"Alex checked in an hour ago. No sign of—" Killian stopped, his jaw tightening. "Shite. Sorry. Not Alex. Alice. Still getting used to..." He rubbed the back of his neck. Glancing toward the back office, he lowered his voice until it was barely audible, even for me. "Kenya's been trying to maintain some kind of connection through their bond. No luck so far, but she thinks he's still alive."
I nodded, my hands automatically reaching for a towel to wipe down surfaces that didn't need it. The motion was soothing, mindless, something to do with the energy that seemed to vibrate under my skin whenever I thought too hard about Marcus and his ability to control supernatural beings through fate manipulation.
"The others?"
"Brogan and Esme are patrolling the Quarter. Dae Jung is following up on reports of strange activity near the docks. Jamal and Angel are..." Killian's lips twitched with something between humor and disgust. "Indisposed."
A familiar tightness squeezed my chest, that old sensation of walls closing in, like my lungs couldn't get enough air. Consciously inhaling and exhaling, I focused on the immediate and tangible. The bar was clean. The doors were locked. The inflow of money was accounted for. These were facts I could trust, unlike the shifting uncertainty of supernatural politics and djinn magic.
"What do you need me to do?" Because that was my role. To be useful, to be dependable, to be the solution to whatever problem Killian faced.
He studied me for a long moment, weighing his words for several long seconds before he finally just came out with it. "There's a Threadwalker coming to see ye tomorrow night."
I froze, the towel crumpling in my grip as the memory hit me. Dark hair, stubborn chin, that infuriating way she'd blown me off when I'd found her wandering the Quarter alone two weeks ago.
"Talin Moss," I said, my voice holding very little emotion.
I'd noticed her before that night, of course. Anyone with functioning eyes would. That ebony hair, thick and slightly unruly, as if even it refused to obey. Those striking green eyes shadowed by dark brows, one pierced with a small silver ring that glinted when the light hit just right. And her mouth… Gods, that mouth. Full, expressive, too tempting for someone who spoke as little as she did. She hid her curves under boyish layers of clothing—button-down shirts, big T-shirts, vests, loose pants—but the effort only made her more noticeable.
Like water trying not to shimmer in the moonlight.
I wasn't the only one who saw how fucking pretty she was, either. I was just the only one who pretended not to.
The few times I'd seen her since that night, she never spoke about what we'd seen. Hardly even looked at me. And I'd never brought it up. I've noticed that something about her was all wrong now, though, like a wire strung too tight that was about to snap.
Killian's eyebrows shot up. "Figured ye'd remember her."
Of course, I did. I'd known all the Moss witches by sight for years. But Talin had always stayed on the periphery, quieter than her cousins, less involved in the formal meetings between our groups. Half-present, half-guarded, trying to disappear into the walls without vanishing completely. But watching everything.
Always watching.
"She was out alone the night Marcus took Alex," I told him, turning back to the bar and scrubbing at a spot that had been clean for hours. "Did I tell you that?"
His eyes narrowed on my face. "No, ye didn't."
"Well, I'm telling you now."
"And?"
"And she told me she knew where Alex was." The memory of her standing outside the warehouse, eyes bright with determination and fear, sent an unwelcome jolt through my chest. "Right before something blew up inside the building. Later on, when I asked her what she'd meant, she just shook her head and told me she didn't know."
Killian studied me with those knowing gold eyes. "She's been having visions about Alex and Marcus, but they're... fragmented. She needs someone steady to help her focus. She requested you."
Someone steady. That was me. Elias, the reliable one. Elias, who kept everything running smoothly. Elias, who never let emotions interfere with duty or discipline.
Still… "Why me?" The question slipped out before I could stop it. "Why don't one of the witches help her?"
Killian's golden eyes sharpened. "Because she said her visions showed her ye specifically. Something about yer threads being intertwined with whatever Marcus is planning."
The walls of the bar seemed to shimmer around me, and I gripped the edge of the polished surface to anchor myself. Fate threads. Destiny. The kind of mystical bullshit that took choices away from people and handed their lives over to forces beyond their control.
"I don't believe in fate," I told him.
"Neither did I, until I met my Lizzy." Killian's voice carried the weight of experience, of a man who'd had his entire worldview upended by forces he couldn't predict or manage. "But believing in it and being caught up in it are two different things entirely."
I turned away, ostensibly to check the ice levels in the cooler, but really to hide the tension I could feel creeping across my features. The ice was perfectly stocked, had been since I'd filled it three hours ago, but the repetitive motion of scooping and arranging helped steady my breathing.
A Threadwalker. I'd heard of this magic only once before. It was someone who could see the invisible connections between people, who could follow the mystical threads that supposedly bound everyone's fate together. The kind of person who dealt in uncertainty and unpredictability, who thrived on the very forces I'd spent decades learning to control.
