“Yes, because he needed something else to stroke his puffed-up ego,” Jade grumbled again.
“Would you stop?” Kai said exasperatedly. “It’s been over a thousand years. I never thought you’d be this petty, Jade.”
“Really? I’m not surprised in the slightest.” Aidan grinned. He always loved walking the edge of Jade’s tolerance.
Jade took a slow breath. “Alright, fine. So, we work our way north and hope we find Rynn along the way. How do you suggest we reach Evonlea from here? We have no ship, and unless Kai wants to swim us both across the Strait, we need to think of something.”
The Strait of Pyr was a short but dangerous strip of water separating Karstos and Evonlea. It was the fastest way to get to the northern kingdom but was difficult to traverse, even under normal conditions.
“Jade, you insult me. We’ll be fine, I can maneuver the water and make sure we avoid the shallows and rocks,” Kai said, waving her hand in the air.
“We still need a ship, sweetheart,” Aidan pointed out.
“Don’t worry, I’ll cover that part, too.” Kai winked. The water elemental had slowly been warming back up to Aidan’s presence, no longer as withdrawn as when she first saw him.
The evening continued on in a similar fashion: the three of them working through problems while Kai and Aidan passed borderline flirtatious remarks. Jade smiled inwardly, relieved that even after a thousand years of rest, things appeared somewhat normal—especially following all the turmoil in their lives when they had parted. She had always felt like a bit of an outsider around those two, but she didn’t mind. She was used to being an onlooker in the lives of those she loved, carefully weaving through their stories but never finding solid ground. That was how it had always been, and she was not one to change things.
Perhaps it was not happiness, but it was expected. Stable.
As night drew closer, the pub filled with more customers. Many of the patrons looked to be tired men retiring from a long day of work, ready to relax and unwind. Jade spotted a handful of people with soot on their foreheads that reeked of smoke. They must finally be done dealing with the chaos Aidan had caused at the River Isles since Kai had helped put the fire out. Jade pursed her lips and glared at Aidan when one of these men walked by, and he returned her look with a humorous glint in his eye.
Before she could launch into another tirade about his carelessness, she caught snippets of a heated conversation taking place nearby between two men and a woman.
“That tyrant thinks he can take whatever he wants and nothing will happen,” the oldest man said. By the graying of his hair and wrinkles on his brown skin, Jade guessed he was in his sixties.
“He’sking. He never has consequences,” a younger man with disheveled blonde hair and tired eyes retorted.
“Neither does anyone associated with the prick, and there’s the problem. Who’s going to stop his soldiers from raiding my booth, huh? What about Samael’s ship? Did you see what they did to him?” The first man practically shouted the last part.
“Keep quiet. You know what they do to dissenters,” a middle-aged woman hissed across the table.
The three of them settled down for a moment, glasses clinking against the table. Then the younger man spoke again.
“Why are they raiding, anyway? Melvina said last week a group of soldiers came in and took an entire crate’s worth. The king can’t possibly need any of our stuff.”
“They’re calling it ‘inspections,’” the older man spat. “I think it’s a cover.” He leaned closer to his companions, and Jade strained to hear the next part. “I think he’s looking for something.”
Jade exchanged curious glances with Kai and Aidan.
“You sound ridiculous,” the woman scoffed.
“No, no, hear me out. You know Dominique, who trades over at Amherst? They’ve been having lots of the same problems. He overheard a couple of the soldiers arguing about how ‘it’s not here’ and they needed to move on.” He banged his fist on their table, as if this proved his point.
“What would they be looking for?” the younger man asked with wide eyes.
“You’re acting like a couple of idiots, listening to these conspiracies,” muttered the woman.
“I don’t know, but the new king hasn’t been seen in years. Maybe his health is bad and he’s looking for a cure. Or some sort of weapon. Whatever it is, he wants it bad.” The three merchants sat in silence, and then another approaching group drowned out anything else they may have said.
Jade, Kai, and Aidan looked at each other. Kai raised an eyebrow. Whispering, she said, “Well, that could be something.”
“Or it could be nothing. It might be a different century, but monarchs are still playing the same games. We are not here to get involved with the humans,” Jade countered.
“We don’t knowwhywe’re here, Jade. That’s the point. What if we were called awake to stop some war that’s rising among the kingdoms? Or whatever this king is doing?” Kai rolled her eyes. “I don’t even know his name. There’s so much we need to figure out,” she sighed.
“Sebastian.”
“What?”
