I closed my eyes for a long, horrible moment, and then put my shoulders back and walked to my room.
When I returned—teeth brushed, hair smoothed back into a ponytail, and fully dressed—Logan was uncovering our breakfast dishes at the table.
He took note of my jeans and boots, but I didn’t explain my logic. I didn’t want to think of the previous day, of that slip-on tumbling down from the second story. I would just be prepared.
I sat, draping the napkin over my lap as Logan joined me, and stared at the bowl of cereal in front of me. It was the first time I’d been served anything other than epicurean cuisine and I glanced at Logan’s plate of eggs, bacon, sausage, and toast. He raised a brow, then reached over to exchange the dishes, sliding my bowl with one hand and his plate with the other.
I stopped him. “No, I just,” I glanced over my shoulder at the closed door, “I didn’t know they had regular food here.”
He grinned. “Next time, talk to Ellin.”
“Good to know,” I mused, recalling the trim blonde who managed Division affairs before delving into my plans.
“I’d like to go to the Council archives today,” I started, hoping I wasn’t under some kind of house arrest since the attack. When he didn’t argue, I continued, “There are a few things I need to research, and I’m guessing that’s the best place to start.”
I’d completely forgotten to discuss it with Aern, of course, because he’d shown up with this … Logan. I shook my head. “It will probably take me a few days, but I didn’t know if the security updates were finished yet.”
Logan sat his napkin on his plate. “They’re not. And it’s not the best place for you to stay right now, but I don’t see the harm in going for an unscheduled visit or two.”
I breathed a sigh of relief, grateful my protection was not going to be an outright prison. The door opened behind me, and Logan leaned forward.
“Now would be a good time for me to make those arrangements.”
I turned to find Emily, smiling fondly as she passed him on her way to the table, and decided she looked right among these guards. She might have been my twin, but we were seldom mistaken for one another. While I’d been tutored in language and subterfuge, she’d been training eight hours a day, learning hand-to-hand combat, weaponry, and who knew what else at the hands of my mother and her instructors. Between that and the toll the magic had taken on me, our mannerisms, our very bearings, were entirely distinct. And her hair curled more, which I could never understand.
Emily grinned at my cocked-head as I watched her. “What?”
“Nothing.” I smiled. “You just look happy.”
She shrugged. “I know things aren’t perfect, but they’re better. We’re better.”
She was right about that. Since our mother had died, we’d been all but torn apart, shuffled through the system by arrangements in place long before her death. I didn’t know how our mother had done it, how many people were involved, but I knew it couldn’t have been easy. And I hoped she’d taught me enough to be able to perform at least some of those deceptions on my own. The last vision I’d had of her came suddenly back, and I returned my spoon to the table. She had died because of Morgan. She had died to save us.
“Bri?” Emily said, moving to stand.
I shook off the image, coming back to the conversation.
“What is it?” she asked.
“Nothing, nothing new.”
Emily understood, if not in practice, at least in theory. I didn’t think she would ever truly comprehend what it was like to see our mother take her own life over and over, when nothing could be done to stop it. Although the visions were gone, the memories were not. They were there to be replayed as often as my wandering mind would let them.
So I stopped it, focusing on my sister instead. “It’s six o’clock, what are you doing here so early?”
She smirked. “Like you’d be sleeping. Aern and I have some business, so I wanted to let you know I’d not be back until this evening.”
“No problem,” I said. “I don’t know what to do anyway.”
“You’ll figure it out, Bri. You’ll get it and everything will be fine.”
I narrowed my gaze on her, knowing it wasn’t that simple. Neither of us knew what her talent would be, but there was some great power hidden within her that would allow us to help Aern prevent war, to fulfill the prophecy completely. She couldn’t pretend she wasn’t concerned.
She leaned forward, determined to change the subject, and whispered, “What do you think of Logan?”
My cheeks flushed, but embarrassment was immediately replaced by guilt. I had promised Emily no more secrets, and I wanted to mean it. But she didn’t know about the man in my visions. The man who was Logan.
“Fine,” she said. “Don’t tell me.” She stood, tugging my ponytail on her way by, and added, “See you tonight.”
Logan reappeared, jacket in hand, and asked, “Ready?”
I glanced at the clock. “Now?”
“Probably best,” he said, and I wondered if we were hiding this from Brendan, or possible attackers, or if it had something to do with Aern and Emily leaving as well.
I stood, prepared to question him, but he thrust the jacket at me. I stared at it.
“It’s chilly,” he explained, as if that answered everything.
I slipped my arms into the soft, cotton zip-up, and though I wasn’t exactly short, it dwarfed me. I started to explain that I had hoodies of my own, but then I realized where they were, along with most of my other things … in the room I’d been shuffled out of. The room with the window.
I shrugged the jacket tighter, pushing up the sleeves and flipping the hood over my hair. Logan’s mouth turned up, and he placed a hand at the small of my back to usher me toward the door.
The guards that were waiting there were not Brendan’s. They were not even men of the Division as far as I could tell. They didn’t so much as blink at the hand that rested on my back, or the jacket that was clearly not my own.
They split into groups, two remaining outside my now closed bedroom door, and two more walking the corridor in front of us. When we came to the back stairs, the one with dark hair waited, falling behind us as we made our way down. Logan pressed me forward, gently leading me around the service entrance to a small carport at the rear corner of the house.
Lining the curb were several new, black SUVs with dark-tinted windows and I cringed, feeling like we were in a cavalcade of foreign dignitaries. But we didn’t get into the massive vehicles, instead walking around the back of them to what was unquestionably the coolest car I’d ever seen.
I was far from an auto enthusiast, but it was hard not to be impressed. Polished black, some modern blend of muscle and sports car, windows narrow and tinted, it just looked mean. Logan opened the passenger door, and I ducked into a charcoal interior of leather and chrome to stare at a dash full of shiny swank emblems that meant absolutely nothing to me.
He slid in beside me, and I looked up to see the procession of SUVs pull out of the drive toward the main gate. I glanced at Logan, who’d yet to put the car into gear, and he said, “Seatbelt.”
I reached for the belt, still watching ahead for the others. Through the trees, I caught a glimpse of two black vehicles that had turned right, and assumed the rest had gone left. When they were out of sight, Logan slipped on a pair of dark sunglasses before glancing at me. “Ready?”
I nodded, not even a little bit certain now, and the car sped forward, taking a hard right before turning onto the service road. When the large iron gate opened and we turned south, I was pretty sure Logan hadn’t cleared our trip with anyone on the property.
“Security,” he said, reading my thoughts. He looked over at me as he took another right. “If no one knows where you are, you’ll be harder to find.”
“Clever,” I murmured, thinking of how mad this was going to make Brendan.
Logan smiled. “It’s what I do.” There was something mischi
evous in his tone, and I wondered if he knew what I was thinking this time as well.
The drive was long, or rather it seemed long because Logan had avoided the downtown traffic in lieu of a more scenic route. I slid down into the leather seats, pulling the warmth of the hoodie up to my cheek as I watched the landscape fly by. The material was soft and threadbare, the way they only got after years of wear, and it smelled of Logan.
I reexamined the vision of him, brief as it was, searching for a sign I might have missed when he was less real. That was what he’d been before, an abstract. And now I was sniffing his coat.
I straightened, abruptly aware of how alone we were. We’d been together in my room, but had been different somehow, with the guards outside my door. Safer.
The car turned onto a narrow street, and I began to recognize the area. We were nearly there. Council. I’d not been to the building, not seen it in person, but Brendan had laid out the property in detail only weeks ago. When Morgan was planning an attack. My eyes fell to Logan, who seemed composed, and it lessened my unease.
We entered the back of the property, driving slowly up a narrow road, and eventually through a low garage door that left us in what appeared to be the main building. Logan got out, glancing to a small black dome that I was fairly certain held a security camera, before coming around the car. I was unsure how all of this worked, so I stayed where I sat until he opened my door and held out a hand.
I grasped it, allowing him to pull me from the low bucket seat, and didn’t let go until we were standing at the doorway and Logan had to enter a passcode. The box beeped and flashed red, but did nothing. Logan shot a glare toward the domed camera and pointed toward the door. A moment later, it slid open. Three more coded doors, several long hallways, and a set of stairs later, we were standing at a thick metal shutter. Logan pressed his palm to a crystal pad and said, “Black.”
The shutters pulled back and a door slid open so silently, I felt the need to whisper. “Is that your code word?”
He glanced over his shoulder at me, grinning. “It’s my last name.”
Oh, I mouthed, and he jerked his head toward the door.
When we entered the archive, I felt my intake of breath. Brendan had shown me photos, but the sheer volume of books could not have been accurately portrayed.
“What’s wrong?” Logan asked from beside me.
My hand fell from my chest. “How will I ever find what I need?”
Logan looked disappointed. “I thought you were a prophet.”
I stared at him, mouth agape, and he laughed. “There’s a catalog, Brianna.”
Chapter Four
Archives
Catalog notwithstanding, this was going to take me much longer than a few days. The room was immaculate and organized, but shelves and shelves lined three of the four walls, not to mention the other door to a room that I had a pretty good idea held encased documents that needed to be protected from the environment because of their age.
I flipped through the index, not sure where to start. I guessed there were at least mentions of what the ancients were capable of, some reference to powers that I could use to help Emily. The document would probably be fairly old, maybe from around the time their gifts had started to fade. But I wasn’t even sure they’d recognized the fading right away. If they had, did they have the knowledge to understand it? Even today, with science and doctors, Morgan had been unable to advance his talents on his own. He’d only been able to use what my mother had given him.
I concentrated, trying to remember what she’d told me about them, but suddenly realized Logan was studying the way my eyes scrunched up. “You know,” I said, “this is going to take a while. You could go—”
The expression on his face stopped me, a clear no.
“Right. Okay then.” I stood, walking to the far wall to retrieve several of the old records of the dragon line, Aern’s line. And Morgan’s.
When I returned to the table, I spread them out, hoping one would jump out at me. It did not. I slid a random one forward, opening the carved leather binding to slightly yellowed pages. It wasn’t written in the ancients’ language, so I knew I hadn’t gone far enough, but I read a few bits anyway, trying to get a feel for how they kept records. Before long, I was engrossed in the lengthy Council reports, forgetting about Logan, who’d taken to pacing the shelves at the far side of the room.
I carefully turned the pages, reading of births, deaths, and transfers of power among the various leaders. But nothing detailed their gifts, or lack thereof. Evidently they’d still possessed a stronger sway, because they controlled their lands, the people, everything, but it wasn’t clear whether they’d held any other talents.
Logan’s pacing had moved closer, and I glanced at the clock, surprised a full hour had already passed. I closed the book I’d been reading and moved to another, this one older than the first. It contained more detailed birth records, a family tree of sorts, and listed the bloodlines much further back than anything I’d seen. It must have been copied from some other record, probably a scroll or …
I looked up, surprised to find Logan perched on the chair across from me, peering at the page.
“Is there … something I can help you with?” he asked.
I laid the book flat, glancing again at the clock to find another half hour had passed. “I really don’t know what I’m looking for,” I said.
He shifted, sliding a hip onto the table, and spun a tome with his finger to read the title. “But you think it’s in the records?”
“Maybe,” I answered. “Mostly I’m just hoping something will spark an idea.”
He nodded, leaving me to my work. By the time I’d read through the handful of books in front of me, my back was getting stiff. I stretched, glancing around for Logan, and found him sitting in what appeared to be a far more comfortable chair by the side wall.
“Nothing here,” I said, gesturing toward the volumes on the table. “I think I’m going to try some of the older ones.”
As I returned them to their place, searching for new material, Logan stopped me. “Brianna, the section here is actually older than those.”
I followed his direction, pleased when the first documents I pulled from the shelves were handwritten in the ancient text. Logan stood, reaching over my head for a sizeable black book with leather tied binding. He pointed at the markings on the first page. “This says ‘The Blood of the Dragon’ and these are the symbols for the specific time period.”
I looked up at him. “You can read the ancient language?”
He smiled. “Don’t you think it’s odder that you can?”
I didn’t, but only because my mother had taught me. Trained me to hear the prophecies. “Do all of you know it?”
“No. Aern, Morgan, most of the elders.” He hesitated, knowing the answer was leaving something out. His gaze went back to the shelf. “And I was shown because of my duty.”
He pulled down another book, this one bulky and worn-edged.
When it became apparent he was done explaining, I asked, “Your duty?”
His eyes met mine, waiting. “To protect the heir to the dragon’s name.”
Morgan.
I winced, but instantly regretted it.
Logan sighed, stacking the three books together on his arm. “I refused. Long before any of this. I would have stayed, had it been Aern …” He glanced at the symbol etched into leather. “But it wasn’t.”
We were both silent after that, but Logan stayed beside me as I worked through the pages of archaic text. It was slow going, as I’d not studied the language since my mother’s death. Before that, I’d only seen it in her hand, in the modern curves of a ballpoint pen, not the scratches and arcs of quill and ink. I knew I had to find something, understood that if I didn’t find a way to change Emily, to fix those connections, then I couldn’t save any of us. And I knew something else, something the rest of them didn’t.
Time was running out.
The words blur
red together and I reached up to massage my temples. Logan touched my forearm. “Brianna.”
I looked up, blinking against the black swirls that marked my vision.
“We should get going. You’ve got to meet Emily in a few hours, and you’ve worked through lunch.”
I glanced at the clock. Almost four. My eyes fell back to the books.
He reached over to slide them out of the way. “Tomorrow.”
I followed Logan back to the garage, grateful for the movement at least, and rubbed my eyes one last time before settling again into the soft gray leather of the car’s seat. It must have been a half hour later when I got an odd sense we were heading in the wrong direction.
I pressed my feet into the floorboard, rising out of my relaxed position to see the road. I didn’t recognize it, but the sun was on the wrong side of the car. I glanced at Logan, still apparently at ease, and then through the window, focusing on the side mirror. There was a line of cars behind us, nothing out of the ordinary, but I couldn’t shake that strange feeling.
Logan pulled into the left lane to pass a minivan, and took a hard right onto a two lane road. I looked at him again—no noticeable signs of distress—and back to the mirror. I’d about decided I was being paranoid when a black sedan turned too fast onto the road several blocks behind us. It disappeared behind a truck, but Logan’s foot pressed the accelerator, and we were whooshing past the marked speed limit signs. He glanced at my seatbelt before turning a sharp left.
It wasn’t scary, not yet. The car was built for fast maneuvers, and Logan was calm and confident, unquestionably a good driver. But when a second car appeared, this time cutting across a street in front of us, the car jerked hard to avoid it, throwing me against the door. Logan pressed a tiny black gadget into his ear as we swerved left, and then right, dodging slower traffic before veering off onto another street. Logan was reciting numbers, picking them from the navigation screen on the dash, and spun mid-intersection, taking us back a half block to a narrow alleyway.
Descendants Series Page 18
