Ludan capped the decanter and handed Eryx his glass. “And he’ll die for treason on this end. Gotta spin your angles where you can.”
That son of a bitch. “Spin it?”
The men went on alert. Call it instinct or male preservation, but every one of them knew they’d struck a nerve. She could see it in their eyes.
“We’re talking about a man who’s admitted to his faults,” she said. “Who’s offering to share what he knows, and is willing to lay his life on the line to make the wrongs in his life right before he dies, and you want to spin it? What the hell happened to decency in this family? Or maybe a little compassion?”
“Compassion?” Ramsay got up in her face. The whites surrounding his soft gray eyes burned a harsh white, a sure sign his formidable powers teetered close to loss of control. “He gave up the right to compassion the day he threw my trust in my face.”
Galena wobbled back a step, and the hairs along her forearms stood straight, no doubt from the violent energy sparks snapping around Ramsay. She glanced at Ludan, then at Eryx. “What’s he talking about?”
Ramsay held his tight stance a second longer, huffed, and then backed away. He dropped into the wingback beside hers.
“Tell me,” she said.
Ramsay sucked in an audible breath and his jaw tensed.
“If you want her to understand, you’re gonna have to tell her,” Eryx said to Ramsay. “Otherwise, you just look like a dick.”
Ramsay fisted his hands atop the armrests and fixated on the far wall. He was the spitting image of Eryx, minus the ridiculously long hair and covenant braids. One wouldn’t think a man so hard and formidable on the outside could be hurt, but in that moment she sensed a vulnerability he wasn’t altogether comfortable with.
The grit in Ramsay’s voice raked her. “Reese was my friend. I love my brother. Hell, I’d die for him in a second, but he was always with Ludan. Reese…” He dragged a hand through his already mussed hair and sat forward, a grimace on his face. “He seemed genuine. Not a suck-up. Not a dick. Just a good guy. Or that’s what I thought.”
She knew what Ramsay meant. She’d felt Reese’s warmth. The genuineness of his presence. Under normal circumstances she’d have been sensitive. Maybe tried to lure whatever bothered Ramsay out with soft words or a gentle tone, but the very tangible hatred for Reese kept her question tight. “What happened?”
The corner of his mouth curled in an ironic smile. “I trusted him, Lena. I was so damned happy for him at his swearing in. I knew how much it meant to him, or how much he’d said it meant to him. Then, to have him not share his memories? His bullshit friendship was nothing more than a bridge to get through the swearing in. It was a farce. For all we know, he was scamming to get on the inside for Maxis.”
Galena crossed her arms. Stupid, emotionally negligent men. “Or maybe he was afraid his secret was so bad you wouldn’t be able to see past it.”
He cocked his head and scrutinized her. “What in histus is so bad you can’t share it with your best friend? With a man you’re prepared to fight beside and die for?”
No point in pulling her punch. “Maxis is his half brother.”
Ramsay’s jaw dropped.
Ludan let loose something between a hiss and rumble, then poured a fresh drink.
Part of her wanted to stop there. To quietly leave the room as she normally would and hope her point hit home, but if she was going to make a difference for Reese, now was the time to drive it home. “Do you have any idea how hard it is to expose your deepest secrets for fear you’ll be judged for it? Put yourself in his place and tell me if you’d have done any differently.”
“Hey, babe. Guess what…we…found…” Lexi’s voice trailed and she looked from person to person. “Who died?”
Galena nearly bit her tongue in half.
“No one.” Eryx rounded the desk and headed for his mate. “You got something?”
“A precedent.” Despite being wrapped in Eryx’s welcoming embrace, Lexi stared at Galena, a concentrated stare that made Galena want to twitch. Her voice went flat, bordering on curious. “We haven’t combed out the details, but it’s enough to cover what you need with the ellan.”
“Then you’re set.” Ludan sprawled into his place on the couch, a reloaded glass of strasse in one hand. “Let Reese do his thing, blast Maxis, and short-circuit the council.”
Ramsay shook his head. “Reese teamed with Maxis is a risk you don’t need.”
“I’m done playing it safe.” Eryx faced the rest of them, Lexi tucked tight to his side. “I was too short-sighted with the rebellion before. If I let Reese have his chance at Maxis it gives me more stroke with the ellan. Proof I gave the traitor a chance before I took him out. I’ve got enough political problems without adding more headaches and this circumvents a hell of a lot.”
“And what if it works?” Everyone turned Galena’s way, a mix of incredulity and confusion painted on their faces. All except for Lexi who still watched her with way too much insight. She focused on Eryx. “What if Maxis surrenders? Then what?”
“Reese is a traitor.” Venom coated Ramsay’s voice. “Traitors die.”
Slow, near-to-bursting rage shook her. “So you’ll use him. Give no quarter for his efforts. Is that it? And here I’d thought my brothers played fair.”
They glared back at her, the hurt and surprise in their expressions so potent it torched her from the inside out.
She stormed for the door. To histus with them and any answers they coughed up. She’d heard enough in the last thirty minutes to shake a lifetime of perceptions. Using her mind, she slammed the doors behind her. She needed air. Air and enough distance she couldn’t use her Myren gifts to lob the heaviest object she could find toward their heads.
She abhorred the rebellion as much as anyone. Hated what they stood for and the atrocities they’d committed against humans and the throne, but in this her brothers and Ludan were wrong. The past was the only thing driving their actions, not any sense of decency. Not factoring Reese’s circumstances into the equation was just stupid.
She threw the gate to the private castle garden wide, and a gust of ocean air slapped her head to toe. Reese was going to die. Either by her brothers’ hands or Maxis’. And there wasn’t a thing should could do to stop it.
She doubled over on a quiet sob and slid to a crouch, her arms wrapped tight around her stomach.
Lexi’s voice cut through her thoughts. “There’s more to this than you’re letting on.”
Galena surged to her feet. The wind cut a cold path along the tears trailing her cheek. “Why? Because I'm championing a traitor?”
“No, because my scary emotional mojo latched onto some serious worry this morning.” Lexi strolled forward, her saucy jaunt not the least bit dimmed by the simple blue gown she wore. “Couple that with your comment about exposing your deepest desire for fear of being judged? The guys might be too stupid to see what’s going on, but I’m not.”
Damn, but her shalla’s new gift was scary. Galena cleared her throat and shuffled to the rock ledge lining the garden.
“You know,” Lexi’s voice grew closer. “The first time I was around your family as a whole, I was floored. You're so fiercely loyal to each other. I'd never seen anything like it. Never felt anything like it.” She took a spot beside Galena and mirrored her study of the churning waves below. “I guess I can see why a woman would be afraid to upset that dynamic.”
Galena spun to face her. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
Lexi shrugged, gaze still locked on the horizon. “I mean upsetting the family balance to take care of your own needs would be a little frightening.” She laid her hand on Galena’s and faced her. “But there comes a time when a woman needs to stop looking at what everyone around her needs and start taking care of herself.”
Chapter 9
Eryx strode through the dungeon, Ludan and Ramsay’s booted footsteps rumbling alongside his to fill t
he cavernous space.
Ludan glanced at Eryx. “You call the council session yet?”
“After the raid,” Eryx answered via link just outside Reese’s cell. After a long night and significant back and forth with Lexi, he’d decided Reese was likely telling the truth, but that didn’t mean he was willing to toss info around so Reese could hear it. “We’ve got nothing to prove Angus is hooked into Maxis, but with the information he knew about Lexi, I find it hard to believe anything else. I’m not up for tipping him or anyone else off to our plans before Ian’s safe and we’ve got a bead on Maxis.”
He buried all thoughts but the task ahead of him and checked Ramsay on his left. He dropped his mental connection to Ludan and isolated his link to Ramsay. “You sure you’re up for this?”
If his brother could do the Superman laser vision bit, there’d be man-sized hole in the cell door already. “He’s a traitor. Nothing to feel.”
“That’s bullshit and you know it.” Man, but Reese had done a number on Ramsay. While Eryx sympathized with Reese and the awkward position having Maxis for a brother caused him, he still wanted to choke the bastard for the blow he’d dealt his brother. Ramsay kept most people at bay with his laid-back persona, but he’d let Reese in. Taken him under his wing, trained him, and treated him like a brother. “You want to stuff your shit, that’s your business, but keep it tight while this goes down. We’ve got enough irons in the fire without you blowing up the whole damned forge.”
Ramsay scowled back at him, but thankfully held his tongue.
Eryx mentally triggered the latch, braced for the slam of zeolite, and stepped across the threshold.
The crystal’s power-stealing impact sluiced from head to toe, ripping and clawing every organ and muscle along its path. Myren powers were more than bonus options for their race. They were inherent to each person’s being, no different or less important than a spleen or a kidney.
Reese stood, the whites of his eyes shot with red and fatigue weighting his stature. Confession might have been good for his soul, but it didn’t appear to have done much where sleep was concerned.
“Malran.” Reese shifted his gaze to Eryx’s left and his voice lowered. “Ramsay.”
Fuck if this whole scenario wasn’t a brawl waiting to happen. “I’ve got an answer on your offer,” Eryx said before shit could get out of hand.
Reese’s Adam’s apple bobbed.
“You’ll take point in the raid on Maxis’ hideout,” Eryx said. “You’ll draw your brother out for whatever it is you feel you need to say to him. If he surrenders, we’ll take him into custody and bring you both to zeolite. If he doesn’t, we attack.” Sufficient details for now. Highlighting Reese’s low odds for returning alive seemed about as heartless as Galena had accused him of being the night before.
Reese jerked his head in agreement. “Done.”
“Not quite.” No way was Eryx letting him off that easy. “I’m not foolish enough to buy your claims without confirmation. You give your memories, all of them, from birth to now. You hold anything back, we take you to trial tomorrow, and we know how that ends. Clear?”
“Clear.”
“And you give your link.”
“Agreed.” Reese’s gaze stay locked to Eryx. His body language remained loose and open, but there was still no a guarantee he wasn’t a lying son of a bitch with an gift for acting.
Ramsay prowled forward and offered his hand, grim enough to scare the diabhal.
Eryx stopped him with a palm at his chest. “No. This one’s mine.”
“Like hell it is.” Ludan stepped between them and glared at Eryx, the idea of a traitor having a link with his malran clearly not high on his list of bright ideas. Links made it easy for bad guys to track and kill. Not exactly an ideal situation when your primary job in life was to keep the malran breathing.
Eryx spun for the door. “Not your call, Ludan. Reese, outside. Now.” His powers roared to life as he stepped into the barely lit corridor. He turned in time to see Reese sway beneath the same onslaught. After nearly three days behind the crystal, the rush had to pack a wallop. “You good?”
Reese focused on the wall behind Eryx and shook his head as though to clear it. His eyes were still glassed over, but the torchlight and the rush of power made the rest of him look better. “Yeah.”
Eryx crowded close and offered his hand. “Time to show your cards.”
Reese clasped it, his grip solid, albeit weak. Not at all the tentative or shaking grasp he’d expect if things weren’t on the up and up.
“Hold him,” Eryx said.
Ludan and Ramsay snapped forward and seized Reese by his upper arms.
Eryx speared into Reese’s mind, and Reese’s knees buckled, his body sagging into Ludan and Ramsay’s firm grip.
Snippets of Reese’s youth plowed by. Not the whispered, painless sweep Ludan’s unique gift provided, but a slow, detailed study that left a burning trail of discomfort in its wake. Intelligence gained, and a warning given all at the same time.
He slowed through Reese’s training years. So much time with Ramsay, Ludan and Eryx absent for most of it. Galena was prevalent then too, picture after picture, though most were captured from a distance.
He lumbered through more recent years. A solemn stretch spent alone, Maxis finding and blackmailing him, all of it confirming Reese had spoken the truth. He slowed at Reese’s memories of the battle, scrutinizing every moment. What the—
Galena hadn’t just healed Reese on the battlefield, she’d talked with him. And the way Reese registered her appearance wasn’t anywhere near the way Eryx saw her. This woman was exotic. Sensual and enticing.
He fast-forwarded and growled at the site that greeted him. Galena, on her knees between Reese’s thighs and locked tight to his chest. He shook his head to clear the vision and refocused on Reese in real-time. His gut roiled, energy pounding for release. He should make the link and get out. Take advantage of the traitor while he could. But damn it if he didn’t want this man’s head.
He stabbed his link through Reese’s palm, and spasms wracked Reese head to toe. The thread pulsed neon red in Eryx’s mind, loaded with enough energy to jump Reese’s tremors to outright shakes.
Lexi’s warning from the night before shuttled past his thoughts. “He means something to her. Right or wrong, the emotion is there. You, of all people, should remember what it’s like to have to choose.”
Reese’s emerald green link inched toward Eryx’s. It coiled around Eryx’s angry red strand, slow, but determined.
The link snapped tight and the colors merged to solid black.
Reese’s eyes rolled back in the back of his head and he sagged deeper into Ludan and Ramsay’s hold.
Eryx dropped Reese’s hand and stepped away before he could snap Reese’s neck.
Reese staggered and tried to push upright.
The image he’d witness flashed back in full color. The flush on her cheeks when she’d knelt so close to Reese. The need in her eyes. Eryx knew that rush firsthand. Felt it every time he looked at Lexi. Histus, every time he thought of her. Galena would suffer enough at Reese’s death. Better for Maxis to bring his downfall than her brothers.
He sucked in a lungful of air. “Your mother’s homestead’s in Runa?”
Reese rubbed his forearm and stared almost defiantly at Eryx. “Close to Cush’s border, halfway through Big Valley on the east side.”
Good. Far enough to keep him away from Galena until tomorrow.
Eryx motioned to Ludan and Ramsay to step back, but kept his focus on Reese. “You’ve got twenty-four hours. We meet on the ridge across from Maxis’ rat hole at ten AM. You’re so much as a minute late, I’ll make the burn you just experienced feel nice in comparison.” He spun for the door. “It’ll last a good, long time before I kill you.”
* * * *
Reese touched down in front of his mother’s homestead. Crosswinds whipped his bare torso and cheeks, easing
the noonday sun’s heat. Compared to the rest of Eden, Runa paled in terms of beauty and its sweeping winds were hellacious on a tame day, but no other region beat its fertile soil.
The stretch of land in front of him was no exception. Waist-high wheat stretched twenty acres wide and five deep, the color more a rose gold than what grew in Evad. The puffy topped stalks bobbed a happy greeting and their familiar honey-cinnamon scent grounded him in a way no other place could.
Praise The Great One, he’d missed this place. More than he’d realized. Life had been simple, he and his mother farming a tiny section of their acreage and renting the rest to farmers just starting out. She’d joked about how Maxis’ father would hemorrhage if he ever learned the jewels she’d smuggled in her escape went to finance something as sensible as agriculture.
Their modest cypress cabin stood more weathered than when he’d seen it last. The windows were clean, the porch tidy, and pretty little ferns he’d probably kill in three days sat perched on the porch rail. The nearby couple he’d hired to tend the place after his mother’s passing had done their job well. Still, the years had taken their toll. The ivory-hued wood now glowed a deep honey gold, the cherry slate roof more carnelian.
His footsteps rang hollow on the porch planks. No activity bristled against his senses for at least a good hundred feet out, nor had he scouted movement from the skies on his way in, but he couldn’t afford to be complacent. Not with Maxis on the run and undoubtedly eager to slit Reese’s throat.
Reese buried the thought and triggered the door’s hidden lock with his mind. He’d have more than enough time to ponder all things related to Maxis after he’d eaten and found some decent clothes.
The above-ground level was a simple, wide-open space split into quarters with the kitchen and living area up front, and a bed and bathroom at the back. More a bachelor’s dwelling than a hideout for a woman with a small child on her own, which was exactly what his mother had intended.
She’d always feared Maxis’ father would find them, and had built in as many warning and escape features as her jewels had allowed. The single inhabitant guise was one, the escape tunnels below ground another. Probably smart to make sure the latter were still operational. After food.
Healing Eden Page 8
