I frowned. What he said made sense, but it wasn’t right. The dream had been important.

‘Anyan was there,’ I said, my memory flashing briefly. Then failing.

‘I’m sure he was,’ Ryu said, his voice grim. ‘Today was the first time you saw the White since he took Anyan, right?’

‘Well, yes, but…’

‘That’s why you dreamed about him, Jane.’ Ryu’s voice was gentle, sympathetic. He was obviously concerned for me. I sort of wanted to strangle him.

But he was probably right.

‘It was just so real,’ I said, leaning back against my pillows in defeat.

‘Of course it was.’ Ryu patted my hand where it lay in the bedclothes. ‘You miss him.’

More tears welled up. I blinked them away furiously, refusing to speak for fear that whatever I tried to say would come in a garbled sob.

‘Now, try to get more sleep. You need it.’

I let Ryu tuck me in, felt his cool lips on my forehead as he gave me a goodnight kiss. But my mind was a hundred miles away.

When he shut out the light and closed the door behind him, I blinked in the darkness.

On the one hand, I desperately wanted to shut my eyes and see Anyan again. I knew I’d dreamed about him.

Dreams aren’t real, I reminded myself. And yet they were something.

Which was why, on the other hand, I wanted to stay awake. I’d felt so utterly alone, so heartbroken, when I’d woken up just now. I didn’t want to feel that way again, not if I wanted to function as a normal human being for the rest of the day.

Unfortunately, no matter what I wanted or didn’t want, my body had other plans. I was exhausted, and after a few minutes I felt my heavy eyelids sliding shut of their own accord.

My dreams, this time, were empty.

Chapter Nine

The next morning we had a surprise visitor.

A sweet-faced, deferential young monk ushered Ryu and me into a boardroom on the same floor as our suite, where we found Daniel Rankin, the British secret agent who had helped us fight the Red. He was part of a special unit within MI5 or MI6 – I couldn’t keep them straight – that knew about supes and liaised with the Great Island’s Alfar Powers That Be.

‘Daniel,’ I said, shaking his hand. Our friend, the older monk from yesterday, smiled and nodded his own greeting to me, which I returned.

‘This is Ryu Baobhan Sith,’ I said, introducing the two as they shook hands.

‘A pleasure to meet you,’ the human said, his eyes aglow with curiosity. ‘I’ve heard so much about you, and we’ve been watching your territory’s experiment in democracy with great interest.’

‘Is that so?’ Ryu asked, his ever-eloquent eyebrows rising.

I took a moment to explain to Ryu who Daniel was, and for whom he worked. I could tell my ex had not known about Daniel’s organization, and that he was not too happy to find out about it now, under such circumstances.

‘The Great Island always has done things its own way,’ was the baobhan sith’s cryptic reply. Daniel couldn’t hide his obvious pleasure in discomfiting such a well-known supe.

‘So what brings you to…’ For a split second I paused, unable to remember where we were. ‘To Hong Kong.’

‘I wanted to meet with you, obviously,’ Daniel replied.

‘Okay…’ I’d figured he had come chasing dragons.

‘May we talk?’ Daniel’s eyes flicked to Ryu, whose eyebrows rose another notch. ‘Alone?’

The older monk made his way to Ryu’s side, taking my ex by the elbow.

‘I would love the opportunity to ask you some questions,’ the monk said, clearly bluffing. Ryu didn’t look happy about it, but he let the smaller man lead him out of the room. The monk shut the door behind him, leaving Daniel and me in peace.

‘What can I help you with?’ I asked, taking a seat at the conference table. Daniel took a position across from me, leaning forward on his elbows and clasping his hands in front of him.

‘My government wants to be a part of this operation,’ Daniel replied bluntly.

I frowned, cocking my head at the man. ‘That’s very generous, but I’m not sure if I understand. This isn’t much of an operation, to be honest.’

‘Let me rephrase, then. My government feels it represents human interests in this operation, and it wants to help. Specifically, it wants to help you.’

Daniel wasn’t the only one who could be blunt. ‘Why?’

‘It’s simple. Times are changing, and the Alfar are about over. Their control over the supernatural population is crumbling, and we think this latest incursion of the Red and the White is going to break it entirely. Their numbers are too low, and there are too many of your kind, Jane, coming to power.’

‘My kind?’

‘Half-humans,’ he said. Only then did I start to see where he was going.

‘Do you think that because we’re half-human, we’re more sympathetic to human causes? Or to humanity in general?’

Daniel met my dark gaze with his own pretty blue eyes. He was a good-looking man, in a nimble upper-class way, and undoubtedly he was used to charming his way through society. Supernaturals, however, were rather immune to charm.

‘You are. Working with you was a revelation. You’re practically human, but you’re so powerful.’

I couldn’t help laughing. ‘Daniel, I’m not a revelation, I’m a freak. I’m not the status quo for anything, even halflings. Believe me.’

At that moment, images of Conleth, the crazy ifrit-halfling who hated humans with a maniacal passion, sprang to mind.

‘There are just as many halflings who would happily kill off humanity as those who would help it. And this power you admire isn’t really mine. It’s been loaned to me by a far more powerful being. Under normal circumstances, without this borrowed power, I might be able to take on a weak Alfar, but not one of the monarchs. They’re too strong.’

‘Be that as it may, times are still changing,’ Daniel insisted. ‘Think about your own territory. It’s a democracy now, Jane. Imagine how unthinkable that would have seemed just months ago. But now it’s happened.’

‘Again, all of that happened under extraordinary circumstances—’

‘I disagree,’ Daniel interrupted. ‘Our analysts believe that humanity is encroaching on the supernatural world. Our culture is infiltrating theirs. Ideas like democracy are well known in the youngest generations, and it’s only a matter of time until even the most powerful of the older generations die out. Supes are long-lived, not immortal, which means not even the Alfar can exist entirely in stasis.’

I thought about what Daniel said, and it did make sense if one looked at the territory that Ryu now ruled alongside Nyx. When Morrigan had revealed her true self by killing her husband and king, Orin, she’d taken most of the powerful Alfar with her when she left. Faced with that power vacuum, the supernatural community had been left with an ugly choice of which weak, fairly pathetic Alfar to push into power.

But then they’d made a totally unforeseen decision. They’d skipped over the few Alfar still around, and had decided to vote on who would be their new leader. Ryu and Nyx were nominated, and the subsequent race was so close they agreed to share power. It had worked well. They’d managed not only to hold the territory together, but by banding together and making smart defensive choices, they’d kept any wannabe monarchs from neighboring territories at bay.

‘So why exactly are you talking to me about this?’ I said.

Daniel gave me a funny look then, as if we were having two different conversations.

‘Of course I would come to you. You’re in charge.’

I graced the human with one of my unladylike snorts. ‘What? That’s ridiculous. I’m just the champion, and once that’s over, I’ll be back to being me.’

When I said those words, it was as if they fell onto the floor in front of me with an audible plop, like that of horseshit. I stared down at the bland, if luxurious, hotel carpet and wondered how I could have been so stupid.

When Daniel spoke again, his voice was gentle. ‘Jane, you have to realize this won’t end with your destruction of the Red and the White. If you do pull off that feat, you’ll be … God, how to even describe it? You’ll be the savior of your people. You’ll be the halfling that did what no Alfar could do. And they’re not going to be able to hide, not in today’s world.’

An involuntary shudder wracked my spine as a mini-explosion went off in my brain. My thoughts spiraled out in a hundred directions, trying to envision what it was Daniel was saying and to place myself in the center of this drama for which I’d never auditioned.

[No one can know what your future holds,] came the creature’s voice, pulling me back to reality. It’d been pretty quiet since it had apparated the Red out of Hong Kong, making me think that had taken more out of it than it wanted me to know.

I dunno, I thought. Daniel’s right. What if I can never go back to being just Jane again?