The Relentless Warrior (7 page)

“My parents have a vacation house in Cuiaba,” I revealed. “It’s not exactly close
to any of those borders, but it’s more west than their main house in Sao Paulo or
their weekend home in Rio.”

“How many homes do your parents have in Brazil?” Talbott asked quickly.

“Three.” It was a simple word, a simple honest truth. But, in this moment I was probably
betraying my family. A family I had hoped was wayward but never evil. “Rio’s the third.
And they have a residence at Canesburry.”

“Your father was the South American Regent,” Talbott stated as fact not question.
He seemed to taste the words carefully, practiced them even while he expected them
not to fit.

“And he was not happy with the fall of Lucan.” Now I sounded defeated. I hadn’t spoken
with my parents since the summer after our infamous coup. They quietly disowned me
the night Eden and Avalon took power. They had been at the dinner, at the All Saints
Festival, just like everyone else. Only they fought for the crown not against it.
They fought with Lucan and against me- the son they had refused to acknowledge since
I first left Brazil with Avalon all those years ago. There were just a few bad feelings
between us.

We had gone our separate ways. They seemed to accept defeat, even if they didn’t like
it. And after making it perfectly clear they wanted nothing to do with their “traitor”
son anymore, left to return to the life they’d made for themselves in Brazil, until
about six months ago when my father tried to get in touch with me for the first time.
Now his calls came in regular instances, but I ignored them all.

Even without any power of his own, my father was a proud, strong-willed man. I thought
he meant to live out his remaining years in self-induced exile, but maybe he and my
mother had simply changed factions.

Talbott let out a long, growling sigh. “You couldn’t have thought of this before?”

“He’s my father. He’s been misguided his entire life, but not evil,” I bit out slowly.
“Not exactly the front runner for Terletov’s psychotic army in my mind.”

“I apologize. It might be the break we have been looking for. I did not mean to offend
you.”

“Forget about it, Talbott,” I ordered. “Just check on him. Go to his houses, see if
there’s anything weird going on.”
“Already on our way,” he promised.

“Maybe, while you’re down there,” I shot a fast glance to Kiran before braving my
next sentence, “Maybe check on Analisa.”

More weighted silence from Talbott’s end. “You don’t think she would…”

“No,” I cut in. “But she would be a target. If they were rounding up important Immortals.
She might be of some significance to them.”

“It’s not exactly public knowledge that she’s down here.”

“But my mother would know,” I argued. “My mother and every other politician’s wife.”

“Alright,” Talbott agreed without any more opinions. “We’ll talk tomorrow.”

“Tomorrow,” I echoed. And then we both disconnected.

Kiran was staring at me with a mixture of pure loathing anger and disbelief. I hoped
the anger was not directed entirely at me.

“Good work,” he finally relented. “Your parents. I wouldn’t have thought of them either.”

“I might be the biggest asshole of a son and they could be perfectly innocent,” I
shrugged, trying to play this off casually. Inside my blood was boiling with the need
to destroy something. This wasn’t right. My dad was a hard, egotistical racist, but
he did not condone genocide. And he wouldn’t bring the human race into this.

“It’s not the worst thing in the world to find out that your father is the devil himself,”
Kiran promised solemnly. “It would be much worse to wake up one day and realize you
turned out to be just like him.”

Kiran’s words fell heavily on my shoulders, like a physical weight I would have to
carry around with me every day forward. He was right, of course. If my father was
involved, I would be able to survive. I would be able to move on with my life, knowing
I was nothing like him.

I opened my mouth to say thank you. I was cut off by Olivia shrieking from across
the room and light as bright as the sun shooting out of her palm and into the marble
portico across the room. Centuries-old stone and debris scattered and crumbled to
the floor. The smell of gritty smoke and hot rock drifted through the air, and all
of our ears rang with the memory of the explosion.

“Impossible,” Kiran gasped.

“Apparently not,” I mumbled. Humans. Into Immortals. It didn’t make sense. This went
against God, science and the laws of nature.

Olivia had Magic. Terletov had created an Immortal out of humanity.

And that meant nobody was safe.

Chapter Six

Olivia

I turned around to face Jericho. Slowly, so slowly I had to talk myself into it inch
by freaking inch. I didn’t want to. I didn’t want to see the look in his eyes or the
expression on his face. If he felt sorry for me, I
knew
I would just die. If he was proud of me…. I thought I might get so angry I would
have to punch him in the face. I didn’t know how to feel about what just happened.

Truthfully, I thought I might be numb. I couldn’t distinguish my own emotions or differentiate
one of my thoughts from the other. My head was a whirlwind of chaos, but it was all
white noise. The only thing that ran clearly through my body was the after-effects
of what just happened. I’d gotten to the point where I’d felt like a two-liter of
Diet Coke that had been shaken and jostled until the fizz filled three-fourths of
the bottle. My entire body hummed and vibrated with palpable energy that did not belong
in my blood. And then someone removed my top and dropped an entire pack of Mentos
down the spout.

I exploded.

Everywhere.

I destroyed an entire wall of expensive-looking marble.

Me
. I did that. With something that now
lived
inside my body!

I really hoped they weren’t going to ask me to pay for it either. There was no way
I could explain that kind of expense to my parents, or any way in the realm of reality
where I would be able to cover it.
 

I met Jericho’s intense gaze and felt my stupid chin wobble. I wouldn’t cry. Not again!
I was stronger than this- tougher. So what? So what if I could blow things up with
Magic
? So what if I wasn’t human anymore! I mean, really, this was only temporary. I would
find a way to fix this. Jericho would find a way to fix me.

Our eyes collided with the force of a thousand things unsaid and my head moved back
and forth desperately, like I was coming out of a dream. I actually prayed this was
a dream. I pleaded silently with Jericho to confirm that this was some subconscious
apparition and I would wake up in my old bed, late for class with the smell of fresh
coffee drifting up from the kitchen downstairs. I begged him to declare that I hadn’t
just shot Magic out my fingertips like I had seen them do so many terrifying times,
like I hadn’t really just blown something to bits and pieces with only a thought and
wave of my hand.

But he didn’t do any of that.

“It’s going to be alright,” he promised in a calming voice from where he stood across
the room. He lifted his hands as if soothing a frightened animal and took a slow step
towards me. “You’re going to be fine.”

Something cracked inside my head.
Broken, I was broken
- and the dam of emotion I’d been holding back broke free. My body crumpled with the
weight of every emotion that had been pressing against me since the moment we were
abducted and I sunk to my knees in defeat. I covered my face with my hands, trying
to disguise my uncontrollable fear; my hair fell over my hands, curtaining me in.

Fragmented. Damaged.
Changed.

So different I didn’t even recognize myself anymore.

And that was what scared me the most.

I had been through a lot in my life- too much. And now this? The only thing I’d had
to hold myself together year after agonizing year had been me. Myself.

Sure, my family had always been supportive and my siblings were great. But at the
end of the day, the only thing that had gotten me through each and every day sane
and whole, was that I knew myself. I knew my strengths and I knew my weaknesses. I
knew how much I was capable of withstanding and I knew when I’d hit my limit so that
I could back off.

But I couldn’t back off now. I was stuck with this. And now I was a stranger in my
own body.

Jericho was at my side in an instant. I glanced up at him through a crack in my fingers
and watched him communicate silently with his friends.
 
He nodded his head toward the hallway and the King and Queen disappeared quietly through
the wide, brassy doors.

I appreciated that. I felt grateful that he knew me enough to get rid of any audience.
It was bad enough he wanted to stick around. I hated the idea of anyone else witnessing
me mid-nervous-breakdown. I was strong and independent sometimes… most of the time…
well, up until I’d been changed. I didn’t need an audience in the few moments I was
overwhelmed by circumstances.

The ballroom felt hugely empty now that just Jericho and I remained, but I was too
overwrought to care. I tucked my knees to my chest and gave into the trembling sobs.
I felt Jericho’s presence above me, hot, heavy and desperate to do something for me.

He squatted in front of me and slowly reached for my hands. Removing them with gentle
force, he held them in the space between us.

“Hey,” he whispered in a commanding voice that immediately grabbed my attention. I
expected gentleness or pity. I did not expect him to turn into an impatient alpha
male. Yet somehow his tone and behavior felt exactly right. “You’re okay. You did
a good thing, not a bad thing. You got the Magic to work. Don’t you feel better?”

My eyes lifted off the glossy floor to meet his as he hovered above me. I nodded slowly,
even while tears continued to stream down my face.

I did feel better, at least in the physiological sense. My body didn’t feel quite
as out of control and the suffocating buzz of electricity had softened.
 
My head seemed clearer, my vision more focused. Releasing the energy had done wonders
for my apoplectic heart that usually felt close to beating ferociously right out of
my chest.

“And it will get easier next time, and every time after. You won’t blow something
up every single time you use it, alright?” Jericho promised with that firm but patient
tone.

This time I disagreed with him by shaking my head vehemently. “I don’t want to use
it again,” I whispered. “I don’t want it to get easier. I just want it gone.”

“Liv, is this what’s going to break you?” he demanded. He tipped my chin up by gripping
it firmly between his thumb and forefinger so I was forced to look at him. His hold
was tight but when I obeyed his action, he swept his thumb across my bottom lip. The
anger and resentment dropped immediately and my heart lurched in my chest at the sweetness
of his gesture. “How long did you spend in that sick scientist’s captivity?”

“Two weeks,” I confessed with real, true tones of hatred and loathing. I was only
twenty-one but these feelings I had for Terletov, this abhorrence and disgust, was
the most real thing I’d ever felt in my entire life.

My body flashed hot and electrified. The force of that energy was back, buzzing in
my blood and ringing in my head. But at the same time I felt my old confidence flare
to life, too. I gulped in
lungfuls
of air and with it my resolve for revenge, my commitment to my sister.

“And were those two weeks easy?” he pressed.

“Jericho, you know they weren’t,” I glared at him. Now he was being cruel. “You know
he tortured us. You know he tried to kill us.”

I spit out the words, even while an ugly, sinister whisper echoed something else.
The truth was, he was doing the opposite of killing us. If these people were real,
if they were telling the truth… then Terletov had risked our lives in order to fuse
our blood with immortality. Whether we wanted it or not. But I couldn’t bring myself
to think those thoughts completely through.

At least not yet.

He quirked a challenging brow at me. “So? You fought then, why are you giving up now?”

My head lifted a little higher, my eyes hardened with a little more resolve. “I don’t
want this,” I hissed at him. As if I needed to remind him. I felt like I’d been saying
that constantly for hours. “I don’t want to be like you. I just want to be normal.
I want to be like I was before. And I want that for Ophelia, too. I didn’t ask for
this to happen to me-
to be changed
. I just want to go home!” Tears were falling again, but these weren’t the same self-pitying
tears as before, these were emoting frustration and determination.

I pulled my hands from his and balled them into fists in my lap. My chin quivered
again, but just for the smallest second before I grappled back control of my body
or as much control as I was given these days. Jericho watched me carefully as I pulled
myself together. Slowly, but determinedly, I reigned in my emotions, choosing confidence
over fear and strength over weakness.

I watched Jericho, too, as he sat before me, leaning in so that he consumed my entire
field of vision. His dark hair had fallen over his forehead, just brushing over his
equally dark eyebrows. His hair was that awkward length that was neither short, nor
long. I doubted he used product, but there was enough volume and unruliness about
it that I thought maybe he should use some. Not that his untamed hair diminished his
looks, but it did something to them, distorted them in a way that made my breath quicken
and my mouth go dry. His skin was olive-toned and perfect. His mouth was wide and
full; his smiles came easily enough but so did his frown. His body a flawless specimen
of male, testosterone and virility hovered perfectly toned in front of me. But it
was his hazel eyes that truly held my attention. That was the only way to describe
them. Sometimes they were so green they looked like cut emeralds. And sometimes they
were such a deep, rich chocolate they seemed to liquefy in front of me. And then at
other times they seemed to find the perfect balance of color between the two, a color
not even present in real life, a color so complicated and luminescent that it couldn’t
possibly be real.

That’s what color they were now. That indefinite blend of a priceless jewel and dark
coffee.
 

The color of his eyes, more than anything else, nudged something immovable inside
of me. I felt it crawl beneath my skin and fuse together with the other foreign entity
living inside there. This man was Magic. He was Immortal. And maybe those things had
something to do with the way he was looking at me. Or maybe he held the ability to
look into my eyes and see me in a way nobody else ever could. But he didn’t just look
at me. He devoured me with his gaze, with his presence, with his soul. He ate me up
in a way that consumed me entirely. And I just sat there, bared, naked and confused.

“I’m not giving up,” I swore with the confidence he had given me back. “I won’t.”

“Good,” he tried to smile, but it wobbled unsteadily across his mouth. His gaze stayed
in place, but his entire body tensed and jolted.

“Good,” I echoed. I jumped to my feet, feeling the atmosphere shift around us. This
wasn’t innocent anymore. We weren’t safe together right now. Trying to change the
subject, I looked down at him and demanded, “Show me what it does, Jericho. Show me
how to use it.”

“Alright,” he answered gruffly. He hopped up to his feet and held out a hand.

“And don’t you dare go easy on me.” I ignored him, not feeling able to touch him just
yet.

“I wouldn’t dream of it.” He shook his head but finally smiled at me.

And we were back to normal again. We were in familiar territory again. I exhaled a
staggering breath and bit down on my bottom lip. I felt like I’d dodged something
huge but I didn’t know exactly what that was yet.

And I couldn’t decide if I wanted to know.

We got to work. Immediately.

I was the kind of person that threw myself into everything. I had an unquenchable
need to ensure that I was the best at everything I did. I was a perfectionist to an
obnoxious degree, determined until I was blinded by my tasks and neurotic when it
came to learning something new. Most people found me extremely hard to handle, especially
when pitted against me.

I was ruthlessly competitive and I didn’t enjoy people standing in my way.

Running had always been an outlet for me. I liked the challenge of races. I liked
to challenge myself to meet better times. But it was also therapeutic for me, sometimes
even soothing. But most importantly, it was something I could do alone.
 
 

My grades and goals in life were what really drove me. And in the highly competitive
field of culinary arts, I needed to be the best at everything in every way or I would
fade into the background as a line cook at Denny’s. That was unacceptable.

And so was failing at this.
 
 

When the Magic didn’t instantly fly from my fingers again, I growled with frustration.
When the Magic didn’t obey my every whim and command, I blew something up just to
spite it. When Jericho didn’t explain something perfectly to me, I tried to turn my
Magic on him.

“You know I can be just as dangerous, if not more so,” he threatened after I tried
to start him on fire. Again.

I laughed loud and a bit out of control; there was an edge of hysteria to the sound.
Mostly because he was right. He was infinitely more dangerous to me than I was to
him. But still, he was trying to be funny and I appreciated that. An easy smile stretched
across his face and made him look boyish and sexy all at the same time.