Page 139 of Elven Shadow

Zida smiled, revealing her gummy grin with only a few razor-sharp teeth left inside her skull. “I’m just the one who picks up the pieces afterward. The rest of this you did all on your own.”

The question now was whether or not Rebecca would get the kind of help she needed to keep her from ruining everything.

She still didn’t know if she could trust Zida beyond the old healer’s attempts to fix her, but she didn’t have anyone else.

She didn’t know if she could trustanyone. And exactly what kind of leader did that make her?

35

Rebecca’s head pounded, her ears rang with noise she might or might not have been hallucinating, and she tightened her grip around the leather chair’s armrests, her fingers digging into the wood and leaving deep, grooved divots.

Better to destroy the furniture like this than to act on the single constant urge gnawing at her for the last several hours to punch someone in the face and run.

Now, her mind reeled like the center of a deadly storm beneath the constant onslaught of official visits from Shade’s members, their individual requests of her, and everybody’s personal vows sworn to her as the organization’s new commander.

Most operatives simply made an appearance for the sake of tradition and ritual. They came in to shake Rebecca’s hand, to tell her they were glad to see her on her feet again, to make sure she heard it from their own lips that they had specifically voted for her during the huur-akíl.

That, after seeing what she’d done and how she’d handled the situation in the garage, they had no doubt in their minds Rebecca really was Shade’s best option.

Those on her most frequent mission team—Leonard, Diego, Nyx, and even Titus—all made an appearance as well. Each of them gave her a version of essentially the same thing: that they always knew Shade’s single elf had something amazing up her sleeve to offer the rest of them.

And everyone who came to see her in this incredibly outdated ceremony that felt so out of place on Earth made sure to, in one way or another, officially swear their fealty to their new Elven commander.

With each new face that appeared through that office door, the pit of guilt and blooming embarrassment at the giant misunderstanding—and the giant lie she was still living inside this organization—only grew. Every minute, Rebecca felt worse and worse about the whole thing.

Several times throughout the process, she also felt the effects of Zida’s mystery adrenaline cocktail ebb and surge again when she least expected it. Though fortunately, for now, her last dose seemed to hold for the duration of this ritualistic meet-and-greet, which was entirely unnecessary.

Rebecca had already met every member of Shade, but clearly, that was beside the point.

All the faces and names, the congratulatory handshakes, the smiles and encouraging comments toward the task force’s bright future blended together in her mind. Rebecca smiled and nodded through it all.

Yes, this was exactly the kind of thing she’d been avoiding back home since the day she’d left. And now, through no fault of her own, she’d been forced into the same stupid, useless formalities simply by falling into command of a privatized magical task force now ready and willing to hop into action at the slightest word fromher.

Most other people probably would have jumped at the opportunity to sit in this chair, however grotesque the green leather upholstery.

Rebecca hated it.

The next supplicant to step through the office door, however, caught her attention more than any other before he’d even fully closed the door again behind him.

Becausehispresence was the only one that brought that odd warm, tingling energy racing up and down her body—insideher body—as he drew closer.

The same energy that had convinced her she’d been closer to death than ever when he’d caught her from bashing her face in against the garage’s concrete floor.

Why did she feel itnow?

And why had Maxwell decided to take part in such an archaic ceremony like the kibrál when he clearly hated her guts?

The second Rebecca whipped her head up to look at him, taken off guard by his arrival, Maxwell had already crossed the office toward her armchair.

The giant cardboard box in his arms dropped to the floor directly in front of her bare feet, and a plume of dust rose with the echoing thump of that box hitting the old floorboards.

Only now did it occur to her that bare feet was a terrible choice of footwear for receiving her “new subjects”, no matter how excited or unimpressed they were by her new position.

Maxwell definitely wasn’t impressed. At least he didn’t comment on her lack of shoes.

Rebecca stared at the box for a moment, then smirked up at the scowling shifter in front of her.

“I gotta say, Max, I’m surprised you decided to show up at all for this.”

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