionate and dedicated the twins were to the territory. They’d hardly want an interloper to come in and provide yet another heir.

  The gleaming surface of the genuine wooden desk was framed by neat stacks of paper, flowing handwriting scribbled across every spare inch of the expensive parchment. Edward wasn’t a fan of technology, which was why his palace was run as a pseudoregency system, aspects of technology mixed in wherever it suited him.

  Cade picked a sheet of paper up, tilting it to the light. His eyes roved the words.

  There comes a time when a person must consider what makes us human. Is it our ability to care, to heal, to think and create? Our joy in life itself? Or our ability to seize an opportunity? I am here to seize that opportunity, my friends, and to say to you that we will not stop until we fight the disease of humanity and stand victorious upon the rubble of its defeat. Together we can stand tall and strong against death, against powerlessness. Together we can win.

  Okay, so the guy was passionate about beating poverty and disease. In Cade’s book that didn’t make him a bad guy. Whatever Alana believed she’d seen in the human’s actions had clearly been guided by this masked leader.

  Liberty had a lot to answer for.

  Cade placed the paper back on the desk, careful to align it to the edges as he had found it. Smoothing a hand down the mahogany, he clasped an iron drawer handle and pulled it open. The usual suspects were revealed
in the carved interior: feather pens and ink blotters, crystal inkwells, spare paper as thick as a slice of pastry. A narrow velvet box the color of pitch hid in the corner, decorated with an unfamiliar insignia. A wasp in deep violet that only showed itself when Cade grasped the box and turned it to the light.

  His jackal arched in warning as it caught the sound of approaching footsteps. Cade inhaled, the faint scent of sugar teasing his nose.

  Edward.

  He replaced the box, easing the drawer shut, before returning to his hiding place near the bookcase. He’d had many years to become acquainted with the sticky cobwebs of shadows, and he allowed the threads to spin around him as Edward dismissed his guard at the door and headed for his desk.

  Although he looked a mere forty in human years, Cade knew Edward had to be much older to have led the human army in the Kingdom Wars, one hundred years ago.

  Knew, too, famous as the war tale was, about Edward’s prized trophy: Excalibur.

  Therein lay the secret to both his life and his death. As far as Cade was aware, he was one of the few who knew Edward’s biggest secret: how to kill the long-lived war hero.

  Not that he was letting that slip to the pesky phoenix. Edward’s longevity, due to possessing the famous sword, was the ruler’s own business. As long as Edward continued to build hospitals, he could keep his life-giving sword.

  Cade waited until Edward was seated, until a pen was scratching its way across paper. A titanium ring on Edward’s second finger gleamed with its engraving of the royal symbol.

  “Working this early?” Cade disguised his voice, again dropping an octave lower. “Do rulers not sleep?”

  Edward’s head snapped up. His shoulders settled inside his padded velvet jacket as he caught sight of Cade’s outline in the shadows, clearly recognizing enough to relax. “Not a ruler who has a terrorist killing his people.”

  He threw his pen down and steepled his hands, studying the mask that hid Cade’s features. “Even now?” The ruler’s powerful voice thrummed with the gift of oratorical skill. “Even after all the years we’ve known each other, you still hide your face?”

  Cade’s mouth twitched. It was a familiar battle. “Even now, Edward.” Cade called no man his ruler. He answered to the Treaty alone.

  The older man’s eyebrows drew together. A familiar oath left him. “Stubborn as ever. Drink?” Edward jerked his chin toward one of the crystal decanters.

  Cade shook his head. “It’s a little early for me.” He tracked the man across the room, head cocked.

  A chuckle poured from Edward’s mouth, as smooth as the wine he decanted into a goblet. He brought it to his lips with one hand, the other placing the crystal stopper into the decanter’s neck. “I assume this means good news.”

  Cade leaned against the side of the bookcase, deceptively casual. “Good news?”

  “Yes. You usually return to inform me of success.” A gleam played light across his eyes. “Liberty is dead?”

  As the wider implications of that question struck home, Cade struggled to maintain his objectivity. He knew this man, for fuck’s sake. “Not yet.”

  Edward’s hand tightened on the stem of his goblet, the cup lowering until, with a steady voice, he asked Cade to repeat himself.

  “I have a lock on her through one of her followers,” Cade said. Kind of true. He watched Edward carefully, jackal-keen. “I just need to make sure the woman I’m watching is the right one.”

  Edward scoffed. “Whoever spouts that righteous rubbish about my being a soulless dictator is the right one. Whoever stirs my people into a rebellion that will force my hand against them in a bloody war is the right one. Your follower could be her. Liberty.”

  “No.” Not possible. Alana couldn’t. Wouldn’t.

  Though she had admitted to killing. What else was she hiding?

  No. Alana wasn’t Liberty. He’d feel it if her soul had rotted through like so much dead wood.

  He returned to Edward’s previous statements. “You still consider death preferable to capture?”

  A small impatience thrummed through Edward’s voice. “I have been over this, Shade. You know I don’t wish to kill an innocent, but Liberty’s hands are far from clean. She’s inciting my people into a war. Thousands will die. Dozens are already dead, tortured and burned by her hand. The people in the Outer Boundary and the Maze are making her a martyr; that cannot happen.”

  “Don’t you think killing her will expedite that?”

  Edward paused, tapping his manicured nails against his goblet. A breath out, then a weary smile curved his mouth. “You’re absolutely right, Shade. I should never underestimate you. Forgive my snappishness.” He paced to his desk, placing the goblet on top of a thick pile of papers awaiting his royal seal, the titanium ring he wore on his thumb. He linked his hands behind him. A dangerous position, leaving him open for an attack. A sign of trust in both security of his sword and his assassin.

  Cade was officially lower than shit for questioning everything the man was saying.

  “My worries overcome me sometimes, but I know reason when I hear it. Take her alive, contain her—if you can.” Edward curled his hand inward, ring pushing into his palm as if to seal the decision.

  A reprieve, Cade realized. Time to discover the truth—no matter how ugly.

  He nodded, asking, “And after?”

  A shrug. “I will weed out the rest of her followers once I have her. I may still break through her resistance and join her sword to my cause. She would be a valuable voice to convince others to help our race succeed.” His lips curled, showing teeth. “Shade, I’m going to have to pay you a bonus. If you would join my private guard…”

  “As ever, I decline. I’m a free man, Edward.” Cade flashed a savage grin, despite his inner turmoil. “I’m determined to stay that way.”

  As he made to leave, Edward called out his name. Cade stilled, keeping the ruler in sight.

  Edward stood at his desk, playing with the dull-edged letter opener that had sat atop his blotter pad. It reminded Cade that, though the man in front of him wore velvet and silk, had manicures and a magnificent home, he had also led the human army to a bloody success one hundred years ago. Not an aristocrat, but a warrior. “Yes?”

  “Liberty’s people are liars and murderers.” A steely glint entered the warrior’s eyes. “Never trust them.”

  Chapter Ten

  “Want to hear my bargain?”

  Ana flicked a stinging glower at Cade, undeterred from her pacing. He’d been out until early afternoon, returning an hour ago with no explanations, only a sticky slice of cake. She’d eaten the cake because she was weak for sweets, and because she needed to keep her strength up if she ever wanted to escape. Before she did something as ridiculous as latch her lips on to his. Again.

  She’d have attempted escape while he’d been elsewhere if the dick hadn’t put her in fucking chains again.

  Breathing out through her nose, Ana counted to ten, determined to keep her temper cool. She’d always assumed she was one of those phoenixes who learned to keep their fire under wraps—at least, until Cade had strutted back into her life. Now she was a blazing fireball of emotion that could erupt from the slightest touch.

  A thumb grazing her bottom lip. Black eyes devouring her.

  The way he’d arranged himself had her gritting her teeth as she stalked from the window to the bed. His long legs were draped over the arm of the chair she’d sat in earlier, upper body twisted in such a way that his sweater had ridden up to expose pale skin and the hint of a stomach hard enough she could do laundry on it. He had one arm up and behind his head, bicep bulging, practically insisting she fall to her knees and beg to bite it. Wicked eyes watched her progress, languid. Melting her.

  He was doing it on purpose.

  With a vocal curse, Ana completed another set of pacing, from the bed to the windo
w to the bed. Repeat.

  A hint of a smile curved his mouth. “Well?”

  The bargain. “Fine.” She plumped down onto the bed, waved a hand at him regally. “Amuse me.”

  He arched an eyebrow but didn’t rise to her baiting. Instead, he swung his legs around to thump his feet onto the floor. He leaned forward slightly. Dark hair brushed his shoulders, caressed him as she longed to.

  Back in the fucking room, Ana.

  His mouth firmed. “Give me Liberty.”

  Ana made a negative sound, dropping back to reality, where a shifter merc and a phoenix rebel played on opposite sides of the board. “Sorry, no dice.”

  “Why?”

  She snorted, thinking about how he would react. I’m the rebel you long to kill.

  Yes, she could see that playing out to her benefit.

  “I follow justice, and Liberty has become a symbol for that. Besides,” she added, with not a little irony, “I’d trust her with my life.”

  “So, there’s nothing I could offer to sway your allegiance?”

  Her face iced over with challenge.

  A smile played in the obsidian, as though he weren’t taking this seriously. And then, “How about my sword to your cause?”

  She swore her heart paused for a beat before beginning to attempt a mile in four minutes. Fire bloomed curiously, lifting its tendrils to blush her skin with heat.

  Ana thinned her lips at him, folding her arms across her chest in a gradual movement. “Say what?”

  Cade pushed to his feet, wearing as serious an expression as she’d ever seen on his face. He inclined his head. “If you can prove within the next fortnight what you told me about the experiments is true, I’ll fight on your side.”

  “Why would you do that?”

  His shoulders rose and fell in a casual wave. “I can’t stand to see an aristocrat getting away with murder. If Edward’s doing what you said, he should be stopped. However”—his steely undertone brought to mind the night she’d tried to sneak out after midnight to meet a village boy and been caught. He’d been stony-faced then, too—“if you’re lying to me, I will hand you over and walk away without a second glance. I won’t be made a fool.”