Sun
The scent of night-blooming jasmine permeated the evening air as I stepped into the King’s Garden. I stood for a moment, letting the surroundings wrap me in comforting arms. My father’s retreat had been one of my favorite places after settling outside Nashville, but tonight its magic seemed far away. The last twelve hours had been vile, terrible in a way I hadn’t experienced in a millennium. Rage and despair still banged a harsh rhythm against my rib cage, refusing to settle—not that they would, not for a long time. But the arrangements for Thomas had been finalized, and I could no longer wait to speak to Solomon. I had to convince my king of the need to act.
That need pulled me forward along paths lined by flowers and grasses luminous with the moon’s barely existent glow. I focused on my boots, on the close-cropped grass cushioning my steps, anything but what I would say. What I would have to do if my father refused to bend.
I rounded the turn into the central courtyard. My gaze fell on my father, and I stopped, taking a long look at the male who had led the Archai for hundreds of years before I was born. King Solomon sat on a bench to one side, his gaze concentrated on the phoenix statue spraying water into the air in the center of the quiet circle. Hair now silver with age fell back from a face that could easily have passed for fifty, not the fifteen hundred years my father had seen since birth. Rainbow eyes flashed in the dark, matching my own. A king of dignity, power, discipline. Courage.
At one time he had been all those things. Now…
Taking a deep, heaving breath, I moved into the heart of the garden.
Solomon turned his regal head and speared me with a knowing gaze. I refused to slow, refused to cow. I had not bowed for Solomon since the night Arik had sent his human with a message, nor would I now. Instead I stood, shoulders back, spine rigid, as rigid as the will of my father.
Solomon’s body went tight. “You brace for conflict, my son. Why?”
Solomon knew; I had no doubt. Would I develop a taste for these games when I took the throne? I sincerely hoped not.
I let out my breath as I settled into the seat beside him without invitation. The trickling water gave me focus when my tongue stuck to the roof of my mouth. Why had it come to this? In all my long years of service to my people, I had refused my father nothing, yet here we were, at the crossroads of our past and future, and the outcome, I feared, was inevitable. My continued loyalty to my father king would mean my people’s death.
I knew which road I must take.
“The pyre is prepared.” Another breath. I turned to meet Solomon’s eyes. “I must tell the clan what happened to him.”
Silver brows rose. “You will tell them nothing. I gave my orders regarding this business; they did not change with the loss of one warrior.”
Agony forced my eyes to close briefly. I’d hoped, in vain, that my father would honor Thomas with the truth. “So you would let our people believe he died for no reason, just some careless act of his own making? Fate, perhaps? You would bury both Thomas and the need for justice?”
The king shrugged, the action stiff on his dignified frame. “Justice is overrated. The clan will believe the word of their king.”
“If you believe that, you don’t know your people anymore.” Tension pushed me to my feet. “Not only should the people know, they must know. War is inevitable. We must prepare if we hope to give our people any chance at survival. The battle began here”—I said, gesturing behind me to the door that led to our clan, to Thomas’s memorial pyre—“and if we refuse to stand, we guarantee our failure and the extinction of our people.” Believing anything else bordered on delusional. “We go to war.”
Solomon stared up at me, white-lipped with anger. “No, we do not. Our people need peace.”
“They need peace,” I agreed, “but they—we—can no longer ignore the greatest threat to that peace. Not if we want to keep it.”
Something in my tone must’ve alerted Solomon, because the king’s eyes narrowed, searching my face. Those phoenix eyes demanded confession, demanded to know who the stranger was standing before him. Demanded submission. I resisted. The tinkling of the water filled the air, at odds with the tension as our strong wills clashed, each seeking the upper hand. I refused to give in. I knew what was right, damn it! I’d seen with my own eyes what the Anigma were capable of. Ignoring them was no longer an option.
Solomon rose to face me, body taut with the same determination he’d displayed in the Warrior’s Council weeks earlier. “What have you done?”
I felt my mind opening, felt the power of the king’s phoenix ripping into my depths. I relaxed, letting Solomon in, letting him see everything.
“You defied me!” Fury trembled in every syllable.
I kept my head up, unbowed. “Yes, I did. For very good reason.” I closed my eyes, drew up the memories of the past night, and for the first time ever, unleashed my own power, forcing the images into my stubborn king’s mind.
Solomon gasped. Resistance was automatic but futile. I would not back down. Thomas deserved better. Our people deserved better.
“You will watch, Father,” I demanded, clamping a hand on the male’s forearm. He would not escape the truth. “Stop this foolishness and listen.”
Staring into Solomon’s eyes, I pushed memories into his mind: Thomas’s last agonizing moments. The identity of the one who had murdered him, the same shifter who had betrayed us so long ago. Baer’s refusal to cooperate and the things I and James had done to change his mind. I shared the scent of burning flesh, the howls of agony, the despair when I realized how far we would have to go. And I shared what it had taken to loosen the werewolf’s tongue, every sick, ugly moment. Through it all Solomon stood rigid, unyielding, his fury hot under my grip.
Sweat dripped down the shifter’s battered face as I circled behind him. “How do the Anigma find the women?”
“Maddox gives each lieutenant a list, all females that have the possibility of being triggered. Some from headquarters, some…I don’t know how he finds them. My pack does not hunt the females.” A sob escaped as James brought a hot knife toward the strapped hand of Baer’s brother, Beckan. The youngest of their pack. The one they all looked out for. The only one still alive except Baer. The older werewolf would do anything to protect his sibling, as we’d proven in the past half hour. “I don’t know how they find them, I don’t! Please, stop. Please!”
“How does Maddox find them?”
“I don’t know!”
Slice. Beckan howled in agony as his pinky dropped to the floor.
Baer’s words rose to a shout. “I don’t know! I don’t know! I don’t know!”
I stepped in front of Baer. “How many have you changed?” I asked.
Gaze refusing to leave his brother, Baer’s voice quivered with fear for his pack mate. “We do not. We only convert the males.”
“How many?”
Baer shook his head. “Thousands.”
“How many females has Maddox collected?”
“For himself? Fifteen? Twenty?”
“Every female they hunted was triggered?”
Sick inevitability filled Baer’s face. “No.”
“What happens if they don’t have Archai genes?”
“H-he orders them killed.”
I stepped to the side and watched as, with deliberation, James placed his hand on top of the young werewolf’s injured one and pressed down. Amid the screams of our victim, I asked, “How many did he kill?”
Baer turned his head and threw up, but not before I and the others received his broadcasted thoughts—memories, more like, of Anigma soldiers on the hunt, of female after female after female, each defenseless, terrified, torn apart, raped, dead. Baer had not participated, but he had seen, had heard the stories, and he shared everything in that single telepathic blast. Cale hunched in the corner, the sound of gagging clear, and I had to fight the urge to join him.
God of the Heavens, how could any male of honor do such things to the helpless?
“They have no honor,” Solomon said aloud, voice heavy with resignation, “just as their ancestors before them.”
I bowed my head in agreement, though the knowledge in no way lessened the horror of what I’d seen and done. I broke off the memory, my gut churning once more.
“The females Maddox turns over to Anigma headquarters are shipped to a central location. He keeps as many as he ships. Though the Anigma soldier has never seen the females Maddox holds, he knows Maddox is training the psychs as weapons. Somehow the Anigma have identified females who carry Archai genes, are triggering them and using them to build an army. That army could only serve one purpose.” War.
And that war would bring the Anigma full force into our territory if Arik’s suggestion of a coup attempt was correct. My people barely stood a chance against Maddox; what chance did we have if we were forced to fight on two fronts?
“No!” Solomon leaned forward, a cobra draining the will of his prey with mesmerizing eyes. “Look at you! Look at what you have already become, what you’ve done, all for a war. You think I do not know what war is? That I have not lived it? I have—a thousand years ago, and every night since in my dreams.” He brought a white-knuckled fist up to pound his chest, the curved talons of his nails ripping the delicate silk of his royal robe. “I know! The Great War decimated us, not just our people but our souls. Our homes were destroyed. Our people were split in two. We cannot bear the cost of another devastating blow.”
“And what of the cost to others?” I let my voice rise with my blooming rage. “What of the women, the dead? We have been told our entire lives that the Anigma were scattered to the four winds, no longer a concern. What of our people who travel in this world without warning that evil is not only present but organized, a formidable force? Will we do nothing? Will we not uphold the honor for which we were born, to stand against the Anigma at all costs, all costs, that our people would live in peace?”
“We have peace.”
“For how long?” I shouted. “We cannot simply bury our heads and hope this blows over. That is cowardice, and the only thing it will gain us is more death.”
Solomon roared, rage setting his phoenix eyes ablaze, but it was the fear lurking in their depths that told the true story. The king had lived through the first war between the Archai and Anigma, had seen things I was certain I never wanted to see, had probably done things far worse than I had tonight in the name of keeping our people safe. War brought death and destruction. I knew that. But the cost was no excuse for running away.
Thomas’s face rose in my thoughts, his final meeting of my eyes. The young warrior would have paid the price of his life all over again to protect our people. I would also pay the price. So would my council. My race was worth it.
And so I stood strong, unwavering in the face of my father’s fury. The time for argument, for sneaking around was at an end. It was time to bring this fight to our people, with or without my king’s permission.
Solomon went silent, staring into my eyes. His fear increased, the stink of it coating my sinuses. The knowledge of his own weakness fed the king’s anger. He drew on his animal, his deep red wings flashing out in a blatant display of power. Still I remained unmoved. Unbending.
“I command you to silence,” the king roared. “Defy me, and you will suffer banishment from all Archai clans.”
Banishment. Every shifter’s greatest fear. Living forever alone was a far worse fate than beheading—our animals demanded community, thrived on the protection of the weak and the strength in numbers. I had served our people for nearly a thousand years, and my father would throw it all away to preserve a dying vision of a dying world. Pain seared my soul, pain I locked carefully away as I faced Solomon unflinchingly, defiance quivering through the heavy dread weighing down my body.
And spoke two simple words: “Try it.”
Lightning flashed in the eyes that were twin to my own. Solomon turned his back on his only son and stalked away, spine rigid, refusing to give even an inch. But as he passed into the entry that would take him to his throne room, I watched his shoulders fall, his body bow, and knew in that moment that I had lost my father forever.