by LJ Andrews
Owen stepped next to Marie, and she finally released her grip on Killian and fell into her husband’s arms. Owen kissed her hard and Killian felt somewhat embarrassed, but was happy to feel it. It seemed normal, something he’d always wanted to see−his parents loving one another.
“You idiot,” Marie said breathlessly when she finally pulled away. “You shouldn’t have risked coming after me.”
“Don’t tell me what to do,” he said playfully. “And look me in the eye and tell me you wouldn’t have done the same thing.”
“I wouldn’t. I would’ve let you stay there. It might straighten you out a little.”
Owen laughed and kissed her again. Killian saw the curtain pull back and a teary-eyed Miller step in with Rhetta close behind. Marie sucked in a breath when she saw him.
“Dad,” she cried and hugged Miller tightly. Killian’s heart broke as he watched both of them cry against each other with happiness. Marie released Miller and wrapped her arms around Rhetta who stroked her hair subconsciously.
“Oh, I never thought we’d ever be here again,” Marie said wiping her eyes.
“It’s always been my dream,” Rhetta agreed.
For several moments they reminisced, laughed, and were reacquainted. Marie held Killian’s arm as if he was going to disappear the entire time. The curtain was pulled back in a huff and Aidan stood in front of the reunited family, breathing heavily.
“Forgive me, Director,” He said. “I’m here to tell you Empress Gwyniera has returned and there’s something you should see at the front gate.”
Miller cocked his head, but quickly went into Director mode and rushed past Aidan. They all followed, Killian stopping to grab Mercedes who was still waiting patiently in the clinic. The elevator car flung them quickly toward the front entrance, so fast Marie had to hold onto Owen for support due to her weakened state.
“Empress, you’ve returned,” Miller said when they saw Gwyniera standing proudly by the large door. She was joined by several of her generals, each of whom bowed low when they saw Mercedes. Marie looked between the guards and Mercedes curiously.
“I’ll fill you in later,” Killian whispered.
“Miller, Glaciem stands vith za Ponderi. Our people are ready to defend our realm,” Gwyniera said with a notable tone of pride. “How is your engineer faring vith za barriers?”
“At his last report, he believes he will crack it at any time,” Miller replied. “Thanks to you and your people. You are the first to officially come forward.”
“Sir,” Aidan interrupted. “Please look at the gate.”
Aidan held a large tablet device in front of Miller and pushed a button that opened a birds-eye-view of the front gate Killian walked through on his first day at the Ponderi. Everyone crowded around Miller to look at the tablet whether he wanted them to or not. Mercedes gasped and looked at Killian, her eyes brightening with excitement. Hundreds of cloaked people stood at the gate seeking entrance.
“Deshuits,” Miller exclaimed. “They came. I can’t believe they are standing with us.”
“Well, let them in,” Marie said shaking Miller’s arm.
Quickly, Miller tapped a code in the tablet and they all watched the large steel gate open wide. Owen and Marie rushed through the front entry to meet them in the lush front garden.
“Angus,” Owen said wrapping the burly man in a tight hug and slapping his back. “It’s good to see you, my friend. I see you got our message.”
“Your boy did a good job convincing us of the need,” Angus said, winking at Killian. “Well, hey now, young lady, you look different. You are the chief’s daughter, right?” He scrunched his face in confusion when he sized up Mercedes.
“The same,” she said. “I change in different lights. We’re so glad you’re here.”
“We’re doing it for the Hemisphere,” Lydie moved up from the crowd, giving Killian a scathing glare.
“Lydie, good to see you,” Owen said. “I see you’re still holding a grudge.”
“He killed Philip,” she said venomously.
Marie stepped toward her and spoke low so it was difficult to hear. “We should’ve recognized him sooner; Philip’s death has always been on Owen and me. He was defending himself, that’s all. Now it’s time to unite and forget sins we’ve all committed.”
“I’ll forget until this is all over,” she snarled. “Well, are you going to let us in?”
Miller raised an eyebrow, but moved aside, ushering them in with an outstretched arm.
The Deshuit clans marched into the Praetorium in small groups. Some stayed outside in the garden, and seemed to be setting up small camps.
“We have room for everyone,” Miller said to Angus.
“When ya live on the mercy of the wilderness every day it becomes more comfortable to be outdoors, ya know. They’ll be fine, but for the rest of us, where do we go?” he said admiring the luxuries and fine materials making up the Praetorium.
“Where do we stand in regard to the Trinity?” Lydie asked.
Miller shifted his eyes over the crowd. “Would you care to discuss this in my office?”
Angus shrugged. “Nah, we like to fill everyone in, we might have leaders to guide us but we’re all equal and all deserve to know what we’re up against.”
“Very well,” Miller relented. “The Trinity have two very powerful pieces of magic created by Merlin and Eldora.”
The Deshuits who heard her name notably ruffled in anger. Miller cleared his throat and continued. “We aren’t sure what one of the pieces is exactly, but we know it’s powerful and connected to a dangerous amount of dark magic. The other is a ruby used to defend against the darkness locked away.”
“Now wait a sec. The kid said ya’ll had this ruby,” Angus interrupted. Killian clenched his jaw at being addressed as a kid.
“We did have it,” Miller began. “But Eldora made sure we lost it.”
“Well then, ya’ll should’ve sent someone after her,” Angus said, his face reddening.
“Eldora’s dead, Angus,” Owen said bluntly. “She was double-crossed; she never made it out of here.”
Angus dropped his jaw and tensed. “Who could be strong enough to stop Eldora? She’s one of the oldest livin’ beings in the Hemisphere. What’d you pull us into, Owen?”
Killian sensed a strong tension blast through the surrounding Deshuits. The anxiety tightened in his chest and he half expected them to turn around and leave.
“Listen, we know it’s not ideal, but what are we supposed to do, Angus?” Owen snipped. “Just sit and wait for them to kill us? You can’t hide from them in the desert or on the Glaciers. They’ll find you and you know it.”
A murmur rippled through the crowd as the Deshuits talked amongst themselves about Owen’s words.
“I can’t speak for anyone else, but I’m tired of hiding. I’ll stand with you.” Killian looked up and saw Tambrynn walking toward Owen in the crowd. She winked at him as she passed, her corn-silk hair hanging loose down her back.
“Thank you,” Owen said. “Angus, Lydie? What about you?”
Angus grumbled and stroked his wide jaw before throwing up his thick hands. “Fine, but this don’t mean we’re friends with these…these…the Ponderi.”
“Of course, we couldn’t expect to bury the hatchet, now could we?” Marie said sarcastically, but she nudged Angus like a friend.
Lydie stood and unsheathed her sword, seeming to study the blade. “I’ll fight for the Hemisphere, but no one else.”
“That’s all we’re asking,” Miller said. “All right, thank you all for joining with us. We have the realm of Glaciem on our side and now with the strength of the Deshuits, we outnumber the Trinity. They have powerful magic in their possession, but we have all four of Merlin’s relics. If we stick together, we just might stand a chance of winning.”
“You have Ignisia as well.”
Everyone’s heads turned and saw Egan stepping off an open elevator car. Mercedes beamed when sh
e saw him and he stood next to her. “My people are ready to fight.”
“This is it,” Rhetta whispered. “The people are ready to rise up, together.”
Killian scanned the room and the large garden outside the windows. For the briefest moment, surrounded by the Deshuit clans and knowing the people were ready to defend their homes, he had hope they could actually bring down the darkness the Trinity had planned.
Two days had passed and two more clans had joined them at the Praetorium, making the building full of thick cloaks and painted faces. Some had washed off the ashen paint, but the stains remained. Others refused to remove any sign of the Deshuit markings.
Aidan was grumpier than ever when the athletic field was bombarded by so many extra bodies, until he saw the fine training most of the Deshuits had—raw and wild, but deadly.
Lucan pinned Killian against the ground and stabbed one of his knives in the plastic grass. “Come on, Killian, you can do better than that. Just because you’re best at the spear, doesn’t mean you can’t master more than one weapon. Look at your dad.”
Lydie ran toward them, looking as if she was ready to murder, and part of Killian believed if they met somewhere dark she might try.
“I want to see this amazing power you’ve got,” she taunted. She pulled out a small set of knives, but on pressing their hilts the gold blades split in two.
Killian wrinkled his forehead but released his spear points and circled the field with her. Lydie smiled wickedly before lunging toward him. He easily dodged and circled around knowing he could bring his point within inches of her face from his angle.
As he ripped the spear through the air it stopped, as if someone had nailed it to an invisible wall. He couldn’t move his spear at all. Lydie smiled and chuckled in her throat. Killian’s eyes widened when he watched her two double-blades floating on the sides of her head, close to her wild white hair. Her gray eyes shone with a mad excitement underneath her dark face paint.
“How are you doing that?” Killian said tugging on his immobile spear again.
Lydie threw her head back and laughed. “They told me you had the power of all the realms; well, dim-wit, what realm am I from? What are these weapons made of?”
“You control elements?” Killian said, surprised. He hadn’t seen a Glacien have such good control over weapons.
Lydie grinned and tapped the side of her head, mocking him. Killian glared at her, the attitude and snide remarks were starting to make his blood heat with annoyance.
“Fine, let’s even the score,” he said confidently.
Something about her made him want to bring her arrogance down a notch. Closing his eyes, he mentally commanded his spear to listen only to him. Within moments, the spear was released from Lydie’s mental trap.
“Not impressed,” she goaded. “You should’ve done that first thing.”
Lydie thrust her palms forward and the daggers flew through the air. Killian swung his spear, knocking the daggers off their path as he pressed toward her. Every time he knocked a dagger away, Lydie would twist her wrist slightly and the weapons would soar toward him again.
Rolling on the scratchy grass as both double blades sliced at him from different directions, Killian narrowed his eyes darkly. Lydie was enjoying every second and they were beginning to draw a crowd, which fueled her desire to embarrass him. He could sense how much she wanted to shame him in front of the Ponderi.
He lifted his arm high as he knelt on the ground. Lydie watched him curiously, then with wild determination flicked her wrists and commanded the blades to come at him swiftly. Killian never dropped his focus from her as he slammed his fist hard on the ground, releasing a loud shout of frustration. The same powerful blast he’d been conjuring rippled out from his core, but seemed to jump over any living being in the room and blasted only the nearby weapons. Lydie’s gold blades disintegrated to a glittering gold powder, but so did several nearby recruits’ arrows and swords.
Lydie watched him with wide, furious eyes. Killian felt her anger; it stewed deep in his chest.
“Impressed yet?” he snidely said.
“Thomas!” Aidan shouted across the field. “What in the blazes do you think you’re doing? Destroying weapons? By the love of the Fire Lords, man. Get it together.” Aidan was fuming, and billows of steam were coming off his shoulders.
Lydia stormed passed him, followed by several other Deshuits. “I would’ve been more impressed if you could focus on just one weapon, not take out the entire arsenal.”
Killian rolled his eyes, but felt the cut of the words. Maybe he wasn’t as focused as he could be.
“Don’t let her get to you,” Mercedes said from behind him. “Want to take a break with me?”
Killian nodded and wiped the small dripping beads of sweat from his forehead. They walked up toward the dining hall to get some peace from the rigorous training schedule.
“How are you feeling?” she asked, and hugged one of his arms.
“As good as can be expected, I guess. I wish I could find Connor. He’s been walled up in his lab for days and no one seems to have a status update on his progress. It’s not knowing that is killing me.”
“I get that way, too. I’ve been so on edge, almost like I expect to run into Maurelle around every corner. It makes me wonder what she was thinking when you left their lair. You made it seem like she intentionally let you go.”
“Maurelle could’ve stopped us. You know how powerful she is,” Killian said. “The expression on her face when I saw her, it was almost like we were doing exactly what she wanted us to do. Like she wanted us to feel confident only to squash us with something she knows that we don’t.”
Mercedes lifted her eyebrows. “That’s a lot of assumptions on one quick glance at her face.”
“Well, it was also a feeling.” He smiled.
He pulled her toward him playfully. As he leaned in to kiss her, they both were knocked off their feet by an enormous, gut-wrenching explosion. Mercedes screamed and covered her ears, and Killian thought he heard her scream Sophia’s name, but his ears were ringing form the loud blast.
Scrambling to his feet, he saw others had gathered in the same hallway and were looking out the large square windows toward the front gate. Killian followed their gaze. The sky…something was very wrong with the sky. Almost as if shields had lifted, Killian could see a hazy view of Glacial mountains to one side, and the incredible fiery ball that looked much like Ignisia’s sun in another. The two moons of Cimmerian were shining behind through the other windows, and the darkness of their sky coated half of the greenish-lavender sun he had grown accustomed to seeing. But his mouth gaped when he looked and saw city lights glittering across wide spaces a great distance away.
“What is it? What happened?” people said to one another throughout the hall. Killian felt a presence to the side of him and turned to see Connor standing and staring stoically out the window, holding his glowing tablet in his hand.
“It’s done. The barriers are down,” he said flatly to Killian. “Get ready for the Trinity to raid every inch of this Hemisphere. Now we leave it to the people; the time to raise the realms is here.”
The Praetorium was in an uproar until Miller’s voice sounded on the intercom system buried in the walls throughout the building.
“The barriers are broken. This is the time we’ve been training for,” he explained. Killian could detect a tone of apprehension as he spoke to the Praetorium. “We can hope and pray the people of the realms will stand up. Do not be surprised if you see people coming. Take what little time we have left and prepare yourselves, for surely tomorrow our world will change.”
His voice cut off and everyone stood silent in the hall, gawking again out the window at the severed barriers.
Mercedes crept next to him and leaned her head on his shoulder. He kissed her forehead and tried to appear collected, but inside, his heart was pounding in fear of what was to come, and what they could lose.
Chapter 20
Night settled upon the limbo the Ponderi called home. Light from Ignisia’s sun still cast an eerie glow, and the bright yellow orb from Terrene had risen in their atmosphere, dissolving the twinkling city lights. But for now, the Ponderi members rested, each in their own way.
Mercedes leaned her head against the brown and gray tile as the water from her numerous shower heads poured over her long chestnut hair.
Owen sat on the stone bench with his arm wrapped tightly around Marie. They were silent, but the stress of what was to come was an unspoken understanding between them.
Dalia oiled her black club until the crystals embedded in the black granite sparkled like thousands of diamonds. She stared out the window at the two moons of her home and prayed for her people.
Miller opened up the large trunk he never imagined he’d open again. The dark uniform still fit as if he were forty years younger. Dusting off the shining silver hilt of his old sword, his mind drifted to his own recruit days when it was used for exciting training exercises−never this.
Killian rubbed the back of his neck that hadn’t stopped aching since the barriers broke as he walked along the cold, damp hallway of the prison. He touched one lock, commanding it to open; it immediately cracked. Without stopping, he kept going until he touched another lock. The metal bent to his will and Bant pushed the door open.
“It’s happened, hasn’t it?” Bant asked, rubbing his scarred stump Connor had finally healed.
Killian nodded. He saw Speron leaving his cell from the corner of his eye. “We need every hand to help us. I thought you two could use this moment to redeem yourselves.”
Speron glared at him, but nodded slightly. Bant just grinned. “How do you know I won’t double cross you?”
“I don’t, but if you want to take your chances with Maurelle welcoming you back, be my guest. But just know your entire family will fight against you.”
Killian smirked at both men and turned out of the prison cells, leaving them to freely make their own choice. The upper floor was quiet with several Deshuits and recruits gripping weapons and watching the distant fractures for any strange activity.
