Interra (Awakened Series Book 5)

by Harley Austin

  “Leave her alone, Terrell,” Jerrod glared.

  “Two sun goddesses now. I’m starting to build a harem.”

  Serena heard him. She stood quickly, anger in her now blazing eyes, her skin becoming golden with an intense glow. Jerrod backed away, his own collar beginning to pick up her psionic aura. All of them backed away from her, including the MP’s.

  “Well, well.” Terrell gazed at her anger, his own face looked slightly bored by her furious display. A psionic wind now kicked up around Serena, her hair lifting and blowing softly within it.

  “Yes, Serena, I can see you’re pissed, but honestly, I could do without the theatrics, if you don’t mind.” Terrell mocked.

  “I’ll show you theatrics!” The tendrils shot from her mind with more lethal force than necessary to destroy Terrell once and for all.

  But her tendrils slammed against something invisible—a barrier of some kind. She hit him, again, and then again, but each time, her unseen tendrils would just not connect with his mind.

  Jerrod watched as one of Terrell’s red-cloaked guards, the male figure, made his way beside Terrell. He lifted a hand slowly, then flicked his fingers. The telekinetic punch hit her hard, easily sending her off her feet and skidding back over the floor of the balcony.

  She recovered to her feet quickly from the dazing blow, her skin still fully aglow with the power of a sun goddess.

  “I’m sorry, Princess. I meant to tell you. The Wraith are not without our own resources.”

  “I’ve got a few of my own—” Serena bolted right for Terrell, a shield of golden light coalescing in front of her, as if she were a high-speed locomotive. Terrell’s guard lifted his arms, a golden glow illuminating his skin fashioning a barrier that was twice as thick as Serena’s. She rebounded off the guard’s barrier like a cue ball striking another, then skidding and rebounding off one of the massive pillars back inside main hall.

  “Three out of five, perhaps, Princess?” Terrell chuckled, garnering laughs from the assembled elite commanders.

  No one stopped Jerrod as he moved quickly to Serena inside the great hall, lifting her half dazed now to her feet. Her skin was still aglow, but that last knock with Terrell’s guard took the wind out of her. Both were marshaled back out to the balcony under armed and ready guards.

  Terrell’s people were still chuckling as both of them were prodded before Terrell and his guard once again.

  “Children. This is what all of you are. You should know better than tangle with experience. Am I not right, Doctor?”

  The red-cloaked man pulled away his hood, his golden skin glowing, his eyes lit with the power of the sun gods.

  “Lucas.” Jerrod glared.

  “Surprised once again, Jerrod?” Lucas asked.

  Jerrod fumed.

  Someone quickly clicked a collar around Serena’s neck as the glow of her skin faded.

  “You see, Lucas. A well executed plan.” Terrell then turned his attention toward the female red-robed guard. “Now my dear, if you would be so kind as to round up our two incognito assassins?”

  The woman approached, her cloak billowing in a soft psionic wind. A crystalline wand in her hand suddenly flashed. Dark and an Asian woman appeared in mid-air about twenty feet above all of them, falling with un-dexterous thuds to the hard stone floor. Only momentarily dazed, both were on their feet within another second, both in martial stances and both surrounded by enough energy weapons to burn them into cinders in the next second if any of them moved a muscle.

  “Dark?” Terrell’s eyes now widened for the first time. He took a step back positioning his two red-robed guards between himself and the other halfblood.

  “Amethyst.” Dark glared. “I knew you couldn’t be trusted.”

  Serena was holding onto Jerrod. “Amy, how could you?!”

  “Sorry, Serena, Sweetie, but, you should know me better than this by now. I always go for the bad boys. I just can’t help myself.”

  “You—you betrayed us?” Serena’s face looked shattered as she contemplated the betrayal brought upon them by the lavender-eyed goddess.

  “Get used to it, Princess.” Dark moved up beside her and Jerrod. “Amy only looks out for one person—herself. Trust me.”

  “Enough.” Terrell still wasn’t moving out from behind his guards. “Who is your accomplice?”

  “Blood Dragon, Terrell,” Dark answered. “Your little mess here is getting the attention of some of the big guns now.”

  Abject fear drew over Terrell’s face now. “Kill her!” Terrell ordered in a voice that came out with fear. “Immediately! Kill her! NOW!”

  Dark never saw the woman move. Two of the surrounding MP’s were suddenly airborne, plowing into both of Terrell’s red guards, keeping them focused on their shields while several more of the guards found themselves launching off of the balcony. It didn’t take Dark but an instant to see what the Blood Dragon assassin was up to.

  More guards began rushing into the hand-to-hand melee, only to be intercepted and bowled over by other flailing and flying personnel.

  Jerrod hooked a nearby officer, twirling and sending the man into Lucas’ barrier hard enough to crack it. The splintering barrier raised Lucas’ eyebrow as he eyed Jerrod taking hold of two more guards and sending them airborne at him just as hard.

  Serena didn’t need to be instructed. Perhaps not as elegant as Jerrod and the others, as more of the halfblood guards rushed in, she sent them into Amethyst’s shield, hard enough to not just crack it, but send the old witch back a step.

  “This a big enough diversion for you!?” Jerrod glared at Serena, catching another guard by the arm as hot blasts of ionic fire began filling the balcony with the guards beginning to realize that their numbers had quickly dwindled to less than half of what they had been only seconds ago.

  Dark was already armed with an ion rifle in each arm, spinning low and pulling triggers as fast as the weapons would fire, dropping MP’s and other guards and assembled officers until both weapons were drained. Still turning, he flung both weapons from him. An MP taking a keen bead on Serena suddenly discovered a rifle protruding from his chest, losing his balance and falling backward.

  “KILL THEM!” Terrell ordered, seeing his forces quickly dissipating from the balcony. “KILL THEM ALL!”

  As more forces poured into the building from below, Terrell fished quickly in his pocket for the remote detonator. They were all wearing collars. In a moment he would be rid of the curse of these accursed sun gods once and for all.

  Heavy ionic weapons fire, empty hardware and bodies were still being flung heavily at the shields of his red-robed body guard. He needed to put an end to this nonsense and quickly. The smart phone-sized control in his hand, he tapped an icon—just as the unit cracked and half melted in his grip. The sizzling hot control dropped to the floor, a third of it missing. Terrell looked up with wide eyes from where the surgical shot had come from, his hand still badly burned by the blast but healing quickly. Standing not but a few yards away from him was another halfblood, blond hair protruding from his weathered Akurba hat and his Australian accent thick.

  “Ay, Terrell, pecker-head. You want to take on an assassin? Now you got yourself a real one.”

  Terrell reached for his side arm, quickly drew it and fired wildly, missing badly as the Australian seemed to minutely move to dodge his every blast.

  “Oh, you’re a bloody crack shot, you are. Try this one on for size.”

  The barrel of Terrell’s weapon ate Rowan’s next shot.

  For a moment Terrell just looked at the gun, then re-aimed it. But as Terrell began to pull the trigger, the ionic pistol exploded in the general’s grip leaving his palm with a few less fingers.

  By now well-armed MPs and soldiers had began pouring onto the balcony. Several combat aircraft that had been neatly parked at the base of the citadel below the balcony for the arms show had been taken aloft and were targeting their heavy weapons on the gods.

  Their circle was narro
wing. The gods were becoming surrounded. Now in a kind of circular firing squad, all of them waved their weapons as thousands of Wraith filled the interior of the citadel’s ballroom and hundreds moved in, heavily armed around them. Rowan was pushed into the small group now as well.

  Dark looked at the old trapper. “I didn’t think I’d ever see the day you would get killed.”

  “Yea, well I’m not dead yet, am I?” Rowan glared targeting his pistol at the guards encircling them.

  All of them were being huddled together into a tighter and tighter group. One of Beau’s hands found and locked fingers with one of Ian’s. Jerrod pushed Serena behind himself as Rowan moved closer to her. Both heard him whispering in her ear. “It’s all yours, Princess. If I had any aces up my sleeve, now would be a bloody good time to use one of ‘em.”

  But Serena was already feeling what that final ace felt like. Jerrod watched as a sly grin moved across her face.

  What was left of Terrell’s gun hand had been quickly wrapped in an impromptu bandage from the sash of someone’s uniform. His red-clad guard still behind him, the general was in pain and pissed. His grand celebration to his achievements disrupted by a handful of these insolent teenage vagabonds.

  He glared at all of them. “Detonate their collars. Now!” he ordered. Lucas began building a psionic charge. He didn’t need a remote detonator. His collar invention would go off by itself the moment the devices detected his own building aura, and then the prophetic reign of these sun gods and goddesses would be no more. Beau’s and Ian’s collars began their high-pitched warnings first. Elle pulled them back from Lucas and stood in front of them, her collar moving to its warning now the loudest.

  “Uh-oh.” Amethyst quipped under her breath, quietly backing up and disappearing into the crowd.

  Lucas was too busy teasingly increasing his charge to notice. He was now waiting for the device to detonate, annoyed at watching the Goddess of Love’s dual fisted fingers at him.

  But her fingers were not the only ones stretching out long. Stepping over the body of the fallen god, a Wraith MP looked down. The fingers of the dead god, Rion, were—moving?

  Huh? She knelt down. His restraining freezer suit badly damaged and non-functional, the bloodied hole in the back of his now inoperable suit had been replaced with clean new skin. She watched his fingers now make a slow fist and then squeeze together as if building in strength.

  The firm stone beneath her began to quake softly.

  “Ohhh. Shit.” The profanity fell out of her mouth. Before she could make another sound the felled god’s skin flashed into a bright golden glow as he rocketed skyward, blowing soldiers away in his wake, his skin a blaze of eternal sunlight!

  Lucas lost concentration, his danger senses off the chart, but so was the psionic aura all around them. Yet, the devices instead of exploding, simply decoupled and fell to the floor.

  “NOT! AGAIN!” Lucas growled seeing Rion aloft. Rocketing skyward toward Rion in a blazing trail of sunlight, he caught Rion in mid-air as both fought and spiraled and wove around the citadel, clashing in a kind of hard-fisted mortal combat that sent showers of lightning and sprays of scintillating light flying!

  “You’re WEAK, Steele!” Lucas gloated.

  Rion was in no condition to be battling another Ra, let alone a newblood, and let alone an Invicti.

  Lucas caught him with a blazing charge of psychic chi that pummeled Rion weakly higher as both telekinetically flew within proximity of the walls of the citadel.

  “Give it up, Lucas,” Rion distracted, trying to put some distance between himself and Lucas’ powerful fists. “Your days of playing god with the lives of others are over.”

  “And who is going to stop me!? You?” Lucas bolted like a shot headlong into Rion, sending him even higher up the tall sides of the two-mile-high structure, skidding Rion upward along its high exterior walls in a dazzling shower of lighting-like sparks.

  “It was you who built the Wraith, wasn’t it, Lucas?” Rion battled the other sun god hand-to-hand aloft. But even Rion’s best martial strikes were still too weak to affect Lucas much.

  “You punch like a fucking cunt.” Lucas hit him hard, knocking Rion into the side of the upper walls of the tall structure again and again. Rion backed up the side of the building on all fours, trying to regain his stamina while Lucas floated like an energized demon in front of him.

  “I knew Terrell had to be taking orders from someone.” Rion moved up the side of the building, fear awash in his eyes.

  “Terrell’s an idiot. Yes, I used him to build the Wraith. Concealed myself within their ranks.”

  “Amy your lackey as well?” Rion lifted off from the building, moving around it with Lucas in pursuit.

  “You are such a stupid prick, Rion.” Lucas caught him by the ankle, dragging him up the side of the building, slamming him again and again into its side and then hurling him onto the glass-steel rooftop of the immense skyscraper. The heavy impact knocked the wind out of Rion as he rolled closer to the edge of the roof, finally stopping just before the edge. Lucas lit onto the edge only a few feet from him. Two miles up, the crowds were like a sea of ants below them. Rion backed away, crawling along the edge of the hyper-tall building along his back.

  “You’re a fool, Rion.” Lucas stood over him. “You make friends with your enemies and then you let your friends become your enemies.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “Amethyst, of course. She’s been on my side the whole time. You might say ‘fate’ has been in my corner since I was awakened.”

  “Amy’s a Fate?” Rion’s eyes drew wide.

  “Oh, you’re quick. I know who the others are as well.”

  “They’ll stop you.” Rion backed away.

  Lucas kicked one of Rion’s legs off the side of the building. “Stop me? Hell, Rion, they’ll be helping me!”

  Rion scrambled back onto the ledge after nearly falling.

  “Who are the others?”

  Lucas knelt down over him, taking hold of Rion by the neck, gripping him so hard he could barely breath. “That’s for me to know—” Lucas gripped his neck even tighter, turning his head painfully. Rion could hear his neck popping as a vertebra broke. Lucas grinned gritting his teeth, tightening his grip on Rion’s neck even more. “—and you to never …”

  Rion’s eyes rolled back into his head as he fought Lucas’ iron grip. He felt Rion’s grip on his wrist weaken. He leaned over Rion’s limping body to strengthen his hold and tear the whelp’s head clean off—it would just take one—more—squeeze.

  Lucas’ danger sense had been going off the whole time while he’d been beating the hell out of Rion. His attention unduly focused, he never saw combat boot that landed solidly against the side of his face harder than anything he’d ever been hit with in his life. The blow stunned him, rolling him over and over up the shallow dome of the rooftop. When he finally stopped tumbling, he recovered quickly to one knee, a new grin moving across his face.

  “Serena—” he half chuckled. She was moving toward him, anger blazing in her eyes. Lucas stood, his red robes billowing in a psionic wind. “Rion’s little sex kitten come out to play?”

  “Fuck yew!” she glared closing the distance between them.

  “Honestly, Serena you should find a better tailor.” He mocked her ragged clothes and then easily dodged the martial Krav Maga punch she threw at him. Lucas lifted his hand leveling a heavy telekinetic punch she didn’t know was coming, sending her rolling backward down the rooftop. It only took her a few moments to be on her feet again. But Lucas was now closing the distance between them.

  “Do you know the problem with you kids—?” he began.

  Serena adjusted her martial stand, her fists and feet ready.

  “—it’s that you have no panache.” Lucas tossed a martial punch at her that Serena blocked, but then found her wrist suddenly firmly gripped in Lucas’ hand. He whirled her, pulling her back against himself, his arm across her chest
and his hand around her throat, gripping her tightly. The quick moved startled her. “Apparently, they also don’t train you kids very well either.”

  Serena tried to wrestle herself free from his grasp but male sun god was a lot stronger than she was.

  She heard Lucas drawing a deep breath.

  “Hmmm, now I see what the big fuss is all about. You have quite the intoxicating scent, Serena.”

  Lucas’ other hand was now cupping her breast, kneading her through what remained of her top.

  She managed to elbow him—hard—but it wasn’t enough to break free of his grasp. His fingers pinched her nipple. It hurt. She reverse head-butted him in the chin causing him to loosen his grip. Serena then put several yards between the two of them.

  Lucas shook off the attack the next moment. “You are feisty.” He slipped out of his regal red robe and cloak, revealing a shining suit of red body armor that reminded Serena of what the man who had attacked her back in bedroom of the lake house had been wearing. She backed away as he approached. But then something gripped her—something that was all around her. She couldn’t back away from him! She fought the telekinetic grip with everything she had, but his will was strong. He moved himself up to her, her scent filling his senses. His face was next to her ear as he drew her against himself, his hand moving over her half exposed ass.

  “Jesus, you need to be fucked.”

  She could feel him growing firm against her bare thigh. Even struggling with everything she had against his will she could barely move. She felt what remained of her fatigue shorts being torn away from her skin as Lucas bent her over forcefully. No longer just a bulge in his armor, she could now feel his hard cock sliding against the inside of her leg from behind.

  NO! She cried out in her mind.

  She called out to Rion. But there was no answer.

  Lucas pulled her strongly against himself as she felt him probing her, pushing himself against her folds.

  “Rion and I aren’t exactly compatible, Serena.” Lucas forced Serena to her knees while she struggled to get free of him. “I couldn’t use his DNA. But with yours—I can control all of Interra!”