by Eva Brandt
“It was,” I replied curtly. “Thank you.”
I was uncomfortable talking to her out in the open like this. When my lovers had told me about the help she’d given them, I’d been under the impression my mother would hide her within the temple, at least until it was a little safer for her to roam about. But apparently, that had been a little too much to ask for.
Then again, the whole debacle wasn’t my mother’s fault at all. “Lady Welton, it’s dangerous for you to be here,” she said. “Please return to your quarters.”
“I refuse to be locked in there forever. I understand the necessity of precautions, but I should be allowed to at least take a damn walk at night. The people who regularly visit the temple at this hour are already informed about my presence.”
“That may well be, but other people can still drop by unexpectedly.”
If Penelope had been anyone else, she’d have probably snorted. The disdainful twist of her lips was the Chimera nobility equivalent of that. “If that happens, I’m confident that you can let me know in time, Your Holiness.”
My mother twitched in irritation. Clearly, this was not the first time she was having such issues with Brendan’s would-be fiancée. I’d have liked to help, but I was the last person Penelope would listen to.
It was a little cowardly, but I decided that the best approach in this case was removing myself from the situation. “Was there something you wanted, Lady Welton?”
“Actually, yes. I need you to give Brendan a message. I can understand that it’s not in his ability to help me much right now, but I expect him to put a little more effort into finding a permanent solution for my future. If not for me, they’d have never found you. And there are still other avenues I can pursue if he goes back on his word.”
Wonderful. Now, we had a blackmailer to deal with. “If you had other options, Lady Welton, you wouldn’t still be here with my mother,” I pointed out.
“I admit the idea of going back to my father doesn’t appeal to me. But I’m sure Prince Archibald would like to know his nephew committed treason for the sake of his Terran mistress.”
I took a deep breath, struggling to control my temper. “Treason? You have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“So you expect me to believe that they just walked into the home of the apsids and retrieved you?” Penelope scoffed. “Please. I might not be a soldier, Acting Pilot Renard, but I’m not an idiot either. If you’re here, it’s because the apsids allowed it.”
Compared to everything that had happened, her veiled threat was insignificant, and not something she could pursue. But the tension that had kept piling up finally got to me and I snapped.
An outburst of purplish power struck Penelope, shoving her against the metal paw of the Sphinx. My chimera was unfazed, but the same could not be said about Brendan’s mouthy ex. Twitching in pain, she stared at me with wide eyes. “What are you—?”
“Listen to me very closely,” I cut her off, gripping her shoulder in a tight hold. “You’ll keep your mouth shut about this, or you won’t need to worry about your future—because you won’t have one. I’ll personally make sure you die in the most excruciating way possible.”
I intensified the threads of tachyons coursing through her bloodstream. She had Tartarus’s Gift too, but hers was latent, unpracticed, and she had no chance of fighting me off. “Please,” she whimpered. “Please, stop.”
I realized what I was doing only when the coppery scent of blood filled my nostrils, mingling with the stench of charred flesh. It snapped me out of my fugue and I let go of her, stepping back. Penelope slid to the ground, drained of strength.
The whole exchange couldn’t have lasted more than a few seconds, but it still left me dazed and lost. My mother rushed to us, pasty white. She knew how uncharacteristic it was of me to attack someone like this out of the blue, for nothing except conversation.
Penelope was far more injured than I was, but my mother still stopped by my side and cupped my cheek with a gentle hand. “Selene? Selene, can you hear me?”
“Of course, Mother. I’m fine.” My power was still buzzing through me, restless and out of control, so I moved away from her. “You should help Penelope. I’ll be fine. You know what this is about.”
She nodded, but she still seemed concerned. Even if she must have realized my loss of temper was caused by hormonal imbalance, it didn’t sit well with her to leave me on my own.
Sphinx didn’t give her a choice. She grabbed me in her paw and slid me into the cockpit without waiting for my permission. Meanwhile, she nudged Penelope slightly, making the other young woman groan in distress. My mother had to intervene and do her duty.
“Goodbye, Mother,” I remembered to say just before the cockpit hatch closed.
The words held a striking degree of finality, more so than I myself intended. But they came out anyway, and I couldn’t help but think that it was for a reason.
I felt strange, as if my body didn’t belong to me anymore. My control was shot. My focus was all over the place. I’d worked so very hard to learn how to control my skills, but none of those lessons would help me now.
“Don’t panic, Selene,” my chimera told me. “Just breathe. Slowly now. Remember who you are. Remember your goals. Focus.”
I was relieved that she didn’t swamp me with empty reassurances, but I still wanted to tell her that following her advice wasn’t that easy. I didn’t know who I was, not anymore. Had I ever really known it?
I’d thought I was Unblessed and that couldn’t have been further from the truth. I’d thought I was a member of the Grand Chimera Unit, and while that was officially true, my reality was much grimmer.
But staying here in New Washington wouldn’t help me either, so I connected with Sphinx and launched myself into the air. I intended to go back to Tartarus Base, but before I could do so, a strange, familiar power reached out to me.
The systems of the Sphinx weren’t affected, but they did respond to the energy. “The apsid,” Sphinx hissed in displeasure. “He’s here somewhere.”
I hadn’t seen or spoken to Jared since we’d first dropped him off on Terra, immediately after our return from the Apsid Quasar. I didn’t know if I even wanted to see him. My feelings for him were… mixed.
Or were they? This was all his fault, damn it. If he hadn’t kidnapped me, if he hadn’t decided I was to be his mate and we’d happily go on to have a family together, I wouldn’t have been in this situation in the first place.
“Why don’t we track him down and see what he wants, Sphinx?” I asked darkly. “I think we need to have a longer, honest conversation.”
Sphinx didn’t need to be told twice. She carried us unerringly over the city, to our destination. Jared was waiting for me in the outskirts of New Washington, in an area that had yet to be terra-formed. The levels of radiation weren’t very high, but would have probably been dangerous for an Unblessed.
For me, it was oddly soothing. When Sphinx let me out of her metallic embrace and I set foot on the still contaminated soil, I felt something inside me settle. I was very grateful for that, since it meant I managed to control my bubbling power and remain coherent enough to actually speak. “Jared,” I greeted him. “I see you’ve managed to stay under the radar.”
“Were you concerned about my well-being, my beautiful Terran?” He smiled sharply. “I don’t think that’s why you’re here.”
“I’m here because you asked me to come. I could feel your power reaching out to me.”
That wasn’t exactly true, but I wasn’t going to admit I needed him, not just yet. Jared accepted my explanation. “I wasn’t sure you would. We didn’t part ways under the best circumstances.”
We sat together on the still barren ground, staring at the sky. It looked bright and clear, even at night, and if I squinted, I thought I could see the glow of Tartarus Base.
It was naturally, just, an illusion, but it was one that reminded me of my lovers. “I fucked the others again,” I bl
urted out.
I didn’t know why I felt the need to say that. Maybe I just wanted to hurt him. It worked beautifully. Jared recoiled as if I’d struck him. He stared at me, breathing heavily, taken aback by my hostility. Or maybe he didn’t believe me. I could always elaborate. “I didn’t intend it, I admit, but we went to take a shower together and I just couldn’t resist. I just had to have them.”
“Did you enjoy it?” he asked between gritted teeth.
“Very much,” I replied. “I never thought I’d like taking two cocks up my ass, but every day, I learn new things about my body.”
He smiled, an unexpected and unpleasant twist of lips that reminded me of the days he’d spent at Chimera Academy. “I suppose that’s true. You didn’t think you’d enjoy getting fucked by an alien plant either, but you liked that also.”
It was my turn to be shocked, but my response to it wasn’t nearly as sedate. Infuriated, I slapped him hard across the face. My palm left a red handprint on his cheek. “How dare you be so smug about this, after everything that’s happened? Did you mean even a single word of what you said in Eos?”
Jared flinched. “Sorry. Yes, of course I meant what I said. It’s just… This isn’t the way things are supposed to be.” He clenched his fists, his eyes lit up from within. “If you could see into my heart, read my body, you’d understand, Selene. I never wanted to hurt you. All I wanted was for you to be happy.”
The strangest thing was that he meant it, and he truly did believe that he could’ve made me happy like that. It was a fundamental cultural difference, a twist and separation between our respective psyches. But before Jared had been a Heliad, he’d been human, so maybe I could still make him understand my point of view. “I was never going to be happy while trapped in a cage of your making.”
“It would have only been for a little while, until you grew accustomed to the thought of being my mate.”
“Your whore, you mean,” I corrected him. “The slutty Terran you wanted to breed. Do you have any idea what you’ve done to me, Jared? Do you even grasp how difficult it will be for me to carry this child?”
It was a rhetorical question, but he actually answered. “I do, yes. There’s a reason we resort to the Phaeton Hearts, Selene. Heliads aren’t the best at reproducing naturally and pregnancies often tend to go awry. If we had been in Eos, we could have made sure it wasn’t an issue, but here…” He groaned and buried his face in his palms. “The Great Mother said you can do this, that you’re prepared to be a parent. I’m not so sure.”
I hadn’t expected him to acknowledge my concerns with such ease and openness, but then again, openness had never been our problem, not since I’d woken up trapped in that damn mating den. “I appreciate the Great Mother’s confidence, but I’m anything but ready. The baby is already throwing off my power. My hormone levels are all over the place. Leaving aside my libido, I’m concerned I might hurt someone.”
Jared cursed under his breath. “Can’t your mother help? I can try to contact my people again, but it might be difficult.”
“I have some herbal remedies now, but I’m not sure how much they’ll help.” Bracing myself, I reached for his hand and squeezed it. “Listen, Jared. You told me once that you had answers for me. You said you had a mission you couldn’t share and I respected that. But I can’t wait any longer. If you know anything at all about me, tell me. Tell me why I was chosen to carry this burden—why I was given such gifts when I did nothing to deserve them.”
Jared threaded our fingers together, clinging to me with everything he had. “Selene, I’m not sure that’s a good idea.”
Suddenly feeling like we were headed into dangerous territory, I released my hold on his hand and got up. “Please. I can’t wait any longer. I need to know. You owe me that much.”
“I owe you more than that, Selene, but you have to understand that I don’t have all the answers.” He sighed. “I will tell you what I can about my mission. But I don’t think it will help you that much. At the end of the day, you’re still the one who has to make a decision, no matter what goals I might have.”
That might well be, but finding the right path for myself would still be easier if I wasn’t stumbling along in the dark anymore. I only hoped Jared would be able to provide a little light, because if he didn’t, I had no idea what I was going to do.
The Warning
Jared
Sometimes, being a Heliad sucked.
Oh, it was useful to be able to exist without food or water, to be immune to radiation and have the ability to use light as a type of cloaking technology. But there were disadvantages to it too—namely our complete and utter inability to have normal love lives.
I knew I’d fucked up with Selene. If I’d only had more time, I might have been able to make her understand, but the others had arrived before I could explain. And even if they hadn’t come, I couldn’t blame her for not wanting to have anything to do with me.
No matter how much I liked to ignore it, the fact remained that I’d gotten her pregnant against her will. Selene wasn’t a Heliad, so the rules that applied to us didn’t apply to her. I’d rushed her because I’d wanted to be with her so badly, but I’d just ruined our relationship in the process.
“Like I told you, Selene, the whole war between us and Terra started because The Grand Judiciary needed fuel for its machines. But the reason why they came to be was always of interest to us. After all, the ancient gods of Terra went dormant millennia ago. Why did they awaken?
“One of my missions involved finding an answer to that question. Unfortunately, I failed. If anyone even knows anymore, it’s the chimeras. But the Harpies don’t seem to remember why they were awakened. I haven’t brought it up with Grand Chimeras, but I suspect their situation is the same.”
“It is,” Sphinx confirmed. “I think I knew, once, but… It was such a long time ago and my memories tend to go hazy as I go dormant. The more time passes, the more memories I lose.”
This didn’t surprise me, as I’d already reached that conclusion myself. Chimeras preserved some memories in their core soul, but if their shell was destroyed or if they spent too much time out of commission, the information deteriorated.
The Great Mother hypothesized this had something to do with the bonding process between what had been the minds of living creatures and the metal bodies created for chimeras. There was an incompatibility there, which was one of the reasons why chimeras needed pilots to function properly.
“In any case, I haven’t found any real information about that, but I did figure out something noteworthy. Did you know the Weltons never revealed the secret to the secondary alloy they use for creating chimeras?”
“Yes, Jared, but I don’t see how that’s in any way related to me,” Selene replied.
“I honestly didn’t realize it was related to you. But since it’s obvious that The Grand Judiciary is using apsids to feed chimeras, I started to wonder why they turned to that and what kind of methods they might have used in the past.
“Right now, my theory is that the alloy might contain human bone. It’s quite astounding, but human bone can resist temperatures of up to 1500 degrees Celsius. The DNA of a human being could have easily formed the basis of chimera bodies. Which brings us to you—a woman who wields both Gaia’s Gift and Tartarus’s. When you first arrived at Chimera Academy, I knew there was something special about you, something different. But it was just recently that all the pieces fell into place.”
“I don’t understand,” Selene said, still confused. “Even assuming chimeras are crafted out of human bone, The Grand Judiciary doesn’t need living people for that. They certainly don’t need me.”
“No, but the bone is only the raw material. You know how tachyon shields have intensity frequencies that allow them to block certain outbursts of heat? Well, creating that alloy requires a specific code too. It’s a code I gave to you when you were in the labyrinth, because I wasn’t confident I would remember it once my human body was wiped
away.”
I needn’t have worried. I’d remembered it fine and had been able to use it more efficiently than I’d hoped. But Selene had asked me to tell her the truth, and I would try, insofar as it was possible, at least. “It’s why I was able to take control of the Sphinx on Mercury.”
“That still doesn’t explain the reason for Selene’s power, though,” Sphinx pointed out.
I narrowed my eyes at her. “No, it doesn’t, but you know as well as I do that it’s not so simple to explain that. After all, there’s a reason you chose her, and it’s not because of her inner strength.”
Selene was a very determined, brave woman, but there were a lot of women who were determined and brave. There were plenty of people who could have been more qualified to pilot the Sphinx. She did seem to have a natural talent for it, but I had no idea if that was her skill or something she’d borrowed from the Sphinx. As far as I knew, she’d never piloted any kind of vessel before her arrival at the academy, so it stood to reason that her chimera must have given her at least some of her abilities.
But what was unique about Selene was the power that had made it possible for her to face the mirror trial at the tournament and come out unscathed. Yes, she’d had her lovers’ aid at the time, but even that wouldn’t have been easy to organize and channel.
“To answer your question, Selene, I think The Grand Judiciary has been performing more experiments than they ever mentioned in their files. It would have been very easy for them to add a little something extra in the toxins they inject into Terran women and leave something behind when restrictions are lifted for an individual person.”
“And did they?”
“The Great Mother isn’t sure. She said there wasn’t anything in your body, but you were sterile before she got to you so that might not mean anything. Helios only knows what’s inside the bodies of those who do have permission to reproduce.”
“Why didn’t you tell me this sooner, Jared? My mother could be in danger.”
