Exalted

by Ella James

  She locked eyes with the first woman she saw and said, “Nathan.”

  “Two tents down,” the woman answered in a Scottish accent. “And nice to see you, too.” She smiled a sad, sympathetic smile, reaching out to pat Julia's arm but pulling away before her fingers touched.

  “Quite an aura you have there.”

  Julia gaped, and the woman grabbed her hand and squeezed. “There's more than one o' us, you know. The energy inside you makes your colors positively brilliant. Blue-purple, more toward purple."

  Julia blinked, shocked into silence. She'd never known anything about her own aura, and hearing that it had a lot of purple made her absolutely ache for Meredith.

  Finally, she managed to choke out, “I didn't know that. Thank you.”

  It was all she could muster before she turned to go. Cayne was there beside her, clutching her hand as her mind crunched numbers. Twenty-five times twenty-four was… six-hundred. There had been more than 1,000 Chosen in Alexandria, down nearly half from the attack at the Virginia compound.

  She nearly tripped over her All-Stars as she rushed toward the door of the Nathan tent, desperate to see whether Drew and Car were among the living, but before she could make it through the flap, Cayne tugged her arm.

  Her head snapped up, and she whirled to face him. “What?”

  He drew her into the dusty space between the two tents and pulled her against his strong chest. “Breathe,” he murmured.

  She almost slapped him. “I don't want to breathe, I want to know if they're okay,” she hissed.

  He pressed his lips against her forehead. “Julia...calm down.”

  “Don't tell me what to do,” she seethed, and he looked calmly at her.

  Then he smiled, and his trick worked. She took a deep breath, then leaned into his arms. "This power…I think it makes me more high strung or something."

  His lips touched down below her eye, beside her nose, atop her hair. As his arms caressed her back, his voice rumbled near her ear. “We'll be okay, you and me. We'll find a way to make things right. And you know what we'll do after that?”

  “What?”

  “Live happily ever after.”

  Julia nodded, and he stroked her hair back from her sweating forehead. “Where'd you hear of happily ever after?”

  He smiled, lopsided. “We had fairy tales in my day, too, you know.”

  “Back in the stone age?”

  He pawed at her with his hands drawn to his chest, like a T-Rex, and Julia felt depressed that instead of laughing, she just thought about the day Nathan had tracked her to the museum.

  Cayne's smile quickly faded, and he squeezed her hand. “You ready to go in?”

  She nodded, and the world took on a faded, old film look as Cayne held the tent flap open and Julia stepped inside.

  She was still wearing the same dirty jeans and stained, size small shirt Mer had given her at the hostel in Scotland. She knew her filthy, hot pink All-Stars looked like they belonged in the hallway of a high school, and her long, dark hair was probably tangled beyond recognition. But as she looked around the tent, she held her head high.

  This was clearly the place to be. Nathan sat at the center of a long, rectangular table. His face was twisted in irritation and he was barking orders into a gray walkie-talkie. Julia sighed when she saw Drew and Carlin sitting to his left. Carlin was speaking into her own walkie-talkie, and Drew, beside her, was running a hand over his short hair, the way he sometimes did when he was tired.

  Julia's heart jerked up like a buoy in her chest as Carlin met her eyes. Carlin's face split into a huge smile, and Julia noticed her friend's lip was puffy. She glanced again at Drew and Nathan's faces: bloody, too.

  A quick glance around the rest of the tent revealed several bustling stations of what looked to be emergency operation. One table held flash-lights and small generators, another was piled high with clothes (all gray, of course). At a third, someone was arranging what had to be a thousand pairs of boots.

  Julia looked at her friends again, smiling until her eyes led her to the far end of their table. Partially obscured by a massive stack of beat-up-looking water jugs... At that end of the table, there were Authorities.

  Holy crap, what did that mean?!

  One of them had definitely been with Jacquie: Noelle, with the chocolate skin and the long dreads—the one who'd started out testy and told her he was a Guardian. A more careful look revealed that the green-eyed blond one was also there.

  All of a sudden a third rose to his feet, and Julia nearly passed out as she beheld a glorious creature with spiky mahogany hair, dancing brown eyes, and the sexiest lip ring she'd ever seen EVER. “Lille,”said a low voice in her head.

  “That's them,” she squeaked to Cayne, wondering how Jacquie had possibly managed to betray her again. Had she and Nathan been plotting something this entire time? That was crazy, wasn't it? But Jacquie's Authorities showing up here without summon had not been in the plan.

  Before Julia could think more about it, Drew and Car were coming at her.

  Carlin threw herself at Julia, nearly knocking her over and obliterating any sense of decorum Julia might have been trying to foster as she shrieked, “Juuuuuuuuulllliia!”

  Drew hugged Julia, then squeezed Cayne's hand, and Julia looked back at the Authorities, wondering what the h-e-double-l was going on.

  Nathan's gaze pulled hers. “Come sit down. We need to talk.”

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Burned one too many times, Julia wanted to back out the doorway. Nathan had betrayed her in the past; she didn't think she could trust him now. But when she glanced at Cayne, he seemed fine (if a little extra steely), and neither Carlin, clutching her arm, nor Drew, standing slightly in front of her, seemed to mind the newcomers.

  Still, her heart was hammering as she and her friends crossed the tent, aiming for the long table, passing small groups of Chosen busily working to organize salvaged supplies.

  Carlin quickly filled Julia in on what had happened to the pyramid—a Demon attack, though The Adversary hadn’t shown.

  “We lost so many, Julia. So many! And—” she choked up. “And...”

  Drew took Julia's arm, and suddenly they were all stopped, maybe ten feet from the table.

  “We couldn't get her out," he said softly. "We couldn't get to Meredith in time. The place was burning and—” He clenched his jaw, giving a small, apologetic shake of his head, and Julia felt like she'd been punched in the throat.

  “Shit.” She turned around, putting her back to Nathan's table, and took a few steps away from the group, breathing heavily to keep from pitching a big, huge, sobbing fit. She squeezed her eyes shut as her head ached, screaming as Methuselah's power reared its huge, glowy head; she could feel it in her veins, pulsing like it wanted to come out. She gritted her teeth.

  It wasn't fair! It wasn't fair that they'd lost Meredith! So pointless! All of it, so stupid!

  Julia swallowed really, really hard, aware that she was probably doing that low-level glow thing she couldn't seem to control. She could feel the eyes on her. See the auras, tinged with nervousness—everyone in the tent, and even the Authorities seemed nervous.

  Cayne was beside her, murmuring something, and as he draped an arm around her, there was that voice again.

  A smooth, powerful, haunting, lovely voice. “No worries, beautiful. We're here to help.”

  Julia jumped at the tingling sensation of having someone in her head. She tugged away from Cayne's grasp and whirled, her gaze stuck on Lille like a magnet. He was still seated at the table, this time with a lopsided smile. With his reddish-brown spikes, he looked like a punk rocker, not an Authority.

  His smile widened, and although Julia wanted to scream her confusion at the Authority situation, she blushed instead. She glanced around, wondering who all was watching her make an idiot of herself, and that's when she saw Drew—watching the Authority with moony eyes.

  Holy crabcakes.

  “Tell me
about it.”

  The look on the Authority Lille's face could only be described as...well, as hungry. Nathan was frowning at them, Noelle was biting into an apple, and Shea was walking around the room balancing what must have been the world's most obese three-year-old girl on her hip. The situation was so crazy, Julia actually giggled.

  “Was that a girlish giggle?” Drew teased. Behind his hand, he murmured, “He is a hottie.”

  Julia giggled again, and Cayne raised a baffled brow at her, and by the time they were standing in front of Nathan, she somehow wasn't even worried anymore. About anything. Which was fairly crazy. And fairly awesome.

  Nathan stood up, grumbling as the little girl swatted at his head, and Shea smiled. “Julia. I'm glad you made it back.”

  Julia jumped. Shea had spoken in her mind. "You can do the ESP thing too?"

  “I can't really. It's only because Lille is here, helping me. And because you're strong enough to hear me.”

  “COME HERE.”

  Julia blinked, surprised to find that Nathan had moved toward the back of the tent, and was now waving them toward some stairs she saw leading into the ground. There were two new Chosen with him: the Scottish woman from the first tent, and a balding man with sea blue eyes and a fresh burn mark on his left cheek.

  “I've never seen any group of Chosen take so long to get from point A to point B,” Nathan complained loudly as they made her way to him.

  Again, curious eyes were on her, and she wanted to smack Nathan for making her look like an errant child in front of a bunch of people she was supposed to save. Instead, she took her time, stopping to talk to a an older woman who was trying to organize a big box of batteries.

  When she did reach the hole in the floor, Nathan waved at the stairs. "You can go first."

  Julia shook her head. "If you think I'm going ahead of you, you're out of your mind."

  Nathan's eyes widened. "I don't understand." He glanced at the other Chosen, some of whom were still watching him.

  "We have trust issues, Nathan," Julia said. She pointed to the Authorities. "Why are they here?"

  “I can explain,” Nathan sighed. “Rayce, can you get us another tent? One right here? Just a small one?”

  The blond Authority blinked, and they were standing in a tent. He blinked again, and there was a table and chairs.

  They all took seats, and Nathan explained that Lille had “seen” the Demons attacking the pyramid shortly after Julia and Cayne left St. Moritz. He and the other two Authorities at the table had used some Authority trick to zoom to Egypt, managing to arrive in time to help fight the Demons off and get some of the Chosen to safety.

  "We decided to stay and help you plan," Rayce said.

  “Lille is a foreseer of possibilities,” Nathan continued, and Julia had what she knew was a childish urge to tell him duh. “He thinks The Adversary could amass enough power to pull the net completely over Heaven."

  Julia hesitated a second before answering, trying hard to remember everything Jacquie said and ask intelligent questions. "So we know for sure, he doesn't have complete control over it right now?"

  Lille shook his head. “The Adversary doesn't have the whole thing 'in his hands' because it never technically came down.”

  "It didn't?" Cayne asked. “Why didn't you tell us this before, in St. Moritz?"

  Rayce answered. "We weren't fully aware of the situation then."

  Julia felt a smidgen of hope. "How is that possible?"

  “Based on my understanding of what transpired, because of your friend Meredith."

  Julia almost choked when she heard Mer's name. “I-it is?” She noticed Nathan's face pale in time with the twisting of her stomach.

  Lille nodded, his lip-ring glinting. “If she hadn't stepped in when she did, The Adversary might have complete control."

  “I... I didn't know that,” Julia managed.

  Cayne put his hand on her knee, and she put her hand over his, and they stayed like that while Cayne told everyone what he knew about The Adversary, and everyone shared every thought they had. They were in the tent almost three hours before emerging with a plan.

  ***

  “So I might get my own wings?” Julia asked Lille.

  They were seated in the newly erected food tent, eating pre-packaged Army meals that apparently had been magicked out of the pyramid by the little girl Shea had been holding earlier.

  Lille, drinking iced coffee in the seat across from Julia, shrugged.

  “I don't know. You might. We've never done anything like this before. I don't know that I'd have had the idea.” He arched an appreciative brow at Cayne.

  “You are one of a kind,” Carlin said, nudging Julia's elbow.

  “For now, I want you to try not to think about it. If we decide it’s the right course, we'll talk more then. Remember, the choice is always yours,” Lille said. “You do offer a significant advantage, having so much pure Celestial energy, but it won't pan out that way if you don't really want to do it.”

  “But I do,” Julia said firmly. Among other reasons, she wanted to do it for Meredith.

  “That's good to know,” Lille said.

  He met Cayne's eyes, and Julia could see they were already thinking about their espionage mission. Another of Cayne's ideas, and one Julia wasn't especially fond of. They planned to combine Lille's unique foresight with Cayne's ability to (hopefully) use the remnant of his link with The Adversary to discern The Adversary's location and his plans.

  First, though, they had to get back to the States.

  “I'm still not convinced you guys can pull this off,” Drew said, skeptical as usual. He cast a worried glance at Julia.

  “Drew, this is a meeting of minds,” Lille said. “I promise you, Cayne and I both have Julia's best interest at heart.”

  Drew opened his mouth to protest, and Lille's beautiful arm stretched out; he clasped Drew's hand, pulling him up from the table, then waving out in front of Drew's eyes. Julia knew he was drawing a diagram 'in the air' for Drew to see. He'd done it earlier for her.

  Drew's shoulder bumped Lille's, and Carlin giggled behind her hand. “Ooh la, la!”

  “That would be a seriously cute pairing,” Julia murmured.

  The blond one, on Carlin's other side, shook his head. “For an Authority and a...anyone but a fellow Authority... The other person would have to be a resident of Heaven.”

  Julia blinked. In that case, Drew could continue being super and single.

  When the pair turned back around, Julia turned to Cayne, as if they'd never been gossiping about Drew's love life. “I'm not sure about the you part,” she said. “That still makes me too nervous.”

  Lille's eyes narrowed. "Do you want to go over the whole thing again?"

  “No. I want to see a set future where Cayne doesn't get hurt.”

  “A set future.” Lille smirked, and Drew blushed again. “That doesn't exist, but if it did, I would want to see it, too. As it is, I think we have at least a reasonable shot at success.”

  “Very reasonable,” Cayne said, toying with a strand of her tangled hair.

  “I believe you,” Drew said, “if I must.”

  “You must. And that's good, because It's about time to catch our plane.”

  Julia sighed. The first step in their plan.

  Carlin and Drew and the other Chosen were flying on chartered jets bound for Atlanta, where Julia and Cayne (who were flying via Cayne) would meet them. Cayne's Nephilim friend Andre was going to help them out by scouting out the situation on the ground. He would leave a note at a spot only Cayne would know, letting them know if Atlanta was safe or if they needed to travel to one of two other spots: Birmingham or Nashville. He would then alert an Authority of the same.

  As soon as everyone met up and got settled in a safe hotel, Lille and Cayne would fly to California to stake out The Adversary's setup and gain insight into his behavior. The day after that, they'd all meet in Napa Valley, at a retreat center Cayne's friend Andre had "
borrowed".

  And all meant all. Every remaining Chosen would be making the trip. They wanted to avenge their friends and family. Even though the Julia-Cayne plan was a big, fat secret, all the Chosen had agreed to come.

  The most common reason: “If we don't, we'll all die anyway.”

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Flying over South America was scary. Cities were burning. At least, they looked like cities. From high up in the air, it was just bare-looking land or forest, but most of what was burning seemed to feature large chunks of asphalt and cement. Julia regretted not paying more attention in geography lessons, because she couldn't quite be sure which country was which, and she kind of wanted to know. She felt the urge to keep a record.

  Her immediate problem with mass unrest: Julia had nowhere to stop for a potty break. The last time Cayne had landed, on a rural island in the South Pacific, Julia had nearly gotten attacked by a big, brown bird with a freakisly large beak. She waited until what looked like Florida; the skies were stormy, with lightning that made her shake, and being panicked like that made her have to go more. When she and Cayne were both drenched to the bone, she squeezed his arm and pointed ungracefully to her crotch.

  “NOW,” she mouthed, because there was no way he could hear her over the storm.

  Cayne nodded, and a violent burst of wind tossed them a few feet up. Julia shut her eyes and chanted poetry. For some reason, she found it calming, and she reminded herself that she had some of Methuselah's power. Sure, no one knew exactly how much, but hopefully enough to pad a ten thousand-foot fall.

  Eep. Best not think of exact numbers.

  Cayne stroked her cheek, and she instantly felt at least five percent better.

  “I'll stop soon,” he shouted. He said something else she couldn't hear, and she tried to decide if she'd rather be eaten by an alligator or killed in a city. As it turned out, Cayne picked a state park, and the sobbing park ranger in the bathroom didn't do anything but cry while Julia raced in and out of a stall.