Drew’s eyes went wide and she saw the first hint of true panic. “I can’t move,” Drew said. “He’s pinning us to the ground. What they did to him—”
“Stay with me, Drew,” she said. “Don’t freak out.” She realized Drew hadn’t been able to see Gideon before now and he’d had no idea what they’d done to him. The shock of seeing Gideon’s terrible condition was unnerving him. “The rest of the Order is outside. They’re coming.”
“They are?” Drew looked shocked as he whispered his question? “Really?”
She couldn’t look Drew in the eye, knowing she was lying. There had been hundreds of Calydons outside fighting the small group of Order members. Even if they were still alive, they’d still be fighting, not free to come after them. Quinn had told them they were on their own, and she knew he meant it.
Frank bent over them, his face so close she could smell the mustiness of his breath. “Use Gideon to call your magic, but give the power to Drew. His weapon is involved in the rite, so he has to be the one.”
Drew’s eyes widened. “I won’t do it—”
“You want to end up like Gideon?” Frank’s voice was conversational. “I don’t actually need you conscious. Alive is all I need. Lily will do all the hard work.”
Lily met the young Calydon’s gaze. “Just be quiet. You’re no help to any of us if you’re knocked out.” She gave him a hard look, and he finally shut his mouth. She saw on his young face the realization that he had no choice. They had no option but to go forward, and hope an opportunity arose.
If it didn’t, there was plenty of time to die later.
Frank stood up. “Let me get out of the circle before you begin.”
He strode out, the heels of his dress shoes clicking on the rock as he strode across the circle and stepped carefully over the weapons. He took a stance between two Calydons, shooting a glare around the pit. “No one can find Ana? She has to be down here somewhere. Check the tunnels again. Check the cells. Kick down locked doors. I need her here by the time this rite’s finished.”
More than half the Calydons who had been standing around him vacated, streaming out through a maze of tunnels.
Frank set his gaze on Lily. “Begin.”
“Lily—” Drew whispered, shifting against her, so she felt his nakedness against her body. Her stomach started to turn, so she pressed her cheek against Gideon’s face and focused on the feel of his body draped over hers, the stickiness of his blood holding them together, bonding them as they were meant to be.
The panic eased from her chest and her shoulders relaxed as she concentrated on Gideon. On his vanilla scent, on his hard body, on his whiskers prickling against her cheek.
Then she closed her eyes and began to sing.
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
Ana froze when she heard the doorknob rattle on the door of Frank’s office, and her gaze slid to the deadbolt she’d thrown.
“It’s locked,” a male said.
“He said break the doors down to find her.”
Ana stopped breathing, holding absolutely still.
“We can’t break down this door. He specifically built it to keep us out.”
Thank you, God.
“You want to go back there and tell him that?”
The male cursed. “Fine. I’ll get the key. You wait here. I’ll be back in a minute.”
Shit. Ana frantically scanned the room but there were no other exits. It was sealed, and there was one of Frank’s Calydons on the other side of the only way out.
There was no way to escape. Okay, then. If they were going to get her anyway, there was no point in wasting what little time she had left. Fighting panic, she yanked open the drawer of the last filing cabinet, and the wheels rattled over the sliders.
“I hear her! She’s in his office! Hurry up!” There was a slam against the door that made her jump. “Open the door!” He shouted as his weapon thudded against the door. “Now!”
Her heart pounding, Ana rifled through the folders, then Elijah’s name flashed past. She quickly backed up, trying to find the paper with his name on it, her hands shaking, sweat beading down her back as she tried to hurry. There! She yanked the file out and flipped it open.
It was a file on Elijah.
This had to be what she was looking for. It had to, because she was out of time if it wasn’t.
Ana sat down on the floor and started reading as quickly as she could.
*
Lily’s magic surged as she began to sing the melody Gideon had sung to her in the woods, and her hips began to move as she tried to dance.
Drew sucked in his breath and tried to pull back as she writhed against him. She shut him out, taking herself back to the woods. She basked in the memory of the dirt under her feet, Gideon’s hands on her body, sliding over her breasts, along her inner thighs, his face against hers, his rough voice making the music so lyrical and beautiful, rising to such heights.
Her body began to tingle and hum, and she felt the magic growing stronger, reaching out for Gideon everywhere they touched. She sent her magic into him the same way she’d done in the woods, giving him her strength, giving him her power.
Drew moaned and moved closer, and she realized he was getting the high from her magic as well.
She ignored him, continuing to focus on Gideon, sending her magic into him, touching his heart, his mind, his warrior strength…and then suddenly she felt his arm tighten against her. It was working! “Yes,” she whispered. “Take my magic. Let it make you strong.”
His lips moved against her cheek, and she realized he was trying to sing with her. She pressed her lips against his and sang, softly, for him and for him alone. The brands on her forearms began to burn, and her skin began to sizzle everywhere they touched. Her chest felt like it was expanding as strength and energy flowed through her.
Then Gideon’s eyelashes moved against her cheek, and she opened her eyes to see him looking at her. His lips were still moving against hers, mimicking the words, though he couldn’t speak yet.
She held his gaze as they sang, his beautiful blue gaze clinging to hers as if she were his anchor, his life force. She felt the intensity of his commitment to her, the truth of their connection, and she knew in that moment that she could trust him with her magic, every last bit of it. Gideon would never hurt her. He would protect and honor her magic, and he would use the depth of his feelings for her to make sure he didn’t hurt her. And with that, she let go of all her restraint, and she gave him everything of who she was. She opened all her magic and gave it to him.
Gideon smiled softly, and he gave a single, small nod, and she knew then that he believed the same. He had accepted the intensity of his feelings for her, and that gave him the power to be the warrior she knew he was.
She smiled back, and her heart tightened just a little bit more for the man who had won her heart.
Drew shifted against her, and she saw Gideon’s gaze flick to the youth. Drew’s eyes widened, and he froze. “I didn’t mean to touch her,” he whispered.
Gideon shook his head once, ever so slightly, and then his gaze returned to Lily, holding the focus so tight. She tugged at her bound wrists in frustration, wanting to slide her arms around him, stroke the hard planes of his body, and feel his muscles clench under her touch. She moved her hips again, trying to dance, her body needing an outlet for the music.
Gideon’s deep voice melded with hers, his words so quiet she knew Frank wouldn’t be able to hear him. The rumble of his voice touched her deep in her heart, and her magic raced to meet him. She felt the power building around all three of them. Gideon’s eyes became bright and focused. The rhythm of his breathing changed, becoming deeper and steadier, and his stomach muscles flexed where he was draped over her hips.
She raised her brows at him in question as she kept singing, and he gave a quick shake of his head that he wasn’t ready yet.
“Do you feel that power?” Frank’s voice echoed through the room, and she could imagine him
lifting his arms to the ceiling, embracing the magic swirling around them and through them.
But she didn’t look at Frank. She kept her energy centered on Gideon and felt it the minute he began to pull on her magic, instead of simply accepting what she was giving him.
She nodded and summoned more strength, more magic, more power, until suddenly Drew rose to his knees, as if the chains holding him weighed nothing.
“Yes!” Frank shouted. “Read the words! Read them now!”
She glanced over at Frank and saw the Calydon with the war hammer watching Gideon eagerly, his weapon clutched in his fist. She knew they’d hit Gideon again if she didn’t do it. She raised her eyebrows at Gideon, and he grimaced.
“I just need another few seconds,” he whispered.
She looked over at Frank again as she continued to sing, and saw Frank nod at the Calydon, who yanked his arm back to hurl the war hammer at Gideon’s head.
No! She had to give Gideon more time! She immediately started chanting the ritual words, not even understanding them or knowing what they meant, but they flew off her tongue, a mixture of sounds that meant nothing, but at the same time, meant everything. The air sizzled with energy and sparks ignited around them, popping with frenzied light.
Drew raised his arms, snapping the chains and holding his arms out as she chanted. The weapons lifted off the ground and began slamming into his arms with loud cracks, one at a time. Each weapon vanished in a flash of black light when it made contact with his forearm. They weren’t his weapons that he was sheathing. He was taking control of the other weapons, ones that weren’t his and shouldn’t have responded to his call. And yet, they were settling in his forearms as if he’d called his own weapons home.
Oh, yeah, that couldn’t be good.
The music rose in a loud crescendo, taking on a life of its own, swelling through the room, echoing and pounding, like a thunderstorm of the Gods.
Gideon’s muscles bunched, and Lily braced herself a split second before he leapt off her with a roar of fury. His chains shattered and he charged through the circle of weapons at Frank. He called his axes out and hurled them both with deadly accuracy straight toward Frank’s heart. His Calydons leapt in front of him to block the blows, and Gideon’s axes tore through their bodies and thudded into Frank’s chest, taking out all three of them at the same time.
Frank screamed and went down, blood pouring from his wounds as his bodyguards fell, gaping holes in their bodies from the axes that had blistered straight through them. Gideon called back his axes as he sprinted toward them. He reached Frank and slammed his axe down on Frank in a lethal blow.
The man fell to the ground, dead. It was over.
Gideon turned and met Lily’s eyes, and her heart swelled. I love you, Gideon.
He flashed her a smile as if he’d heard her words, then whirled, taking out Calydons as they attacked. Gideon was moving so fast, he was a mere blur.
Then there was another loud crack and she jerked her gaze back to Drew. He was hovering in the air now, just off the ground, his arms outstretched. His irises were a faint pink that almost looked white, and his hair was now long and wiry, a coarse yellow. Holy crap. “Drew!”
She rolled onto her knees and shoved her shoulder against his legs, trying to knock him down. But he didn’t move, didn’t even notice her, his gaze looking past her. She turned and saw he was focused on the only set of weapons that hadn’t yet settled in his arms.
His own.
They were in the air now and spinning in a violent circle, like a baton twirler on speed, and they were racing toward him. “Gideon! Get his weapons.”
Gideon whirled around, his eyes narrowed and he sprinted toward the weapons.
Weakness shot through Lily’s body as Gideon drew ruthlessly on her magic, and she sagged to the floor as he bore down on the speeding weapons. His legs were moving so fast she couldn’t even see them anymore. Drew saw him coming, his eyes widened, and then his weapons picked up speed, hurtling toward his arms.
“No!” Gideon leapt through the air and lunged for the weapons, his fingers closing around them a split second before they hit Drew’s forearms. His momentum sent him crashing hard into Drew. Both Calydons careened out of the circle and smashed into the stone wall. The wall shuddered at the impact and a huge crack split the clay and shot upwards, racing toward the ceiling as if it were alive.
The floor shook and suddenly the ground cracked open beneath Lily, splitting wide and creating a bottomless cavern below her. “Gideon!” She began to slide over the edge, unable to stop herself with her bound feet and wrists. “Gideon!”
Her back scraped over the sharp edge, and suddenly she was over the precipice—
Gideon’s hand latched onto her arm, catching her in midair. He hauled her back up, shielding her body with his as rocks started to tumble from the ceiling. Both of Drew’s polearms were clenched in his fist, and he used the spiked tip to slice through the tape binding her.
“You got Drew’s weapons?” she asked.
“Sure did—” He grunted as Drew tackled him. Gideon threw Lily to the side and away from the crack in the floor as Drew’s momentum carried him across the coliseum.
She scrambled to her feet as Drew attacked Gideon with a power and fierceness no young Calydon should ever possess. He was stronger than Gideon. So much stronger. Faster. Bigger. And he had dozens of weapons at his disposal, blades flashing and slicing and stabbing. As fast as Gideon was, Drew was more than twice as quick.
Drew was no longer himself. He had become something more.
Lily started singing again, sending her magic into Gideon. He drew on it instantly, and the fight exploded with energy and fire and such dizzying speed as she’d never seen before.
Her legs became weak from Gideon’s drain on her, and she eased herself to the floor as Gideon and Drew battled. With the strength of her magic and their bond, Gideon was a warrior far beyond what he’d been in the woods when he’d taken out all those Calydons in less than a heartbeat using her magic. He was so much stronger and faster then was even possible, and yet Drew was beating him.
“Dear God,” she whispered, as realization finally dawned on her. She’d completed the rite. It was too late. Ezekiel had been freed, and he had taken over Drew.
Gideon wasn’t fighting Dante’s son anymore.
He was fighting the warrior who no one could defeat, the man who had almost destroyed the world two thousand years ago. And he was losing.
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
There was a shout from above. Lily looked up and nearly cheered with relief when she saw Quinn and the rest of the Order leaping over the balcony railing of the coliseum, jumping into the pit. They charged into the fight with Drew and Gideon as rocks pummeled down on them from the ceiling. The walls were shaking and cracks were shooting up and down the sides, through the floors, the earth roaring its rage as it shattered under the violence.
Drew struck Quinn, and the Order member was flung backwards into the wall. Then another Order member went down, and another, until Gideon was the only one still standing against Drew.
Drew had taken down the Order in less than a second.
Drew slugged Gideon with a club and Gideon fell to the ground, immobile. He whirled toward Lily, not even flinching as the rocks pummeled him. His eyes were still a whitish pink, and she tensed when he focused on her.
“I will take you.” He strode across the floor, stepping over gaping cracks in the ground as if they were slivers, not yards wide.
Lily scrambled backwards, trying to find the strength in her body, even as she kept the music going, sending her magic to Gideon, who was prone on the ground. “Gideon!” He didn’t move, and she quickly found herself teetering on the edge of a giant crevice.
Drew grinned, a boyish grin that didn’t reflect the ages-old-evil in his eyes. “Gideon cannot stop me. Don’t you see?” He held up the polearms that he’d apparently retrieved from Gideon. “The world is mine now. Mine. As are you.”
His eyes shifted, whiting out entirely. “Nate did well to select you for me.” His voice was hard now, dark, full of malevolence as he reached Lily. He grabbed her hair and wrenched her to her knees. “By the time I finish with you, I’ll be at full power. Your body and your magic will be the last key.”
Oh, God. She couldn’t let this happen. This couldn’t be how it ended. Gideon!
There was movement behind him, and Drew casually tossed his polearm over his shoulder. The weapon sped across the pit and pierced Ryland’s gut. He sank back to the ground with a groan, clutching his stomach.
Lily started to sing, calling to Gideon, sending her magic out to all the Order members strewn on the floor like cast-aside garbage. She felt Gideon catch her magic and feed on it, draining her so hard and so fast she slumped to the ground.
“You raise them, I kill them. Boring game.” Drew slammed his other hand around her throat, cutting off her air. “I have much more important things to do. My list grew long in the two thousand years I was locked up.”
He threw her limp body over his shoulder. Her mind screamed in protest, but she was too weak to fight, too weak to do anything but keep singing, to keep feeding Gideon.
Drew leapt easily to the balcony surrounding the pit, and spots began to dance in Lily’s vision. Gideon. I can’t go with him. I can’t—
Suddenly, there was a roar of such uncontained fury that Drew whirled around just as Gideon flew up from the pit and slammed both axes into Drew’s chest, his eyes glowing bright red with the true rage of a Calydon gone rogue. Destiny had taken him. Gideon was rogue.
Drew shouted with rage and dropped Lily to yank the axes out of his torso.
Gideon charged Drew as Lily fell, bouncing over the edge of the balcony and falling straight toward one of the giant cracks in the floor. “Gideon!”
The wind raced past her as she plummeted down toward the gaping crevasse in the earth, as the pit shuddered and the ceiling began to fall for real. Weapons clashed on the balcony as Gideon and Drew engaged, and she knew he was too consumed by the rogue to hear her.
Darkness Seduced (Primal Heat Trilogy #2) (Order of the Blade) Page 33
