by Lizzy Ford
“She turned her into a gummy statue. Dosy’s alive, but has the consistency of a tire.”
“Alessandra’s come into her power?”
“Eh.” Niko was quiet, thinking hard about the answer. “She’s fighting it and has been. The safe zone is starting to recede, and Cleon’s desperate to create this utopian safe zone filled with the elite and weather away whatever happens next, but can’t wield her power well enough to stop it. And she’s … confused.”
“I would be, too, if I had more than one voice in my head.” My hands tightened into fists instinctively. I did have more than one voice in my head, but I wasn’t about to tell Niko I’d been struggling with my own identity.
There was a pause. I sensed more before Niko spoke. “It’s not just that,” he said pensively. “I have no desire to understand this insanity about power or magic or energy or whatever this is.” He waved a hand at the unseen forces about which he spoke. “But something’s going on beyond what is supposed to be happening. The Oracle is in a coma. Cleon is fading and obsessed with either the insurgency or the safe zone. Lantos is playing an erratic game no one understands, and Alessandra is on the verge of being lost. They’re all part of a bigger picture, and I don’t know who could be calling the shots – but someone has to be.”
“The major players are too preoccupied to be manipulating the board,” I said.
“Exactly. And Lyssa … her visions have her spooked, and her power has something to do with Thanatos and Hades.”
As strategic a thinker as I was, even I was unable to assess what was going on beyond the obvious. Niko’s astuteness came as no surprise. It was his uneasiness that concerned me. When a street thug, whose survival depended upon the speed of his ability to read people, took a step back and couldn’t piece together what the danger was, then the problem was either immense or complex.
With gods and power in the mix, I was guessing both.
“How quickly is the safe zone receding?” I asked.
“It’s sporadic. Some days, it’s a kilometer or five or ten. On other days, no loss occurs. On the rare occasion, it grows.”
“Almost like someone is trying to prevent it from receding.”
“It’s not Cecelia or Cleon or Alessandra, and they’re the only people capable of fighting anything unseen.”
“Lantos?”
Niko shook his head. “If he knows, he’s not looking in that direction.”
“In which direction is he looking?”
“I can do a lot of things, but tracking a shadow isn’t one of them. When he wants to be seen, he’s in his apartment, doing absolutely nothing. When he doesn’t …” Niko shrugged. “But in our discussions, he’s not at all concerned about the safe zone.”
We drew near a checkpoint. Neither of us spoke as we crossed through two checkpoints before reaching the heavily guarded entrance of the wall. Niko drove through slowly with a wave at his men then picked up speed as he headed through the city towards the compound at its center.
The city looked much like it had when I left … until we reached an area cordoned off by police tape. A gaping hole ran for several blocks before the cityscape began again.
Seeing my long look at the collapsed area, Niko spoke for the first time since we started driving.
“Your girl did that,” he said. “Messed her up.”
I didn’t have to imagine Alessandra’s distress; I’d experienced it in some form every day, whenever I tried to rest, only for the image of her to flash through my mind.
“Everyone agrees she’s stronger than Cecelia,” Niko added.
“She’s the strongest since the first,” I replied. “That is her prophecy.”
“Maybe you can fix her.”
Niko wasn’t capable of caring for anyone outside his son and ex, but even he had to understand Alessandra was the key to everything.
He drove us to the compound. We entered with no difficulty, and Niko parked in the general lot a short distance from the mall, around which the buildings were arranged. We left the van and began walking towards the House, the largest of the remaining buildings.
“You may want to see Lantos first,” he said. “Cleon can see everything Alessandra does. He’ll alert security the second she spots you.”
Niko was genuinely concerned about something. At the moment, I cared too much about the woman on the third floor of the House to find out what.
Niko left me at the back entrance of the heavily guarded house. I wore a uniform similar to my old one, complete with the red patch on the shoulder marking me as a commander, which ensured no one challenged me. Several checkpoints inside the House slowed my progress considerably. My blood was boiling, my skin crawling with my growing sense of dread.
Finally, I made it through the final set of guards monitoring her hallway and stood before her door. My heart pounded hard in anticipation, and I was on edge enough that I paused to breathe deeply, so I didn’t snap if I heard a loud sound.
Niko’s advice returned to me. As much as I yearned to walk into Alessandra’s apartment, the rational side warned me I had one shot today, and I needed to talk to Lantos first.
With reluctance, I left her door and passed through another set of guards to the section of the House where Lantos was loosely confined. His door, too, appeared to be locked from the outside. As I stood there, I felt sorrow replace much of my anger when I considered my only friend in the world had betrayed me.
I walked into his apartment and closed the door behind me, senses on alert.
“I’m not due for my meeting for an hour,” Lantos said from the breakfast nook a short distance away. He glanced up at me from his tablet then back.
Spotting the camera in the corner of his apartment, I didn’t remove my mask.
“I’m not here about your meeting,” my voice carried a note of unmistakable tension. The muscles of my frame were taut, stiff, as I considered my personal failing in trusting Lantos. “I came to see a friend, but I’m not certain he exists anymore.”
His bright green eyes fixed to me. “Adonis,” he breathed after a moment.
“I have little time,” I said. “Because we are … were friends, I wanted to give you one chance to tell me why you’ve done what you’ve done. I urge you to think and speak quickly. Your candidness determines your fate.”
“I assure you, there is an explanation.” He stood and moved towards me then stopped when he saw me tense further. “Adonis, I need you to know what I’m doing is for the benefit of everyone, including Alessandra. My actions appear –”
“Like you betrayed the man you called your brother?” I finished with calm I didn’t feel.
“And like I betrayed everyone else,” he said. “The truth is much more complicated.”
“Tell me. Now.”
“I can’t.” He searched my features. “I know how this looks, and I know how this sounds. A secret was revealed to me, so that I could take action. But it is not my secret to reveal. I consider you to still be my brother. I have, and always will, do what I feel I must to protect you.”
I absorbed his words. He was sincere and firm. I wanted to believe he had a reason, but with the overwhelming information Niko had revealed, it was difficult to believe anything could be worth what Lantos was willing to sacrifice.
The human side of me, who viewed Lantos as my savior, was too hurt to want to give him the benefit of the doubt, while my primal instinct was more rational. Lantos was a politician, and a damned good one. He was always manipulating the environment and people to better his access, position or power. But he had always needed my help, too, when it came to the political game, which I had learned the same way Phoibe did – as a child-ruler of a vast empire. I always knew the possibility existed for Lantos to manipulate me, if the circumstances warranted it. I’d also thought I would be aware of it, since my instincts were better than his.
As the long silence stretched between us, I couldn’t help wondering what I was more upset about: my own failing to catc
h the warning signs about Lantos, or the fact he had done what I had always understood him to be capable of doing. He was not acting out of character. Before Alessandra, however, we had been an inseparable team.
I entered expecting to be able to decide with ease whether or not I would kill Lantos. Five minutes later, I was mired in an inner battle between understanding who and what he was, and denial anything in the world could make up for what he’d helped do to Alessandra.
“I can forgive your betrayal of me,” I said at last. “But Alessandra … Lantos, I can’t turn the other way.”
“How do you think I felt, knowing I’d probably lose you to do what I had to?” he replied bitterly.
“Yet you did it,” I pointed out. I drew near him, scouring his features. “Tell me the truth. Is it worth it?”
“Yes,” he said without hesitation. “Hurting you is the hardest thing I’ve ever done. But it was necessary.”
I didn’t doubt that he believed his own words.
“What’s worst: I’m not done hurting you,” he said with a harsh laugh. “If I don’t continue down this path I’m on, much worse will befall you than anything I can and will do to you.”
“You’re hurting me to save me?” I asked.
“Yes. No,” he replied. “But it’s not just you. It’s complicated. I’m trying to fix something I broke.” His gaze rested on the wall separating his apartment from Alessandra’s. “I promise, one day, I’ll tell you everything, Adonis. But I can’t today.”
I was quiet, pensive, unable to shake the ominous sense about the secret Lantos was unwilling to share. His betrayal, while unexpected, made more sense, if he believed he was working to help people choose the lesser of two evil paths.
But it didn’t justify what he’d done in secrecy, to someone I cared about. If he had a legitimate reason for hurting Alessandra, why had he not come to me?
Did it matter what his reasoning was, when his choices were already made and acted upon?
The discussion had taken a turn I didn’t expect and, in doing so, revealed more than Lantos was willing to admit directly. Niko’s hunch that there were more forces at work here than those that met the eye was confirmed. Lantos was operating independently of the other players in DC. Whatever his agenda was, it was not self-driven, which meant, he was not operating out of self-interest this time.
I was too emotionally charged to guess what, or who, could motivate him to leave the course he’d been on or to imagine what his purpose and end state were.
“One day is too late, Lantos,” I said finally.
The light in his gaze faded. “I understand,” he said quietly.
Turning away, I strode toward the door.
“Adonis,” he called.
I paused.
“I mean this when I say I still consider you a brother. If you ever need my help, I won’t ask any questions.”
What good was the offer of assistance from someone who had already told me the worst wasn’t over yet?
Who had such an influence over him that he was willing to say such a thing, when his actions were the source of the damage? The man who could read secrets out of people’s minds wasn’t an easy target for anyone. Whatever he was doing, he was likely executing the directives of a god, or perhaps even his father, to whom his loyalty was greater than it was towards me.
I nodded once and exited his apartment. Wary of the scrutiny the guards were giving me, I didn’t stop to clear my head as I wanted to but returned to the corridor sectioned off from both ends of the hallway.
Alessandra’s door was locked from the outside. I unlocked it and stepped inside, my senses pricking with awareness.
The apartment was quiet, neat and clean. Her scent was in the air, and it managed to clear my mind of the turmoil of emotions remaining from my encounter with Lantos.
“Alessandra,” I called and closed the door behind me.
A quiet pause was interrupted by the sound of a door whipping open. The beautiful woman emerged from what appeared to be her bedroom and stared at me. Smaller than me and toned, she appeared in general good health, though slimmer than she had been. Emotions played across her features too fast for me to gauge which one would win. The air around her rippled with energy and power, to the point her aura blurred the edges of her surroundings.
I couldn’t feel her. Even this close. The connection we shared was battering against my chest, trying to reach her, but unable to. My inability to feel our bond supported Niko’s claim about Lantos going rogue, and lessened my satisfaction with Lantos’ explanation further. This was why she hadn’t contacted me – and I had been too immersed in my sense of betrayal to ask Lantos to lift the wall between us.
“Who are you?” Alessandra asked, eyes narrowed.
In the strange silence between us, I peeled off the SISA mask.
Alessandra snapped her eyes closed. “You can’t be here. He knows. You can’t be here!” she whispered in a strained voice. She whirled away from me and paced to the window, staring out.
I trailed and paused behind her, close enough to feel her body heat and the waves of energy radiating off her. Because she brought me to life, I was immune to her magic. “Alessandra.”
“You can’t be here!” she said again, this time with an edge of desperation in her voice. “You have to leave!”
“I’m not going anywhere, Alessandra.”
I rested my palms lightly on her arms. She tensed, her breath catching audibly. Seconds later, she twisted and flung her arms around my neck.
“I knew you’d come back,” she whispered fiercely.
I hugged her against me hard, uncertain when any physical sensation had struck me to my core as her touch always did. The smell of her hair sent my beast side into euphoria, and the need to claim and protect what was mine rose hard and fast within me. Before I left, we had started down a path that unnerved me, because of how deeply I felt, and how much I feared I’d hurt her. With her body pressed to mine, I was able to feel where I belonged. Every other worry or question or doubt vanished. I had wanted to hold her like this many times before I left but respected her too much to be forward in what I felt.
Tension melted from her frame. I held her tightly, absorbing and memorizing every sensation. Every breath, the softness of her skin, the scent of her shampoo, the firmness of her frame.
“How did you do that?” she voiced.
“What?”
“When you touched me, he was gone.”
Unreasonable anger surged at the reminder Cleon had overtaken her mind, with the help of Lantos. I suppressed it with effort.
“I don’t know,” I replied. “What we have runs deeper.”
“I thought you were dead,” she repeated. “I saw you, Adonis. I saw you in Hades.”
My pulse quickened. No man, especially one who had been alive for four thousand years, was immune to concern when an Oracle admitted to foreseeing his death. Sensing her distress, I squeezed her. “I’m alive and plan to stay that way,” I said.
She released me enough to pull her head back and meet my gaze. Her blue eyes were large and filled with emotions I wanted to remove and destroy permanently, so they never disturbed her again. Her features were flushed.
We gazed into each other’s eyes, lost to the rest of the world, speaking a silent language only the soul understood. Being with her like this was so natural, it was difficult for me to restrain the part of me that wanted more. My concern now was her well being, not the satisfaction of the primal needs thrumming through me.
“You’re not okay,” I said and cupped her cheek with one hand.
“No,” she replied. “You’re in danger around me.”
“I don’t care.”
Her blush deepened under my intense look, and she hugged me once again.
Banging on the door sent a ripple of anger through me. “Niko sneaked me in. I knew they’d figure it out quickly but had hoped it took them a while to react.”
“Cleon saw you when I did. I can
fix this for now,” she said.
The banging became muffled. I glanced toward the door. A thick sheet of metal walled off the front of the apartment from us. The creation of the wall had been effortless for her.
“I won’t let them hurt you,” she added. “But you’ll have to leave before Cleon arrives. My magic doesn’t work on either of you.”
I smiled, touched by her concern, if not amused by the idea she feared anyone could hurt me. Her breathing was quick and shallow. I didn’t need our connection to understand she was struggling with herself, or perhaps, her power. Bending, I scooped her up and walked to the couch. I sat with her in my lap, and we shifted until she was comfortable. I pushed a strand of hair from her features.
“Did Niko blackmail you?” she asked unhappily.
“I wouldn’t call it blackmail. I was happy to pay his price,” I replied.
Her eyes narrowed, and anger flared deep within them.
“He asked for a favor unique to my skill set and one of you,” I continued. “He wants you to undo what you did to Theodocia.”
“I knew it!” Her anger faded, replaced by a reluctant smile. Tilting her head, she peered past me, at the metal wall. Her look grew distant for a fraction of a second before she blinked the spell away. “It’s done.”
“That easy.” I didn’t display my surprise. When I’d left her, she had little handle on her magic and no ability to use it without great effort.
“Yeah,” she said. “It’s gotten both easier and harder. Easier, because I can do anything. Harder, because Cleon can use it, too.”
“You’re the strongest since the first oracle.”
She nodded. “Yeah. She told me.”
“You’ve spoken to her?”
Alessandra hesitated. “I can slip out of our world, Adonis. I can go to an alternate reality. More than one, I think, and I can venture into Hades’ domain at will. The first Oracle was sent by Hades to help us, though I don’t know she understands exactly how.”
My thoughts were on Apollo, trapped in the body of Menelaus. It wasn’t coincidence that the first Oracle was present in some regard, and so was the patron god of Oracles and the Bloodline.
