Copula Chronicles: The Complete Collection: Origin, Descend, Ascend, Legacy

by Venessa Kimball

  For someone who was timid and frightened moments ago, the fire within her has returned with vengeance. “Michael says they have hunted down my family. It won’t be long before they hunt down you and me.”

  I don’t expect to see tears in her eyes. Or expect to see them fall along her cheek. And I sure as hell don’t expect to take my hand and run my thumb along the hot tears she’s spilling. “I won’t let that happen.”

  ***

  I stop in the center of the living room, listening for Corinna’s movement.

  “You’re getting good at this. I can barely sense you.”

  Her hushed laugh fuels a rush of adrenaline within me. I feel her presence in that moment and I quickly move across the room, through the kitchen, into the office, and shut the door.

  “I know you are in here. I can feel you.”

  Suddenly, the closet door opens and Corinna appears. Slowly she walks toward me, seducing me with the sway of her hips and those electric blue eyes of hers.

  She runs her hands up my chest and around my neck as she pushes up on me in all the right places. “This game isn’t as much fun when you’re linked to your prey.”

  I breathe in deeply to right my thoughts and myself “But it makes so many other things amazing don’t you think?”

  I cup and squeeze her ass tightly, bringing her up on her toes and pressing my hard on against her. She sucks in a deep breath as her eyes lazily take in my lips. “Did the university receive the shipment of Copulas?”

  I lean in just as she does, our lips barely touching. “Yes, it was twenty this time.”

  “Why not more?”

  The quiver in her voice and the words that can be misconstrued for her wanting me to fuck her right now make me want to play this game of seduction.

  I draw her lips to mine fully, and then pull back. “That’s quite a few. Don’t be greedy.”

  Her soft pink tongue runs along my lip before she tugs at it with her teeth. “Greed can be good.”

  No sooner than my lips crash against hers, she’s pushing my pants down, and I’m buried deep inside of her, pumping hard and fast as she cries out my name.

  After, she leans against the arm of the sofa, her legs draped over my unbuttoned pants. “I just think that we should be adding our numbers more quickly.”

  Sated completely by Corinna’s and my sexual stamina and release, I rest my hands along the back of the sofa as I let my head fall back and close my eyes. “Have you taken a peek outside Corinna? It has rained for ten days straight. Then, this morning, the rain turned to sleet. The temperature has dropped fifty degrees in a few hours. I’m very sorry that we’re not playing on your timetable.”

  Corinna rests her head on the back of the sofa as she and I stare at each other. I feel the warmth of her toes run along my thigh, up to my dick. Fuck, she can’t get enough. But, neither can I.

  I take hold of her foot gently and hold it still as I make my point. “Sanderson has spread distribution of the Copulas globally. Not just here. With the amount of recruits we are adding to our fellowship, we’ll be more than prepared to open the wormhole in five days.”

  Corinna asks, “Who are the next marks?”

  Sanderson sent me the intelligence that we needed to take on more of the affluent three days ago. “The usual.”

  I watch Corinna as her calculating mind works. The ability for her to maneuver and manipulate is both scary and fucking amazing. “How many are there?”

  I run my hand through my hair knowing that this is a big haul. A charity event being hosted at Womb will have at least a hundred guests––all to be subdued and transported for alteration. To what fucking degree of alteration, I’m not sure. Michael has left Corinna and me in the dark. When I tried to approach him about it, he shut me down. “A room full.”

  Her hand suddenly takes mine from the back of the couch and links it with hers. The simple touch does more than I want it to––always does.

  “Hey. You take the two hosts and I will take the other ninety-eight. Piece of cake.”

  Glancing at her sideways, I breathe out a heavy sigh and scoff. It’s sick how her sense of humor comes through the best when she’s preparing to take down a mark, but it’s also sexy as hell. “Pretty confident, aren’t we?”

  Corinna rises up on her knees and straddles my thighs, not breaking the heavy gaze she holds me in. “Yes, I am.”

  Still clasping one of my hands in hers, her smile lessens as she takes hold of my other hand on the sofa and places it under her open shirt and over her heart. The feel of her skin against mine, her straddling me, has me aroused again. But it isn’t with sex right now. It’s with her essence. Everything that makes up her, me and us.

  She breaks the gaze all of a sudden, as she thinks.

  “Sam, I—”

  For the first time since she arrived, I sense a blocked memory releasing from her mind. I’m not sure if it’s one of the brutal torture inflicted upon her or one from her past as a Dobrian. Either way, I would rather silence it than have her relive it. I pull her to me and kiss her deeply before it can fully strike.

  CHAPTER 20: BOUND

  Jesca

  Appalachian Mountains

  As Ezra promised, it’s a long day. Nate and I have an advantage on Xander. We have experienced ‘the wrath of Kahn’ on a regular basis. This is Xander’s first encounter.

  When Ezra asks Xander to get into a combat stance and punch him as hard as he can, Xander’s face is priceless and I can’t help but grin. Ezra doesn’t waste any time with the basic training we did in the facility. There isn’t enough time. Instead, he uses process of elimination to find Xander’s strengths quickly.

  By midday, it’s evident that Xander possesses almost identical abilities to Nate, which is weird since they are cousins and all. Ushering, the ability to use compulsion on another person. Latrosis, the ability to heal another with his life force. Telepathy, reading others’ minds. Astral Projection, the ability to project himself to another place in both lucid dreams and while conscious and awake. Of course, speed and strength came with the territory of being a guardian. But, the one advantage that Xander has on Nate is his ability to maneuver while astral projecting within a dream state. He even has that on me. Sleep paralysis doesn’t seem to affect him.

  Nate and I model our abilities separately then combined to show him how we can work together through our link.

  Xander asks if abilities can only be combined if the guardians are linked. We all look at Ezra for an answer.

  “It’s easier to combine abilities if there’s a link between the guardians. It’s possible to combine abilities with guardians that are not linked, but it takes a lot of energy and complete trust on each guardian’s behalf.”

  Ezra explains to Xander why links between guardians were created and when the reconfigured and coded Copula was introduced.

  “Well, what about multiple guardians linking?” Xander pauses, looking at me, before continuing.

  “Is it possible to have a link with more than one guardian?”

  Ezra puffs out his lip, as he does when he’s tense or under pressure. “It’s possible, I suppose. It’s never been seen before.”

  Ezra rubs the stubble of hair on his chin, looks from Nate, to Xander, then to me. “There might be a time when you have to combine your abilities with a guardian you are not linked to in order to survive. Trust will be the one thing that can save you or kill you. You have to trust each other over anything else.”

  His serious tone makes me wonder if he’s had firsthand experience with it.

  I remember Ezra telling me about Sam being in love with Anna, my mother. Sam trusted her. When he uncovered her identity, there was only one thing for him to do—kill her. How was he able to kill her though? With all of her abilities, how did he subdue her? Why didn’t she combine abilities with Ezra? Hell, if the
y were linked, why couldn’t he save her? Were they linked?

  Ezra interrupts my private thoughts. “Let’s break for an hour. We need to concentrate on combining and linking your abilities this afternoon. Eat and rest.”

  I don’t mess with stopping in the kitchen for food. I head straight up to my room and seek asylum in my thoughts––tangents of what ifs for my parents link and the link that could be looming between Nate, Xander, and I. A knock interrupts my thoughts.

  “Jesca, are you okay?”

  “Yeah.”

  Ezra asks, “Can I come in?”

  I roll my eyes knowing he won’t take no for an answer. “Why? I’m fine.”

  He pushes the door open and steps in closing the door behind him. Irritated by the intrusion, I move from the window around the front of the bed and flop down on the edge. I keep my eyes on the wooden floorboards and focus on blocking my thoughts.

  Feeling his eyes on me as he stands in the corner, I ask, “What? Are you going to stare me down until I speak? I said I was fine.”

  Ezra stares at me stoically with his arms crossed over his chest. “If you were fine you wouldn’t be blocking me right now.”

  I speak plainly, now that Ezra has me between a rock and hard place. “Were you and my mother implanted with the same Copula as Nate, Xander, and I?”

  Ezra nods and carefully answers, “We were the first wave to be implanted.”

  I let go of my mental block and open my mind to him with everything I’m considering. Him, my mother, Sam, my link with Nate, and Xander.

  He takes a step toward me. “Our situation was very different from yours.”

  “Were you and my mother linked?”

  Feeling the pressure of my direct question, he rests his hands on his hips and looks up at the ceiling as he turns away from me. “No, we were not. She never found her link.”

  I can only imagine my parents being in love then discovering they were in fact not linked. I feel my heart sink for Ezra as I search for any morsel of hope, a silver lining in their tragic love story.

  Ezra walks toward the window, surprising me with a chuckle as he stares at the outside. “When Anna and I met, we were so attracted to each other. After we were re-implanted with the coded Copula, we swore it was inevitable that we would be linked. A few days after re-implantation, we tested the possibility, but it wasn’t evident. Sebastian told us that it was difficult but not impossible to combine abilities if we weren’t linked. It took complete trust and time. The time we took to trust each other is what gave us the chance to fall even deeper in love.”

  Ezra glances over to me. “We were more than linked, Jesca. We were bonded by something much stronger.”

  Ezra pauses and smiles softly. “Linked or not, I wouldn’t change anything about the bond we developed.”

  After Ezra leaves, I wash my tear-streaked face and talk myself into going downstairs to face whatever the afternoon holds.

  When I get to the bottom of the stairs, Nate, Xander and Ezra are standing in the kitchen and eating. No one speaks. They just watch me.

  I walk past them, open the refrigerator and pull out a can of coke. “Why is everyone so quiet?”

  “Xander had a visitor.”

  Breaking some secret code of silence the three of them have contrived, Nate gets an elbow from Ezra.

  I look from Ezra and Nate to Xander. “Was it Sam?”

  He nods, “Yeah.”

  “What did he want?”

  Ezra interrupts, “We were getting to that when you came in.”

  I grab two slices of bread and make my sandwich, as Xander starts in.

  “I went to my room to lie down for a few minutes. I must have dozed off. That’s how it happened before.”

  He takes a bite of his sandwich. “I played along. Acted like I’m on his side.”

  Ezra, Nate and I yell simultaneously, “You did what?”

  Xander holds up his hand, fending off our worry. “This’ll work. Sam can’t read me. He’s never been able to.”

  Ezra glances at me then Nate before returning to Xander. “What happened then?”

  Xander takes a sip of his water. “I told him that I was on board and that I just needed a little more time to get myself together. Sam said that it was fine. He was consumed with Corinna’s training. They’re in Kyoto Japan at a safe house.”

  Nate swallows his food. “Shit, you got all of that from a vision. His plan isn’t half bad Ezra.”

  Ezra ignores Nate’s comment as he probes. “Did you get an address?”

  Xander shakes his head. “No, he said to contact him when I get there. He gave me a number. I wrote it down as soon as I woke up.”

  Taking another bite of his sandwich, he talks with his mouth partially full. “I did ask why he needed me.”

  I can’t help worrying about what Xander is risking by playing along with Sam. Still, I’m curious what he’s learned. “What did he say?”

  “They need me to guard the wormhole.” Xander looks at Ezra now. “What the hell is the Sea of Trees?”

  Ezra looks at Nate, then back at Xander. “The Aokigahara Forest. It’s the forest at the base of Mount Fuji. The magnetic field is absorbent there because of the large amounts of hardened lava below the surface. It’s one of the biggest conductors of magnetism for opening wormholes and vortexes.”

  Nate scoffs, “Yeah, and the biggest conductors of paranormal activity. Coined Suicide Forest.”

  Hearing the macabre reference of suicide, my stomach flips and I swallow down the bile threatening. Nate raises his eyebrows at me, and then looks at Ezra and Xander. “Yeah, I’ve been doing my own digging and the place is lit up like a Christmas tree with the supernatural. Ghosts, sacrifices, demonic presence, tortured souls. All kinds of creepy shit.”

  Accusingly, I look at Ezra since it never crossed his lips or mine for that matter. “Seriously? Fucking suicide forest?”

  Ezra glares at Nate. “There have been some encounters.”

  Nate raises his index finger and shakes his head as he chews the last bite of his sandwich. “No. So many cases of suicide and death, hangings, gunshots to the head, torture that locals won’t step foot on the land. Say that the souls of the dead attack anyone who enters and holds them hostage until they—well, you get the picture.”

  Xander and I look at each other before we all stare at Ezra accusingly.

  “Great! Not only do we have the Sondian fellowship working against us, we have lost souls ready to attack as soon as we step foot in the forest!”

  Ezra shakes his head at my words and raises his voice. “Okay! The forest will bear a challenge, but that is the least of our problem! Once it is open, we have a limited amount of time to close the vortex before it unleashes hell on earth in addition to the hell the Sea of Trees will bring! The longer its open, the more we release into our world!”

  Xander asks, “How do we close it?”

  “A surge of positive energy.”

  Xander looks at Ezra curiously. “Positive energy? The opposite of negative mass—the shit you said keeps the wormhole open?”

  Ezra nods, “Yes, positive energy from a life force.”

  Nate glances at Ezra, “That’s going to have to be one strong life force.”

  Ezra looks from both of them to me. “Yes, extremely.”

  Xander asks, “Jesca?”

  I reiterate his question. “Me?”

  How am I supposed to close a fucking wormhole all by myself?

  Seeing my apprehension, Ezra tries to reassure me. “Jes, you have the strongest life force I have seen since Anna. Your other abilities are just as substantial. The positive energy you possess is immeasurable.”

  I lean back against the counter, my legs weak beneath me. “You’re not talking about one wormhole Ezra. You said many would spawn all over the globe when
the intersection occurs. How could I have enough energy to close all of them?”

  “Yes, multiple wormholes will spawn globally, but Japan’s will be the most volatile. The sight alone will create such a forceful wormhole that the length of time it could potentially remain open is unfathomable. Do you realize how many beings could pass through a wormhole of that magnitude? Nowhere else on Earth could supply a wormhole of its capability.”

  Ezra folds his arms and nods his head, confirming what he believes. “Yes, this is the one you need to shut down. There’s no doubt in my mind. The others can be controlled by our assets.”

  I’ve stopped breathing as the pressure on my chest has become too heavy. I can’t be expected to do this! I don’t even know what to do!

  Xander interrupts my crazed thoughts. “I’ll keep stringing Sam along to get as much information as I can without giving him any reason to doubt me.”

  What if Sam figures out that he is no longer loyal to him and the Sondian fellowship? Sam will kill him. “Xander, if he finds out...”

  Xander shakes his head and looks up at me. “Jes, that’s not going to happen, I’ll be fine.”

  Ezra cautions him. “I want to know every time he contacts you. After a couple more sessions of training, you’ll be able to reach Sam the same way he has been contacting you through your dreams. Contacting him needs to be limited though. There is no need to pursue him since he is already pursuing you. Plus, you have an advantage when he contacts you. When you enter into another’s dream state, you are entering his mind and the environment he is creating. That can be a dangerous position in which to put yourself. At least when he is initiating the shared dream, he’s entering your dream state. You remain in control.”

  Back down in the basement, Ezra scratches his neck and points to an open area of the basement. “Nate and Xander, stand in the middle there. Jesca, have a seat.”

  I find an old, rickety stool and sit down in the corner.

  Ezra directs Nate and Xander, “Okay, you two are going to try and combine your abilities.”