Whereas before, I’d cut through the water at an average pace, now my body sliced through it like a bullet, turning and swerving as if on autopilot. The possibility that I was wrong tantalized my mind, but my gut told me differently. A shock wave rippled through the water, a signal, a warning, and then the seabed around me was filled with forms dashing back the way I’d come.
The guys were doing what they needed to do to get the sea dwellers to safety, but it was up to me to stop the threat from harming all those that didn’t make it.
The water around me grew silent. How much farther before the red coral and the edge of the royal waters? Not long because there was the formation rising into the water in a forbidding wall. The threat would be beyond, it would—
Silver and black shapes smashed through the coral, humanoid shapes with wide-open mouths, crimson eyes, and ropes of black hair streaming behind them like errant snakes.
I’d seen pictures of these creatures—kelpies—except these kelpies were part flesh, part machine, and they were headed right toward me.
I brought the staff round as it lit up bright green, and then arcana blasted out of it, hitting the closest kelpie scout and bringing it down. Two more went down easily under the assault. Obviously, Genesis hadn’t expected this kind of resistance.
Ha! I could do this, no problem. There wasn’t even any need to evacuate. Not really. Four more left.
I twisted and blasted, my body shooting through the water from side to side to leave a trail of arcana for them to swim into and die.
Fuck you, Genesis. His scouts were down. Dead. I’d done it. Triumph was sweet on my tongue, but then a sound like thunder vibrated the water around me. What the …?
I looked back at the battered crimson wall through the gaps in the broken coral to see a dark cloud headed my way. No. Not a cloud. My heart raced, and my lungs tightened. A fucking swarm of kelpies.
There was no way I could take them all out, not without draining myself. I turned and shot back toward the palace. Had to get away. I had to get back.
There would be no almost-dying today.
The royal kingdom came into view—neat domes and towers and pretty flora, all about to be destroyed and, shit, there were still dwellers swimming toward the palace. They weren’t going to make it. I could get past them. With Rydian’s power running through my body I was faster than them all. I could make it back to safety.
I shot over them, headed for the airlock, and then the vibrations of screams hit my ears.
Damn it!
I turned and swam like a bullet toward the sounds. The kelpies were almost on us. Red lasers were flying. Blood was a cloud in the water.
What could I do? I had to do something. The arcletic lamps! They were connected to the generators, to the pipes that conducted energy. Energy like arcana.
I began to wave at everyone to swim faster, urging them to get behind the light posts. To move already.
Either they picked up on what I was saying, or they were just acting on self-preservation, it didn’t matter as long as they were moving. The kelpies were almost on us.
I dove and grabbed hold of the nearest pole. Please let this work. As the kelpies bridged the final distance between us, I channeled all my arcana into the pole. For a moment, nothing happened. My heart climbed into my throat and beat there like a tiny drum, and then the light exploded into green and a wave of energy shot up and out, creating a barrier of arcana.
The scouts were going too fast to stop; they hit the barrier in a wave, sending a shock through me, and then there was silence. When the water cleared, the sea beyond the arcana barrier was filled with the floating, deactivated bodies of kelpie scouts.
I’d done it. I’d stopped them. Relief washed through me, and my hands held on to the pipe so tight they were almost melded to it.
Hands closed around my waist, and a body pressed to my back. Rydian. He grasped my forearms and tugged gently.
Let go. He was telling me to let go, but if I let go, I’d collapse. Everything I had was in those pipes. It was flowing through me and flowing through them. What would happen if I broke the connection? Fear clamped a fist around my chest, but logic asserted itself. I had to let go, simply because I couldn’t stay there forever.
I peeled my hands from the post, and with a shudder, the arcana died. My body was suddenly weak, but Rydian was there to hold me up. He was there to swim us both back to the palace.
He was there.
What now? That was the question on everyone’s faces. The crisis was over for now, but the sea dwellers had been herded back out of the catacombs. My energy was slowly returning, but it would be a couple of hours before I was working with a full battery.
“Well, at least we know what happened to the kelpies,” Rydian said. “The seabed is covered with dead bodies.”
“They were dead a long time ago,” Emory said. “Genesis simply used the biomatter and melded his machinery to it to get down here. Which makes me wonder how long he’s been planning this?”
“A couple of decades? About as long as the kelpies have been missing? They must have migrated to land for him to get his hands on them.”
Rydian ran a hand over his face. “That could be the lot of them, but there could be more.”
We had to do something. “How many people do you have that can live on land?”
He frowned. “I know what you’re thinking, but your Hive couldn’t hold us all.”
He was right.
His jaw was a hard line. “We’ll have to post more guards, open up the rest of the catacombs and be ready to hide if need be. New protocol. There are communication systems down there. We’ll radio you if we’re attacked again.”
“Not sure how much good that will do,” Deacon said. “I haven’t been able to get in touch with the Hive the last two days.”
“You should go,” Rydian said. “Go now and tell the council that you were right. That Genesis is upping the ante.”
It was awful that it had taken another attack for there to be proof about my assertion that Genesis had an aggressive plan. “He’s desperate. He’s desperate because … because he’s dying. There aren’t enough souls topside.”
Deacon sighed. “Actually, Echo, there are other souls topside. Others aside from the Keep dwellers.”
“I know. Micha told me about the hybrids.”
Deacon’s brows shot up.
“Yeah, I know there are others out there like me, and they’re in hiding too, but maybe Genesis is finding it too hard to get to them? He needs big hits, like the Run and Haven and now the sea dwellers. Places where lots of souls can be reaped at once. And the only conclusion is that he is desperate for energy, that he’s dying.”
“So, we wait him out,” Deacon said.
And suddenly it all made sense. “That’s why the council didn’t want to do anything. They want to wait it out.” I grabbed Deacon’s arm. “Was that their plan all along? To hide in the Hive and wait it out? Did you know?”
Something dark, and suspiciously like guilt, crossed his face. I turned to Emory. “Did you know about this?”
His expression was solemn, his gaze on Deacon. “No. I didn’t. Why did you come to me? Why ask me to find a way to trace Genesis if the council doesn’t intend to do anything?”
Deacon’s smile was self-deprecating. “What’s the harm in having a plan B?” He shrugged. “Honestly, we’ve never had true hope of finding Genesis. The Keep did the rounds, but as the years passed, it became more for show. More to give people hope. Harker knows that even if Genesis is dying, he could still live for decades to come. But if we can truly find him, then we may be able to discover a way to end him once and for all.”
“Let me guess,” Emory said. “She sent you to me. She wants the evidence. She wants to force the council’s hand to act.”
Deacon smiled. “Bingo.”
“Then we go back, and we present them with this.” I reached for Rydian’s hand and gave it a squeeze. “We can’t sit by and
do nothing while the sea dwellers are at risk of attack. We threaten the council with a retraction of the crystal.”
Rydian shook his head. “No, I couldn’t do that. I couldn’t kill your people to save mine.”
He was a noble man. A good man. “And let’s hope they feel the same.”
It was time to head back.
It was time to call the council out on its bullshit.
Chapter 20
MICHA
Verona opens the door and sags at the sight of us. Her hair is kinda messy today, not the usually groomed woman we’re used to.
“You have news?” Her gaze flits from Lyrian to me and then back again. “How is she? Is she okay? When can we see her?”
The woman is obviously distraught, and Bry hovers in the background looking shell-shocked.
“Hey.” Lyrian places his hands on her shoulders. “Calm down and start from the beginning. What happened? Who are you talking about?”
“Gem.” She says it as if we should know, as if we’re wasting her time. “I’m talking about Gem.”
“What happened to Gem?” Lyrian asks.
She grips his wrists and sags a little, as if this is the last thing she wants to hear, as if she expected us to have answers. “I went to pick the kids up from school, and she wasn’t there. The teacher said she was sent home to grab her textbook, but she never came home, and she never got back to the school. I reported it to a Protectorate officer, and he got back to me to tell me she was in quarantine. That she’d been intercepted because she was exhibiting signs of the virus that’s been going around.” She shakes her head. “But she was fine. She wasn’t sick, Lyrian, I swear she wasn’t.”
Lyrian shoots me a look and then releases Verona. “Stay indoors. Stay here. I’m going to find out what’s going on.”
Verona shuts the door.
I climb down the metal steps. “This is fresh bullshit.” Lyrian’s hunch is correct, something isn’t right here. “If there was a virus affecting humans, then why hasn’t the medical team been down here to do a sweep, to take blood and quarantine those that are in the incubation phase?”
“Because it’s not a fucking virus, it’s a cover-up,” Lyrian says. “And I’m going to make Harker admit it.”
Oh, shit. Lyrian doesn’t get riled too often—the guy is a cucumber, as in the cool kind. But if something gets his back up, he’s unstoppable, and those kids … Those kids are just as important to him as Echo.
Harker is going to get an unpleasant surprise.
They’re holed up in the control tower at the back of the Protectorate Chamber, or “the eagle,” as they call it. Cameras galore and eyes on the whole place. So, yeah, they need to have some answers for us. At first, the guy manning the door is resistant to letting us through, but one look from Lyrian and he’s stepping aside. He glares at me as I pass, and I bare my teeth. He flinches.
Good to know my looks still have the desired effect when needed. I’m beginning to think I may be getting a soft reputation around here, so this reaction is kinda life-confirming.
Harker and Bane turn to look at us as we enter. Harker doesn’t look shocked. Heck, they probably saw us coming.
“Where are they?” Lyrian asks. “Where are the humans? Where’s the child? And don’t give me the bullshit that they’re in quarantine. I want you to tell me what the fuck is going on here? It’s the Sanguinata, isn’t it? They have the humans?”
Harker’s face drains of all color. “Who told you? No one knows.”
“Harker, I think he means the Sanguinata in the neph chamber,” Bane says softly.
She blinks and blows out a breath, composing her expression in a blink. “Of course he does.”
“Whoa, whoa. Back up.” I hold up my hands. “You just said who told you. So, the Sanguinata do have the humans?”
She pinches the bridge of her nose. “It’s complicated. We’re doing our best to resolve the issue, to find the breach and pinpoint who’s involved.”
“Involved in what, dammit?” Lyrian’s tone drops to I’m-gonna-lose-my-shit low. “Gem is missing. Echo’s little sister, she’s missing. A child is fucking missing.”
Harker meets his gaze head-on. “I know.”
“Then do something.”
“I am. I have officers rounding up the last of the humans, and then we’ll initiate a lockdown of Chamber H. Once they’re safe in their chamber, we’ll be doing full sweeps of the Hive and interviewing all the nephilim.”
That doesn’t answer our question. She’s skirting around it, and I’m done. “Who has the humans?”
Bane puts a hand on her shoulder.
She reaches up to cover it with hers. “The Sanguinata.”
Fuck, I am so confused right now.
“But not the ones that live in the Hive,” she continues. “The ones that live below it.”
Below … what the …
Lyrian takes a menacing step forward, and Bane growls low in his chest and steps around Harker to block Lyrian off. There are clenched fists, and there is crackling tension, and for a moment, I’m tempted to let this play out. I mean, I can take down a Draconi or two, even tangle with a Shedim, but my forte is leadership and strategy. People follow where I say to go, but Lyrian is a powerhouse that, when taken off the leash, clears the path, leaving peripheral destruction. And Bane … Bane is a Black Wing, an ancient. This would be some fight.
But not today. I step in between the guys. “Calm down.”
Bane’s lips drop back over his fangs.
“What do you mean below?” Lyrian continues, as if the almost-smackdown didn’t even happen.
Did I just overreact?
“Councilwoman,” the guy at the monitors interrupts. “We have an entry request from dweller tunnel.”
“They’re back early?” Bane looks to the screens, and I see Echo on the monitor. Even with the color stripped from the world, she still shines. She’s standing in the tunnel, waiting to be let back into the Hive with Emory and Deacon. They’re back a week early. This can’t be good.
“They probably tried to contact us and couldn’t get through,” Bane says.
But Harker is staring at the monitor, her bottom lip caught between her teeth.
“Serenity?” Bane nudges her with her name.
“Let them in. Tell them to head straight to the control room. Tell them not to take any detours.”
The control operator speaks into the microphone to relay the information, but my attention is back on Harker. “You were saying?”
She runs a hand over her face. “Not everyone can play by the rules, and there was a House of Sanguinata that didn’t want to comply with Hive operation. They wanted to drink from the vein, and they wanted it often. They staged a coup, and we had no choice but to react.”
“Killing them all wasn’t an option,” Bane says solemnly. “Not unless we could do it in one fell swoop. You know as well as I do that Sanguinata aren’t easily killed, and if we’d succeeded in evacuating them, they’d have attacked us again and again. Our Hive location would have been compromised. But we had a heads up, a spy, and our spy helped to trick the House into meeting in the lower levels of the Hive. It was still under construction back then, a potential extra level to allow us to grow.”
“But instead, we sealed the Sanguinata down there,” Harker continues. “We left them to die.”
“But they’re not dead, are they?” I look from Bane to Harker.
“No, we don’t think so,” Bane replies. “We think someone has been feeding them bagged blood, enough to keep them alive, and now … Now, I think that same someone has taken humans.”
“We’ve searched everywhere in the Hive,” Harker adds. “All units have been turned upside down, but there’s no sign of the humans, and they didn’t get out, because we’d know. There’s only one place they could be.”
“Sanguinata aren’t permitted to work in the donor center,” Lyrian says. “It has to be someone with access to the blood, and if not a Sanguina
ta, then who?”
“Now that Deacon is back, we can find that out. We’ll be interviewing everyone who works there to determine—”
The lights go out.
“Shut it down. Shut down Chamber H,” Harker orders. “Do it now.”
“I can’t,” the man at the controls says. “The auto shutdown has been overridden.”
“It’s happening,” Bane said.
Chapter 21
Finn
I can’t do it. I can’t hold onto this information; the council needs to know. My father left for his meeting a half hour ago with clear instructions for me to sit tight. But my gut is churning. Something bad is about to happen, I can feel it in my bones. Fuck this. Throwing on some clothes, I head out of my room and out of the pack house. Mina is on the doorstep, dressed.
Her brows go up. “It looks like we had the same plan.”
I can’t help but grin. It looks like our minds operate on a similar wavelength. “Come on.”
We walk quickly toward the chamber exit, and then all the lights go out. A mechanical whirr echoes around us.
“What is it?” Mina grabs at my arm. “What’s that sound?”
The lights flicker back on a moment later, and Mina curses softly. I follow her gaze, and foreboding grips my scalp because the chamber doors have come down.
We’re sealed in.
Chapter 22
The world was smothered in darkness for a long minute, and then the emergency generator kicked in and the tunnel was filled with light. There was a tremble at the back of my mind—unease mingled with anxiety.
Lyrian?
My heart fluttered. Micha?
“Something’s not right.” I glanced at the metal door behind us. “What just happened?”
Emory stood with his head cocked. “A power cut. But that shouldn’t be possible.”
The lights came back on.
His shoulders sagged. “I need to get to the hub.”
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