Page 160 of Maksym

No one told us to enter. The invitation was the absence of a barrier.

I picked up my portfolio.

Nikolay moved to my left. Maddie took position beside him, close enough that her sleeve brushed his. Remy came to my right, her face calm, eyes bright with quiet calculation. Behind us, Lucia, Doc, Bohdan, Taras, and Devon formed a line so close I felt them at my back.

I was not alone. I was a part of the Kozlov family.

The chamber was cathedral-scaled, though no God I had ever prayed to would have accepted responsibility for it without a stern evidentiary hearing.

The air was colder here.

Older too, though old should not have had a smell. This did. Old blood. Dust sealed in stone. Candle smoke from rituals long extinguished. Magic layered so deeply it no longer announced itself as spell work but as atmosphere.

A semicircle of twelve thrones occupied the raised dais at the far end.

Thrones.

Not chairs. Not benches. No polite pretense of democratic modesty. Each seat had been carved from dark stone and backed by symbols I did not yet know how to read. Every throne was occupied.

Upon the thrones sat the leaders of the Supernatural Council. The wolf kings were easily identifiable, as each was ruggedly handsome and larger than life. I tried to remember the notes I’d made days ago when Maksym laid out the monster Congress to me. The witch coven leaders each radiated magic seemingly from their cores somehow. One looked like stars shone in her eyes, while another seemed to have flowers growing from her hair. The other two reminded me of Elvira from late-night television. Shit, I needed to rein in my imagination.

I noticed an oddly handsome giant of a man who sat on a throne at the end of the row. He had to be nearly seven feet tall, and I swore there were two small horns protruding from just above his forehead through a black mess of curls on his head. That had to be Adramal, the Demon King. I noticed Kazimir was near the center and to his right sat another man who was larger than life. He wore a robe that seemed to shimmer with golden light. His long white hair glowed with a luminous sheen. Now, that was the Angel King, no doubt.

Then my eye caught Maksym next to his father. Regal and powerful, without a question as to his ability to rule with an iron fist when necessary. A small thrill ran down my spine in spite of myself. I was among my own kind now, as crazy as that was.

My eyes moved along the curved walls and saw the spectator seats that rose in tiered rows.

Vampires, witches, and wolves sat like they were there for damn college football Saturday night. Their attention moved over our group like hands, assessing, measuring, deciding what story they preferred before facts inconvenienced them.

I kept walking. My heels struck the stone at even intervals. Not too fast. Never hurry toward people who want you to fail.

Maksym’s eyes found mine. Only for a second.

No softness showed on his face. Not here. Not in front of this chamber full of teeth and precedent. But something passed between us all the same, quick as a pulse beneath skin.

You are ready. I held that, then let it go before I could need it too much.

The designated floor position lay before the dais: a marked circle inlaid into the stone, not large enough for comfort, large enough for display. Two narrower marks flanked it, presumably for Nikolay and Maddie. A table stood to the side, and a lectern polished to a black shine.

I scanned the chamber as we approached. Habit.

Always know the room. Always know exits. Always know who watched with boredom, who watched with hunger, who watched with fear disguised as contempt. Courtrooms had taught me that power revealed itself most honestly when it believed itself unobserved.

Then I saw him. Lucian Devereaux sat in the front row of spectator seats.

For one terrible heartbeat, my body forgot the jet, the estate, Maksym’s bed, the war room, the blood in my veins that was now mine and more than mine. It forgot healing. It forgot teeth. It forgot that I stood surrounded by people who would set the world on fire before letting him touch me again.

It remembered a chair beside a bed.

Long blond hair tied in a neat low ponytail. Handsome face by human standards. Cruel mouth composed into mild interest. He wore a dark suit cut with elegant restraint, his posture loose, as if he had come to enjoy a spectacle from a very good seat.

That was the expression he had arranged for the room.

The particular expression of a man who had never once believed he would be held accountable for anything.

His gaze moved lazily across the entering party. Nikolay first, with faint disdain. Maddie, with dismissive curiosity. Remy, Taras, Lucia, Doc, Bohdan, Devon. Then me.

It took him a moment, then his body registered me before his face did. A shudder moved through him.