Atlantis Unleashed (47 page)

Justice laughed again, just because he could. The wounds were finally taking their toll, overcoming the burst of adrenaline-fueled strength. He'd always been immune to vampire bites but sheer blood loss could get him. He stumbled, suddenly dizzy, and the vamps took it as their cue. They all swarmed him and he went down in a tangle of arms, legs, and slashing, ripping fangs.

The last thing he heard was the fading echo of the Nereid's voice.
We don't have to die like this.

Keely saw Justice go down under what looked like hundreds of vampires and she fell to her knees, the gun falling from her nerveless fingers. Something fragile ripped wide-open in her chest, and she cried out in anguish.

Eleni sat up and leaned against her, throwing her arms around her in a fierce hug. “Don't cry, Keely. The water god is coming, but first Justice will make the pretty blue waterspouts.”

The child pressed something round and smooth into Keely's hand, and she automatically closed her fingers around it. A rock. Eleni was so traumatized, she was babbling nonsense and had given her a rock to comfort her. Keely didn't know whether to laugh or cry.

Then the full force of Justice's love swept into her from the rock, so powerful it permeated her glove, lifting her up and washing her away with the currents.

“I. Don't. Want. To. Die. Like. This,” Justice gritted out, as he ripped one of them off him by the jaw. The vamp's fangs took a chunk of skin with them, but at least that was one fewer. He smashed his elbow in the face of another, and suddenly his arms were—for just a moment—free.

He threw them up in the air and roared out a single word. A word in the ancient language of the Nereids. A word he didn't even know that he knew, but that had suddenly swelled in his heart and soul, dangerous and sharp and deadly.

The word called power to it and turned tangible as it left his mouth, hanging in the air above the place where he lay on the ground, dying.

Being murdered.

He watched, his life's blood draining out of him from so many, many wounds, as the word took shape and became real and raised in dark and terrible beauty the fearsome power of the universe.

A thundering boom shook the land and the trees and even the sky, and a shock wave visibly poured out from the word in concentric circles and turned the world to crystalline shades of blue and silver.

All around him and on top of him and even somehow underneath him, the vampires exploded, not into their usual acidic slime but into fountains of clear, pure water.

He raised his head with the last of his energy and looked around and saw that everywhere the same thing was happening. Miniature geysers of pure water sprang up wherever a vampire had stood. Last to go was Gultep'can himself, who screamed his defiance to the very end.

“Some grand gesture,” Justice said, his head thumping to the ground as his neck could no longer support the weight of it. He turned toward the small hill and saw Keely, his beloved Keely, glowing like a flame. She had her arms around Eleni, but she was starting down the hill toward him.

So they lived. They both lived. It was enough.

Justice smiled a little, full of regret but also content. He'd saved them.

It was enough.

Keely stood in awe as the vampires exploded, one after another, into beautiful whirlpools of silvery blue water. Justice had done it somehow. She knew it.

Then she saw him, lying on the ground, so bloody that it was impossible that he still lived. She started downhill, picking up pace until she was running, barely even noticing that Eleni ran behind her.

“Justice! Don't you dare die on me! You have to live. You have to live for me!” She kept yelling meaningless nonsense all the way down the hill, until finally she skidded to a stop in front of him and fell to the ground.

At first she thought he was dead, and pain knifed through her so intensely that she doubled over from the force of it. Then she saw his head move, just a fraction of a centimeter, but it was a movement.

“Please, please, please, come back to me,” she begged, stroking the top of his head, which seemed to be the only uninjured part of his entire body.

Alejandro ran up to them. “Is he—”

“No!” Keely shouted. “No, he is not. And don't you dare say it!”

“Keely, you should take Eleni back to the village,” Alejandro said, kindness and sympathy warm in his voice. “There is nothing we can do for him. That one gash is so deep, it must have cut into his lungs.”

“No. I won't leave him. You take Eleni back.” She kissed Eleni's forehead to reassure the girl, as much as she could be reassured after an experience like this. “I'll come back for you. But right now I must be with Justice so he's not alone.” Her voice broke and she hugged Eleni, her bitter tears falling into the girl's hair.

Alejandro spoke again, but somehow this time it was not Alejandro. Keely didn't know how she knew this, but she did. She jerked her head up to stare at Alejandro, who suddenly seemed to shine with silvery light.

“I CHOSE WELL WHEN I GIFTED MY SWORD TO JUSTICE,” thundered a voice that held all the power, glory, and mystery of the seas.

“Poseidon?” Keely knew. She'd heard that voice before, in her visions.

“YES, OBJECT READER. I AM THE SEA GOD WHO CLAIMS THIS WARRIOR AS MY OWN. KNOW ALL PRESENT THAT NOW THE SWORD THAT FULFILLED ITS DUTY SO WELL AT HIS HAND SHALL SERVE TO HEAL ITS WIELDER.”

The silvery light spread from Alejandro and formed an iridescent dome over Justice, Keely, and Eleni, and the icy cold of the ocean depths suddenly seared through her skin and bones. Eleni gasped and huddled closer to Keely, burying her face in Keely's shirt.

Justice's sword, lying nearby, lit up. The sigils on the blade glowed with a silvery fire so bright that they all had to shield their eyes. After long moments, the glare that filtered through Keely's eyelids faded and she dared to sneak a narrow-eyed glance.

The light was gone. Alejandro still stood frozen, unmoving, but the light was gone.

“I like it not that I nearly died, and my woman is already looking at another man,” Justice said, amusement in his husky tone.

She whipped her head around, almost afraid to look. What she saw made her cry out in wonder. Justice sat up, whole and uninjured. Even the blood that had coated him was gone.

“You . . . you . . . you—” she stuttered, then threw herself into his arms.

“That's more like it,” he said, then caught her lips in a soul-melting kiss. It was a kiss infused with heat and wonder and awe, and it lasted a very long time.

“SO,” the voice like thunder said, startling them out of their embrace. “YOU HAVE CHOSEN WELL IN YOUR WOMAN, BUT TELL HER TO KEEP HER HANDS OFF MY TRIDENT. SOME SECRETS ARE TOO VIOLENT FOR AN OBJECT READER TO EVER KNOW AND SURVIVE.”

Justice stood up, pulling Keely to her feet beside him, and he lifted Eleni into his arms. “What was it?” he asked Alejandro, who was not Alejandro. “Was it a test? After these hundreds of years of loyal service, you test me now and put my woman and these innocents in such great danger?”

“IT WAS NOT I WHO PUT THEM IN SUCH DANGER, BUT IT WAS FOR YOU TO PROTECT THEM. POSEIDON'S FURY IS MINE TO GIVE AND MINE TO RECLAIM, AND EVERY FIVE CENTURIES I DECIDE WHO SHALL HOLD IT AND PASS IT DOWN.”

The sea god's voice was haughty beyond arrogance, commanding beyond dispute. Keely supposed that, being a sea god, it came with the territory.

“Thank you,” she said, not knowing if it was allowed for her to talk to Poseidon, but needing to say it. “Thank you for his life.”

“YOU GAVE HIM HIS LIFE, DR. KEELY McDERMOTT OF THE LAND OF OHIO. I SIMPLY HEALED A FEW WOUNDS.”

Poseidon held up Alejandro's arms and glanced down at his body. “THIS ONE IS STRONG. I WOULD NOT HAVE MINDED HAVING ONE SUCH AS HE IN MY WARRIORS,” he said, and it was so odd to hear and see it that Keely almost laughed, but figured that might be some kind of blasphemy.

“ENOUGH. I MUST GO NOW,” Poseidon decreed. “BUT FIRST, ONE FINAL THING.”

He reached out with one of Alejandro's hands and touched Eleni's face. “YOU WILL GROW UP TO BE VERY WISE, YOUNGLING, AND A COUNSELOR TO KINGS. MIND THAT YOU REMEMBER THAT.”

She laughed and clapped. “Can I come play with the dolphins with you, Señor Sea God?”

Poseidon's laughter rang in the air. “MOST DEFINITELY, YOUNGLING. MOST DEFINITELY.”

Alejandro stumbled, then looked around wildly, raising his shotgun. “What? What happened? Where is he?”

Justice tightened his arm around Keely. “Now we get some rest, and then we get to work.”

“Work?” She had no idea what he was talking about.

“The Star, Keely. We must find the Star of Artemis and take it back to Atlantis.”

“The Star,” she repeated. “You know, I'd almost forgotten about it.”

Deep voices sounded from inside the temple, and they all reacted instantly, going for weapons. When Ven, Conlan, and Alaric appeared at the entrance, they were greeted by several shotguns and a sword pointed directly at them.

Keely smiled a little, remembering another surprise entrance. Turnabout was only fair play.

“We thought we'd lend a hand,” Ven said cheerfully. “But it looks like you've got things well under control.”

Alejandro, shotgun pointed at Conlan's head, glanced at Justice. “Do you know these men, or shall I propose another
barter
?”

Justice laughed. “No, my friend. These men are . . . my family.”

Alaric gave them that narrow-eyed stare. “Much more has happened here than is apparent at this time, I think.”

Conlan inclined his head. “I think you're right. Does anybody want to tell us what in the hells has been going on here?”

Justice and Keely started laughing like loons, and the three Atlanteans looked at them as though they were crazy.

“I'll tell you the story of San Bartolo and the league of extraordinarily vicious vampires,” Justice told his brothers and Alaric, when he could finally speak. “We'll have food, rest, and talk. And then we'll all come back here and find the Star.”

“The Star of Artemis is here? We will find it now,” Alaric commanded.

“Justice almost died,” Keely told him with some asperity. “The Star has been safely buried in that rock for thousands of years. One more night isn't going to hurt it.”

Alaric started to respond, but Conlan held up a hand. “No, she is right. At this time, I find that I would like to have a meal with my
brother
and his woman.”

Justice clenched his jaw and fierce emotion shone in his dark eyes, but Ven held up his hands in mock protest. “Oh, hells no, Brother, don't call her his woman.”