Page 116 of A Warrior's Fate

“You have a library here?” she asked, excitement edging her voice.

Kai placed a hand on the glass. “Of course, we do. Not for public use, just for the alpha’s estate and our council members.” He ran his fingers on the metal panes of the window before pressing flatly on them. There was a click and then a whine as the glass loosened and freed. A whip of cool breeze moved through the space.

“Come on,” he beckoned. “This is what I really wanted to show you.”

Isla bit the inside of her lip. She wanted to tell Kai to wait. Wanted to tell him to forget whatever this was and get her down to the library. The private property of the alpha surely possessed knowledge not available in a local bookshop, right?

But the opening from the window had created a clear path for her like it was presenting whatever lay on the other side. Tempting and inviting.

Hesitantly, she walked along it, and as if she knew what was about to greet her would steal her breath away, she wouldn’t look up until she’d stepped over the shallow edge of stained glass rising from the floor and onto a small stone balcony.

And when she finally let her eyes behold what was before her, she nearly fell over.

She was one with the mountains, on top of the world as she looked upon the entire city of Mavec rolling down hills to its faint glow of star-fallen streets. The river was an inky-black passage leading to tiny dots like the flicker of the eyes of beasts in the forest at its end. Surely, it was Abalys. Isla scoured for what she knew. The top of the hotel. The Bookshoppe. Any of the stores and squares she’d desired to visit. From here, she discovered game parks she’d never crossed. Some open fields. The train that shot through another mountain to get to Ifera.

She moved back and forth along the balcony, her eyes hungry to take in everything she could, barely blinking as if it all would disappear if she closed them.

She didn’t know how to speak. What to say. How to say it. What to ask.

As she stammered over her words in an almost embarrassing fashion, she could sense Kai watching her. Could see him moving in her periphery to remove his suit jacket. She hadn’t even realized she’d been shivering—the air even more frigid so high up—until its warmth enveloped her. She couldn’t get thank you to even escape her mouth, only one simple word that seemed to be the only one she could use to describe this place. “Beautiful.”

Kai hummed in agreement, but his eyes never left her.

She moved to the railing, a black metal that leveled off at her chest, and placed her hands upon it as she looked down. She mapped the path they’d traveled to get to the hall. Along the lamp posts, beneath the archway. All the spectators had departed now, and all the cars of the guests had been left parked and waiting to be reclaimed. Guards hung about, two of the half dozen sparring while the others watched and chortled, surely having placed bets.

“So, what do you have for me?”

Isla turned to Kai who’d since paced backwards to lean against the thick glass of the window. He’d surely been up here many times and wasn’t nearly as enthralled by the view.

“Your pack tends towards intense vanity, for one,” Isla said, sliding her arms into the too-long sleeves of the jacket, feeling the slick material that lined the inside, then subtly breathing in the scent of him that it held.

Kai snickered. “That’s rich coming from the member of a pack that deems itself Imperial.”

Though it had been a joke, Isla couldn’t help but catch a biting undercurrent to it.

She pursed her lips but didn’t comment on it. Instead, she crossed her arms. “My presence was really a hit or miss. People either wanted nothing to do with me or were courteous enough to ask questions and entertain conversations. A lot of people asked if I was the general’s mate.”

Her mention of retribution for the dig at Io was met by the unamused reaction she’d expected.

Kai began rolling up the sleeves of his dark dress shirt—somehow not freezing—stopping them just at his elbows. Isla’s eyes honed in on the ink that cut a bit over one of his forearms that she’d never noticed before. The patterns of the tattoo didn’t look like those of any lumerosi she’d seen.

“Who fell in what category?”

She flicked her gaze back to Kai’s, and then began rattling off names—at least those she could remember—and then covered the rest with very vague descriptions. By the time she’d gone through each of her accounts, through every detail she picked up, big or small, she felt winded. But Kai had listened to every word, eyes focused on the ground, brows drawn, and jaw clenched. Isla had tried to mark every twitch of any muscle to glean what mattered most and what didn’t, but her mate was unreadable.

Except for the fact that he knew what he’d wanted to hear.

“You know what you’re looking for,” she said. “What is it? Why am I here?”

Kai looked up and adjusted himself against the glass. He shoved his hands in his pockets, a picture of aloofness. “I just want to see how members of my pack act toward those of others. Seeing how much they’re willing to say. What they say. We don’t get visitors often, you know.”

Isla didn’t buy it.

“And how does that help you figure out who you can trust on your council?”

Kai pushed himself up. “You said it yourself, Delta Croan doesn’t like my push to funnel more resources into re-evaluating the Wall. My Head of Trade wants more say in what can be distributed—even if she has all control besides the need for my approvals. If they’re willing to share that around you, who knows what else they’ll say?”

More bullshit.

---