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surrounded by people she loved who were suffering. No one, empath or not, could withstand that forever.
    The only people in the Circle who weren’t in constant pain were Cora and Jacob, who had the luxury of being on a different continent. Cora had found someone to help train her gift, and Jacob had been conducting his own research into the Order of Elysium—research that had yielded several books of linguistics and history that Nico was now using in his translation efforts, but that was about it. The Order seemed to have gone underground. Whether that was due to the threat of Morningstar, or because they didn’t want to help the Pairs whose number included the Prime who had slaughtered their High Priestess, Miranda couldn’t say…but she knew there would be no help from them, at least not unless something significant changed.
    Everyone just hurt so much. It wasn’t killing her, or driving her mad; she wasn’t losing her will to live the way Nico seemed to be. She was strong enough to carry it. But it was so hard to be in her home, to go through the motions of her life as if things were the same—as if one of her best friends wasn’t dead and the other nothing more than a shattered shell of who he had once been; as if her world wasn’t under the threat of genocidal war that could break out any second…
    …as if she weren’t a serial killer.
    Even with all the connections and relationships she had gotten into, she was lonelier than she had ever been in her life.
    There was, however, one bright spot.
    Twenty-two months ago, Stella had woken the Pair up to inform them, voice quivering, that they had a houseguest. Prime and Queen had immediately headed for Nico’s room ready to decapitate invaders but also mad with curiosity, and had not been disappointed.
    Miranda remembered standing there, staring, trying to maintain her authoritative cool—she’d learned how to project an unflappable facade from David, but she’d probably never be as much of an expert at it as he was—in the face of the strangest, and most fascinating, creature she’d ever seen.
    He looked like Nico, yet not at all. They had similar features but totally different coloring; their eyes were even two different shades of purple. Nico had said once that he was an average-looking Elf, and as exotic as they found him, they would be amazed if they ever met his brother. Miranda had always thought Nico’s opinion of himself was lower than it ought to be, and now she was pretty sure she knew why. Anyone, no matter how accomplished or beautiful, would feel like a homely sparrow next to Kaimereth Eleanari.
    And damned if Kai didn’t know it.
    He had turned toward the Pair from where he stood by the window, taken them in with a single disdainful glance, and said coldly, “So it was you who did this to my brother.”
    Things didn’t improve much from there.
    David, who was used to being deferred to by the most powerful beings on the planet, had immediately bristled, and his power-aura flared up like some kind of animal threat display. Miranda had stared at her Prime as if he’d lost his mind, unable to decide whether the Elf or David’s reaction to the Elf was more incredible.
    “We are Prime and Queen of this territory,” David said icily. “Who the hell are you?”
    Elf and vampire had stared daggers at each other until David said, steel reinforcing every word, “Answer my question.”
    And Kai rolled his eyes.
    Only a pleading look from Nico kept David from wringing the Bard’s neck. After that, the Pair stayed as far away from Kai as they could when he visited—he obviously wasn’t a threat, and his presence was a healing balm for Nico’s frayed heart, so there was no reason not to let him come and go.
    Over the months, things between Kai and David calmed down a bit and they could be in the same room without a venomous glaring contest; it helped that Kai clearly doted on his brother, and was as gentle and loving with Nico as Nico was with