Oh, God, oh, God, oh, God. They really could hear her!
“You are broadcasting quite loudly,” Zaen said with a lift of his brow.
There was a squeal and Kira pushed through her brothers and hugged Lucie. “Is it true? You’re fully bonded… But how? Lucie has been here all the time.”
“I think we’d all like to know what had happened.” Madlyn said as the kings helped her to her feet.
Kira looked as lost as Lucy felt. She tapped her foot and her eyes narrowed as her gaze bounced between her brothers. “I think you need to tell me what’s really going on.”
“That’s what I’d like to know, too,” Lucie said, her voice weak, but then she was enveloped in a flood of humor and warmth and love and… desire and arousal.
Her skin prickled and her blood heated. She squeezed her thighs, trying to relieve the pressure the onslaught of emotions brought about in her. Kyel chuckled, and the sound wove through her. Her own emotions spiked and spiraled in a cyclone of yearning and need.
Juliran groaned. “Lucie, I’m not going to be in control of my actions if you don’t stop that!”
A gentle, cool hand rested on her arm, and she looked at Madlyn.
Madlyn’s gaze locked on her. “It had to be true, my dear. You are finally mate-synced to my boys.” She smiled and it was like the sun coming out from behind clouds. “I can hardly believe that something so monumental has happened. You are a true miracle, Lucie.”
Lucie’s cheeks heated, embarrassment and desire warring for place of attention.
“There now, I’ve embarrassed you. It need not be this way. We have all experienced those first few weeks of the bond. I am only happy to see that the first Quad has formed in ten years, and honored that it has been my sons and you, my dear Lucie.” Madlyn smiled and her gaze ran over Lucie’s skin. “However, might anyone explain to me what has happened to Lucie’s skin?”
With a scowl, Lucie stood on her tiptoes to peer into the mirror on the far wall. “Oh, my God! What’s happened?”
She blinked and shook her head, but it made no difference. Her skin was imbued with little blue and green glittering stars that caught the light whenever she moved. It was like her skin was the shiniest sequined material.
“I… I’m shining!” She looked to Zaen. He always had the answers, with that brain of his. “Zaen?”
Zaen’s lips fell open and his eyes grew wide. Her heart lurched at the panicked look on his face.
“I don’t know, my Lucie. I can only assume that something happened to you at a molecular level. When you bonded with us, you also bonded with the crystal’s energies. Because you are human, it has affected you differently than it would if you were from Negari.” His fingertips skimmed along her arm, his gaze roaming her skin. “It is beautiful, Lucie. Stunning, in fact.” His eyes were deep pools of emotion, when finally, he looked at her face. “You are special, Lucie. The crystal has bonded you in a way it has never bonded with any being before.”
“But, that’s not right,” Lucie said.
“How so, my mate?” Kyel asked.
She thought of Evelyn and the magenta gem that grew from the middle of her forehead. She thought of Riley’s golden eyes, whom she’d virtually met when they’d returned to the Erion Homeland. “Riley’s eyes glimmer with golden light and Evelyn has a magenta crystal in the middle of her forehead, and I’m… glowing blue. All the crystals have bonded with us separately. I’m not the only one.”
Zaen shook his head a little, planting his hands on his hips. “I never thought about that.” He shook his head, a smile playing on his lips. “It’s as amazing and our beautiful human mate.”
Several guards bolted into the room. Sweat gleamed on the guard’s skin. Another had splotches of blood over his uniform. Lucie’s blood ran cold. They snapped to attention when they saw their Lucie, the Princes, and their family. The guard that had entered first, stepped forward and spoke in a rushed voice. “The clouds have descended and are destroying our city,” he said. “We’re fighting it, but… it’s having no affect. Nothing is stopping them. We’re at its mercy.”
Chapter Nineteen
Zaen
Lucie was so frail, looking no more filled-out than a child in Juliran’s arms. He’d become so used to how she looked in the reality from the depths of her mind, that it was almost painful to see how she’d become.
If only he’d known she was being mentally tortured like she had been. He would have done everything in his power for her not to have suffered like that. The one consolation was that it wasn’t because of them. If she had, he didn’t think he could have ever bonded with her. Better to let her leave and find someone who could love her, even if they never would find anyone else for the rest of their lives.
“No. It can’t be!” Lucie wriggled from Juliran’s arms and bolted to the door.
“Lucie. You can’t go out there. It’s too dangerous,” Kyel said. Just like Kyel to want to protect her from the world, but this was Lucie and she wasn’t someone to keep anywhere she didn’t want to be.
She spun, the expression on her face desperate. With her skin gleaming with a million tiny lights of the Erion colors, she looked ethereal.
“I have to see it.” She held a fist over her heart. “I feel… I can’t explain… but please. I have to see.”
A deep frown formed on Kyel’s forehead as he strode towards Lucie. Zaen tensed and was about to tell his brother to let Lucie do as she wanted when he said, “We will escort you. Guards, front and back. Let Lucie guide us.”
The Guards stepped into formation in front of and behind his brothers. “Tann, send in guards for the kings and queen and my sister. Keep them safe here.”
“As you wish.” Tann barked into his comm.
“My sons!” Madlyn came over.
Kyel held his mother’s hands. “It will be fine, mother.”
“We will come with you. I will not let my sons fight on their own,” Emex said. The other kings murmured, agreeing.
No, please stay and protect Kira. We’ve met this thing before, but I can’t stop to explain. Remain safe here. Protect our mother and our sister and we will protect our mate and our city,” Kyel said.
“Spoken like a true Warrior Prince,” Nolan said, pride breaking through his concern.
Guards came into the room and secured the perimeter in well-trained formation.
Kira hugged her mates. “Stay safe.”
With a nod, Zaen hurried with his brothers and their mate from the medi-bay, surrounded by the best guards. As soon as he stepped out of the medi-bay, he knew something was wrong.
The overhead light flickered, strobing the corridor into darkness and back to brightness. The air was thick and stale, their footfalls falling with dead clicks in his ears. The guards shared a look, and two withdrew their swords, their bodies tense. That same tension washed through him and he noted his brothers as well.
Juliran’s gaze darted to and from Lucie, and Kyel’s jaw must have been creaking with the way it was locked tight. He held Lucie’s elbow, wanting to make sure she stayed upright. She was pale beneath her new, glittering skin and he had to remember the poor condition she was in before the crystal had put her in a coma.
The lights in the room flickered one last time before going out completely and plunging them into absolute darkness, except for the faint blue glow from the crystal Lucie still held. The glow brightened so much they could see to the end of the corridor.
“It’s as though it knew we needed light,” Juliran said.
“That’s strange. I just wished for more light and then it started to glow brighter,” Lucy said.
“There’s no time to wonder about it. We need to see what’s happening to our city,” Kyel said, striding ahead.
Zaen followed him through the twists and turns of the corridor until they came to a familiar door. Outside of that door was a balcony that would let them see over the whole city. Kyel drew a deep breath and threw the door open to reveal Armageddon.
>
Lucie gasped, bringing her shaking hand to cover her mouth. Zaen tucked her against his side, fighting with his protective urge to take her back inside and lock her into the deepest room with the thickest walls in the palace. The landscape was unrecognizable.
Black clouds shrouded the sky, blotting out the suns entirely. There was only darkness and shadows as far as he could see. The clouds had descended and slithered along the ground, creating trails of dark mist.
In the gardens below, guards fought the mist, slashing with the swords, but it did nothing but slice through thin air. A terrible, pain-filled scream rent the air that was abruptly cut off. A guard fell to the ground. His sword clattered out of his dead hand, his face contorted in a rictus of agony.
There was another agonized scream, and another, and guards below them fell to the ground dead, one after the other.
The mist covered their bodies, devouring them like acid until it thinned out, leaving no trace of the body. The mist seemed to become fuller, more solid. Stronger.
“It’s eating them to come alive. That’s what it’s doing. It’s eating people so that it can live.” Lucie stammered. Zaen’s thoughts exactly, reinforced through their linked minds.
Lucie tried desperately not to sob, but the small sound cut through his racing heart. The mist crept over trees and shrubs and everything else in its path, covering it all and hiding it away beneath its black, dense depths, leaving nothing but blackened earth and a few stumps after it passed.
The distant clouds began to descend, settling over rooftops. Faraway screams could be heard, echoing their agony over the charred and empty ground.
Above the tallest steeple in the distance, a face twisted from the clouds. Black, pitiless eyes formed within the billowing clouds and opened. A gaping mouth appeared, big and black and hollow, and descended over the city outskirts, bringing with it nothing but death and destruction.
“God. It’s… it’s not going to stop. It’s going to devour everything in its path. Everything on this planet will be destroyed,” Lucie said.
“But what can we do? It’s nothing but mist. Nothing can fight it,” Juliran said.
Kyel swore. Zaen had never seen him appear so lost.
Juliran couldn’t keep his eyes off Lucie. He looked at her as though he wanted her to be the last thing he would ever see.
Zaen’s gaze slid to his beloved also, regret taking place in his heart. The life he’d looked forward to since a child had been stolen away before it had even begun.
“We’ll still be together. In the afterlife. Now that we’ve bonded, we’ll have that. It cannot tear us apart,” Kyel said.
The screams of men merged with the screams of women and children. Kyel threw back his head and roared, giving voice to the same dread that coursed through Zaen’s veins. As though in agreement, the Erion crystal pulsed with light. The little tiny glittering stars in Lucie’s skin began to throb in time with the crystal.
Lucie sucked in a quick breath. Shock and clarity registered on her face before she pierced them with a sharp gaze. “We need to get the crystal back into the tower.”
“Lucie, we’re not going to put you into any danger,” Kyel said, turning towards her and cupping her cheeks within the span of his palms.
The expression on her beautiful face firmed. “If we don’t do anything, we’ll all be dead anyway.”
The guards shifted and darted a look between them, uneasy. He didn’t blame them. A sharp word from Tann had them square their shoulders and resume their position.
“How do you know, Lucie?” Juliran asked.
She frowned, her delicate brows pushing together. “It’s going to sound ridiculous…”
“Since when have recent events not been something none of us could ever have expected? And yet, I wouldn’t have changed it for anything,” Juliran said.
She offered him a relieved, nervous smile. “I think the crystal and I… well, something happened to join us. I can… almost hear it. Not like I can hear you guys now, in my head, which is weird enough, but it’s more…”
He wished he knew what she was describing. He was at a loss to understand what she meant.
Something pulsed in the middle of his chest, a tingling warmth that spread to his extremities. It vibrated with endless energy, and at the center of it, he felt an urgency to return to the tower. To be taken it where it could broadcast its energy and fill the land.
“I feel it!” He gasped, splaying a hand over his chest. Amazement and wonder raced through him. His gaze rushed over his brothers. His mate. His family. They were tied more than a normal mate bond. What they had was so much more. “You all should be able to feel it, too. Through Lucie. We need to get the crystal to the tower, and we need to get it there as fast as we can.”
“The tower is through the garden,” Juliran said, his voice flat. Zaen felt his concern for their safety, and fear for Lucie’s life washed against his own.
They peered below as the mist crept ever more towards them. The base of the palace was clear, and so was the path towards the tower, but it wouldn’t take long for the mist to cover that ground. Not with the number of people it was devouring.
There was no hesitation in Kyel’s words. His face was determined, steeled for the fight of their lives. “Then we need to move—now.”
Chapter Twenty
Kyel
Kyel took his mate’s hand and raced down the outside steps, along the side wall of the palace from the balcony to the ground. It wasn’t a place he wanted to be, not with those clouds cannibalizing everything in their path, but the cries and screams of his Homepeople were unbearable. He would not leave them to their fate without trying everything.
Until Lucie had spoken, he’d been out of ideas. If only he could stash her somewhere safe and save her from this trauma, he might breathe easier, but there was no time to dwell. Their sweet mate wouldn’t be happy hiding away. She might look fragile on the outside, but she was made from Negari steel on the inside, the toughest metal known to the galaxy.
She kept pace even though she was in poor physical condition. He would make it a point to see her health fully restored in the future.
Their future.
He would not let this thing take away the future he’d fought so hard for. He worked to stop the rush of anger, not wanting to distract anyone with his emotions. He’d never had to keep himself in check before. It was a new experience and something he welcomed.
“Turn left. Now!” Juliran pointed to a tendril of black mist that slithered along the ground.
Kyel wrapped his arm about Lucie’s waist and bolted away from the mist. His brothers and the guards followed the change of direction. Lucie clung to him as they dashed through another section of the garden. He kept his eyes trained on the ground, thinking that any of the shadows might be mist.
“Turn right,” Tann yelled.
Kyel scooped Lucy beneath her knees and shoulders and hugged her tight to his chest. They could run faster this way. She wrapped her arms about his neck and clung to him so tightly he felt her racing heart beating against her ribcage.
“Highness. In front!” one of the guards called.
Kyel skidded to a stop, pivoted to change direction, and came up short as mist gathered into a solid wall to his left. His right. In front. “It’s surrounded us.”
One the guards bumped into him. Kyel swung around to see the circle of mist tightening. They were trapped. He spun, looking for a way through. Looking for anything. The wall was tight and thick and intelligent, though. It knew what it was doing.
“Put me down, Kyel,” Lucie said.
He clutched her tighter. “No, mate. I will run and you will be safe.”
“Kyel. You need to put me down. Now.” Blue light glowed from the thousands of little crystal shards in her skin. She glowed so brightly, even her eyes shone with something other. “It’s telling me what to do. Trust me. Please.”
He forced his hands to loosen, fighting against his first and utmost in
stinct to protect her at all costs. She slid down his body and he reluctantly let her go once her feet had reached the ground.
She turned and held the crystal above her head. The crystal burst into life and a blue-green glow encircled them. Her skin glowed brighter than the crystal, until he had to shade his eyes just to look at her.
The light extended to the edge of the mist and continued to expand. The mist sizzled and recoiled. The more the light from the crystal expanded, the more of the mist was pushed back.
“Gods! She’s…” one of the guards whispered. There was a tremor in his voice.
“She’s saving us.” Kyel growled and spun to catch the guard with a withering stare, but the guard watched Lucie in awe, and his anger faded.
“The crystal light is eating the mist away. Look at it! No wonder it wants to get to the tower. The light from the crystal will eat the clouds away from our entire Homeland,” Zaen said.
An unearthly moan trembled around them. The moan became louder and turned into a high-pitched scream made from a thousand voices. Vibrations quivered the air. A slight breeze became a gale that whipped his hair and his clothing. Leaves and debris blasted against him, picked up by the wind and hurtled everywhere.
The darkness surrounding them grew darker still, the black outside of their little glowing circle absolute. A yawning mouth formed in the solid wall of clouds. Unblinking eyes the size of dinner plates stared down at them. The air turned so frigid that Kyel’s breath condensed.
The wind buffeted them, as hard as a fist. Lucie stumbled and the scream increased in pitch, scouring his skull from the inside.
He caught her and brought her up against his chest again, where she belonged. She was burning hot, almost too hot to touch, but she held the crystal high, her face a mask of concentration. Beads of perspiration pearled on her upper lip and forehead. A slight tremor worked through her body. The crystal was taking its toll.
“Kyel. Tower. Stay. Together,” Lucie panted, her face scrunched tight.
The Erion Triad: A Negari Sci-Fi Alien Abduction Reverse Harem Romance Page 15
