He was unresponsive. His face still. That presence she’d always equated to a force of nature dimmed. It was shuttered. Sleeping.
He was gone.
Kira felt numb as she looked up at Elise. “What did you do? He’s my Raider.”
Elise shot Graydon. She’d taken him from Kira.
“ELISE, WHAT DID YOU DO?”
Tears welled in Elise’s eyes as she lifted the sleeper and pointed it at Kira again. “What was necessary.”
The world slowed to a crawl, Kira not moving. A part of her unable to believe Elise would pull the trigger even after what she’d done to Graydon.
The wanderer appeared out of nowhere, grabbing Elise’s arm to yank it upwards. The sleeper discharged into the ceiling.
And the world started moving again.
Kira was up and across the platform in seconds. Her fist collided with Elise’s temple as she turned to fight off the wanderer.
Elise dropped.
“Why did you do that?” Kira asked Elise’s unconscious body.
Elise didn’t answer.
The wanderer took a step back, his gaze on the bridge.
“Are you here to try your hand?” Kira asked Aeron where he waited behind her.
Her primus moved below her skin, the symbols that harkened its rise appearing and disappearing from her skin as the Mea’Ave drained it away from her.
“It’s tempting. But no, I’m quite content to return to my cage.”
Kira finally looked at him. “Why?”
Aeron’s face was contemplative as he considered Elise’s sprawled form. “Let’s just say I think you have a better chance of freeing our future than her.”
“Is that right?”
Aeron’s gaze was calm. “I guess we’ll see.”
Or Kira could kill him.
Things would be so much simpler if she did. No more questioning whether she’d been right to view them as an enemy for all these years. None of that pesky empathy that might one day cause her death when she hesitated a second too long.
Aeron tipped his chin at the sphere. “What are you going to do about that?”
The sphere pulsed from the tiny streams of manifested ki feeding it. The pressure in the room built as power flooded the space.
Cracks ran through the chrysalis as what lay inside began to push its way forth.
The moat of water surrounding the platform frothed as something large moved beneath its surface. Several somethings, Kira realized as bright sparks registered in her consciousness.
Kira didn’t move as three lu-ong surged up from the channel of water she would have sworn was much too shallow to accommodate their large bodies.
There was a depth of wisdom in the lu-ongs’ gazes that hinted at the immense span of years they had lived. Resembling humanity’s myths of eastern dragons, the lu-ong possessed a serpentine body. A crest decorated the area around heads that were more birdlike than dragon. Horns and long whiskers trailed from their snouts completing the image.
Of the three, Kira only recognized the big one in the middle. He had a scar along one side of his jaw that trailed over his snout. His crest and whiskers were made up of the colors of dawn. His scales as black of night.
