Immortal Reign(42)

“Whatever you say.” Felix snorted. “I think we’re done for today. You might want to put on your shirt before anyone gets a glimpse of your little secret.”

“Good point.” Jonas grabbed a white shirt from the ground nearby, pulling it on over his arms. When he turned, Cleo saw exactly what Felix referred to.

Jonas’s little secret was a mark on his chest.

The spiral mark of a Watcher.

For a moment, she couldn’t move, couldn’t think. But then Cleo forced herself to follow them out of the courtyard and back into the palace, still unseen by either of them.

They parted ways at a branch in the hallway.

Cleo followed Jonas, hurrying to keep up with his long strides. She followed him right out of the palace and into the City of Gold.

Where was he headed?

As she followed him through the winding streets, she wracked her brain, trying to remember if she’d ever seen that marking before—or if she’d ever seen him without his shirt on.

She had—in the Wildlands, when he’d kidnapped her in a rebel plot to coerce King Gaius into stopping construction of his Imperial Road. Instead, the king had sent swarms of his soldiers out to search for the princess he’d betrothed to his son in hopes of ingratiating the Damora family with their new Auranian citizens.

Jonas had been injured—shot with an arrow. He’d needed Cleo’s assistance to bandage the wound.

There had been no mark on his chest then.

The rebel left the walled city entirely, a bow and quiver of arrows slung over his shoulder. Cleo pulled up the hood of her cloak, staying far enough behind him so as not to be noticed.

He took a pathway toward an inlet the ship that had brought him and the others to Auranos had sailed past on their way to the palace docks. He walked as if he knew exactly where he was going. As if he’d been there before.

It was a small, secluded cove that Cleo and her sister had visited regularly in simpler times, one shielded by a steep cliff. From the small sandy beach, they would watch ships pass by on their way to and from the palace docks.

Waves lapped against the shore of the wide canal, so wide that Cleo could barely see the other side of it. Seabirds waded in the shallow shore water, hunting for food.

Carefully navigating the pathway down to the cove itself, she watched as Jonas paused, aimed his bow and arrow, and let it go. Jonas swore under his breath as a fat rabbit scampered away.

He was the guest of King Gaius with a banquet of food ready from dawn to dusk . . . and he was hunting rabbits.

“Watch your step, princess,” Jonas said without looking up at her.

She froze in place.

“Yes, I know you’ve been following me since we left the palace,” he said.

Feeling oddly exposed, Cleo joined Jonas on the small sandy beach with her head held high. “Why are you hunting rabbits?”

“Because hunting rabbits makes me feel normal,” he replied. “Wouldn’t that be nice? To feel normal again?”

“Perhaps.” She scratched her left arm that bore the twisting, vine-like blue lines. “Please don’t kill anything. Not today. There’s no need for it.”

Jonas paused, giving her a sidelong look. “Do I have to explain to you where the meat on your dinner plate comes from?”

Cleo took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “Why do you have the mark of a Watcher on your chest?”

He didn’t speak for a moment, but he put his bow and arrow down on the sandy ground and looked out onto the calm water.

“You saw that,” he said.

She nodded. “I saw you and Felix in the courtyard.”

“I see. And now you have questions,” he said, turning to face her.

“Only the one, really,” she admitted.

Jonas rubbed his chest absently. “I’m not a Watcher, if that’s what you’re thinking. But it seems like I have this well of magic inside me—one I can’t easily access no matter how hard I try.”

“I know a little of what that’s like.”

“Yes, I’m sure you do.” Jonas turned to stare out at the crystal-blue water. “An immortal named Phaedra gave her life to save mine a while back, just after she’d healed me a moment from death. I’ve been told that I . . . absorbed her magic. I don’t understand it. I don’t know why, only that it happened. And then Olivia healed me too, and . . .” He shook his head. “And that original magic acted like a sponge, soaking up more and more. Soon after that, the mark appeared.”

“Oh,” Cleo said. “That actually makes sense.”

He laughed. “Perhaps to you it does.”

“But you say you can’t use this magic.”

“No.” His gaze moved to the markings on her arm. “What is the plan, princess?”

Cleo looked up at him, startled. “The plan?”

“The plan to fix all of this.”

“I honestly don’t know.” She studied him for a moment in silence. “Show me your mark.”

He hesitated at first before he slowly unbuttoned the front of his shirt. She moved closer to him, placing her hand on his skin and feeling his heartbeat as she looked up at him.

“My mark glows sometimes,” she said.

He looked down at her hand before he met her gaze fully. “Lucky you.”