Shadowland (The Immortals #3)

“So you kept it.” I smile, settling into his BMW, happy to see he’s kept it in place of Big Ugly.

He looks at me, eyes still serious but voice light when he says, “You were right. I went a little overboard with the whole safety thing. Not to mention, this is a much better ride.”

I gaze out the window, wondering what sort of adventure he’s planned, but figuring he wants to surprise me as usual. Watching as he pulls onto the street and weaves through the traffic until we’re clear of all cars and he picks up the speed. Pushing the gas and accelerating so quickly, I have no idea where we’re going, until we’re already there.

“What’s this?” I gaze around, amazed by his ability to always do the least expected thing.

“I figured you’d never been here.” He opens my door and takes my hand. “Was I right?”

I nod, taking in a barren desert landscape, dotted only by the occasional shrub, a mountainous backdrop, and thousands of windmills. Seriously thousands. All of them tall. All of them white. All of them turning.

“It’s a windmill farm.” He nods, hoisting himself onto the trunk of his car and dusting off a space for me to sit too. “It produces electricity by harnessing the wind. In just one hour it can make enough electricity to run a typical household for a month.”

I glance all around, taking in the turning blades and wondering what the significance could be. “So, why’d we come here? I’m a little confused.”

He takes a deep breath, gaze far away, expression wistful when he says, “I find myself drawn to this place. I guess because I’ve borne witness to so much change during the last six hundred years, and harnessing the wind is a very old idea.”

I squint, still not getting its importance, but definitely sensing there is one.

“Despite all the technological changes and advances I’ve seen—some things—things like this—remain pretty much the same.”

I nod, silently urging him on, sensing something much deeper in his words, but knowing he’s choosing to dole them out slowly.

“Technology advances so quickly, making the familiar obsolete at an increasingly rapid pace. And while things like fashion may seem to advance and change, if you live long enough, you realize it’s really just cyclical—the readapting of old ideas made to seem new. But while everything around us seems to be in a constant state of flux—people at their very core remain exactly the same. All of us still seeking the things we’ve sought all along—shelter, food, love, greater meaning—” He shakes his head. “A quest that’s immune to evolution.”

He looks at me with eyes so deep and dark, I can’t imagine what it’s like to be him. To have witnessed so much, to know so much, to have done so much—and yet, despite what he thinks, he’s not the slightest bit jaded. He’s still full of dreams.

“And once the basics are covered, once we’ve secured food and shelter, we spend the rest of our time just looking to be loved.”

He leans toward me, lips cool and soft as they brush my skin—fleeting, ephemeral, like a sweet desert breeze. Pulling away to gaze at the windmills again when he says, “The Netherlands is known for their windmills. And since you did spend a lifetime there, I thought you might want to visit.”

I squint, thinking he surely misspoke. We’ve no time for that trip—do we?

Watching as he smiles, gaze growing lighter as he says, “Close your eyes and come with me.”