Protector of the Flame

by Isis Rushdan

Caelius’s eyes burned with anger. “You’ve heard the depraved filth spewing from her corrupted mouth since you got here. Why would you encourage her by giving her smut?”

  “It isn’t smut. It’s literature. She’s confused by the feelings she’s having. You could try to be more sympathetic.”

  “When I try to be sympathetic, she preys on my emotions and turns into a…” He stopped and took a breath. “Don’t give her any more literature,” he spat. Then he looked at Cyrus. “Working in the fields used to help. It tired my body and mind. Now, I’m in the orchard and it’s not enough.” He shook his head. “When you’ve finished your meal, I could use your counsel.”

  “Of course,” Cyrus said.

  “You can find me in the garden when you’re done.” He grabbed his dishes and stormed away.

  Nakia slumped over, elbows on the table and rested her chin on her fists. “Cyrus, if you and Serenity were in our position, would you wait to take her to your bed?”

  Cyrus went rigid as one of the stone pillars. “I’d like to think I’d have the same discipline and self-control as Caelius.”

  “Yes, he’d wait,” Serenity said. “He even made me wait when we met last year.”

  Nakia’s jaw dropped. “You males are such strange beasts.”

  “Cyrus, since you’ll be occupied with Caelius, may Serenity and I play chess?” Adriel asked, eyes cast to the table. His normally bright flame was dim, his weary face thinner than usual and he hadn’t touched his food.

  Cyrus took a sip from his cup. “One or two games, and then she’s all mine.”

  “Thank you, brother. You’re most kind.”

  “Will you join them Nakia?” Cyrus asked.

  “Neith forbade me to spend long intervals of time with Serenity because the baby messes up everyone’s powers.”

  Talus plopped down at the table along with five other sentinels and unstrapped their swords. She threw food onto her plate and her chest heaved.

  “I’m sure Talus would love to join you two after dinner,” Cyrus said, seemingly determined she wouldn’t spend time alone with Adriel.

  “Of course I would,” Talus purred with sarcasm. “That’s why I exist. To serve everyone else while I’m not allowed to have a life.”

  “What’s this about?” Cyrus asked.

  She bit her trembling bottom lip and shook her head.

  Serenity rubbed his leg. “Caelius is waiting, you should go find him. I’ll speak to Talus.”

  After searching her eyes, he kissed her and left the table.

  “I’ll go get the game and meet you in the lounge,” Adriel said, not bothering to finish his food.

  “I know why you’re upset.” Serenity scooted down the table and put her hand on Talus’s arm. “We could all die tomorrow if any of us makes a mistake. You’re a warrior. You can’t afford to be distracted. If we live through this, I’ll do whatever I can to make sure you have a life of your own. And I’ll speak to Cyrus so that no one stands between you and what your heart wants.”

  It might have been too big a promise, but no one had the right to stand in the way of her having a relationship with Micah.

  Talus leaned across the table and hugged her. “Thank you, sister.”

  Adriel waited in the lounge with the chessboard set. Other than a couple talking quietly in a corner, the lounge was empty. With everyone on edge, carefree evenings of enjoying a breeze and relaxing in the lounge were done.

  Sitting across from him, she met his penetrating gaze. They only had a minute or two before Talus finished her meal and joined them.

  “Did you go back and read it?” he asked.

  “No.”

  “Then why are you avoiding me?”

  She looked down at the board. “Why don’t you want me to know what’s in the book?” Bellona had only set the stage for Florian’s sins.

  “If you know, you’ll hate me.”

  The words bit her heart. “Death is coming. Do you feel it?” He moved to the edge of his seat.

  She nodded.

  “I don’t want that book to taint your image of me if I fall. I did something unspeakable in my past life, but I’m not that person. I want you to judge me on what I do in this life. I want you to remember me as you know me now. Can you understand?”

  Oddly enough, she did. She couldn’t tell him she knew the truth of their past lives. “Yes.”

  “Then stop punishing me by avoiding me, by distrusting me.” Pain seeped through his fractured voice. “I can’t take much more. Can’t you see what it’s doing to me?”

  “I’ve only been punishing myself.”

  The baby shifted, pressing down on some organ, causing her to rub her back to alleviate the pain. The days of popcorn going off in her stomach were over. Strong kicks against her slightly rounded and firm belly made her shirt shift from the movement.

  Talus sat beside Serenity. She looked down at her stomach and raised her eyebrows.

  “The baby’s kicking,” Serenity explained as it looked like someone poked her shirt from the inside. She wondered if humans experienced the same degree of discomfort.

  “Your top hangs so loosely it’s hard to tell you’re pregnant. Can I feel?”

  She nodded and Talus caressed her stomach. Longing to do the same ran deep in Adriel’s eyes.

  “Do you want to feel?”

  In reflex, he glanced out at the garden, looking for Cyrus, and then slid down on the other side of her. He put his hands at the base of her belly.

  Serenity took one of his hands and repositioned it to where the baby moved. At a strong kick or punch that stole her breath, he smiled.

  Sothis crossed the lounge, sword strapped to her back, headed to start patrol.

  “Mom, Sothis,” she corrected.

  Her mother walked over. The couple on the other side crossed her path as they left the lounge. “Yes.”

  “The baby is always moving or kicking.” She shifted in her seat. Adriel returned to the sofa and Talus removed her hands. “I can’t get comfortable at night.”

  “Get extra pillows. Try sleeping on your side and putting a couple between your legs.” Sothis turned to walk away.

  “How far along were you when you had me?”

  “You were late. You didn’t want to come out. I was about to hit my fiftieth week when my water broke.”

  “What about when Aurora had you?”

  Sothis sighed, looking impatient. “I came on time as most do.” She stepped closer. “You’re still very small.” She reached out and touched Serenity’s stomach. The baby kicked and her mother’s hand recoiled as if she’d been stung.

  “I feel like a whale.” She missed the days of quick, effortless movement, now hampered by slow, clumsy steps.

  “You look beautiful,” Adriel said.

  Sothis glanced at him, and then at her. “You’re much smaller than I’d expect for five months, but you still have six more months to go.”

  Serenity shifted in her seat, trying to get comfortable. Adriel pulled a couple of cushions from a nearby sofa. She stood and he placed one in her seat and the other against the back of the sofa. His fingers grazed her shoulder as she sat back down.

  With eyes that missed nothing, Sothis watched their interaction. Then her mother’s gaze darted away.

  “How long were you in labor?” One female had remarked the ordeal, as she had put it, could take days.

  “Quiet.” Sothis looked around as if in search of something that she wasn’t quite sure was there. Deep lines creased her brow and she shut her eyes. For the longest minute, she stood so still the unease radiating from her was palpable.

  Serenity scanned their surroundings. Everything appeared the same as always, cloudless blue skies, warm gentle breeze blowing, stately garden fragrant as ever, but a shiver raked her skin, raising goose bumps.

  Some unknown question had been answered and Sothis unsheathed her double-bladed sword. She crept around the room, shifting her gaze from the ceiling to the walls.


  A chill licked Serenity’s heart. “What’s wrong?”

  Her mother zeroed in on an open air outlet on the opposite side of the room facing the garden. “I sense the vibrations of my collective.”

  That could only mean one thing.

  Paladins were on the island.

  Chapter Forty-Five

  Serenity loaded her crossbow with a diamond-tipped explosive bolt. It could bring down any Kindred. All she needed was a clean shot.

  Talus drew her sword, but Sothis held up a hand, warning her to stop. “Go sound the alarm.”

  In a flash, Talus disappeared.

  Adriel stood and turned to focus on the same point near the other end of the room in the garden.

  The wind blew, rustling bushes across the lawn to the west side of the lounge. Everyone watched, waiting for something to emerge.

  Serenity reached out with electric tentacles of her stream, brushing past Adriel’s dim current to see if she could detect anything unfamiliar with this seventh sense. Beyond the lounge in the garden, nothing stirred. She stretched farther, unhampered by ordinary Kindred constraints, and canvassed the area until an ache coiled in her body as she hit her limit.

  Power rippled in the air, a tight hum of vibration. The scintillating undulations of a force she didn’t recognize drew closer like a storm about to break.

  A foreign energy stream nipped at the tentacles of her outstretched pool, forcing her to withdraw. She shook off the sting and searched again. She had to strain this time, but it was still there, just out of reach.

  Even with every recalled record-keeper swelling their ranks to six hundred, Neith’s collective had merely percolated as separate rivulets of shared energy.

  This was different.

  The stream that had barely brushed her extended probes was…well it wasn’t a stream at all or even a pool. It was an ocean pulsating like one massive heartbeat. Immense power pounded through the electric current. She’d never experienced anything so alluring and terrifying. There was no way to distinguish how many there might’ve been, only that they throbbed as one ferocious fist.

  And it had felt as if it was coming from everywhere.

  A man dressed in black, long golden ponytail swinging behind him, sauntered into the south side of the lounge from the garden. Silent and deadly, he never even made a sound.

  Sothis spun in lightning quickness. He drew two swords from vertical scabbards strapped to his back and blocked her. Their movements, faster than anything she’d seen, flowed with artistic grace. Fiery sparks came from every clash of their swords as they parried.

  Serenity stood, taking aim.

  The slightest miscalculation and she would hit her mother. She sucked in a long breath, tracking each blow and block. The startling dance of swords increased tempo until there was a blur of gleaming silver.

  She exhaled slowly, keeping her arm steady, holding her position, waiting for an opportunity. In a fluid rotating maneuver, Sothis drove the male backward, putting just enough distance between them for a shot.

  A tingle twisted in her spine. A whisper of that incredible power stroked her stream.

  “Hello, cherub.”

  Every fiber in her chest wrenched tight at the familiar male voice.

  As she swiveled to her right, Archimedes knocked the crossbow from her grasp and tossed something white at her. She caught a dead pigeon with a broken neck; its cold head flopped against her hand.

  She dropped the stiff bird and faced her Paladin uncle.

  He was just as she remembered, sly eyes and rich brown hair plaited in a long braid. An obsidian blade at her throat glinted in his hand. She eyed the crossbow on the floor. Archimedes pressed the blade to a throbbing vein and shook his head, killing the idea.

  Adriel turned, making a motion toward them, but Archimedes tsked at him as if he was a dog and gestured for him to sit. Adriel stepped back and took his seat. “Sothis,” said Archimedes, sweet as sunshine, “we come in peace, put your sword away.”

  Her mother didn’t hesitate or look in her direction. “You never go anywhere in peace.”

  Arms twirled with razor-sharp precision. The fair-headed man deflected each deadly blow from Sothis, seizing any chance to advance.

  Archimedes stepped closer, angling the tip of the blade against Serenity’s pulse, and kissed her cheek. “Sothis, stand down.”

  “You have a knife to my daughter’s throat and you tell me to stand down, you bastard.”

  Archimedes sighed. “Stand down, my pet, and so shall I. I haven’t come with war in my heart today, although I always have a thirst for blood to flow.” He pressed his lips to Serenity’s ear. “For you, cherub, there may be hope. For your kabashem, there is none.”

  Without Cyrus, there was nothing. No hope, no happiness, no future. Without him, there was only darkness.

  Sothis continued to fight the golden-haired man, both of them spinning, barenpetium clanking and glinting in the light. One of the man’s swords clattered to the floor.

  “Rayhan,” Archimedes bellowed. His eyes left her for a second, knife dipping. “Enough!”

  The man with hair the color of sunlight floated backwards on his toes. Kneeling, he sheathed his remaining sword and raised cupped fists before his bowed head. Sothis swung, bringing her sword to his neck, stopping short of cutting off his head.

  Serenity flicked her wrist, ejecting the concealed blade and shoved it into Archimedes’s throat. A gurgle left his smiling lips, blood trickled down his neck.

  “No!” Sothis ran to Archimedes.

  Serenity twisted the blade, severing an artery, and yanked it out. A spray of blood splattered across her neck and chest.

  Sothis caught him before he hit the floor and pressed a hand to his wound. “What have you done?”

  “He threatened to kill me.” To threaten Cyrus was to threaten her. “If he wanted you dead, you would be.” Sothis turned to Adriel. “Heal him.”

  Adriel looked to Serenity, but she couldn’t agree to help him.

  “We need him alive. He cannot die. Not at her hand.”

  “Only Archimedes had the message meant for you,” Rayhan said to Sothis. He retrieved his other sword, the movement sharp and quick like his whole body was a finely honed weapon.

  Serenity picked up her crossbow, gaze glued to the fair-haired Paladin.

  “Heal him. Now!”

  Adriel dropped to his knees and clamped the wound. Sothis dragged Serenity several feet away, giving plenty of room for his healing powers to work.

  Palms glowed bright white. The rush of blood stopped flowing. The wound mended. Adriel wiped his bloody hands on his pants and stepped away.

  Archimedes gave a bright smile, as if the near death incident had only entertained him, and rose smoothly to his feet. “Guess my thirst for blood has been temporarily quenched.”

  Three sentinels rushed in followed by Nakia.

  “Did you see them coming?” Sothis asked the young girl.

  “No.”

  Sothis stared at both of the Paladins, chest heaving.

  “We’re under strict orders not to engage. Arcturus says although you are a wicked minx, hell-bent on breaking our hearts for a second time, he will uphold the blood vow made to the cherub, keeping it sacred,” Archimedes said.

  Her mother maintained a defensive hold on her sword. “Why are you here?”

  “To track, surveil and guide.” Rayhan crept closer to Serenity.

  “Scouts?” Sothis asked. “When did we lower ourselves to this?”

  Archimedes hooked his thumbs on the utility belt around his waist and glided to Sothis with the gait of a lithe dancer. “Arcturus refused to lead the lions in the slaughter of your lamb, but we had to appease Sekhem somehow. After what happened to the last scouts they sent, how could we refuse? We couldn’t deny our sweet brother every request.”

  Serenity couldn’t take her eyes off her uncle. The intonation of his voice, the way he moved, even the cockiness of his stance mesmerized her. />
  Sothis lowered her sword. “How long have you been here?”

  He smiled like a man aching to spill a secret. “Long enough to know your change of guard at dinner is sloppy and that you always start your shift by exiting through this room. You’re slipping,” Archimedes added. “I’m rather disappointed. I was hoping for more of a challenge.”

  “How many are coming?” Sothis asked.

  A laugh, pleasant and bubbly as champagne, floated from Archimedes. “Enough.”

  Her mother didn’t look amused. “How much time to do we have?”

  “The first wave will be here shortly,” Rayhan said.

  Sothis signaled to the sentinels on the other side of the room by snapping twice, and then twirled her hand, index finger raised, in circles above her head. They took off running in different directions. She looked at Archimedes. “First wave?”

  “Different tactics for a special mission. I highly recommend vacating the premises.” Archimedes touched his ear piece and listened.

  Nakia gasped, her eyes clouded to a milky white and she shivered as if in a trance. “Hundreds are approaching the island by air and sea.”

  Archimedes fixed his slithery gaze on her. “What’s your name little one?”

  Serenity moved to safeguard her, keeping the girl from his reach. She held the crossbow low, but put her finger on the trigger in case she had to fire quickly.

  “Nakia.” His voice rang light as a bell. He spun on his heels as though someone behind him had said something and stared at Adriel. “How do you know me?”

  He was a powerful empath indeed.

  Cyrus and Caelius appeared from the garden. Serenity met her kabashem’s hardened gaze, but two Paladins stood between them.

  Archimedes slipped a dagger from his belt, holding the blade behind his forearm. Rayhan twirled his swords.

  “Best stay there, Cyrus. No need for bloodshed at Paladin hands today,” Archimedes said. “I have more to share that could prove most helpful, but I shan’t do so until you—” Archimedes waggled a finger at Adriel, “—tell me how you know me.”

  Adriel moved back next to Cyrus and Sothis inched closer to the Paladins.

  “I told him all about you, Uncle Archie.” Serenity tightened her grip on the crossbow.