Kissed by Darkness

by Shéa MacLeod

  I had no need to ask who “they” were. I knew exactly who “they” were. The acrid stench of smoke burned my nostrils. They were burning the Temple.

  The ones who had destroyed my home and my family were hell bent on eradicating every sign that my people had ever called this planet home, and despite my human blood, they were particularly interested in killing me. Which was why the Temple and my survival had been a closely guarded secret; we were the last bastion of our once thriving civilization. No one had known we existed. Until now.

  Amaza wrenched open the door of my wardrobe and shoved aside the robes. After a moment of fumbling, she beckoned me forward. Instead of wood where the back of the wardrobe should be, there was utter blackness. My eyes must have been very wide indeed, for Amaza smiled just a little. “Did you think we would leave you without some way to escape, should the need arise?”

  “Honestly, I never thought about it,” I admitted. “I just figured we’d fight our way out when the time came.”

  She shook her head half in amusement, half in frustration. “Silly child. That is a man’s way, not a woman’s. We have nothing to prove, so we may use our heads to do our thinking instead of our rods. You are far too precious to risk in battle. Hurry now.”

  So, I stepped into the darkness with Amaza close behind me. She shuffled the robes back in place then slid the panel shut behind us. It was so black I couldn’t see my hand in front of my face. Not a ray of light seeped in from the other side of the panel.

  I closed my eyes. I wasn’t terribly fond of the dark. Silently, I wished for light, just enough to see. An orb appeared in front of me, floating about three feet off the ground glowing with a soft bluish white light.

  “Very good. I see you’ve been practicing.” Her voice held approval.

  “Yes, my lady.” She didn’t need to know that I had needed no practice. The High Priest and the Warrior both had warned me to never show my true self to anyone. Not even the High Priestess of the Temple of the Moon. No one was to know the true nature of my powers. It was my only real protection against those who sought my death.

  It was known that a full-blooded member of the Royal Line carried natural abilities and power beyond even that of the High Priest himself. That was how the Bloodline became the ruling class of Atlantis in the first place. It was either subjugate, or be destroyed. It was what made them both incredibly powerful, and frighteningly dangerous. It was only the gift of the gods which made the High Priest more powerful than the Bloodline once he’d been chosen, an unnatural power tied to Atlantis itself which kept the Bloodline in check.

  Half-breeds like me, however, did not possess such powers, even half-breeds of the Royal Line. They had some, much like any ordinary citizen of any of the Common Lines, but nothing near what a Pure Blood had.

  For some reason, I was different. I was special. Even the High Priest himself did not know why, but he’d given me the best advice I’d ever received: Hide what you are at all costs. It had served me well for fifteen years.

  The orb led us down a short hallway to a set of narrow, spiral stone steps which led into the bowels of the hill on which the Temple had been built. Everything was thick with dust and cobwebs and creatures with many legs skittered away from the light to hide in the shadows. Must assaulted my nose and I itched to sneeze. Sneezing, however, would not be a good plan. We might be heard.

  The staircase seemed to go on forever. My legs began to tremble and burn with every step. When we finally reached the bottom, several tunnels branched out from the main corridor. Each tunnel was marked with a carved symbol above the entrance. Amaza led the way down the tunnel marked with the sign of the crescent moon and my light darted ahead to illuminate the path.

  The already low ceiling slanted lower and lower, forcing us to stoop. The passage became narrower and narrower, pressing in on us from every side. Water trickled down the walls and pooled on the floor, leaving streaks of green, slippery scum coating everything. I could feel panic rising, threatening to overwhelm me. I shoved it aside and focused on Amaza and the glowing orb leading the way deeper into the hillside.

  At last, we came to a fork in the tunnel, the left fork marked with a crescent moon. The tunnel opened up and allowed us to stand for the first time in what seemed like hours.

  “It’s safe to speak now.” Amaza beckoned me to walk beside her. Once it would have been a great honor. In light of current events, it was meaningless. Without a Temple, the office of High Priestess meant less than nothing.

  “Where are we going?” I wondered where on earth would be safe enough for us now.

  “To the east of here,” she said. “There are beautiful and wild lands, empty of humans. We will be safe there. I have been preparing for some time, sending warriors ahead with our most important treasures and scrolls.”

  I nodded. She’d known this day was coming, just as I had. The first dictate of the Priestesses of the Temple of the Moon was to protect the Royal Bloodline. The second was to protect the knowledge of our people. I was the last of that Bloodline, half-breed or not. She would protect me with her life. I hoped it didn’t come to that.

  We hurried down the left fork of the tunnel and within minutes found ourselves outside in the night air. Behind us was a hill on which the Temple stood and above it the sky glowed red. “They’re burning the Temple.” There was infinite sadness in her voice. The last stronghold of the great city of Atlantis was gone forever.

  Though I was sad to see the Temple fall, I did not feel the same pain. The Temple was not my home. My home had been destroyed ten years ago when the citadel of Atlantis fell. Now the only thing that remained of my people were a few scattered conclaves hiding in plain sight, praying they would not be discovered, not daring to use their powers. I was used to hiding. I’d been hiding since the day I was born. Hiding did not bother me.

  “If we should become separated, you must continue east for three cycles of the moon.” Amaza led the way down the slight incline and into a thicket of trees. “Look for a fortress of wood that sits on an island where three rivers meet. The locals will know it.” She turned to me and gave me a fierce look. “You must get there, Princess. You must survive. You are our last hope. You know that.”

  I knew it. Any descendent of Atlantis could access the knowledge of the amulet to at least some degree and with a special ritual access some of its power, as well, but only a member of the Royal Bloodline could access its complete knowledge and control its full power. And anything less than full access would lead to absolute power without the knowledge and wisdom to temper such power with mercy.

  To ensure this never happened, I was to be broodmare to the future. It was a duty for which the High Priest had prepared me since childhood. Until recently, I did not even question my fate.

  “Who shall I ask for? What shall I say I’m looking for?” Part of me hoped we’d get separated. A lifetime of being locked away had left me longing for adventure and freedom, to be an ordinary person just for once.

  She cast a quick look back over her shoulder at the fire lit sky then turned toward the east, her face hard with resolve. “Tell them you seek the Amazons. “

  ***

  I bolted upright in bed. “Jack! Jack!” Dammit, my feet were all tangled up in the duvet again.

  Jack stirred next to me. So I hadn’t imagined him crawling in to bed. “What is it? Are you OK?”

  “I know why Darroch wants the amulet.”

  “What do you mean?” Jack tried to wrap an arm around me, but I pushed him out of the way impatiently. I needed to get up, get going, now.

  I slid out of bed and probably would have slid all the way to the floor if Jack hadn’t grabbed me. Damn, my legs were jelly.

  “Slow down, Morgan. You expended a lot of energy tonight. You are in no shape to go running around the city.” He kept one arm around me and I was suddenly very aware that not only was I not wearing a bra, my left breast was squashed up against his very firm chest. I really hoped he couldn’t feel how
hard my heart was pounding.

  “I have to. No choice. We have got to get that amulet back from Darroch before he uses it.” I shrugged away from him and started scrambling about the bedroom. Where were my pants? Where were my damn pants? I finally found them folded neatly on the chair in the corner. Kabita’s work, obviously. She was the neat freak, not me. I would have never folded my clothes, neatly or otherwise. The only reason my house wasn’t a complete disaster was that I knew myself well enough to hire someone to come in twice a week to clean.

  I jerked them on, nearly falling over in the process. “There’s a reason Darroch has the amulet Jack, and it’s not because he wants you dead. I mean he does, but that’s not the main reason.”

  “I agree. He wants the knowledge the amulet contains. It will allow him to become even more rich and powerful than he already is. We already knew that.”

  I shook my head. “Wrong.” I stuffed myself into a clean T-shirt. In the dark I couldn’t tell what color it was, but frankly, I didn’t care. “He doesn’t care about the amulet’s knowledge; he wants its power.”

  He didn’t answer at first, but his brow wrinkled. I figured he was scanning through what he knew of the amulet and coming up blank. “Surely, that’s not possible. Unless he’s a member of the Royal Bloodline, which he obviously isn’t, he can only gain power through knowledge. Did you dream this?”

  “Yeah, I did. I’ve been dreaming of it little by little, seeing bits and pieces of the puzzle, and tonight I finally got all the pieces, or at least enough to know why the amulet was created and how it can be accessed.” Shoes, shoes, shoes. Why can you never find a matching pair of shoes when you need them?

  I scrounged around on the bottom of my closet, tossing footwear left and right. I finally came up with a pair of black Chucks that matched. Well, I hoped they matched. There was always the off chance one was dark blue. I knew this from previous experience in the matter. I should probably just settle on one type and color of shoe and buy twenty pair. That would solve the problem.

  “I know why it was created. It holds the knowledge of Atlantis.” He folded his arms and watched me hop around, trying to get my shoes on.

  “True.” I flashed him a grin. “But it holds a lot more than that. It holds the power of Atlantis.”

  He frowned as he handed me my jacket. “What do you mean?”

  “Well, you know this Kissing business? Kissing the Dark and so on? It turns out it was something only the most powerful Atlanteans could do. The High Priest, the Royal Bloodline and all that, that’s where the Elemental Mages came from until the bloodlines got too weak.”

  He nodded. “Yes, OK, that makes sense. Though all Atlanteans had at least some abilities far beyond that of humans, at least from what I’ve seen in my dreams.”

  “Exactly. With time and intermarrying with humans, the descendents of those few of Atlantean blood who survived the massacres lost their abilities.” I started strapping on weapons. Lots and lots of weapons. “Or at least they stopped being able to access their abilities, which eventually became dormant. The amulet was created by the last High Priest of Atlantis not only to store all the knowledge the Atlantean people had gained over the millennia, but to make contact with those of Atlantean blood until it found a member of the Royal Bloodline.”

  He gave me an aggrieved look. “Yes, I know this. I am the Guardian for a reason.”

  “What you don’t know is that when the amulet comes into contact with a member of the Royal Bloodline of Atlantis, it will reawaken all the power and abilities of the people of Atlantis within that person.”

  “Of course, that’s the whole point.” He was starting to sound annoyed. “But Darroch isn’t a member of the Bloodline or he’d have accessed the amulet a long time ago.”

  “Exactly.”

  “So, we’re fine,” he insisted. “No need to rush around like a headless chicken.”

  I smirked at him as I slid my sword into its sheath. “That’s where you’re wrong.”

  I did a quick mental weapons check. “The power of the amulet can be accessed by anyone with Atlantean blood. Warrior, Priest, Royal or Commoner, doesn’t matter. It’s simply the level of power and type of ability that changes. The amulet will only allow a descendent of the Bloodline to fully tap into the knowledge and power contained within.”

  My favorite stiletto knife needed sharpening so I yanked out a drawer and grabbed a whetstone before continuing. “That’s why you have become as strong as you have, Jack. The amulet allowed you to tap into your latent abilities and gave you the information you needed to understand your mission and survive the centuries, not to mention make you freaking immortal. The problem is that even a Commoner can access at least some of the power of the amulet, and with that power and knowledge combined … “

  Jack looked a little pale. “With the Church losing power day by day and the economy in a mess, he could become infinitely more powerful than the Templars ever were. He could take over the world.”

  “Or destroy it,” I agreed. “He doesn’t even need to find the Bloodline.”

  “But that doesn’t make sense.” He shook his head. “I know he can destroy the world if he accesses the amulet, but he can only access it if he finds a descendent of the Bloodline. If he could access the amulet himself, he would have done so already. You’ve got to be wrong about that.”

  I shook my head. “Not necessarily. If he’s descended of a Common Line, he’s not strong enough to access the amulet’s full power on his own, true, but there is another way. He has to perform a very specific ritual to release the power. Even members of the Priest and Warrior Lines can only access a tiny fraction of power unless they perform the ritual, unless they are directly descended from Varan or one of his Warriors like you are. Heck, even you can only access a certain amount.”

  I did a mirror check. “That is why the amulet chose you in the first place. That was always the plan. A descendent of the original Warrior who delivered the last member of the Royal Bloodline to the Amazons should be the one to find and deliver the amulet to a Royal descendent, presumably so that he could access both the full knowledge and power contained in the amulet without having to perform the ritual.”

  “So, that pretty much proves you are descended of the Warrior Priest Class, as well. That must be where this new ability is coming from, this Kissing the Darkness thing. If the Elemental Mages you mentioned were other descendents of the Priest Class and they lost their abilities over time as the Atlantean blood was watered down by human, it would explain your abilities,” Jack pointed out.

  I mulled it over. “I guess that makes sense. Once I got close enough to the amulet at Darroch’s house it must have sensed me or something like that. That’s why I keep getting the dreams. Obviously it wants us to rescue it.”

  Even to me that sounded a little weird. Referring to an object like it was a person who’d been kidnapped, but the amulet was starting to feel almost sentient. That old High Priest must have had some serious magic mojo to create it.

  “Anyway …” Sure everything was in place, I turned away from the mirror. “We need to get it back so that you can do your job and find the right person to give it to. I prefer you find somebody not evil and creepy.”

  Except something was bothering me about those dreams, something I couldn’t quite put my finger on. Unfortunately it was escaping me at the moment.

  “Well come on, then. Let’s go save the world.” He opened my bedroom door and waved me outside.

  I shoved aside my doubts and flashed him a grin. “And kick Darroch’s butt.”

  His answering grin was frighteningly feral as he followed me out the door. “And definitely kick Darroch’s butt.”

  Chapter Twenty

  I was not entirely stupid, so before Jack and I did the whole breaking and entering thing, I sent a text to Kabita and Inigo to let them know where I was and what I was doing. Jack was one of the best fighters I’d ever seen. OK, he was the best fighter I’d ever seen (900 year
s of experience would do that), but Darroch had a lot of goons. Backup was never a bad idea.

  “Doesn’t look like anyone’s home.” His voice was low in my ear. His breath tickled my skin and sent shivers through my body. Bad libido. Bad! This was so not the time to be acting up.

  “He must have one hell of a night life. I swear the man is never home.” I scanned the grounds. Sure enough, two of the big, black cars I’d seen on the day of the barbecue were gone. Then again, I wasn’t discounting the possibility of a trap. Call me suspicious.

  “How many times have you broken in?”

  I shrugged. “This is only the second time. And lucky you, I’ve been here before. I know how to get in.”

  “Good. You know where the amulet is kept.”

  “Um. Not so much,” I admitted.

  “So it could be anywhere.” Exasperation was clear in his voice, which resulted in some eye rolling on my part.

  “Well, excuse me. I only had time to search the bedroom before he came home,” I sniped.

  “It wouldn’t be in the bedroom.” He sounded very sure of himself.

  I gave him a look. “What do you mean; it wouldn’t be in the bedroom? Wouldn’t he want to keep it close?” I guess I had a few things to learn about the fine art of burglary. Was it my fault I was better at killing things than stealing them?

  Jack shook his head. His eyes glinted silver in the moonlight. “No. That’s the first place a burglar would look. There’s no way Darroch would allow that amulet to accidentally fall into the hands of some petty thief.” Now it was his turn to give me a look.

  “I am not a petty thief.” I couldn’t help it if my voice came out a little snippy. “I was trying to get the amulet back for you. So it’s your fault.”

  He laughed softly. His face was awfully close to mine. Wouldn’t take much for him to lean over and kiss me. I shivered with the thought. Despite the slight chill in the night air, I suddenly felt decidedly warm.