“Christ, Roo.” Cash’s hand locked onto the back of my neck. “When you look at me like that.”
He crushed his lips to mine and his tongue pushed passed my teeth, delving inside with a possessive intensity. Hot mess melted inside me and I moaned. Tongues tangled, tasted, danced. His powerful essence rushed into me, fanning my kindling desire and it was almost too much. Too hot. Too raw. But knowing I could undo him with a look ignited me further and suddenly, I couldn’t get enough of him. I kissed him back, without hesitation, because I missed him so much.
Even if he had changed since I’d last seen him, in that moment I didn’t care. He didn’t either. In our desperate passion, we knocked into tables, sending medical instruments flying. I needed to know he was still my Cash, despite the ash.
The ash.
“Wait.” I pulled back. He frowned, irritated, wanting more from me. It gave me the fuel to push his hard body away. “Cash, we need to talk.”
He stared at my mouth with single-minded determination and damned if my body didn’t ache for him to ignore my words, but I stepped back. I turned around and placed my palms on the cold steel bench next to the examination chair. The icy temperature anchored me.
A warm touch on the back of my neck as Cash brushed my long hair aside. The hard length of his body pushed up against me, insistent, pushing me into the bench. Hot breath hit my neck.
“Talk,” he rasped and kissed the skin beneath my ear.
A tremble tore through me and my eyes fluttered closed. Damn it.
“Stop. Jed is outside.”
“I’ll shut the gate.”
“He can see through the bars.”
“Lets go to our room.”
Our room. My heart squeezed. I’d have no resolve there.
Cash’s hands slid around to my front, tickling my stomach underneath my clothes. His fingers searched until he found the top of my jeans.
“Shit.” I grasped his wrists before he went any lower.
“I want you now,” he urged.
“How did you move so fast?” I asked. “Before. You moved from behind me to Malcolm in the blink of an eye.”
My words were an ice bucket thrown on us. He pulled back, and I spun to face him.
His broad chest heaved on a deep breath. “It’s who I’ve always been. Now that I’m Seraphim, my abilities are completely restored, amplified even. I’ve lived thrice over while everyone else has lived once. The universe must have liked my contribution to the world because I’m evolved.”
“And the light saber thingy?”
“What’s a light saber?”
“Oh yeah, you hate pop culture. I meant the flaming sword.” He’d had a sword of blue fire that appeared out of nowhere to obliterate Malcolm. In mythology, the Archangel Michael used a flaming sword. Marc told us the myth originated from Cash’s ancient exploits as the queen’s enforcer. He was the avenging angel who, on God’s word, cast the sinners out of paradise. Except, in reality it was another version of me who ordered him to kill all the people, and block them from returning to the Empire via the star-gate.
Cash shrugged. “It’s just a focused extension of my aura. It has the power to obliterate both body and soul if I choose.”
“But why did you have to kill him? Couldn’t you have resolved it some other way? Aren’t there procedures for this sort of thing?”
“I didn’t kill him. I could’ve, but I didn’t. I ended his Game. There’s a difference.”
“Can you use that sword on anyone?”
Understanding cleared his eyes. He knew where I was going with this.
“I’m not some half-cocked green teenager, Roo. I know what I’m doing.”
Unease unfurled in my gut. He could kill someone with that thing, not just end their Game, but their forever soul. With his temper, his reactions… I looked away because an even darker thought occurred to me. Cash had done this before. Jed’s lack of reaction proved it. I’d been kept in the dark deliberately.
I didn’t get a chance to explore this revelation with Cash because Jed poked his head around the wall of the exit to say, “The Tribunal wants you for the meeting.”
Cash scrubbed a hand over his short hair. “How long?”
“Five minutes.”
Chapter 3
I didn’t feel very intimate after I found out Cash’s true nature had been hidden from me. In fact, I tried desperately to not feel much at all, but my swirling cocktail of emotions was too hard to ignore. Betrayal, confusion, guilt—all threatened to undo me and I had no time for that. Not again. Jed had interrupted us with a message: the Tribunal wanted to meet.
As we walked through the cold castle, I squeezed my eyes shut and blocked my feelings out. If I let one emotion slip through, the entire flood would drive in, so I forced a deep, calming breath and focused on my steps.
Step—empty. Step—empty. Step—empty. Don’t think of Cash. Don’t think of his change. He’s the same Cash, and you’re the same Roo. But the vision of him standing over Malcolm’s ashes kept flashing before my eyes.
Step—empty. Step—empty. Step—empty.
This is good. I am in control.
A sideways glance at Cash caused me to stumble. Instantly, his hand shot out to steady me. “You okay?”
Warmth bloomed in my chest.
I smiled and his lips lifted on one side, wary but happy.
I was overreacting. Totally.
We went up the maroon carpeted steps, past a few living quarters and on to a large assembly room where there were fourteen seats at the large round oak table. Ten were occupied by Watchers—Seraphim banished to live out their lives on this planet. The buzz of electricity humming from their virulent auras was loud enough that I wanted to cover my ears. I stared at the jugs of water and empty glasses while I acclimatized myself to their power.
Fourteen spaces, I mused. Perhaps two representatives from every continental Ludus were meant to be there. That would make sense.
I recognized a handful of faces, Jacine the Goddess of Love, among them. Marc was conspicuously absent, but he often was at these things. Being God of the In-Between, he often got distracted by space and time and had zero punctuality. He’d also told me once that the in-between could warp your sense of time, or perhaps it was that you could get lost there… I hoped he turned up soon. Another friendly face would be welcome.
Lena, the blind healer from Corvus House was here. Her head titled my way upon my entry. She could sense people’s emotions and obviously I wasn’t concealing mine as I thought.
Wren and Lincoln were also here, sitting together on one side. My brother’s blond scruffy hair had been trimmed to look neater, but his shirt was still recalcitrantly inside out. Wren also had short-cropped blond hair and big blue eyes. They were Players and not officially Tribunal, but since both their Houses, Urser and Cetus, were among the traitors, we needed representatives we could trust. Lincoln was what we classed “a defective download”. Despite his body being covered by an enormous star-map, he had no supernatural abilities apart from being a world-class party boy. He seemed tamer when Wren was around, though, and since Urser’s attempt to convert him to darkling, he had no love for our father of the flesh. I liked to think our friendship had brought him from the dark side, but when I saw the way he looked at Wren, I was sure I had nothing to do with it.
For the record, Wren looked at him the same way, shyly and from underneath her lashes. In fact, they could be holding hands under the table. Their auras harmoniously touched—wisps and frequencies melded together.
Her powers let her commune with animals and, after this meeting, she was taking Lincoln to Africa to rescue endangered animals from human poachers. He said he wanted to see a Safari, but I knew otherwise. He would follow her anywhere. Seeing them both together made me smile.
To one side of the table sat a pair of men I could only assume were from Eridanus House because they were Ken Dolls, the pair of them. Tanned skin, plastic blond hair with shots of silver at t
he temples, blue sparkling eyes and Hollywood teeth. One wore a blue suit that reminded me of a rigid Navy Captain. The second wore a white, linen shirt that opened at the neck to display the dip in his collarbone and perfect male chest. The barely restrained sneer-turned-smile they sent me pulled their skin taut as though they’d had Botox. Shiny expressionless and frozen faces. I couldn’t tell if it was from plastic surgery, or if their timeless features were a symptom of their particular Seraphim origins. Cash and I were apparently from the Orion Constellation. But Eridanus would be a separate constellation all-together and perhaps many light-years further away. It was all part of the Empire and, as far as I knew, every native from those planets was humanoid, but these two… there was something otherworldly about them. Angry dolls come to life.
Cash cleared his throat and pulled out a seat for me. “After you.”
I smiled sheepishly and sat down. I’d been staring.
A glance at my engagement ring had me twisting the band around my finger with the thumb of the same hand. Cash and I hadn’t spoken about it much since he asked me to marry him at the Libertine Ball. Obviously, we’d been busy. I hoped that was all there was too it. On the other hand, plans for Kitty and Alvin’s Margaret River wedding was in full swing. My friends were knee-deep in preparations. Kitty called me nightly to discuss color themes, venues, flowers and decorations—you named it, we discussed it. Her wedding was only a month away. She was my best friend, but she didn’t know about my engagement, or my true identity. She just thought I had witch-like abilities and could dye her hair blue and green without a trip to the salon. I don’t know why I didn’t tell her about my engagement.
“Thank you all for coming,” Jacine said, standing up. Her pink, cotton candy hairstyle didn’t move, stuck permanently in a bob position. She wore her usual white sheath dress that hugged her curves. In mythology, she had been known as the Goddess of Love and Fertility. Marc told me she got carried away creating a cult in Roman times and had to be confined to the underground London Ludus. But she didn’t let her failure beat her. She used her time to progress to Operations Manager. She was every little girl’s role model. Slick, demure, confident. Everything I wasn’t. She stared at everyone at the table until all speech halted and eyes were on her. “I know there’s a lot happening within each of your Ludus territories and I thank you all for convening here. You’ve been busy with your disaster recovery efforts, but as you know, the Empire’s Enforcer has returned and in a timely manner too. We’re in dire need of a war council, and military direction. Mr. Samson, you called. We’re here. What can we do?” Jacine nodded to Cash and sat down.
Cash called the meeting? That was news to me. Jed had made it sound as though it was the Tribunal who called. I supposed I shouldn’t be surprised, Cash had not only been the Queen’s Enforcer, but he’d also been a respected military leader, reincarnated many times over.
Cash cleared his throat. “It’s been two weeks since the attack on Luduses around the world. Urser will unleash more chaos if we don’t stop him. So far it’s only been Nephilim and Seraphim souls in the crossfire, but I know for a fact he tested his serum on humans. He’s harvested most of your Nephilim stock and has left your Houses depleted. Since we’re in a”—he glanced at me—“sticky situation, we can’t return him to the Empire and seek formal aid. We must remain on this planet for the foreseeable future. Thankfully, humans currently believe the acts to be terrorism or witch—related, and our secret remains safe.”
“Would it be so bad?” Grumbled another man. When a series of shocked faces looked his way, he added, “Not the chaos part, the secret revealed part.”
His skin was dark brown. Youthful in appearance but ancient in the wisdom shining behind his gray eyes. From his accent, perhaps he was from the Afrikaan Ludus. There was nothing left of it now.
When Marc and I had teleported to each Ludus, the Afrikaan Ludus had been hit the worst. The pyramid above it was ancient and dense. It crumbled to the ground and beyond. So many died. Mainly Seraphim and Nephilim, but there were a few human casualties. The death toll was enormous. The Players who weren’t killed were converted to darklings. We couldn’t end their Game because the dark poison anchored their souls to their bodies in such a way that if we killed the host, the soul went with it. A true death. It was as though Urser played to our sense of preservation. He knew if we killed them permanently, their interplanetary homes would blame us for their loss just as much as Urser. Most Players were diplomats and people in high places. There would be an intergalactic war.
So far, those missing darklings hadn’t resurfaced, which meant Urser was saving them for something. Since the mass infection and destruction of Luduses, we’d been wracking our brains to think of a possible plan. We knew Urser couldn’t coerce Marc to transport the darklings to the Empire because their souls were tethered to their bodies. They’re atoms would entangle and they’d die. Also, the star-gate that originally brought all Seraphim to this planet was broken, so Urser can’t use that to bring darklings to the Empire that way. So, unless Urser planned on using them to control this planet, I had no idea what he wanted with them. It was the calm before the storm.
“Your Majesty?” A male voice broke through my thoughts.
“I’m sorry, what?” I asked, glancing around the table searching for who spoke. It was the Afrikaan Watcher who returned my puzzled look. Maybe it wasn’t him, but someone had asked me something and I had no idea who. I kept my brave face on, but inside I was sinking in shame. Real un-queenly of me to zone out during an official meeting. To cover for it, I said, “Would you mind introducing yourself before you speak? I’m afraid I still don’t know many of you.”
Mr. Ego-Anus—the name I’d decided to call the youngest of the plastic Ken dolls—rolled his eyes and sighed dramatically.
“You can start.” I pointed at him. “What’s your name?”
To my pleasure, Cash placed a firm hand on my shoulder in a show of solidarity.
Ego-Anus narrowed his eyes briefly but his companion, Sir Captain Eridanus answered for him. I named him Captain because of his navy like attire. He seemed the oldest of the plastic pair. “Please forgive us, Your Majesty, we are only fresh in from Iceland where we were staying at the time of the attack. My name is Cato and my son here is Thurstan.”
“Nice to meet you, Cato and Thurstan.” I shifted my gaze to the Afrikaan Watcher.
“My name is Zebedee, Your Majesty. I am from Draco House of the Afrikaan Ludus.”
Afrikaan Ludus, but Draco? I hadn’t heard of that House yet.
“We have few left in our House after it was slaughtered by Urser.”
“I’m sorry for your loss, Zebedee,” I said. “How many Nephilim and Seraphim were taken?”
“Forty-one were infected. Sixteen were Nephilim children, twenty-five were Players who had their Game ended.” He looked around the room. “Additionally we still have three Draco Seraphim unaccounted for. It is unclear whether they had a hand in the betrayal or were taken themselves.”
“From the intel we have, I don’t believe there are any Seraphim infected with the serum,” Cash said from behind me. “Only Nephilim and the occasional human.”
Any Seraphim missing must be a traitor or a prisoner. I studied my hands, thinking back to something Zebedee said. “Nephilim Players know their souls will return to the Empire, but did the children have a clue?” What I wanted to say was, did the children know they were being murdered, or was this shock tempered with the knowledge that they weren’t really dying, but going to a better place?
“Nephilim are not educated about the truth of their Player status until they reach adulthood. They all thought they were human. Oh, and that figure I gave you about losses was just for our House. If you want a report on the full extent of Afrikaan casualties, I’m afraid I can’t give it to you.”
Cash glanced down at me. “Do you want to know?”
“Yes,” I said quietly.
“It was in the hundreds,” he replied
.
I slumped in my chair. There were no words. Anger replaced despair as I dwelled on Seraphim betraying their own kind and I kept thinking of how I would have felt if, as a young child, I was suddenly thrust into the world of the gods, watching others of my kind turned into monsters. I refused to let my train of thought touch on the possibility that they were infected too. How could any decent person willingly gift wrap Players for darkling conversion when they knew they were killing their forever souls?
“This is why I believe we should go public,” Zebedee said, interrupting my thoughts. “We expose Urser, we blame him for the catastrophes, and get the human population on our side before he manages to do it first. We can use human resources to flush him out and capture him. The sooner we squash his rebellion, the sooner we go home.”
“And unleash chaos? That’s the worst suggestion I’ve heard all year,” Cato rumbled. His son snorted in approval.
“You would use humans as pawns to clean up our mess?” Another nameless Seraphim rumbled from his table seat. I was about to ask for an introduction, when Zebedee snapped, “And what do you suggest? Give them all a makeover?”
I let them bicker amongst themselves and glanced at Cash who frowned at the Watchers. Feeling lost, I looked for Marc.
“Excuse me, but has anyone heard from Marc?” I asked, interrupting.
Jacine shifted in her seat as did a few others. It was Lena who finally spoke. “He’s taken the last load of souls in Purgatory back to the Empire where he is gaining insight on how to further proceed here.”
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