by Lara Adrian
“But what does Opus’s attack on the GNC summit have to do with the Atlanteans or their queen?”
“The Opus member who masterminded the whole thing was Atlantean,” Gabrielle explained.
“Reginald Crowe?” Brynne asked. She’d been shocked enough to learn one of the world’s richest, most powerful business magnates was part of the deadly terror group. But this? “Are you saying Crowe was one of Zael’s people?”
“No one knew,” Tavia said. “Just before he was killed, he boasted to some of the warriors about how Opus was only a game compared to what his queen was plotting. He said we should expect a war like we’ve never seen.”
“My God.” Brynne swallowed against the cold knot of dread in her throat. “As if dealing with Opus isn’t bad enough, now there’s this too?”
Gabrielle nodded. “We may have some advantages in our favor, though. We’ve been looking for ways to get ahead of Selene. Zael may be able to help us.”
“He may be the only one,” Tavia added. “But we’re putting him in a hard place.”
“Yes, but he’s got reasons of his own to ally with the Order now,” Gabrielle said. “Jordana, for one.”
Tavia had told Brynne about the young woman during her visit to her sister in Boston recently. Jordana worked with Carys Chase at an art museum and had been recently mated to one of Sterling Chase’s senior warriors. “What does Zael have to do with her?”
Instead of Tavia or Gabrielle answering the question, it was Carys who replied. She stood in the open doorway with another young woman. “What does Zael have to do with who?”
“Jordana,” Tavia said, though whether in answer to her daughter or in greeting to the ethereal, willowy blonde who strode in with fiery Carys, Brynne wasn’t quite sure.
Without pausing for greetings, Carys walked up to Brynne and pulled her into a fierce hug. “I’m so relieved that you’re okay,” she said, drawing back after a long moment. “When I heard what happened in London last night, I was so scared that you might’ve been injured—or worse.”
Brynne smiled at the younger daywalker, equally pleased to see her.
“I’m fine. And thankfully, so are you.”
The two of them had a special bond even before their shared mission together at Fielding’s house party. Brynne had been beside herself with fear and horror when she’d discovered Carys had been abducted right under her nose by one of Opus’s most sadistic members.
“I wouldn’t be here if not for you,” Carys said. “The Order came just in the nick of time, all thanks to you.”
“That’s not quite the way I would explain it,” Brynne demurred. “And from what your mother told me, you handled things rather impressively on your own. Maybe that talk we had about you joining the Order wasn’t all that crazy, eh?”
Carys grinned, her pride beaming from her sharp blue gaze. “As much as I love working at the museum with Jordana here, I actually have been considering a career change.”
Jordana snorted, shattering the illusion of the unearthly goddess. “You won’t if Rune has anything to say about that.”
“We’re negotiating,” Carys said with a waggle of her brows. “He knew what he was getting into when he blood bonded to me.”
Her friend laughed and shook her head. “Hello,” she said to Brynne. “It’s a pleasure to meet you. I’m Jordana.”
“We were just talking about you,” Tavia said gently. “We were about to explain to Brynne that Zael knew your father.”
“Oh.” Her face lit up, but there was a trace of sadness in her eyes. “They were best friends. They served together as soldiers.”
“In Selene’s legion,” Tavia added. “They both fled the realm years ago.”
Brynne couldn’t pretend the news didn’t shock her. “He was a soldier?”
“One of the best,” Jordana said. “After my father was killed recently in Boston, Zael kept me safe from the queen’s guards who came to find me and bring back me to her. He protected me with his life.”
Zael, the smooth-talking player, was not only a warrior of note to the Atlanteans but a savior to his fallen comrade’s child as well? It wasn’t easy to reconcile the two conflicting views of him, but Brynne’s mind was struggling to process something else Jordana had said as well.
“I’m sorry about your father, Jordana. But… I’m not sure I follow. Why would the queen’s guards be looking for you?”
Carys wrapped her arm around her friend. “Because Jordana is her granddaughter. Her sole heir.”
“Oh, my.” Brynne’s mouth went slack. “Heir to the Atlantean queen. As in, the royal line?”
Tavia gave her a confirming nod. “We’ve been keeping Jordana’s identity a secret for her own safety.”
“My mother was Selene’s only child,” Jordana explained. “She and my father fell in love, even though it was forbidden. My father broke the law when he made her his mate.”
“There is no law strong enough to forbid love,” Gabrielle said.
“No, there isn’t.” Jordana smiled ruefully and shook her head. “After I was born, there were problems…consequences to be paid. Selene separated my parents. My mother grew despondent, then eventually, she took her own life. And so my father stole me away. He hid me with people he trusted on the outside, then he stepped out of my life to protect me and to give me freedoms I’d never have inside the realm. My grandmother put a price on his head. It took her guards twenty-five years to find him, but they did.”
Brynne didn’t know what to say. Torn between amazement and abhorrence for what she’d just heard, she stood mutely, aching for what Jordana—and her doomed parents—had gone through. “And Zael helped, you say?”
Jordana nodded. “When Selene’s guards came to Boston and killed my father, Zael took me someplace safe. He even battled some of his former comrades to protect me. Without him, I wouldn’t be standing here today.”
Jordana’s fondness for Zael was obvious. Given what he’d apparently done on the young woman’s behalf, her affection was understandable. But Jordana seemed to be describing a different man than the one Zael presented to the outside world.
To Brynne as well.
This Zael was a courageous man. A noble one, the kind who would risk everything to protect the child of a dead friend from an enemy with cold, far-reaching power. Jordana had described a hero—not the first word that leaped to Brynne’s mind when she thought of him.
She didn’t know what to do with this new information.
She also didn’t know what to do with the softening of her regard for the man she so desperately wanted to despise.
“Our lives would all be emptier if you weren’t part of them,” Tavia said as she tenderly squeezed Jordana’s hand.
“It’s true,” Carys agreed. “And we also wouldn’t have the Atlantean crystal your father hid away from Selene all these years.”
The odd reference pulled Brynne out of her unwanted musings about Zale and that troubling kiss they’d shared.
“What do you mean, a crystal? What are you talking about, Carys?”
“Ah, that is a whole other story,” Tavia said. “We’ll explain everything to you, Brynne, but let’s do it over breakfast. You’ve had a very long night and I’m sure you must be starving.”
CHAPTER 8
“Have you thought any more about what I asked of you the last time you were here?”
Had he thought about it? Zael grunted at Lucan’s question. “You asked me to consider betraying my people, Commander Thorne. I assure you, it’s been foremost in my mind ever since.”
The two of them had left the conference room to talk alone, and because Lucan had something to show Zael, he’d said. They strode the labyrinth of corridors that snaked past smaller meeting rooms, training facilities, and Gideon’s high tech lair of computers and communications equipment where the eccentric Breed male was already deeply engrossed in his work on half a dozen touch-screen monitors filled with scrolling code.
“I haven
’t asked you to betray anyone, Zael. What I asked was for your trust. For your confidence as the Order attempts to learn all it can about your queen and her intentions.”
“Selene hasn’t been my queen for a very long time.”
“You served her for centuries as one of her legion,” Lucan reminded him.
“Yes. And more than a hundred years ago, I left the realm a fugitive. For as long as I’m alive, to Selene I’m merely one more defector with a price on his head.” Just like his comrade, Cassianus, and the small number of other Atlanteans who’d escaped to begin again in a new place, without fear of a volatile ruler.
“But your loyalty is still intact?” There was weight in Lucan’s question, and its implication.
Zael answered honestly. “I don’t serve Selene, but I can’t condemn her completely. She was good once, but she’s a vengeful, powerful woman. Her heart iced over when Atlantis was destroyed by your Ancient ancestors.”
“That’s a damned long time to hold a grudge.”
“She’s immortal, Lucan. Her heart may never thaw. It went even colder after her only child was dead and her sole heir was stolen away.”
“Along with the crystal Cass took at the same time,” Lucan added.
“Yes, along with the crystal.” Which was now in the Order’s hands. Not that Zael had actually seen the treasure to verify that fact.
As crucial as their newfound alliance was, Lucan Thorne had been reluctant to let Zael anywhere near the crystal Jordana had received from her father and entrusted to the Order. For that, Zael had to respect the Breed male.
The crystal was one of five that the realm once possessed. They were each a source of immense power and versatile uses. Put into the wrong hands—the hands of an Atlantean whose motives were less honorable than Zael’s, for instance—and the outcome could be catastrophic.
Lucan paused in the corridor and faced him. “When we met here a few days ago, I asked if the Order could count on you as an ally.”
Zael nodded. “And I told you that as long as I was confident we both wanted to achieve the same thing—lasting peace for all—that you would always have my trust and confidence.”
“So you did.” After a moment, Lucan motioned him forward.
Zael instantly recognized the huge chamber he was brought to. He’d been there on his first visit to Order headquarters just a few days ago, and he would never forget the vast archive room. Or the remarkable woman responsible for it.
“Hi, Zael.”
“Jenna. Hello.” He smiled as the lean, short-haired brunette set aside a journal she was recording and came over to greet him.
“Have you had a chance to see Dylan yet since you arrived?” Jenna asked. “She’s come by here a couple of times already, hoping she might find you.”
“I haven’t seen her yet, no,” Zael answered, feeling a pang of regret—and affection—at the mention of the other Breedmate. “I’ll make sure that I do.”
Lucan cleared his throat. “We’ll all have plenty of time for reunions, but right now, I wanted Zael to understand where things are progressing with your visions, Jenna.”
Even knowing her history and the astonishing cause of the Breed dermaglyphs that tracked all over Jenna’s human skin, it was hard not to stare. But her outward appearance wasn’t even half as interesting as the other thing that made Jenna unique.
After surviving a horrific attack by the last living Ancient—the savage fathers of the Breed race—Jenna was now gifted, or cursed, some might say, with the dreamlike memories of her attacker. The journals she’d been filling for the past two decades were a staggering chronicle of the Breed’s history, as seen through the eyes of that now-dead predator.
She glanced at Lucan. “Did you tell him I’ve been seeing more details of the attack on Atlantis?”
“We were just getting to that,” Lucan said. “I’ve decided it’s time to show him.”
Zael was about to ask for an explanation, but since he’d entered the room his temples had begun to fill with a persistent and distracting buzzing. His chest and limbs felt increasingly warm…as if a furnace had been turned on inside him.
“The crystal.” He swung an incredulous look on Lucan. “It’s here in this room.”
He wasn’t asking for confirmation. He didn’t need to ask. Every cell in his body was responding to the close proximity of the otherworldly power source belonging to his people.
Lucan nodded to Jenna. “Show him.”
She walked to a large safe that stood open on the other side of the chamber. Retrieving an object from within the sturdy vault, she returned carrying it in her hands. It was a small, unremarkable metal box with a broken seal.
Zael didn’t have to look inside the titanium container to know it held the egg-sized, silvery crystal. Had the box been sealed, the metal’s properties would have prevented any of his kind from feeling the crystal’s power, even at close range. According to what Jordana had told him, that’s how Cass kept this particular crystal hidden in the human world for so long.
But with the power source exposed to him now, Zael felt its heat and vibration as if it were a part of him. In many ways, the crystal was a part of him. He and all of his kind shared a unique connection to all five of the crystals that once belonged to Atlantis.
Jenna paused in front of Zael and Lucan, holding the box carefully in her palms. “The first time I touched this thing, it really kicked my butt.”
Lucan grunted. “That’s an understatement if I ever heard one. Her glyphs went crazy, rioting with color, and that crystal glowed as bright as the sun inside her hands.”
Zael listened, marveling that she dared touch the crystal without knowing what it might do to her. But from what he’d seen of all the women who were part of the Order and their extended family, Jenna had a rare courage.
“The visions I saw after touching the crystal were the strongest I’ve ever had,” Jenna explained. “Since then, I’ve been working a bit more with it, conditioning myself to hold on longer each time because it seems to make the memories stronger, more vivid in my mind. I’ve almost collected a full account now of the day Atlantis was destroyed.”
Zael couldn’t hide his amazement. “Remarkable work. I know it can’t be easy, seeing the things you do when you look through the Ancient’s eyes. The Order is fortunate to have you.”
She laughed. “Do me a favor and tell that to my mate. Brock thinks I’ve lost my mind to be doing this.”
“Because he loves you,” Lucan said soberly. “He doesn’t like seeing you suffer, even if it’s only through hideous visions like the ones you’ve been chronicling. If you were Gabrielle, I’d rather smash this chunk of Atlantean rock to dust than let you anywhere near it.”
Zael understood the sentiment, but what Lucan suggested was impossible. “The crystals can’t be destroyed. Not through any means you or I might have.”
He glanced down into the titanium box in Jenna’s hands, awed to be seeing one of the five crystals up close. It drew him like a beacon, like the living source of power it truly was.
Beneath its glimmering, silvery surface, facets of sparkling light glowed deep in the crystal’s core. The hum of cosmic power reached into him, waking his cells as it would any of his kind.
He heard Lucan’s wary growl beside him as the energy within the crystal responded to Zael’s nearness and began to pulse. And inside Zael’s body, he felt the warmth of the crystal’s power building in him too.
“The crystal,” Jenna whispered, her eyes widening. “Something’s happening to it.”
“What the fuck is going on, Zael?”
“You’ll understand best if I show you.”
The answering look on the massive Breed male’s face was anything but certain.
“Trust,” Zael said. “Do I have yours?”
At Lucan’s hesitant nod, Zael reached into the box and collected the crystal into his palms. “In close proximity of a crystal, an Atlantean’s life force increases exponentially. As do
es our power.”
To demonstrate, Zael pivoted toward the large safe across the room. Lifting one finger, he sent the hulking block of metal gliding across the marble floor as if it were nothing. He stopped it a split second before it crashed into the opposite wall.
Jenna gasped. “That safe weighs more than a ton.”
“With this crystal,” Zael said, “if I wanted to right now, I could break down the walls of this chamber with a sweep of my hand.”
Lucan’s stare was hard and flat with understanding.
Zael glanced at him solemnly. “Now imagine an entire Atlantean army with a crystal in its possession. They would be unstoppable.”
“Why hasn’t Selene unleashed this power on us already?” The Order’s leader demanded. “Why not retaliate against the Ancients immediately after they destroyed Atlantis and drove her into exile?”
“Because to use a crystal for war, she would need to remove it from its other purpose.”
“Which is?”
“Protection,” Zael said. “The crystals have many uses. When there were five of them in realm, they provided energy for all our needs. If we required it, the crystals could’ve been used to power defensive weaponry as well, although that was never something our people hoped for. And, as you just witnessed, they can also enhance an Atlantean’s own individual power.”
“You said Selene uses them for protection,” Lucan prompted.
“Yes. They’re what kept Atlantis safe for thousands of years after my people arrived here. The crystals cloaked Atlantis beneath an impenetrable shield that concealed the island from the outside world. The shield kept the realm safe from any curious visitor or attack.”
Jenna’s brows rose. “You’re talking about an actual force field around Atlantis?”
“To simplify the concept, yes.”
“And then Atlantis lost two of the crystals,” she replied. “It weakened the shield.”