"Perhaps not if they’re very confident of his success, but I think not, Margrit. Not with this morning’s attempt on his own life. He’s badly shaken, or he’d have never approached you." Janx pursed his lips in thought, then smiled brilliantly. "And I think that if I were he and intended on challenging me, I would have voted to overturn our third law. It would be ill-advised to strike at me without killing."

Margrit sighed. "Yeah, that’s true enough. God, what have I gotten myself into?"

Janx turned an unexpectedly sympathetic look on her. "It isn’t often that a human finds herself so thoroughly ensconced in our world. I wish I could be reassuring and promise that all will be well, but historically, it hasn’t worked that way. Our good, true Stoneheart may yet come to regret speaking to you that night."

Margrit managed a weak smile. "Somehow I get the impression that I wouldn’t necessarily be around in this scenario to share his regrets."

"Ours isn’t an especially kind world, Margrit, not even to those of us born to it. I would warn you toward caution, but-"

"It’d be crying over spilled milk. Thank you, Janx," Margrit said dryly. "I think, now that I’m feeling so reassured, that I’ll find Alban and have him drop me off on a nice high mountaintop until you’ve all settled this new way of-You didn’t tell me." She broke off accusingly. "You didn’t tell me why you could make this decision for your whole race."

"No." Janx smiled merrily and stepped back with an extravagant bow. "I didn’t. Good evening, Margrit Knight." He turned on his heel and strode back toward the ballroom, leaving her with a helpless laugh on her lips.

A peculiar ripple went through the ballroom as Margrit entered a few minutes later. Dark-eyed faces turned toward her briefly, beginning with those nearest the balcony and washing out to the edges, like a stadium wave effect. She saw one or two who were familiar: Cara Delaney, whose enigmatic smile made her seem much older than she had only a month or two earlier. Kaimana Kaaiai, who acknowledged her as solemnly as he had in the boardroom. His personal assistant, Marese, didn’t smile, but something in her expression suggested approval.

And in the rest of the faces she saw thanks, admiration, delight, excitement. Selkie faces, all of them, dotted among the oblivious humans at the party. It would have been a formidable source with only mortals as attendees; with the selkie ranks swelling the guest list, there were over a thousand people swirling through Daisani’s ballrooms.

"No point standing on shifting earth." Biali’s voice rumbled near Margrit’s ear, startling her. He barely paused as he passed by, though he cut a glance from her to the gathered selkies and back again. "No point standing against the tide."

Then he was among them once more, white-haired and broad-shouldered as he moved unceremoniously through the crowd of dark-haired selkies. They let him pass without comment, though Margrit saw from some faces that they knew how he’d voted in the quorum, and were pleased with him for it. Kaimana stepped aside for him, then turned back to Margrit and lifted a hand in question. She smiled and came down the stairs, fingertips light on the railing, to work her way to the selkie lord and fall into the steps of an elegant, formal dance with him. "I thought maybe you didn’t dance."

Kaimana gave her a broad, bright grin with no artifice to it. "I wasn’t sure I had reason to, earlier."

"What will you do now?"

"Party like it’s 1999," Kaimana said drolly, then glanced around the ballroom. "As Eliseo would have it, it seems. I assume this extravaganza is his way of showing us the advantages of building an alliance with him."

"Is it working?"

Kaimana brought Margrit around in a slow, stately turn, offering her the chance to watch the fluid motions of the dancers around her. A sense of confidence imbued them, not that her dealings with the any of the Old Races had suggested they were less than confident. But it was more than that: a sense of belonging; of joy. "I guess I’d be pretty thrilled to be handed the keys to the-" She broke off, realizing she’d stolen Janx’s phrase. "But you have money," she said after a moment’s uncomfortable silence. "This isn’t new to you."

"Dancing with the elite isn’t," Kaimana agreed. "But dancing with my own people so freely? With all of us welcomed as what we are by the rest of our kind? I think we could do worse than ally ourselves with Eliseo Daisani."

Margrit nodded, unwilling to voice her own reservations. Alban had warned her about just such an alliance too many times-and fruitlessly-but she was human. Kaimana held more cards than that, and had moved with assurance from the moment she’d met him, all toward the end game he’d achieved during the quorum.

He spun her again, and she caught a glimpse of Tony, his jaw tense with strain. The sensation of dancing on a knife’s edge suddenly blossomed within her. Kaimana had, from all appearances, moved before she’d met him, putting Tony into a position where the selkie lord could get to Margrit through him. Abrupt anger at her precarious position made her steps clumsy. It seemed that there had not been an unorchestrated moment in her life since Alban had greeted her in the park on a frozen January night.

Kaimana steadied her, his forehead wrinkled with concern. Margrit shook her head and put on a meaningless smile, trying not to feel as though she was baring her teeth. "It’s been a long week. I guess I’m more tired than I thought."

The selkie lord looked rueful. "I think you’ve done your duty by us tonight. You’ve even danced with everyone. I know you support Alban, Ms. Knight. I’m honored that you’ve chosen to throw your lot in with my people, as well. And I think the fact that you’ve chosen Daisani as your benefactor speaks highly of him as a man worth having on our side."

"As opposed to Janx?"

"Janx runs a much darker empire than Eliseo does. There’s something to be said for a life lived in sunlight, don’t you think?"

Nothing in his expression changed, no hint of a threat appeared in his pleasant gaze, but Margrit stumbled again, heart lurching. Kaimana came to a halt, his hands steady on her waist and his eyebrows drawn down, still with nothing more than genial concern and friendship in his eyes. "Margrit?"

"I’m sorry." She stepped back. "I just need to sit down for a little while and catch my breath."

She gathered herself and fled the dance floor in search of the man she would never build a life in the sunlight with.

CHAPTER 28

Moonlight softened the city’s shadows, turning concrete and steel to faded lilac and blue. A handful of stars glittered above, defying both city lights and the moon. Music and soft light rose from below, open windows carrying the sounds of Daisani’s party up to the rooftop. Wind played in Margrit’s hair, threatening to finish what the tango earlier had started and emphasizing bursts of chatter with its ebb and fall.

Alban alighted behind her with a soft thud and a rustle of wings. Margrit glanced back at him, smiling. His silver-shot tuxedo was gone, abandoned in favor of the jeans he typically wore in his gargoyle form. Typically, or rather, for her benefit: her first glimpse of his natural shape had been staggering, and he’d donned clothing he didn’t normally bother with so she might be able to meet his eyes. Bare-chested and pale in the moonlight, he looked like a dream come to life, warm and comforting and not at all human.

"When I said meet on the roof, it didn’t occur to me until too late that you didn’t have an elevator key for rooftop access."

"It occurred to me that you didn’t have wings." Alban sounded amused. "I assumed you had some method of getting yourself here, but it seemed like a curious place to meet."