Interra (Awakened Series Book 5)

by Harley Austin

  He seemed to ponder for a moment and then shook his head, “No, I think that about covers it.”

  “Rion—a coronation? What are you pulling me into?”

  “I’m not pulling you into anything. It’s the rest of my family that is.”

  “They want to make me a princess?”

  “No. You’ll already be a princess, they just want to have a formal ceremony and celebration over it.”

  “What do you mean, ‘be’?”

  Rion flipped the pancakes. “When you’re awakened.”

  “Rion, you are not making any sense. I’m not part of your family, am I?”

  “Not at the moment. But you will be.”

  “I thought you said the Ra don’t marry?”

  “We don’t.”

  “But somehow I’m about to become your wife—or princess or whatever?”

  “Serena, you’re about to be awakened. By a prince.”

  “Wait—” Serena’s wheels began turning. She set down her mug. “You said the DNA of another Ra is what awakens the newbloods. Right?”

  He nodded.

  “So your DNA—”

  “Will become part of you.”

  “Part of me?!”

  “My genes will infuse with yours.”

  “YOUR genes?!”

  He nodded with a half smile.

  “RION! What are you going to do to me—exactly?”

  He shrugged. “Make you a goddess. A really powerful one—at least Sevrin thinks so.”

  “I kind of like my genes the way they are. Rion! You’re talking about messing with my genetics here!”

  Rion nodded.

  “Don’t you think you’re being a little cavalier?”

  “Serena, people have been awakening for tens of thousands of years. You’re hardly the first. And you certainly, hopefully, won’t be the last.”

  “I—I just had no idea. Messing with my genetics?”

  “I’m—I’m sorry, Hon; I guess I should have told you more about what it means to be awakened.”

  “You guess?! Rion I’ve been sleeping with you for weeks. We’ve been this close at times with you all over me. And you guess you should have told me!?”

  “Serena,” Rion put down the spatula and moved toward her. Her feelings were really jumbled suddenly; like the thought of his genes comingling with hers hadn’t at all been a welcomed revelation. He went to embrace her but she pushed his arms away.

  “Don’t touch me. Ever.” She moved away from him and then stormed out of the kitchen.

  Rion frowned, watching her leave. He sighed. Wow. This morning wasn’t exactly going very well.

  * * * * *

  “This is quite the unexpected surprise, Rigel.” The president walked with him through the network of nicely paneled tunnels that crisscrossed a good portion of the metro area around the White House and Capital.

  “I try to keep all of my surprises, unexpected, Brett. But it is you who have surprised me, frankly.”

  “Oh?”

  “Perhaps I should have counted on your resourcefulness. I did hire the best after all.”

  “I appreciate the compliment.”

  “Your team arrived at the Forks Ranger Station yesterday.”

  “They did. I sent them.”

  “What is it you hope to accomplish?”

  “At this point, it’s purely expeditionary. I don’t know what we’ll find.”

  “You must recall them. Immediately.”

  “And why is that?”

  Rigel stopped walking. It was the first time the president had seen a frustrated look on the older man’s face. “Because you’re meddling now, Brett. In things that don’t concern you.”

  “I disagree. The ancient capital of the Ra seems to be a pretty big deal.”

  “You see, Brett? I knew at some point you and your team would discover some things we don’t always tell everyone. There is a reason why your predecessors erected a highly protected wilderness area on that peninsula.”

  “So the city does exist.”

  “Of course. And it has been there, resting quietly, deep beneath those mountains for tens of thousands of years. No one living today, that I know of, has ever set foot in that place.”

  “So, why don’t you want us going down there?”

  “It’s very dangerous, Brett. The ancients concealed and protected the last of their strongholds. Since the modern age we’ve tried to keep people out of and away from the area. We discourage any kind of activity in the area, even air traffic.”

  “We’re not children, Rigel. I still don’t see why it would hurt for us to know more about what’s down there.”

  “Because, Brett, we are already there. Trust me. This government, your government now, in fact, has already been carefully watching this mountain since before this nation was ever founded. It was our victory, long ago, forcing our adversaries out of that place. We have fortified the whole complex, protecting it, all in an unbridled effort of making sure another Sentinel never again steps foot in the place. You were—just not made aware. That’s all. The rangers informed our people once your staff arrived.”

  “That’s a little unsettling. People working for me I don’t even know about? People reporting to you without telling me.”

  “It is. Agreed. But you cannot be everywhere, my friend. We need you focusing on things that are much more important at the moment.”

  “What could be more important than finding the ancient capital city of the gods?”

  “I’ll tell you exactly what is more important—” Rigel glared, gripping his arm tightly, almost painfully. “Not letting them back in to it!”

  27

  J ake put down his orange juice to grab his phone. “What have you got, Mira?”

  “We have another lead. And there’s someone here that I’m pretty sure you’re going to want to meet.”

  “Great, I’m on my way.”

  The receptionist ignored Jake this time. He strode into Mira’s office noting a man in a smartly tailored business suit sitting in one of her chairs. Jake ignored him, for the moment.

  “What do we have?”

  She nodded in the direction of the man sitting quietly in the chair.

  Jake looked at the man and then look back at Mira. “Shabak? Here? What the hell do they want?”

  Jake’s comment got the man’s attention. He got to his feet and closed Mira’s office door.

  “What the hell does the ISA have to do with this?” Jake glared at Mira.

  Mira said nothing.

  “Jacob, I’m Special Agent Wolfeson,” he said, extending his hand. Jake ignored it. Shabak was notorious for gumming up the works when it came to getting things done. However, if the ISA was here, it probably meant Mira had stumbled onto something they didn’t want anyone snooping into. That was a lead Jake was about to be all over.

  “We’re taking over this investigation,” he offered simply.

  “The hell you are.”

  “Jacob, we don’t need to get into a pissing match here.”

  “What are you hiding?” Jake demanded.

  “You’re about to encroach on a long-standing high-level program. I respect you and your family very much, but we can’t have Mossad trampling all over what is a very delicate operation.”

  “You didn’t answer my question.”

  Wolfeson said nothing.

  “Mira, what did you find?”

  “He’s not authorized for any of this, Mira,” Wolfeson blocked. “And neither are you, for that matter.”

  Jake shot an ugly glance at Wolfeson. He wasn’t worried about himself, but Wolfeson’s last comment was a warning to Mira. If she stepped over the line and ignored the ISA, she would not only get fired, but likely arrested by Wolfeson on the spot as well. Jake took a step toward Wolfeson, getting right in the agent’s face. “Do you know how fast I can have your sorry pencil-pushing ass fired, Shabak?”

  Wolfeson didn’t back down. “You’re meddling in national security,
Gold. I don’t care who your family is, I’m just doing my job. This is a delicate investigation and I don’t need some muscle-brained nimrod blowing it apart!”

  “Boys!” Mira chimed in.

  Both of them glared at her.

  “I’d love to watch you two compare Johnsons here. Really, I would. I’m sure they’re both real impressive. But this young woman,” Mira pointed to a monitor showing a snapshot of Serena, “may not have time to wait for your committees to make a decision on whose is bigger.”

  Jake glared back at Wolfeson.

  Wolfeson frowned. How Jacob Gold had gotten involved with this was still a mystery. With anyone else this meeting would have been over and done before it had started. But Jake’s presence now severely complicated things. Wolfeson knew that if he pulled rank, Jake could overrule him with a phone call on the spot. Damned politicians. All he could do was attempt to limit the damage and hope he himself didn’t get fired or court marshaled in the process.

  “Alright, Gold. On one condition,” Wolfeson acquiesced. “You damn well better have my back when all holy hell rains down on the both of us.” He held out his hand.

  “Done,” Jake agreed, taking hold of Wolfeson’s very firm grip.

  Wolfeson released his hand and sat back down in the chair, listening, but still not looking very happy.

  Jake turned his attention back to Mira, “What’d you find?”

  “Something you said earlier, Jake, got me thinking,” Mira began. “You said you didn’t have time for ‘dead ends.’”

  “I don’t.”

  “So that got me thinking. I’ve only been looking in databases of living people, comparing this Rion guy with them. Well, just out of curiosity, I tapped into the data records of DNA from people who are not living—and got hits.”

  “What do you mean by, ‘not living’?”

  “Dead people. Really old, dead people.”

  “You mean like fossil records,” Jake probed.

  “Exactly.”

  “It’s not a perfect match or course, but it’s at least a match. This Rion guy you’re looking for? His DNA closely resembles a tribe of people who lived in and around the cradle of civilization ten to twenty thousand years ago.”

  “But he matches no one living today?”

  “Nope,” she assured.

  “Good G-d.”

  “A couple of hours after running my search, our Agent Wolfeson here shows up and shuts down the investigation with a sledgehammer.”

  Jake looked at the still frowning Shabak agent. “Who is this guy, Wolfeson?” Jake pointed at Rion’s screen.

  “Not who, Jake, but what.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “As close as we can tell, this guy you’re looking for is part of a very reclusive, and very ancient race of people. Ridiculously cunning and just as intelligent. There aren’t many of them left. We have various passive sensors out all over the world, trying to detect them now. When Mira ran your DNA check, she set off one of our tripwires. That’s when I showed up. That’s what I meant when I said you have to approach this ‘delicately’,” Wolfeson emphasized.

  “I can be delicate,” Jake insisted.

  Both Mira and Wolfeson smirked.

  “Do we have any idea about where these people live or where they hide?”

  “The don’t hide, Jake. They blend. Some better than others.”

  “So you know where some of them live.”

  He nodded. “Some. For now. It takes years to relocate a subject once they decide to re-blend. That’s why we have to be so—‘delicate,’” he re-emphasized with lifted eyebrows.

  “Who else knows about these people? Are any other governments actually tracking them?”

  “Besides the Americans and the Vatican, we’re the only ones who even know they even exist.”

  “Do they have a name?”

  “Yea. Nephilim.”

  Jake glared at Wolfeson. “Is that some kind of joke?”

  “You see me laughing? Look at your DNA sample. That dead Marine the Feds pulled from the park, he was one of them. Someone cleaned that little mess up real nice and tidy. That’s why no one’s talking, they don’t know. The whole event’s been wiped. Like it didn’t, even, happen. That’s how efficient these people are.”

  Jake looked that monitors again. “How do I find this Rion guy?” he insisted, pointing at the monitor.

  “Trust me, you don’t.”

  “I don’t trust you. Just tell me who he is and how to find him.”

  Wolfeson grimaced. “You don’t know who these people are, Gold, or what you’re up against. These people are like gods compared to us.”

  “Yea, I got it, Nephilim.” His sarcasm was palpable.

  “You think I’m kidding? This guy you’re after, his name is Rion Steele. He’s the leader of these ‘gods’. We’ve only seen him a few times in the past century.”

  “Century—?”

  “You think I’m bullshitting you, don’t you, with all of this gods and goddesses talk?”

  “You never mentioned goddesses.”

  “I am now. Every now and then these gods will take Human consorts.”

  “WHAT?”

  Mira raised an eyebrow.

  “These people, or gods for lack of a better term, are called Ra. When the sons of the gods mated with the daughters of men, they created the Nephilim. Half Human. Half Ra.”

  “Right, the children of—”

  “No. Not children.” Wolfeson interrupted. “Just mating with one of them would turn you into a Nephilim.” Wolfeson snapped his fingers. “Just. Like. That.”

  A look of horror spread across Jake’s face.

  “As hot as she is,” Wolfeson pointed to the monitor, “I’d say there’s a really good chance Zeus is already fucking your former girlfriend—big time.”

  Mira never saw the punch fly.

  She stood up and looked over her desk. Wolfeson was out. Cold. His fine suit and silk tie, sprawled all over her floor. A large red bruise beginning to move over his jaw and split lip.

  Jake stepped over him. “I need everything we have on these Ra and the Nephilim, Mira.”

  “I don’t know if I can get into those systems, Jake.”

  “I don’t care how you do it. I’m authorizing it. We’ll deal with the fallout later.”

  “Yes, sir—” she winced taking her seat. “Heading for the unemployment line,” she began typing, “… and then jail.”

  * * * * *

  Serena hadn’t seen Rion all day. He wasn’t in the house; she had looked everywhere. Even her ring was silent as she reached out to him over the continuum. Sevrin had not returned either.

  Frustrated by the sudden lack of communication after their little tiff in the kitchen, she descended the stairs for the third time in an hour as the sun began to wane behind the mountain peak. This time Serena was surprised to find a thirty-something woman sitting at the island bar drinking a sweet coffee that had filled the whole kitchen with a wonderful Hazelnut aroma. The tall, slender, and thickly dark-haired woman was beautiful. With her European-look, designer attire, and the elegance with which she moved, she appeared in every respect the epitome of a runway supermodel. The woman was a bit intimidating even to look at.

  “Ah—hello.” Serena entered the kitchen.

  The woman stood up effortlessly, as if flowing from her tall chair to offer her hand. “Hello, Serena.” She had a refined and slightly Italian accent. “A pleasure to finally meet you in person. I am Francesca.”

  “Oh! You’re Francesca—” Serena was suddenly completely fascinated now. “I’ve heard so much about you.”

  “Likewise.” She said smiling and taking a sip from her cup. “Welcome to our family. Or would that be somewhat premature?”

  Serena pursed her lips. “I—don’t know,” she admitted. “I think I kind of went off on Rion this morning.”

  “I know. Rion has been sulking about it all day.”

  “I think I hurt his feel
ings.”

  “I believe the two of you excel at that.”

  “Is that a joke?”

  “It is, Serena. You will need to get accustomed to my, rather circuitous sense of humor.”

  Serena nodded. “I guess I’m a bit overwhelmed by all of you.”

  “That is why I thought I would drop by. Just to chat. Goddess to goddess.”

  “I’m not feeling very goddess-like at the moment. I think I could use someone to talk to,” Serena admitted.

  “I thought you might,” she broke a smile. “Would you like a cappuccino?”

  “Like you have? Please.”

  Francesca smiled, glided around the counter and began prepping the espresso machine. Serena marveled at how she moved; her mannerisms. There seemed to be a refined complexity to her, a dignity she had seldom encountered in anyone. Rion talked about Francesca more than any of his other family. She wondered if she had become special to him somehow, after the passing of his parents. Serena sensed an opportunity. After Francesca had ground some beans, Serena ventured, “So, what can you tell me about Rion?”

  Francesca looked at Serena with an diabolical grin, “Everything.”

  “Ooh!” Serena felt a bit giddy as she slid her stool up to the kitchen bar.

  Francesca brought her a hot steaming cup and slid the spice cradle over to her. Serena added some cinnamon and sweetened the cup just a little.

  “I’ve known Rion since he was born,” Francesca began.

  “Wow. So, is it crass to ask you how old you are?”

  “Always,” she smirked taking a sip. “I was a teen when I was awakened.”

  “Really? You weren’t born one?”

  “No. The truth is, Serena, few of us are actually born into the family. Our DNA is highly complex; it does not easily complete the natural fertilization process. It happens. But not nearly as often as Humans.”

  She nodded. “Rion mentioned that.”

  “We are very long-lived. A couple might have twenty or thirty children over the course of their lives. But it is statistically far less than the reproduction rates of Humans.”

  “So Rion is an only child. That’s sad.”

  “It is true, unfortunately. The fact is, the Steeles did not want children right away. It was a very frustrating situation for all. Even with our populations falling to the brink of tragedy, the Steeles were all about themselves, their relationship, their friendship with each other. We tried to encourage them until we were blue in the face. But they were who they were, and they were not going to allow a little thing like extinction stand in the way of their relationship.”