Guardians of the Portals
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Authors: Nya Rawlyns
Tags: #science fiction, #dark urban fantasy, #science fiction romance, #action-adventure, #alternative history
GUARDIANS OF THE PORTALS
by
Nya Rawlyns
Lovers, soul-mates, pawns in a game where the risks, and the stakes, lay waste to lives...
For a thousand years the Althings guarded the Portals, insuring safe haven for those with gifts society deemed fearsome and threatening. But time and circumstance divided the Guardians, pitting brother against brother, father against son.
Caitlin is a shifter, transforming herself into disguises so complete even her father and brother cannot recognize her. In the modern day it is a dangerous, desirable gift.
Two Guardians, Trey the enforcer and Wolf the stalwart defender of his clan, fall prey to divided loyalties ... and the woman they each claim as their own.
They safeguard the innocent, the gifted, the feared ... in worlds outside time and space. But when greed and hatred breach the wall of secrets, two men stand against the tide, even if it means denying the woman they both desperately desire.
GUARDIANS OF THE PORTALS
Copyright ©2013 Nya Rawlyns
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First electronic edition published by PubRight
ISBN (eBook): 978-1-936827-99-2
Published in the United States of America with international distribution.
Cover Design by Sessha Batto
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without written permission from the copyright owner except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are the product of the authors’ imaginations or are used fictitiously and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events or locales is entirely coincidental.
DEDICATION
To all those who believe in dreams.
BOOK ONE
TREY
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Trey is the stranger who rescues the shape shifter, Caitlin, and in the process
learns a startling truth that will rock their worlds.
With two splinter groups intent on securing Caitlin’s gift for their own nefarious ends,
Trey will resort to the unthinkable to keep the woman safe.
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“S
it down Number Two.” Gothi Eirik glared at the young man pacing restlessly about the small chamber. “Trey, please, you are giving me a headache.”
The Gothi’s enforcer reluctantly pulled a rough-hewn stool toward the long table hogging most of the available space in the narrow quarters. He sat for a nanosecond, frowned and pushed away from the table, sending the stool to impact with a resounding thud against the log wall. He stalked instead to the Hearth Stone and adjusted the gas feed to a lower setting.
Turning to his liege, Trey spoke with a sneer, “A bit modern for your tastes, isn’t it Gothi?”
“Careful, boy, don’t test my patience today.” Once more the gothi waved his second-in-command to sit. As soon as Trey righted the stool and pulled it close to the table, Eirik launched into the reason he’d brought the young man to the Althing headquarters.
“You really screwed the pooch, Nephew. You not only lost the asset but you managed to alienate our last contact within Greyfalcon.” Eirik thumbed through a sheaf of parchment scrolls and extracted one. “Read this. Our final communiqué.” He flipped it across the table and continued, “That woman—she was our last hope.”
Trey glanced at the parchment but he had no need to read it. He let Gothi handle the machinations and conniving that passed for détente between and among the clans. As for the asset, he could recall those details with excruciating intimacy. His gut clenched at the memory as he’d watched horrified, fascinated, as the asset chose a path of valour he could no longer conceive.
“Well?” Eirik punctuated, with a rap of his enormous fist onto the table. Instead of a thud, the oddly dissonant clanging of metal reverbing off hard-surfaced walls echoed eerily in the chamber. “What part of ‘our last hope’ failed to register when I gave you this assignment?”
“A little Steven Spielberg, isn’t it, Uncle? Now, should I counter with ‘but there is one other’?”
“Damn it, Trey, I’m beginning to understand why Gunnarr beat the royal shit out of you so often. I never approved of his disciplinary methods but if you continue to tax me with your...”
The young man held up a hand to stem the tirade he knew almost by heart, having heard it more times than he could count. “And I will say it again, Uncle, it was out of my control. Your so-called asset had more courage than all of us combined. She took the honorable path. Something I doubt any of us is capable of now.”
“You do appreciate the fact that her
honor
, and her
courage
, will cost us. We could lose this one, Nephew. They grow stronger by the day while we slowly become ... what’s the word?”
“Obsolete? How about ‘archaic’? Yeah, that one hits the nail on the head, don’t you think? Listen, Uncle, if we don’t start taking control of the situation, doing what’s required, no matter the consequences, then we not only lose the skirmish, we lose the damn war.”
Eirik frowned at his nephew but could not fault him on his assessment of the current situation. It had been generations since they’d engaged so formidable an enemy. The Althing had become weak, ineffective and mundane. Desertions and natural attrition had stripped their ranks, leaving only a small cadre to protect and preserve the natural order.
“I dislike violence, you know this thing. Lindisfarne taught us a lesson we should ne’er forget.” Eirik shuddered at the memory. It marked the beginning of the end for amicable relations with his brother. Gunnarr’s scorched earth policy, along with the wanton slaying and enslaving of a helpless population, had turned history on its head and had sent his possessed brother onto a path of insurrection, destruction and conquest.
“Aye, but that was ancient history. Greyfalcon has evolved. They understand the marketplace, far better than we do. They also know how to use the assets, as you all are so fond of calling them.” Trey once more pushed away from the table and paced the room.
“Yes, I know all this, but if we don’t maintain the moral high ground, and protect the witches from the Clans...Why am I bothering to tell you this? You, of all of us, know that we stand for the gifted and the Portals. We always have. It is our legacy, our duty.”
Eirik grunted as he made to stand. His nephew appeared at his elbow and helped him to his feet, a small courtesy and mark of respect.
“Thank you, boy. My time grows short. You must away and deal with this mess you’ve created. I give you leave to do whatever you feel is necessary.” Though Eirik towered over his compact nephew, he felt frail, diminished, next to the raw power and strength of Trey.
“Are you sure, Uncle? Because once this starts, I
will
finish it.”
“No, one thing I can tell you with certainty, my boy, is that I am not sure. Turn off the hologram projector, if you would. I weary of the façade at times.”
Trey flicked a switch on the near wall and watched with interest as the log walls and the furniture constructs faded slowly, ghost images on the retinas, until nothing but green screens and recording devices on a long metal table remained visible in the small studio. He understood the necessity for the artifice, and he much appreciated the technology that allowed them to mask their presence as they violated time-space to do what his uncle and the Jarls so fondly called their “Good Works”. However, on this day, with only the two of them present, he did not grasp the necessity for the artificial staging.
“Shall I call for Astrid?” Eirik nodded
yes
and padded awkwardly toward the plate glass window overlooking the East River.
He turned back to glance at Trey as he fumbled for his smart phone. The young man had accorded him respect and a measure of penance by dressing for his visit as second-in-command with a soft deerskin, hip-length jerkin lined with sheep’s wool and belted with stiff ox hide. Eirik smiled to himself that the young man had foregone the traditional sheep’s wool leggings and sandals in favour of his normal jeans and Doc Marten steel-toed boots. He was not so ancient and stuck in his ways not to recognize the comforts of modern dress, though he preferred a more tailored look. Trey unhitched the device from the leather holder strapped to a loop on his jeans and tapped in the housekeeper’s number, then texted a quick message.
Eirik asked, “Is that a new toy?”
Trey nodded and grinned. “Just replaced my old one, still don’t have all the features down yet.”
Like all of the younglings under his wing, they loved technology and used it with abandon whenever deployed in this dimension. Back home, such devices rarely functioned for long as EMP perturbations wreaked havoc on electronics. That was the assessment offered by their scientists. Mercifully the same could be said for most modern weaponry, although the explanation for that rested more on the wards he’d carefully placed about the Portals to ensure that bit of legerdemain.
Trey would be the first to admit that he was addicted to modernity and its ever-evolving technology, and had been for some time. It helped safeguard the Portals without investing in a huge expenditure of manpower, which sadly, the Jarls could ill afford. Greyfalcon’s increasing presence in illegal activities, and their single-minded recruitment of the gifted for the planning and execution phases of their nefarious schemes, put untoward pressure on his peoples’ limited resources.
Trey joined his uncle at the expanse of plate glass. He stared at the impressive view with unabashed pleasure and murmured, “It’s nice here, isn’t it?”
“I guess so, my boy. I do miss the mountains and the fjords and the forests and I miss our old place, but it will do until we can rebuild.” Eirik sighed and turned toward the young man. “What will you do now? Do you have a plan?”
Trey barked a rough laugh, “Plan? Uncle, when did I
ever
have a plan, or even a clue?”
“Listen and listen well! If ever you needed what you call a clue,
now
is the time. I sense we approach a crossroads. What choices we make or what direction we choose will forever change our realities.” Eirik grasped Trey’s shoulders and stared hard into his nephew’s eyes. “Means and ends, boy. Make it right or we shall all suffer the consequences.”
Trey nodded solemnly, then bowed slightly from the waist and backed away. Eirik tracked his movements with laser intensity. When he reached the door, he called out, “Wait!”
“Yes, Gothi?”
“Where will you...?” he left the question hanging.
“Like I said, Uncle. There is one other. I’ll start there.”
Eirik turned back to the view, now cloaked with lowering gray mists, the cityscape shadowed to softness.
“Can you really do it, boy? Can you save us from my mistakes?” The words echoed with hollow intensity.
Eirik returned to the metal desk and sank gratefully onto the leather seat. He hadn’t been exaggerating when he said his time was short. He’d spent too long in this dimension, fighting the constant fires of discord set by his brother.
“Ah, Gunnarr. He is your son. Why do you torture him so?”
Leaning against the headrest he allowed himself the small pleasure of remembrance and contemplation, tiny gifts that served to bolster his flagging resolve. At his core he knew his people carried the heavy burden of safeguarding the Portals willingly. Their commitment never faltered, but they were few, their enemies many, and unmonitored gateways proliferated at an alarming rate, spreading their resources beyond thin into the realm of impossible.
His legacy of protecting a universe of virgin worlds rested on a tortured young man who’d made a decision that cost him his birthright and a family, but whose loyalties seemed solid, implacable. Yet the Jarls had doubts, as had he. If his nephew’s father ever discovered the extent of Trey’s gifts, not even their gods would be sufficient to protect him, and them, from the avaricious greed of the Greyfalcon head.
