68. Chapter Sixty-Eight - Wilder
A firm knock at my door interrupts the quiet of my office at the Borealis Blade Precinct.
Since our showdown with Lua in Aurora, the Council has been too preoccupied with drafting treaties to consider replacing me as the commander.
I chose to stay in this position to help maintain peace between the factions, and now that the country is more stable, I find fulfillment in the work I’m doing to keep it that way.
Growing up, I never envisioned myself as the commander, but now that I’m here, I can’t imagine walking away from the role, not yet at least.
Soter enters.
The scent of his cigarette smoke mingles with the aroma of freshly brewed coffee.
His bi-colored gaze darts between Pallas, seated across from me, and myself.
His eyes narrow.
Pallas spent the last five months in Aurora working with Eddo and his Blades.
“You wanted to see me,” Soter states.
He’s not a fan of Pallas, given that Soter spent months trying to imprison him during the Nyx case last year.
My Domna still possesses an inch-thick file documenting all of Pallas’s alleged crimes.
Pallas smiles at him.
“Hey, how’s it going?”
Soter steps deeper into the room.
“What is he doing back here?” he asks through gritted teeth.
I lean back in my chair.
He’s always wound so tight.
“Pallas works here now,” I say.
“He will serve as a consultant, providing insight into organized crime in Borealis and teaching us how to think like criminals to catch more of them. Eddo implemented this approach with great success in Aurora, and I plan to do the same here. You’ll show him the ropes.” My grin widens at Soter’s flushed face.
“Excuse me?” he says, his voice low and dangerous, like the rumble of an engine.
“You heard me, Domna. You’ll be Pallas’s point of contact while he works with us. You will get him anything he needs.”
The muscles in Soter’s jaw twitch.
Heat radiates off him, raising the temperature in the small office by several degrees.
“Do we have a problem?” I ask.
He doesn’t answer.
I lean forward, the ancient wood of my desk creaking under the weight of my elbows.
Soter may not like it, but Pallas’s unique perspective will be invaluable in our fight against organized crime.
The supernatural underbelly of Borealis is a tangled web, and we need all the help we can get to unravel it.
“Fine,” Soter grumbles.
I fight back a smile.
“What was that?”
“I said, fine, I’ll do it,” Soter repeats, but commotion outside draws my attention.
I rise from my seat to investigate.
Soter follows close behind as I peek between the blinds.
Dressed in civilian clothes, Marlowe dismounts her motorcycle, which she parked in the red zone.
I raise my brows.
Someone tries to stop her, but she dismisses them with a wave of her gloved hand as she strolls into our building.
We went through hell together that night at the wolves’ encampment, but since returning to Borealis, she’s kept her distance.
She hasn’t stepped inside the precinct since we returned from Aurora.
There are too many eyes to judge her for her past actions.
She’s been hanging out around the city, making amends with the people she hurt, starting with Mom.
Mom’s been so busy with the cure that she still doesn’t give Marlowe the time of day.
She’s still angry at her former friend for lying about Dad and Nyx.
She’s rightfully upset about not only losing her husband but also her best friend, leaving her broken in the process.
A part of me feels sorry for Mom’s dismissal of Marlowe—a small, minuscule part.
If she is here now, she must want something.
But what?
“I thought this was the Blade Precinct,” Soter remarks, glaring at Pallas.
“Not a halfway house for the criminally inclined.”
“Where’s a criminal?”
Soter stiffens as I whirl to face Isolde.
She’s dressed in cut-off shorts and a cropped top, revealing a sliver of her toned midriff.
Her cobalt ponytail sits high on her head, swaying with every shift of her weight.
Shopping bags hang from her arms.
“What’s in the bags?” I ask.
Isolde’s cheeks flush a delicate pink.
She sets her purchases down atop the empty chair beside Pallas, and the bags crinkle as she rummages through them.
With a flourish, she pulls out a strappy orange dress.
A dramatic slit runs up the side.
Soter inhales a sharp breath.
“It’s for the party,” Isolde explains, her brown eyes sparkling.
The party, thrown by the royals and the Council, will honor Mom’s completion of the cure inside the first-ever Lunar Witch reentry facility before the first witches move in next week.
Isolde groans, then stuffs the dress back into her bag.
“You’re right. I will look ridicu?—”
“You will look beautiful,” Soter says.
Isolde gapes at him.
As I watch Isolde struggle not to smile at his compliment, a twinge of sympathy for Soter stirs within me, even as I consider the deep waters he’s found himself in with her.
But then I remember what an incredible douche he is and move on.
Pallas breaks the awkward silence.
“What else is in the bag?”
Isolde’s grin returns, genuine this time, as she pulls out a beautiful journal.
The fresh leather scent fills the air as she unbuckles it and flips through the pages, the paper whispering beneath her callused fingertips as Marlowe enters my office.
Isolde frowns, still mad about Marlowe giving her the scar above her right brow when she knocked Sol out that day in Aurora to get to Leigh.
“Marlowe,” she says.
“Faez,” Marlowe responds, but her gaze is on me.
“Give us the room,” I tell my team.
Isolde leaves, but Soter and Pallas glance at each other, and I remember their assignment.
“Soter, show Pallas to his desk.”
Soter’s upper lip curls, but he doesn’t fight me.
He walks past Marlowe, ignoring her presence, while Pallas squeezes her shoulder in a gesture of support.
The room empties, leaving me alone with my former boss and friend.
I’m eager to find out what she wants, considering she will break five months of silence to tell me.
“Looks good on you,” Marlowe says once we are alone.
I fold my arms.
Marlowe helped us in Aurora by telling Leigh about Stellan working with the wolves.
She even stayed behind when I turned myself over to Alden and Zeus’s captivity to save Queen Jorina, taking the beating of a lifetime to be with me after I thought she would run the second shit hit the fan.
Our relationship may never return to what it was, but I hate her less than I did.
“What does?” I ask, my tone guarded yet curious.
She grins a flash of white teeth in the dimly lit office.
“Authority.”
I shake my head.
“What do you want? I know you didn’t come all this way to compliment me for taking your job. Or did you come here to tell me I didn’t earn it, so I should give it back?”
Her brow furrows in mock concentration.
“Would you?”
I lean back in my seat, assessing her.
Is she challenging me?
“A pardon isn’t enough to get you your job back.”
Her hand cuts through the air like a dismissive blade.
“That’s not why I’m here, but it brings me joy to hear you defend your position. I guess the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree. Seeing you sit where he sat, you remind me of him. Moran must be proud.”
I wince.
The phantom pain of Dad’s betrayal is still fresh, though it’s been almost a year since he was convicted of assassinating President Sinclair.
I’ve visited him with Mom twice in the past five months, and we try to get along, primarily for her sake.
But I don’t think Dad and I will ever have a good relationship.
“What do you want, Marlowe? I was in the middle of a meeting,” I say, uncrossing, and re-crossing my legs.
She gives me a pointed look.
“That was work? It looked more like a social hour to me, but whatever. You’re in charge.”
“That’s right, I am, and seeing as you no longer work here, you’re trespassing. So tell me what you want, or leave.” Despite my words, curiosity gnaws at me.
“That’s why I am here,” Marlowe begins in a softer, almost hesitant, voice.
“I am leaving.”
I blink.
A part of me doesn’t want her to go, a surprising realization that catches me off guard.
“Where will you go?”
She shrugs, picking up a stapler, then an empty coffee mug from my desk that used to belong to her and setting them down, her fingers lingering on each one as if saying goodbye.
“I hear Amro is nice this time of year.”
“What’s there?” I ask.
Amro is the southernmost city in Corona.
It is a vacation spot.
I’ve never known Marlowe to relax.
She sighs.
“A fresh start.”
My heart lurches.
Ever since I took the job as the head of the precinct, it has never felt right without Marlowe working here.
I always expected to wake up one day and have her tell me she got her old job back, and I’d have no choice but to accept it because the order came from a higher authority than mine.
Somehow, her telling me she is leaving town for good hits harder than the thought of her taking back the position I currently hold—a position I convinced myself was temporary, but now I want to keep.
She is the reason I am sitting in Dad’s old chair.
She made my childhood bearable and my return to Borealis tolerable after his arrest last summer.
Even though Borealis is no longer home to her after Chiron’s imprisonment, I still thought she’d stay for me.
Though I will never admit that aloud.
Pallas is the only connection to her past life.
Now, even he has a new job on the right side of the law.
Trying to mask my disappointment, I say, “Well, if you came to say goodbye, you could have just texted.”
Marlowe narrows her eyes like a predator.
“Quit being a little shit, or I won’t give you your gift.”
Marlowe reaches into the pocket of her riding pants and retrieves a small, black box.
When she tosses it to me, I catch it, turning it over in my hand.
The smooth surface cools against my skin.
“Are you proposing?” I joke.
“Open it,” she encourages after I do nothing but stare.
I lift the box lid, finding a platinum pentacle pin inside.
My gaze meets hers, and Marlowe folds her arms in a gesture of finality.
“The commander’s pin.”
She grins.
“Now, you can stop embarrassing yourself by wearing that pewter piece of shit the president gave you. Here.” She takes the pin out of the box and gestures to my chest.
“May I?”
I nod, unable to speak.
Marlowe is passing the torch to me, someone she trusted as an acolyte.
I never expected being the commander rather than her Domna, but I didn’t foresee Marlowe being Nyx either.
It’s funny how things always work out, even in the bleakest days.
Marlowe’s ocher eyes mist as she hovers over me.
“I’m sorry for bringing up Moran earlier. You two have had a rough relationship, but someone needs to say it. I am proud of you, Wilder. I watched you grow up, protecting your sister with a fierceness and loyalty I admired. Seeing you sit in this chair because you’ve extended that loyalty to your country makes me smile. Caring for you and Desiree while you were kids was never a burden. I hope you know that. It was a bright spot for me. I wanted you to be my Domna; that is no secret. But now . . . I see you are exactly where you belong.”
After removing my fake pin and replacing it with the real one, Marlowe adds, “There. Much better.”
Thanks to the symbolism and Marlowe’s confession, I gaze down at the shiny pin to mask the emotion in my eyes as my world spins.
This pin represents leadership and stability.
Her giving it to me shows how much she still believes in me, even though I’ve made it clear I no longer believe in her.
But that was to protect myself.
Ever since she chose me that night, we surrendered to the wolves, and a huge part of me forgave her for what she did.
She wanted to make the world a better place for the Nebula, like me, and I can’t fault her for that, but she went about it the wrong way.
So much has changed since Marlowe almost suspended me after Soter accused me of being Nyx at the Harvest Festival.
It turned out she was Nyx, which prompted me to get the job at the palace, where I met and fell for Leigh.
I should thank her for my relationship bliss.
“Thank you.”
Marlowe bobs her head in reply.
“Well, see you around, kid,” she says, turning on her heel to leave.
“Wait,” I rush out.
She halts, peering back at me.
“Is this it, or will I see you again?”
Marlowe smiles.
“Are you going to miss?—”
She doesn’t finish.
I cross the room and pull her into a hug, the scent of her leather jacket filling my nostrils with a familiar comfort.
“Be safe,” I tell her, and I mean it.
“Stay out of trouble. My influence only travels so far.”
She laughs.
“Good thing you have friends in high places.”
Yeah.
Good thing.