Page 12 of Bargains with Benefits
Of course it was. I flipped through the pages. She may have complimented my wind, but she’d still thrown a drink in my face. My only interest in her was for my feature story. I needed a source. It was too good an opportunity to pass if she was related to Darius Pierce.
The book was organized by surname. It looked like the newest court members were at the bottom of the page by the dates. Alphabetical order was at least attempted for the surnames. But with the recent influx of half-fae and mixed-faejoining courts, some order had been lost.Better late than never, I thought. My wind flipped the page in agreement.
The Pierce page was easy to find, the family having been included since the beginning of the courts. Laid out like a family tree, the document listed parents and children back to the creation of the fae. As I scanned the page, my gaze snagged on Darius’s name. He didn’t appear to have siblings or children. He was lowest on the Pierce family page and he had to be at least a hundred. His parents were listed above him, and their siblings were in the same row. I doubted she was older than Darius and there was no way she was more than two generations of fae back.
Her temper had flared multiple times in our short acquaintance. The emotions streaking plainly across her face told me she couldn’t be older than me. A consistent calm, often considered devoid of emotion, was a trait of older fae. One my parents often reminded me that I, or more aptly my wind, was lacking. Luna hadn’t seemed shy with her words, and her face was even more expressive. My lip curved as I remembered the smirk she’d given me when offering the backhanded compliment about my wind. It swirled inside me like it remembered, too. I shook away the memory to focus. There was no Luna Pierce on this page.
Where was she? The other woman had called her Luna Pierce. I know I’d heard it. Luna’s water magic hadn’t been ostentatious, but it had been obvious once I saw it for what it was. She had to be in this court record.
“Excuse me,” I called to the gentlemen waiting by the door. “Any reason why someone wouldn’t be on the family page in this document?”
The man tilted his head like he considered this a trick question. “If they weren’t part of the Norden Court?”
I sighed. “Besides that. I know she was of the Norden Court. As I said, I have her surname.”
“Maybe she didn’t want to be associated with the family in question.”
I blinked, staring dumbly. “Is that…allowed?”
“Of course,” he replied. “That list is a voluntary declaration of court association. It’s not a detailed family record.”
Not having realized this, I considered updating my own Osten record.This is not the time,I thought, even as my wind swirled with excitement, flipping the cover of the Osten Court book. I shook my head, focusing on the Norden book. “Where would those names go? The ones not associated with a specific family.”
He pointed to the book. “Flip to the end. They’re usually listed there.”
I thanked him as my wind flipped the pages, ready to work backward. The entry I was looking for was there at the bottom—Luna Pierce was the most recent addition to the Norden Court.
My fingers grazed the page, circling her name. Luna was young, but she obviously wasn’t a recent birth. For an adult fae, there was only one reason to add yourself to the court listing now.
If you hadn’t been previously allowed.
Luna Pierce was half-fae.
Things started falling into place with that revelation. She’d been upset with her father last night. A father who, according to her surname and where she listed herself in this book, she didn’t claim as her own. Her father was either Darius or Darius’s father, Klein.
My wind blew in short, pointed blasts against my temple as if tapping to sayYou can’t use this.Something in my chest constricted as I realized what this meant. It was more than names on paper. Luna, the bright and confident fae I’d met last night. The one I was almost jealous of because it seemed sheknew her place in this city. Half her family had ignored her, likely up until very recently.
Did she have any human family, or was she essentially an orphan? Even as I thought it, I knew my wind, acting as my conscience, was right. I couldn’t ask her to investigate a family that had disowned her. Rationally, she wouldn’t even have access to the information I needed.
They didn’t disown her, did they? She said her father was the one she was angry at.
I couldn’t decide whose side my conscience was on, but it had a point. How bad of terms could they be on if she’d seen him yesterday?
Of course, her overreaction to my words, and me in general—even if I’d been alittlerude—didn’t speak of a happy encounter.
I was more confused than ever as I left the records room and headed into the stairwell. The attendant didn’t bother to see me out. I weighed my options as I walked. Luna was my only lead. I had to try, right? What kind of journalist would I be if I gave up without asking? I’d be honest with her. She could say no if she didn’t want to participate.
My mental spiral was interrupted by another set of voices in the stairwell above me.
“You’ve made your position clear,” a stern feminine voice echoed more loudly than I was sure she intended.
“Not clear enough if you’ve still taken no action,” replied a deeper, more masculine voice. I froze. That voice was familiar, like I’d heard it before. I couldn’t be sure if my imagination was playing tricks on me or if I was indeed this lucky, but it sounded like the voice I’d listened to repeatedly in the memory stone from Patricia. I would bet anything that Darius Pierce was speaking a floor above me.
“I will take action in my own time,” the feminine voice said. “I don’t appreciate your persistence.”
The human governor’s voice had been harder to hear in the memory stone, but the floor abovewasher office. I needed to hear more.
“That only means you have someone on the opposite side being as persistent as me. And you’re still not sure which of us to listen to.”
