Shadow's End (Elder Races #9)

People were going to die due to the decisions he made over the next several hours. One way or another, he had been in command of other soldiers for a very long time, so he was no stranger to seeing it happen. He had experienced that particular kind of loss before.

That never made it any easier.





TWELVE


After Graydon left the hotel, he shapeshifted and flew back to Cuelebre Tower.

It had stopped snowing, but the snow hadn’t yet lost its newness. The city looked pristine and sugarcoated. Even in the daylight, Christmas and masque lights twinkled along the streets.

He arrived at Cuelebre Tower quickly enough. His apartment was on the seventy-eighth floor of one of the most stringently guarded buildings in the city, so he never bothered to lock his balcony doors. That meant he could come and go with a decent amount of freedom.

Aiming carefully, he executed his shapeshift as he landed, with a sense of timing built on years of experience. Once he strode inside, he went into his bedroom, stripped and stepped into the shower.

Call him obsessive, but he set the portable hard drive on the bathroom sink where he could keep a visual on it, and he stayed under the jet of the showerhead for a long time, letting the hot water ease cold, tired muscles.

A sound came from his living room. He lifted his head out of the jetspray. He had company.

Grabbing a towel as he stepped out, he took a quick swipe at his dripping hair, then wrapped the towel around his waist and went to see who had invaded his apartment.

As he entered the living room, Constantine closed his refrigerator door. The other gryphon looked a little windblown, and his color was high underneath his tanned skin. His handsome face wore lines of tiredness.

All four gryphons were some version of tawny and brawny. Rune and Constantine were the two most handsome, and while Bayne had a certain ruggedness to his good looks, Graydon had always been comfortably aware that he would only be considered handsome through the gaze of someone who looked at him with true love.

Constantine said, “You’ve got no food in your fridge. What’s the matter with you?”

Graydon suppressed a sigh. Leaving his balcony door unlocked meant, of course, that other avian Wyr who had security clearance could enter his apartment too.

He replied, “Since I didn’t know when I would be coming or going over the next few days, I threw things out. What are you doing here, Con? I’ve been up all night and I’m tired.”

“I’ve been up all night too.” The other gryphon inspected the Keurig on Graydon’s counter, selected a cup and started the machine. After giving Graydon a quick once-over, Constantine said, “From the look of things, I probably had more fun with my night than you did with yours.”

“I’m not available to talk about work stuff. You’ll have heard I’m on leave right now.”

“Why, yes. I did hear that. I thought it was interesting, since you never ask for a leave of absence. I mean, sure, you take your vacations when it’s your turn, but you don’t ask for time off. Like, literally almost never, which makes it memorable when you do.”

He stared pointedly at the mug Constantine pulled from the machine. Not that Constantine chose to pick up on it.

The other man blew on the hot liquid in his mug. Then he took the bottle of scotch Graydon had left on the counter and splashed some liquor into his drink. “In fact,” Con said, “I’m pretty sure this is the first time you’ve asked for a leave in, oh, let me think . . .”

Graydon watched the other man without moving. Damn him, Constantine was sharp as a whip, stubborn as a bulldog, and he had a memory like a computer—he just wouldn’t give up or stop piecing things together. His personal life was a mess. He catted around compulsively, and he was always wrecked and hungover, but he was a vicious, talented fighter, and his mind never, ever shut off.

Constantine gave him a gentle smile. “If memory serves, wasn’t the last time you took a leave of absence when we went to London all those years ago? And wasn’t that right after you’d had a private conversation with the Lady of the Elven demesne, at the Vauxhall masque?”

Exasperated, Graydon said, “Now, why the fuck would you remember something like that?”

“I watched you walk away with her, and you didn’t reappear until the next day. I remember it so clearly because afterwards, you were uncommunicative and withdrawn for weeks. Gray, that’s not like you. You’re usually a laid-back, friendly, cheerful kind of an SOB.”

Sighing, Graydon pinched the bridge of his nose. “You’re not going to go away, are you?”

“Nope, I don’t think I am.” The other man turned back to the Keurig machine. “Why don’t I make you a cup of hot chocolate or coffee while you get dressed? Then we’ll chat.”