Page 34 of Guardian of Exile

“Nyx,” Nyx replied. She already felt awkward, and like the conversation wasn’t going how it should be. The woman on the phone had sounded very take charge, and Nyx had more or less expected to be interrogated the moment they met.

“Can I join you?” There was nothing take-charge in that voice, only a note of…hopefulness? Nyx tried to remember what the woman on the phone had sounded like, but she wasn’t great at matching a voice she’d heard once over the phone to a woman who had spoken all of seven words to her.

“Are you here for the birdwatching group?” Nyx asked.

Amy’s eyebrows drew together, then cleared as her gaze dropped to the flyer on the table. “Is it cheesy if I say I could be if you want me to be?”

What was she—oh. Oh. Panic, pure and simple, flooded Nyx. Given that no one had been able to remember her until recently, she had zero experience with being hit on. Unless she counted the Travelers who wanted to join the ranks of “people who’d slept with a Guardian”, which Nyx didn’t, because those people were rude and creepy and therefore easy to turn down.

Amy seemed nice. And not creepy. So…how did normal people politely turn down a nice, not creepy advance? “I can’t date,” Nyx blurted out. “It’s my heart. I have a heart condition.”

“Right,” Amy said slowly. “A heart condition.”

Nyx felt bad for having intentionally caught Amy’s eye because she’d thought she was someone else, so she kept explaining. “It’s broken. Extremely broken. Unfixable by medical means.” What in the ever-loving fuck was coming out of her mouth?

A strangled sound came to Nyx’s left and she refused to look to see if it was Evra or Morgen.

Amy stared at her for a moment, then shook her head, an amused expression on her face. She dug a pen and a small notebook out of her purse and scribbled something down. “Well, Nyx with a broken heart, if you want to try fixing it by non-medical means, call me sometime.” She tore the page out of the notebook, and placed it on the table before exiting.

The cafe door had barely closed behind her before Morgen and Evra were laughing so hard that half the people in the cafe turned to stare at them. Kaden was the only one doing her the courtesy of looking bored. Nyx wadded the paper with Amy’s number on it into a ball and chucked it at Evra’s head. Predictably, the Amazon batted it aside effortlessly.

Nyx covered her face with her hand, so she wouldn’t have to look at her friends anymore. And because it covered the mortification she was feeling. Maybe it was a good thing she didn’t spend much time in polite society. She clearly wasn’t cut out for it.

“A heart condition, then?” a new voice said.

Nyx looked up. A Black woman in her mid-twenties stood on the other side of the table, hair a halo of tight curls, her brown eyes a mix of warm and wary, as if her default state tended toward kindness, but she’d seen enough of the world to override it.

She slid into the chair opposite Nyx. “Someone’s been asking all over about fixing her sister’s heart. Guessing that’s her?” She nodded to Evra.

Nyx shrugged. Maybe if Evra and Morgen hadn’t found her getting hit on so hilarious, they wouldn’t have blown their cover. Then again, maybe it was good they had. Nyx had noticed the woman come in about fifteen minutes ago, but Nyx had dismissed her because she hadn’t so much as glanced in Nyx’s direction. She must have been waiting to see if Nyx was truly alone, and now that she’d identified who she was with, she’d felt comfortable enough to approach.

“If he agrees to see you, they can’t come along.”

That was going to be a problem and a separate discussion, but for now Nyx leapt at the possibility in the statement. “Then he might? See me?” She didn’t care that she sounded desperate. People in search of miracles were desperate. And Nyx needed a miracle, just not the one she was pretending to need.

“If I decide, he’ll see you. Whether he heals you is up to him.” She leaned forward. “So you want to see him? Convince me.”

Nyx started to give her rehearsed talking points. She’d looked up various heart conditions to find the one that most closely matched what Evra had explained about Tamrin, and had memorized the finer medical points. But as the woman focused on her, Nyx knew it wouldn’t work. The faintest hint of magic reached for her from across the table. It was so slight, Nyx almost didn’t feel it. So slight Nyx doubted the woman knew she had it. But whatever it was, it felt measuring. Weighing.

Nyx was a terrible liar anyway, so she gave the woman the truth. “I need him. I have looked everywhere else for another solution to my problem and there isn’t one.” One living Shaman in all the universe who was unattached to the Congregation. An impossibility made possible by Dead Earth. “If he won’t help me, that’s it.”

That hint of magic tasted her. The woman studied her. Then she nodded, and the trace of magic vanished. “Is the number you called me from earlier a good contact for you?” At Nyx’s nod, she continued. “I’ll call you with a time and location.” She stood.

“That’s it? Just wait around for you to call sometime?”

“If you want to see him, yes.”

“Can I have a time window? I can’t just wait here for a month on nothing more than you word.” No normal person had the time and money to do that. “I don’t even know your name.”

The woman blew out a breath. “It’s Valerie. And it won’t be more than a week. Stay or don’t, but when I call, that will be the only offer.”

Valerie walked out. Nyx went back to Evra’s table and watched Valerie stand on the sidewalk outside, as if waiting for someone.

“Did you catch all that?” Nyx asked. Three nods answered. “She has magic. It’s faint but it’s there.”

“She is mildly empathic,” Morgen said. “Very mildly. Given the Dead Earth views on magic, she likely thinks only that she is an exceptionally good judge of character. You took the right approach, expressing only that you need Tristen to help you. Her magic would sense your desperation.”

“I don’t know that I trust her.” Nyx drummed her fingers on the table. “We don’t have any proof she actually knows Tristen. Even if she knows him, we don’t have any proof she actually works with him.