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vying
for her attention. He needed to be closer to her, wanted her to be
his so much, even when he knew that he couldn’t have
her.

    Ixion disappeared and
reappeared next to the stall that sold the jewellery. Looking down,
he spotted the necklace that had made Natalia’s eyes shine and
frowned at the price. It was expensive. The price tag was far more
Lynans than it was worth. But she had seemed to like it.

    Reaching into his jacket
pocket, he took out all the Lynans that he had. He never bought
anything with his wages. It accumulated in the Central Bank of
Lyra. What he had in his pocket was this week’s pay and wasn’t
enough to buy the pendant. He looked at the old woman and then in
the direction that Natalia had gone. She had stopped two stalls
away.

    His hand went straight for
his blade when someone touched his money where it sat on his
upturned palm. He stopped himself from drawing it when he saw it
was the old woman. She smiled at him, as though she knew why he
wanted the pendant, and took some of his money, not nearly enough
to cover the cost of the necklace.

    “ Tk’llsoi nkayk
utteaiosolance.”

    Ixion stepped back,
glaring at her, shocked by the language that she had
spoken.

    She offered the pendant
with a broad warm smile.

    “ Akkati nem
utteaiosolance.”

    His hands shook when he
went to take it. The clear purple heart was warm against his
fingers and slowly turned black when he touched it. Variance stone?
He stared at the old woman. How had she managed to lay hands on
something from his home world? No traders went there. She nodded
and smiled. Her words rang in his head.

    A heart for an
assassin.

    How did she know
him?

    An assassin deserves love
too.

    She didn’t know him at
all. If she did, she wouldn’t say such things to him in his own
language.

    Her eyes shifted, the
edges of her irises turning purple. Perseian. Their own language
then. He had never expected to meet another Perseian outside of the
royal assassins, not here on Lyran soil so far from home and
definitely not a female.

    He bowed, pocketed the
pendant and followed after Natalia, trying to shake off the
unsettled feeling inside of him. It had been twenty Lyran years
since he had left Perseia. In that time, he had forgotten things
about his home world, things that came back to him now.

    He shook them away and
focused on Natalia.

    The crowd was closely
packed but he moved through it with ease, never breaking his cover
or being seen and always aware of his surroundings but focused on
Natalia.

    She pointed to something a
short distance away and tugged her attendants there. Ixion slipped
through the crowd and stopped when he saw her. She was laughing. It
had been so long since he had seen her laugh. Years. It was a
relief to see her smiling again after her confrontation with her
father.

    Ixion moved closer,
wanting to see what had amused her. Her eyes lit up, glittering
like the precious stone from which they had stolen their colour,
and she laughed again.

    He looked at her hands as
a portly middle aged Lyran female placed a small bundle of pale
blue fluff into them. A head immediately popped out of the mass of
feathers, wide blue eyes taking in the Natalia as she stared back
at it. It pecked at her with its dark blue beak and then wriggled
as though settling down for a sleep in a nest.

    A baby Friskin.

    They didn’t have such
things on his planet. It was bleak and lifeless, barely able to
sustain his species let alone any wildlife, and situated beyond the
point where the markets roamed.

    There was so much life on
Lyra Five.

    He narrowed his eyes on
Natalia, almost smiling along with her as she laughed and stroked
the Friskin now settled and sleeping in her delicate
hand.

    There was so much life in
her.

    It only made him love her
more.

    Natalia turned and stopped
when her eyes fell on him. Her hand continued to stroke the Friskin
even though her concentration was clearly on him. The laughter fled
her lips, replaced by