Descendants Series

by Melissa Wright

  Her eyes fluttered shut with the words. Aern couldn’t be certain whether she truly believed them or not, but Ellin had been trained. She would understand the others were keeping Brendan, using him for leverage. She would understand that in this world, their version of safe meant something different. It wasn’t a promise to remain unharmed, only the reprieve to shut your eyes. To recover until the next round.

  The cart was rushed from the room; the preparations made that would allow them to repair her most serious injuries. To reset bones and stitch up wounds that would recover better given a headstart. The crowd of soldiers stood silent, watching as the door swung shut behind someone who’d been central to their Council lives, and later, at the Division.

  “They’re coming for her?” Eric said, breaking the stillness of the room.

  Aern closed his hand, the warmth of it only reminding him of how cold Ellin’s skin had been. He turned to Eric, who stood waiting in front of what was left of his team. “We have time. Brianna will give us warning.” He hoped the words were true, but if not, if they didn’t have time to prepare, it wouldn’t matter.

  Eric gave a small nod, and drew a map from his pocket to start his report. “We found her here,” he explained, pointing to a derelict industrial area. “Another warehouse. This one wasn’t even on Council’s records. We just got close and…” He stopped, wetting his lips, and glanced up at Aern. “It just seemed right.”

  “You were pushed?” Aern said.

  Eric shook his head, uncertain as he brought back the memory. “I’m not sure. I wasn’t…” He gestured toward his men. “None of us really know how it happened.” He indicated another spot on the map. “We were heading to the Jamestown buildings to see if we’d missed anything there. And then Cooper took a side street, and this place looked suspicious. There were new locks on the gate, but they were open. High-dollar security equipment and no one had bothered using it. We dropped the team, and suddenly we were heading through doors, following new tracks and evidence of water, a fire that had been extinguished. But it wasn’t right, Aern. There wasn’t any smoke damage, no sign of anyone around. Something was off. Wrong.”

  Wrong. Brianna’s words echoed through Aern’s mind, and he patted Eric on the shoulder. “Send Seth and the other teams to check out the area surrounding it. But don’t engage.” He looked again at the map in Eric’s hand. “Whatever this is, I don’t want anyone getting too close. Not until Brianna gives us the go-ahead.”

  “And if they find us?” Eric said.

  Aern glanced at the door that Ellin’s cart had disappeared behind, remembering her broken body. As if they had played with her, taken their time. Brianna’s face when she’d described Brendan, when she’d said the others were coming.

  His gaze met Eric’s, his tone even. “Pray.”

  Chapter Seven

  Shadows

  Callan brushed a finger over his mouth as he watched the monitors. They would have retrieved her by now, taken the blonde back to their Council properties. He’d have to destroy the buildings soon, before the others noticed the body was missing. He’d liked the woman—the way she stared at him without flinching, the way she’d kept calm even when the water came. She had fight in her. But that wasn’t what had saved her. Brianna was the only reason the woman had lived, and Callan knew it. She’d been restoring their powers. Fiddling with the lines.

  It was time. She was getting stronger, finding her own answers, and it was going to be too late. He couldn’t go to her, the shadows had warned him against that, but there would be no call for issue if Brianna found him. If she initiated the contact. Come to me, Brianna, he thought. Come to me and I will show you why your kind is hiding.

  Chapter Eight

  Brianna

  Brianna stared up at the canopy of her bed, vague memories of the foster families they’d lived with through the months they’d been on the run teasing at the back of her mind. “Do you ever wonder what it would be like to have a cookout?” She flexed her right foot where it crossed over the ankle of her left. “You know, just invite the neighbors over and sit by the pool. Maybe watch some fireworks after dark.”

  Logan’s lips pursed. “Hot dogs are overrated.”

  She shook her head, shifting so that her denim-covered leg touched his. “You’re cooking them wrong.”

  He laughed, turning to see her. “How’s that?”

  “You have to smother them in chili and that radioactive-yellow cheese sauce, and then you cover the whole thing with a bag of corn chips.”

  “That’s not a cookout,” he said. “That’s carnival food.”

  She looked at him. “To just be normal. To not have to fight?”

  He rolled toward her, placed a hand on her hip. “Where’s the fun in that?”

  She sighed, twisting her palm away from her stomach, and drew the power through it again. She held up a small metal pin with her other hand, showing Logan how he’d be able to use the gifts she would give him. “Electromagnetic,” she said, releasing the pin to watch it slip into the space above her palm and then pulling it free again to hold to the side. “Arc.” She released the electricity, a thin line of spark shooting to the pin in her hand, and then dropped it, keeping the power in check. “And fire.” She pushed again, adding the energy required to ignite a flame.

  “Enough,” he said, wrapping his hand around hers. “I trust you, Brianna.”

  She turned to her side, facing him. “If the old texts are right, you’ll probably have some skill with mass as well. Gravity.”

  He ran a thumb down her cheek to smooth out her distress. “Whatever you need from me, Brianna. Whatever it takes.”

  “It will use a lot of energy. And your kind, the Seven Lines, doesn’t have as much in reserve. The shadows will be stronger than you, Logan. As a general rule, any of them you come in contact with will be able to overpower you.”

  “I understand. Don’t engage unless we’re forced to, use some sense.”

  “Yes,” she said. “And focus on your specialty, what you were made for.” Her hands slid up his, resting on the inside of his forearms. “You’ll be able to feel it, to know your limitations.” He listened patiently, taking in every word she said. “It won’t be new to them, Logan. They’ll have used it their whole lives, trained for this. Most of the time, you won’t even be able to see it coming.”

  “Most of the time?” he asked.

  She smirked. “They’re going to be a bit like Morgan, I’m afraid. They’re very proud of their power.” Her eyes went unfocused as she studied the visions, a set of futures where the lesser shadows sought her out. She couldn’t see them, exactly, but she could glimpse the events, knew the way things would unfold. She was hunting in the darkness, searching for bits of light in fog. These shadows weren’t as quick and ruthless, not like the others, but she knew that was coming, too. “Not all of them,” she said. “The men behind this, they aren’t in it for the glory.” She shivered, finding the last of the visions, the scenes too hard to relive. “They only want the outcome.”

  Brianna fell silent then, watched him while she hesitated, and Logan drew her tight against him. “It’s okay.” He pressed his lips to hers, a soft kiss, and said, “It will be fine.” He drew back to look at her. “We’re just like any other couple, lying in bed on a Saturday afternoon, making fire with our hands.”

  “It’s Tuesday,” she deadpanned, some small part of her thrilling at the word couple as his mouth came up in a lopsided grin.

  “Oh,” he answered. “Well, that is weird.”

  She laughed, finally closing her eyes to search his connections. Logan was different than Aern, though both were strong. Aern’s connections would allow him to use the sway, to send those impulses more easily and to more people at once. It would make his direction stronger, the way it had with Morgan, and—if her suspicions were correct—give him a talent for knowing what people were thinking that would drive Emily crazy. But Logan’s powers would be more in the physical realm, his line ha
ving a talent with mass that the others lacked. It was scarier for some reason, and she wanted to believe it was because she’d had no choice with Aern, not because it was more dangerous. Not because of her visions.

  She resisted the urge to draw her lip in, knowing that Logan was watching as she worked. She could practically feel his eyes on her face, roaming over her features, wholly unconcerned with the change she was producing inside him. She wondered how it would feel to him, if the process would drain him the way it was draining her. She wanted to open an eye, peek at his face, but knew she didn’t have much longer to work before exhaustion took them both.

  “Brianna,” he whispered, and she could hear in the density of his voice how tired he truly was. When she looked at him, he murmured, “Let’s spend all of our Saturdays together.”

  She smiled as his eyes slid closed—because it was still Tuesday—and wondered if he’d already fallen asleep while she tied the last two broken links.

  ***

  When she woke later, Logan was up, sitting at the bedside table with a handful of maps and photographs.

  He slid the paperwork over the top of the photos and closed the folder. “Hi.” Shifting, he braced a hand on his knee and leaned toward the bed. “Sandwiches in the front room if you’re interested.”

  She squinted her eyes shut. “But business to talk about first?”

  He smiled. “Am I that obvious?”

  “No.” She sat up, craning her neck in a stretch. “I just thought I heard Aern’s voice earlier.”

  Logan nodded. “Eric’s team found your warehouse. It seems Brendan wasn’t the only one they’d taken alive.” Brianna’s fingers tightened into the blanket, and he said, “Ellin is downstairs. They’d left her for dead, and it seems she wasn’t far from it.” He slid one of the photos from the bottom of the stack, carefully keeping the others from her view. “Does this look like the place?”

  She stared into a photo of dark concrete floors, wet and tracked with footprints and drag marks, raw metal framework lining the walls. It was the space the dark-haired man had dragged Brendan through. “He’s gone,” she whispered.

  “Yes,” Logan said. “It looks like they took Brendan and left, no care as to the evidence they were leaving behind. Aern sent a team in to check it out, but the building went up in flames.”

  Brianna’s eyes came up from the photo, nothing but wet concrete and metal—not the most flammable material—to find Logan. He sighed. “Not exactly a natural disaster.”

  Her stomach dropped as she remembered the dreams of the dark-haired man, heat and flame crumbling stone and metal as she waited with no chance for escape. The way she could hear his steps, even with the roar of the fire.

  “Brianna?”

  Logan’s voice was a vague background noise to a new vision, and she realized she must have triggered it with the memory, made some wrong decision. Things were different now, and those feelings—the little nudges that she’d taken to calling pushes—were turning to scenes, showing her exactly what would go wrong if she didn’t listen.

  “No,” she said, shaking her head against an onslaught of wrongness that sickened her in its clarity. It was Aern, and Eric, and all of the Division’s men. And it was fire. Logan’s hands were on her, and she focused on that, tearing from the vision to burrow into his chest.

  His arms came around her. “Brianna.”

  “It can’t be them, Logan. We have to go ourselves.” She pulled away from his chest to look at him, to make him promise. “When we find where they have Brendan, we have to go to him ourselves. It has to be us.”

  He nodded, smoothing her hair away from her face. “Whatever you need, Brianna. Whatever it takes.”

  Chapter Nine

  Aern

  Aern sat staring at the maps and photographs on his desk, all too aware that they’d lost their best chance to find Brendan. He’d sent two more teams out, scouring the area for any sign of the men who had burned the warehouse. It was a risk, but it didn’t matter. Everything they did now was a risk.

  Emily stopped her pacing behind him to lay a hand on his shoulder, and he leaned back, grasping it with his own. He’d not wanted to admit how seeing Ellin had affected him, but there was no question it had. It had affected all of them. These men were not simply a danger, not the type of threat that Morgan had been. They were something else, something that was beyond their understanding. They were something that scared even Brianna.

  “What if she’s right?” Emily said. “What if they’re just waiting for something to happen?”

  Aern breathed deep; whatever was going to happen was out of their control if they couldn’t figure out what exactly it was. “There has to be more,” he answered. “If they’re keeping Brendan for leverage, there has to be something else. Something they want.”

  “Us,” she said from behind him. “They want us.”

  He lifted her hand, drew her around to face him. “You don’t know that, Emily. Just because you’re a shadow—” He stopped at the pained look that crossed her face, and pulled her onto his lap. “It doesn’t matter what any of them wants. Whatever this is, whatever plans they’ve laid in place, we will fight it.” He slid a hand to the side of her neck, urging her to meet his gaze. “We.”

  She nodded, pressing her lips together. She hated the waiting. Felt helpless at the unknown. And he knew it not only from his heart, but through the bond.

  “Does it feel different to you?” he asked.

  Her fingers twisted into the hem of his shirt. “Like I can sense you, where you’re standing when you’re behind me,” she said. Her eyes darkened. “When you want me to move closer.”

  He smiled, testing it, and she leaned in, lips hovering inches from his. “Like that?” he whispered.

  “Like that,” she said.

  “You try. Think about sending me something you want me to know. Or a feeling.”

  She closed her eyes, and he was tempted to move the last inch to touch her lips. “I don’t know how to use it,” she said. “Didn’t Brianna say we’d know how things worked?”

  “With the power,” he answered. “I mean, you knew exactly when it was there and how to use it with Morgan. But maybe the bond is different. Maybe it doesn’t operate the same way.”

  She concentrated, unable to produce anything but frustration, and then opened her eyes. “Or maybe it’s you.” He kept trying and her gaze flicked to his mouth, feeling the instinct. “Maybe you’re the one doing it. Like with Ellin,” she said. “The way you knew what she was trying to tell us. The way you let her believe she was safe.”

  “She is safe,” he said.

  Emily shook her head. “I mean, she believed you. She was on a crash cart, for heaven’s sake. And when you said everything was okay, she closed her eyes and fell asleep.” His mouth twisted. “Maybe you didn’t even realize,” Emily offered. “You just wanted her to feel better and knew she would heal faster with rest.”

  “Maybe,” he said. He narrowed his gaze and could tell Emily felt the pull, harder this time.

  “I can’t be swayed,” she reminded him. And then she leaned forward, closing the distance. “But I can sense what you want me to do.” She smiled, the barest of space between them, her breath teasing his lips. “Even if I don’t have to comply.”

  He laughed, no more than a breath of air, and leaned forward for the kiss. It was soft, but in earnest, and when he drew back, he whispered, “Then you’re stronger than me.”

  She smirked. “Wait ’til my sister gets done with me.”

  He sighed, glancing at the clock. “Speaking of …” It was time, and all of the playfulness dropped from Emily’s face. She didn’t want the change, didn’t want to be any more of a shadow than she already was.

  But she would do it, for the same reason as Aern. She stepped back and he stood, wrapping his arms around her for a long moment before finally letting go. She wore a plain white Henley and her favorite sneakers; the overstocked closets of their Council rooms hadn’t
changed her a bit. He pressed a kiss to her forehead, tucking a loose wave that had escaped her ponytail behind an ear. “We’ll get through this,” he said. “And then I’ll work on your resistance.”

  She laughed, eyes going to his lips despite the challenge, and then caught herself, slipping free of his grasp to head for the door. When her hand touched the lever, she stopped, and he could tell she could feel him there, was aware that he hadn’t moved since she’d stepped away from him. He was watching her, she could sense it. And she could sense something else: contentment, a fierce loyalty. The way he felt about her. She looked back, smiling over her shoulder. “I think I like this, Mr. Archer.”

  He grinned. “I think I like it too.”

  They walked the halls to Brianna’s room, warm and wide, the exact shade of pale paint, trimmed in dark wood, from when he was a boy. Despite the fact that he’d never wanted to lead Council, Aern realized he was glad to be home again; glad everything with Morgan was in the past. He glanced at the same ancient artwork posted in the same location; the only thing changed the Council security and its staff. His pace slowed when they reached the corridor outside of Brianna’s room, because it was empty of either. There was no trace of Logan’s men.

  “Emily,” he whispered as she reached toward the handle, but she’d already paused, noticing their absence herself or taking Aern’s cue, he didn’t know.

  He slid past her, urging her farther back as he released the latch. The front room was lit, by all appearances empty, and he could see from his vantage point that the door to the bedroom was open as well. He took a step inside. “Brianna?”

  When there was no answer, Aern slid the earpiece from his pocket, scanning the room for any sign of struggle. He’d been there hours ago; Brianna’s jacket was gone from its place on the chair. A half-eaten sandwich lay plated on the table. Emily moved behind him, pointing to an end table. To the dagger Brianna had been keeping in her boot.