1
“You updated the mate log, correct?”Xavier asked.
“Of course.” Who knew that fated mates were a thing? I hadn’t. “It’s mostly a shifter thing, right?”
“Mostly.” Xavier shoved a giant box across his desk, the weight of it scraping against the polished wood. “Add that to secured storage,” he instructed, barely glancing up from his computer screen. Behind him, the wild lights of the necropolis pulsed through the wall of windows, the sky choked with ominous clouds rippling with ethereal lightning.
Three months working for Xavier across the Veil, and I still hadn’t gotten used to the display. Unnerving. Breathtaking. A lot like my boss himself, with his sharp features, silver hair, and a presence that screamed otherworldly, no matter how human he looked.
“Luca?” Xavier’s voice snapped me back. His storm-gray eyes locked onto mine. How long had I been staring? “The sword?”
“Oh. Right.” I grabbed the box, nearly staggering at the weight. “It’s a sword?”
“’Curse Cleaver’ is a stupid name for a dagger. Take it to the secure storage for magical weapons.”
My nose itched just being near the thing; stupid, sensitive nose. A damn side effect of the “variance” that hit me after that mystery cold three months ago. One day I was human, sneezing my way through a nasty fever, and the next, I was a shifter with a nose that could sniff out magic like a bloodhound.
Getting fired from my accounting job was bad enough. Losing control of the change in the middle of the office? Worse. It was like pissing yourself in public. Except instead of wet pants and humiliation, you lost your thumbs, your voice, and any last shred of dignity as coworkers started cooing ‘Here, kitty kitty’ at your newly furry ass.
Ending up as Xavier’s personal assistant had been the only boon. The pay was divine, literally, but no amount of godly generosity could make hauling cursed artifacts, wrangling supernatural nutjobs, or enduring politicians who looked at me like gum stuck to their Italian leather shoes feel any less like glorified janitor duty. Especially when your boss could smite you with a glance.
“Be back in a few,” I muttered, hauling the box toward the elevator. Sylas leaned against the wall beside it, looking bored. His long red hair, unnaturally vibrant, like something out of an anime, marked his supernatural presence as one half of the twins. Yin and yang, though I had no clue which was really which of that dynamic. His brother, white to his red, was no doubt lurking nearby.
Kitsunes by nature, not at all native to the human world I’d been born in, were tricksters to the core, and they could be dangerous, or so Xavier warned, though neither bothered me. Sometimes clients disappeared around them, and I knew enough to be wary.
“I’ll escort you down,” Sylas said as I hit the button.
I eyed the box. “Should I be worried?”
“Not this time.”
Not ominous at all.
The doors slid shut, and down we went.
Sylas waited at the elevator while I made my way through the two shielded doors and to the weapons vault. What did Xavier need with an enchanted arsenal? I never asked. Rather I liked to think he was good for all of humanity, or non-humanity too, by keeping dangerous magical weapons contained. Maybe he was planning for the next war and gathering arms for his people, which I was now technically a part of as new shifter stock. But I tried to think positively of most people until they proved otherwise.
The vault hummed with spells and electronic wards as I heaved the box onto a shelf already crowded with blades: a rapier that whispered in French, a cleaver that dripped black ichor no matter how often it was cleaned, and a katana wrapped in something’s peeling skin. Gross.
Just another Wednesday.
I headed back up, humming absently along to Huntrix’s “Golden”, until the elevator lights blinked. Sylas growled. I took a step back. No one wanted to be stuck in an elevator with a grumpy kitsune, and what the hell was with the lights?
My watch buzzed with a reminder of a meeting. The Summer Court’s envoy had likely already arrived, and the meeting was in four minutes. Fuck. I hadn’t even had a chance to lay out refreshments.
The elevator doors opened as Keanan, Sylas’ twin, showed a willowy man with glowing gold hair and eerie butter-colored eyes through the loft toward Xavier’s office. The attire looked like something out of a high-end fantasy novel based in Europe, frumpy and filled with ruffles. But if I stared too long, the man flickered, an outline of wings fluttering before his appearance restabilized.
“Wrong time of year for that sort of bastard,” Sylas grumbled.
“Yeah?” I asked quietly as we exited the elevator.
“Summer fae rarely leave their court in winter.”
“Maybe it’s super important.”
“Hmm,” Sylas said without commitment.
The envoy held a painting, its shape obvious beneath the butcher paper wrap, and ignored our arrival as I rushed to beat them to Xavier’s office. I peeked in the room to ensure Xavier was ready. He was, though focused on something on his computer screen. Behind him, white flakes floated in the strange dark fluorescent ombre of the sky over the Veil outlined through the window. Snow across the Veil? The holidays were coming. My first as a variant, and I’d been avoiding my family for fear of being cast out.
