Page 71 of Above Cursed Winds

“Come on, Jeremiah,” Zia managed, “you can play Mario Kart with Myko while you recover.”

Barely perceptible, Nero flinched beside her. That’s when Zia knew with no shadow of a doubt that the nascent mating bond she had felt between them was real. Any sovereign worth his salt would know the telltale signs, even one as feeble as the barely-there connection that’d formed between her and the Elemental on the floor.

When she lifted her eyes to his, she found only concern hidden in the sienna-brown gaze. For Nero knew, just as Zia did, what’d become of her fated mate.

***

Night had fallen before Key decided to visit. Jeremiah, quickly recovered from his near brush with death, had taken Myko under his wing once more. Now, he was showing the boy how to tile in the basement shower. Zia hadn’t even known he’d bought tile.

Despite what had transpired only hours earlier, Zia chose not to speak a word of it to Jeremiah. She knew very little about Elementals, but from what she’d heard, they couldn’t sense the bond the same way Raeths or even werewolves did.

If she told Jeremiah the truth—either truth—their time would inevitably be over. Before that, she needed to speak with the Foreseer.

As Zia belligerently washed the dishes, Key manifested on a stool along her kitchen counter, the woman’s long white-blonde hair tumbling over her shoulders. Zia barely withheld her snarl.

“You told me he wasn’t my mate, Kiyonne.”

“I never lied. You simply weren’t ready for the answer.” Oddly somber-faced, Key’s eyes were shadowed with grief. “I told you he belonged to someone already.”

Fear and anger forced tears from her eyes, her focus blurred, while her soapy hands clenched together in a silent prayer. She tried to remember that Key was one of her closest friends, one of the only women who truly understood her.

“But you know what’ll become of my fated mate, Key.” Tears continued to dapple her cheeks, and Zia angrily batted them away. “You were the one who told me!”

“I haven’t forgotten, Zia. But this is all in the plan.”

“What plan, Key? What plan?!” Shivering, Zia lost hold of a plate and it clattered to the countertop in a riot of sound. Abandoning her quest, she crossed her arms and glowered at the other woman. “Answer me.”

Key didn’t, lost to the abyss that frosted her iris white. For a moment, she simply stared unseeing out the darkened window, gazing into the beyond. Stained silence lulled between them, and with every passing second, Zia’s anxiety battered her.

Just when Zia was ready to admit defeat, Key spoke.

“The plan is more important than one person, Danzia. If we fail, our lives are forfeit. The plan must succeed. The plan must move forward.”

Zia threw her hands into the air. “What are you even talking about? Do you realize how crazy you sound? Have you finally succumbed to the madness that comes with foresight?”

The ivory lightning that pierced the amber of Key’s eyes rapidly receded, rendering the woman’s gaze pure gold. So startling was the change that Zia flinched, realizing that for the first time in ages, she had Key’s undivided attention.

“Zia.” In a single word, Key had ensnared her, completely capturing her every attention. “Our future is never fixed, regardless of the brief windows into time I’m gifted. Foresight allows me to see variations of an impermanent future: what can be versus what will be.

“Some visions are flashes of fiction, while others are virtually concrete,” Key continued, a lock of her hair twisting around her finger. “The only things that are immovable have already come to pass.”

“Then why have you told me that my mate will fall?”

The sweeping cascade of her silvery blonde hair shifted as she tilted her head. “Because he will. Jeremiah’s fall will happen, it’s nearly inevitable, but what happens afterward is still being written.”

Zia’s anger almost sizzled between them. “Then he’ll die because of you! If you had told me that he was my fated mate, I would’ve stayed away! I would’ve ensured we never came to this impasse!”

“What has happened cannot be changed. You alone can alter your path, Zia, but you must walk this trail whether you want to or not.”

“Why?” A cry now, Zia crumpled against the counter, the sticky trails of tears staining her cheeks. “Why must I walk toward ruin?”

“Because the fate of our world depends on this—this and every other path I’ve placed in motion.” For a moment, Key’s twelve hundred years caught up with her, the ancient look of weariness well-worn across her ageless features. “I’ve been fighting for twelve hundred years to ensure our survival. Your story—your path—is but one chapter.”

***

“Z?”

The single letter brought a tremor to Zia’s hands, her breath leaving her with such swiftness it’d been comparable to being punched in the gut. She remained, frozen, perched atop a stool, unable to immediately respond.

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