Kindred of the Fallen (28 page)

“No time,” he said, opening the door. “I’ve taken too long as it is.” He kissed her good-bye and rushed down the steps of the veranda.

She closed the door, wondering who the person with the dark veil was and why she wanted to speak with Cyrus.

In the kitchen, Mrs. Carter had been prepping to make several meals, but gladly whipped up pancakes even though it was nearly lunchtime. Serenity doused them in syrup and enjoyed each bite. After washing the pancakes down with a glass of milk, she went to the fitness center.

Inside the gym, Abbadon, Cassian and Talus stood atop the tall poles in the middle of the building. Abbadon had shifted to a beautiful dark blue and flew around them, attacking with force. They practiced blocking and balancing on the poles, hopping from one to another, ducking and defending. A blow to Cassian’s chest knocked him off a pole. When he fell, his arm slammed into the wood and his face smacked against another pole. He got right back up and continued with practice, despite his obvious pain.

Abbadon wrapped up their session and flew to the front of the building. His wings retracted and his color lightened as he left. Talus and Cassian jumped down from the poles.

Cassian rubbed his arm. Big red marks lined his cheek and forehead.

“Can’t you heal yourself?” Serenity asked.

“I can but it takes concentration. It’s good for me to feel the pain sometimes. It’s not like I can call time out in the middle of a real fight so that I can heal myself.”

“Finally ready to get started?” Talus asked.

“Ready as I’ll ever be.”

Talus led her through the field of poles to the back. Interlocking foam mats formed a large cushiony area. They ran through some offensive and defensive drills at a slow pace.

“Cyrus is a good teacher,” Talus remarked.

“And I’m a quick learner.”

“We’ll see about that.” Talus walked to a side table and tossed Serenity a firm piece of u-shaped rubber.

Serenity sniffed the mouth guard, which reeked of antiseptic. At least it was sterile. “Why do I need this?” she asked, then slipped it in her mouth.

Talus gave her a backhanded slap, jarring her brain. A flash of white blurred her vision.

“Cassian can heal your body, but unfortunately he can’t make your teeth grow back,” Talus answered. Her eyes were bright and a smug smile curled the corners of her mouth.

Bristling with indignation, instinct fueled Serenity’s feet. She clenched her hand into a fist and lunged at Talus.

Silver bell mirth rang in the air as Serenity swung and hit nothing. Something struck her back and she fell to the ground. She sprang up from the mat, but as she whirled, Talus’s palm collided with her face. The sharp, salty taste of blood secreted in her mouth.

Serenity yanked out the mouth guard. “What in the hell are you doing?”

“The question is what
aren’t you
doing? The answer would be blocking.”

Choler welled up in Serenity, but she took a deep breath and forced it back down.

“Talus, maybe you should go easy,” Cassian said from the sidelines.

“I hit her open-handed,” Talus said. Then she turned to Serenity. “You need to learn to defend yourself. This is called practice. If you’re too weak to handle it, you can spar with Cassian, or”—she pursed her lips in a bitter smile—“you can go cry to Cyrus.”

So that was the game this bitch wanted to play. Serenity squared her shoulders and stuffed the mouth guard back in. There was only one way to deal with a bully, and it wasn’t tattletaling to the teacher.

Talus swung at Serenity but she blocked the hit. Talus kicked, and once again, Serenity countered. The drills continued until Talus yawned, then with lightning speed she socked Serenity in the chest.

With a grunt, Serenity fell backwards to the ground. Her head struck the mat and the air expelled from her lungs. Cassian raced over to her and put a hand on her forehead.

“Talus!” he chided, as his palm grew warm against her skin. “You should back off.”

Pain eased from Serenity’s body, but her mind reeled from the blow.

“Good grief! All right,” Talus shrieked, stalking away.

Serenity wobbled to an upright position.

“Better?” Cassian asked, smiling.

She nodded.

Talus chucked a Styrofoam helmet at her. “Is that enough padding?”

Biting the mouth guard, Serenity donned the helmet and cracked her knuckles. Talus took every cheap shot she could. Serenity bore it without a single whimper, which only seemed to agitate her new teacher. Talus narrowed her eyes and charged.

Instinctively, Serenity stepped back, but Talus flipped overhead. Serenity ducked and spun low, then swung, landing her first uppercut to Talus’s chin.

Surprise flitted across Talus’s face as she stumbled back. The flush of anger heated her cheeks to a bright pink. Her eyes grew wide, then hardened to slits.

An arm, solid as a stone bat, knocked Serenity to the floor. Crushing pain exploded in her chest. Holding her ribcage, she teetered to her feet and winced. Talus smirked.

Ire flared inside Serenity and the energy in her core sloshed and percolated in response. She wanted to wipe that smile right off Talus’s face. She wanted to have the power to make her feel small and weak and scared. She wanted to make that brat think twice about ever misusing her physical strength, guised as tutelage or otherwise.

Electricity ripped through Serenity and she pushed out from her core at Talus.

A coral colored wave flashed forward and blasted into Talus, hurling her backward. The vibrating wave swept her across the floor until she slammed into a wall. The wave dissipated and Talus shook her head from side to side, a dazed look on her face.

Cassian ran over to Serenity. “Holy crap!”

Serenity took out her mouth guard and grinned with satisfaction. She turned to face Cassian and glimpsed Abbadon. He leaned on one of the wooden poles, taking everything in, but revealed nothing on his face.

“How long has he been watching?” she asked Cassian.

“He snuck back in about half an hour ago,” Cassian whispered.

Talus wobbled over to them. “I think that’s enough for today.”

“Do you want me to heal you?” Cassian offered.

Talus swatted at him. “I’m fine.”

“I wish to speak with you. Wait for me in the meditation room,” Abbadon said to Talus. She nodded and tottered past the field of poles headed for the exit.

Serenity removed her helmet and Cassian took it.

“Your
ingenium
concerns me,” Abbadon said in an even tone. “I worry for the collective, but I also worry for you.”

She had expected a reprimand, not sincere words of concern to endear her to him.

“It’s imperative for me to make sure you’re properly trained. You’re an important part of our little unit,” he continued as she approached him.

“Are you saying you care about me as an individual, like a family member?”

“Yes, I believe I am.”

The trust and closeness she’d felt for him in her dreams resurfaced. Without thinking, she wrapped her arms around him in a hug. His body was rigid, as if he hadn’t been touched in an affectionate way in a long time. Slowly, he relaxed and hugged her back with one arm. His embrace lacked warmth, but once again to her surprise, he didn’t pull away. Maybe he was like her and grew up without siblings, leaving him unprepared to relate to others in a familial way.

As she drew back, he had a puzzled, disoriented expression. A simple hug had knocked him off balance.

“Were you an only child?” she mused as they headed out of the gym to the house.

“No.”

She waited for him to elaborate, but he didn’t. “How many siblings do you have?”

“I had a sister.”

“What happened to her?”

“
Sangre saevitas
.”

“Was she euthanized?”

“No,” he said the word sharply.

His tone made her glance at him. His face was a pristine slate, clean of any emotion.

“She was Blessed
.
A great source of pride for my family. We’d hoped she’d find her
kabashem
, be the one to redeem us. Losing her…” He bowed his head. “It was a long time ago.”

“I’m sorry.” She touched his arm.

“Now all of my hope rests with you and Cyrus. May you two achieve complete reunification soon and break the curse.”

“What is complete reunification? How do we break the curse?”

“When the souls of the Fallen were split, the Creator declared the curse could only be lifted by one of them. Their bodies had to turn to dust first. Once reborn they would have to overcome obstacles to find one another, to rise above the lust for power that had corrupted them, to sacrifice for love and reunify a single soul that had been severed. It has been prophesized that reunification begins as the body and anima and soul meld to one when you mate. Complete reunification manifests once a Blessed couple has a child, the first Kindred with a sanctified soul, the redeemer.”

Her gaze roamed over the green lawn to the fountain as she absorbed his answer, shock seeping in. “The only way to break the curse is to have a baby?”

He nodded.

She couldn’t be a mother. She’d rather drive nails into her fingertips. “Can’t we go on a quest, cross a lake of fire and slay a dragon to find some magic object to put an end to the curse instead?”

Abbadon contracted his eyebrows and tilted his head to the side.

“Never mind.” She loved Cyrus, but a baby wasn’t part of the equation. She had no idea how to be a mother. Her own had abandoned her, leaving her alone in the world.

Abbadon put his hand on her shoulder. “Today’s lesson will be strenuous. You should clear your mind to help you prepare. I need to speak with Talus first. You may take your time.”

Serenity went to her room and changed her clothes in a daze, still shell-shocked from what Abbadon had told her.

When she’d made love to Cyrus, entangled in the throes of pleasure, a quiet yearning to create life, to have a part of him growing in her belly bloomed every time like a conspiracy shared between her heart and soul. The feel of him releasing his essence always made her climax again, but once the fire died down and they cuddled, basking in the afterglow, she had dismissed the phantom feeling.

And she had coupled with Cyrus over and over again in the past two days with no form of protection. And he had conveniently neglected to mention the bit about knocking her up to save their race from extinction.

She rummaged through her stuff, looking for her diaphragm. She’d have to blow dust off the thing it’d been so long since she last used it. Evan was always working. Not that either of them seemed interested lately.

Where could it be? Had she even come across it as she unpacked? How could she have slept with him without protection?

Tearing through drawers and toiletry bags, the yellow case was nowhere to be found. She couldn’t share a bed with him and resist the temptation to make love with him. She’d give him a piece of her mind and flat out tell him why she didn’t want his large, hot hands to caress her or for him to be nestled deep inside of her.

Who was she fooling?

She needed his energy stream and body just as much as she needed air to breathe. She could ask him to wear a condom, but there was no way he’d ever agree. She’d have to start keeping track of her irregular cycles, find some online ovulation calculator and when she entered the danger zone, they’d have to stick to using fingers, mouths and tongues for pleasure.

What if her cycle differed from a human and she couldn’t use an online calculator to predict ovulation? She didn’t even know what it meant to be a Kindred female.

How could she possibly be a mother?

The drive to the oracle’s place was faster than estimated on the satellite navigation system, taking less than twenty minutes. The apartment building stuck out as there weren’t many in Mamaroneck. Odd the oracle had chosen to live so close to Valhalla. He wanted to dismiss it as coincidence, to quell the strange sense of foreboding rising inside of him, but he knew better.

Ptolemy, one of his warriors sworn to protect Kindred from exposure to humanity and to euthanize those afflicted with blood rage or the dark veil—a
vadeletor
—stood guard outside of the apartment door. They grasped each other’s forearms in greeting, then Ptolemy opened the door and followed Cyrus inside.

Hardwood floors creaked when Cyrus entered to find the rest of his team standing around, grim expressions hung on their faces. The air was stale and dank.

The main room had been cleared of furniture. Twelve symbols of the Fallen were painted in dark brush strokes on the white walls. His birthmark, the symbol he shared with Serenity, had been circled in red, but one mark was missing.

“Her name is Ereba,” Spero said, pointing to a thin female in the corner.

Draped in red, silky, gauze-like material, she rocked back and forth, rubbing her arms over her legs. Small silver fragments scattered throughout the material of her dress glinted in the light that peeked through the curtains.