CASSIE
I let myself into the house after I’d worked a longer than usual shift at the coffee shop, and immediately wished I’d gone any place but home.
“Sam, this is the third night in a row. We have things we need to discuss, and you know it. I want you to come home.” Mom lowered her voice when she realized I’d walked into the house. “Now, Sam.” She hung up and tossed her cell phone onto the table, giving me her best the-parents-aren’t-fighting smile.
Her smile didn’t fool me. None of it fooled me. For the past couple of days, my parents had been in the middle of a war. It all started when Mom said Dad’s “alien foolishness” was at the point where he needed therapy or else. The fight intensified after he said he thought she should go back to teaching college English rather than running her “little side business.” When I’d heard that argument, it had surprised me. In the past, Dad had always been supportive of Mom. They’d never argued much, either. The dynamics of their relationship had changed after I’d been attacked and guilt became my companion. I thought what happened was my fault. If I’d only been more careful…if I hadn’t ventured out for a walk alone at the campsite…
I headed toward the stairs, planning to shower, and she called my name softly. “How was everything at the shop?”
Stopping, I gripped the end of the banister, lowering my head to hide my expression so I wouldn’t reveal the sadness. “You don’t have to pretend, okay? I know, Mom. You want me to tell me that everything’s fine between you and Dad, and that I have nothing to worry about.” Tired of tiptoeing around the subject, I said, “I get it. He stays at work later every day. You never laugh together. People grow apart.”
Her mouth pinched. “We’ll be fine. It’ll work out.”
“Maybe it shouldn’t, and then we can all stop walking on eggshells. Dad isn’t the same person he once was.” I let her see the weariness in my eyes. Relief burst through me from getting the thoughts I’d hidden for so long out in the open.
Her eyes widened at my outburst.
“I mean, if you’re both miserable…” I dug my fingernails into the wood. “I don’t want you staying together for my sake. I’m a big girl.”
“Sometimes I forget how grown up you really are,” she said with an I-blinked-and-my-daughter-became-a-woman expression.
A lump over our yesterdays that were now gone grew in my throat. I had hundreds of tears locked inside me over the brokenness of our family. Over the broken person I’d become since the attack. But like Mom and Dad, I pretended that we were doing okay. That everything was normal and sometimes, I got so sick and tired of all the faking it that I wanted to scream.
“I’m going to take a shower.” I left her standing at the foot of the stairs watching me. In my bedroom, I started gathering my clothes for the load of laundry I’d do after my shower. Staying busy helped keep my mind off things. I didn’t want my parents to split up, but sometimes it was the healthier option rather than trying to keep something sewn together when the seams were too frayed to save. I already knew that if they split, I was staying with Mom. No way could I tolerate living with my father.
As I pulled out a pair of pajamas I didn’t really like, my cell phone rang. I tucked the phone between my shoulder and ear and continued rummaging for something to wear. “Hello, Syd.”
“I’m coming over,” she said in a don’t-argue-with-me tone. “We need to talk.”
“I’m getting in the shower. Let yourself in the house.”
“Be there in ten.” She hung up.
She arrived not long after I’d showered and changed. I could hear her talking to my mom in her high-energy voice as I made my way into the kitchen. They were seated at the breakfast nook, and Mom was laughing at one of Sydney’s funny bad date stories. Sydney held her hands up. “Disgusting, right? He really said that.” Her laughter faded when she saw me. Casually swinging her legs around, she stood.
“We have homework to do,” I said, and Mom took the hint. She wandered off into the living room and seconds later noise from the television filled the silence. I led the way back to my room with Sydney at my heels. After I closed the door and sank onto the bed, she paced back and forth, barely containing her excitement.
“You’re going to think I’m losing it, and I’m okay with that judgment call all things considering. I would probably think the same thing about you if you were the one to even think what I’m about to say.”
“Syd,” I said, holding out my hands in a what’s-up gesture to halt her rambling.
“Okay.” She bit her nail, and that worried me. Syd never bit her nails. Plopping down beside me on the bed, she said, “It’s about the earthquakes. I think your dad is right. There were aliens left behind after the war, and they’re causing them.” Holding her arms open in a ta-da gesture she raised her eyebrows, waiting for me to respond.
I groaned, and threw myself backward, covering my face with my arm. “Oh, come on, Sydney. Aliens causing earthquakes?” After what I’d learned on the hologram, I couldn’t see the aliens doing anything to hurt our planet. Not when they’d fought hard to save it. I felt weirdly protective of Jason because of what I’d learned even though he was still an ass. I hadn’t heard from him since we’d broken into the warehouse two days ago.
She grabbed my hand and dragged me into an upright position. Shaking my shoulders, she said, “I’m serious. Look at this.” Taking out her phone, she swiped from one news site to another. “Earthquakes happened in Cane Creek, Washington, Monday and in San Marcos, Texas on Tuesday. Two in California, Wednesday, and three in Idaho today.”
“There have been a lot. I realize that.”
She tucked the phone away. “Haven’t you been mapping them?”
“Yeah, but you know that’s a hobby. It’s not scientific or anything.” I’d started mapping out the areas because I’d wondered if the fracking going on in some places had contributed to the quantity of earthquakes.
“You’re smart, Cassie. Like Einstein smart, and if anyone can figure out what’s going on, it’s you.”
I put my hand over my heart. “I can be brilliant if you think so.”
Sydney laughed, but sobered quickly. “Seriously. Look at your maps.”
“Fine. I’ll pull out my charts, but I guarantee you there isn’t going to be anything specific we’ll be able to see. The earthquakes are all random.”
“They’re caused by some sort of alien activity,” she said stubbornly.
I didn’t want to hear it. Because if what she said was true, that might mean that Jason and his family were tied in with it somehow. I covered my ears. “No more ‘aliens are behind everything’ in this house. It’s bad enough with Dad. Please don’t. I need you to be my oasis from crazy, okay?”
She started pacing, acting like she hadn’t heard me. “Dig out the charts.” Crossing in front of the mirror over my vanity area, she paused to fluff her hair, then met my eyes in the reflection. “I’m scared, and you know I don’t scare easily.”
“You’re never worried about aliens. What brought this on?”
“I caught a documentary on at this guy’s house.” She shook her head when I asked who it was. “That’s not important. What’s important is that there was a scientist on there who used to work at Area 51. He knew things. Like strange things.” She lowered her voice. “He said that there were still Ragespawn among us.”
I scooted forward off the bed, worried myself now. This didn’t sound like Sydney. She’d never been big on aliens or conspiracies or anything that wasn’t easily explained. Her seeing some guy talking about Ragespawn after me witnessing one was freaky. “I’ll get the charts.”
Her shoulders relaxed as I knelt beside my bed and dug out the wooden box. I lifted the lid and removed the white butcher block paper. Spreading it out across the floor, I anchored it flat using my sneakers at the top and bottom. “Each of the red lines is a fault line while the black dots symbolize where an earthquake has taken place.”
“They’re all near fault lines.”
“Exactly,” I said. “It’s natural for earthquakes to happen near fault lines and—” I stopped talking and gasped. I’d missed it. How had I missed it? The locations of the earthquakes were arranged so that when studied together, they created a design.
“I’ve seen that before. Where have I seen it?” Sydney chewed on her bottom lip.
Sure I was imagining things, I rubbed at my eyes, but the design didn’t change. “Impossible,” I whispered. My brain was reeling from what I was seeing. I backed away, trying to rationalize what was right in front of me.
“What?” Sydney demanded.
“The grouping of the earthquakes is in the design of the family crest of the Tazavorn royalty. The teacher showed us in history, remember?”
“Oh my God. You’re right.” Sydney rocked back on her heels. “The Tazavorn royalty. What does this mean?”
“I don’t know.” But I suspected. The royal crest was a clear message, a warning. And I bet Jason knew exactly what was behind all of this. It shouldn’t surprise me, shouldn’t make me mad, but it did.
“What about other countries besides the United States?” Sydney persisted.
“I don’t know!” I said, as I shoved my shoes away from the paper and hurriedly rolled it back up. I tapped it against my hand, trying to figure out what to do.
“We have to show this to your father.”
I battled the start of a panic attack. “No! You know how he is. Kill first, question later.”
Sydney looked puzzled. “But since your attack, you’ve never had a problem with the way he handles potential threats.”
That had been before Jason became my only way to keep Micah safe. “I’ll figure this out without Dad for now. You trust me?”
When she nodded, I said, “I’ll talk to someone I know who’s interested in alien studies. Maybe he knows someone who can help.”
“Who? Wait…never mind. I don’t want to know.” Sydney ran her shaking hands down the sides of her pants. “This stuff kind of freaks me out a little.”
“The earthquakes?”
“No, that alien design…like they’re gone and all, but what if they left behind a plan to destroy the Earth with these quakes?”
“I don’t think that’s it.” Hoping to ease her mind, I changed the subject. “How’s the assignment going with Brad?”
“Do. Not. Mention. Him. Ever.”
“That good, huh?”
“I’m allergic to stupidity, and I swear I break out in hives every time I’m around him. Too bad I didn’t get paired with Jason. He’s hot, and he’s got that whole vibe going on, you know what I mean?”
The memory of him protecting me first in the library, then from Carl flashed in my mind. Looking back, it made him seem a lot more heroic. He didn’t have to save either one of us. Maybe he’d done so because he really had a good heart in spite of what he said and the way he acted around me. No, that wasn’t it. He’d done so because he needed to use me. He’d told me himself. “He does have a vibe. A break-your-heart one.” I thought about the girls in our school who’d crushed on him over the years only to end up tossed aside.
She sighed. “Having your heart broken is a rite of passage and if you’re going to have it broken, you want it to be with a guy who’s hot.”
“That is seriously messed up advice.” I changed into jeans and my favorite rock band T-shirt. “I need to show this chart to the guy who might know what it’s about.”
“Tonight?”
I didn’t want to tell her about the sense of urgency humming through me because I had a feeling something bad was going to happen and it had to do with the earthquakes. I forced a smile. I hated lying to her again, but I was afraid what might happen if she knew about Jason. “Yes, my curiosity won’t let me sleep if I don’t.”
We headed down the stairs, and I popped into the living room. Since it wasn’t quite ten yet, it was early enough that Mom wouldn’t have a problem with me leaving. “I’m going out I’ll be back in a little while.” Mom didn’t even turn her attention away from the TV. She waved at me, and kept her gaze glued to the news discussion about the earthquakes.
“Relax,” Sydney said, reading my tension as we walked outside. “You’ll call me as soon as you find any answers?”
“If I find answers,” I said. “But I promise.”
“Okay…” She started to get into her car, then hesitated. “You seem different.”
“Different?”
“More like who you were before the attack. Stronger. More confident.”
That surprised me. “Really?”
“Yeah.”
I smiled. “That’s a good thing.”
“Does spending time with Jason have anything to do with it?”
I froze. For a second, panic rushed through me. “How did you know I was spending time with Jason?”
“Duh. The assignment.”
“Right. Sorry. I have a lot on my mind.”
That seemed to mollify her and she got in her car and left.
I waited to make sure she was gone, then backed my car onto the street.
I flexed my fingers on the steering wheel as I carefully eased around a bicycle lying halfway in the road. The neighbor’s kids were always forgetting to put them away at night.
I quietly fumed all the way to Jason’s place. He must have known about the earthquakes being alien related and he hadn’t said a word about it.
I turned the car onto his street and parked in front of his house. I could have called and talked to him, but I didn’t want to run the risk of anyone overhearing me. Hoping Carl wasn’t around and hoping if he was that Jason would step between us, I started up the walkway, then noticed Jason heading around the side of the house with a garbage bag. “Jason,” I hiss-whispered to get his attention, but he kept walking. Then I realized he had earbuds stuck in his ears.
I hurriedly followed him through a white gate, nearly jumping out of my skin when it slammed shut behind me. I stood still for a second to let my eyes adjust to the faint light casting across the yard.
“Cassie?” His voice was louder than usual.
I yelped in surprise and flung my arm out, catching my left one on a nearby rose bush.
“What are you doing here?” A scowl darkened his face. Jason took my hand and pulled me farther into the backyard until we were under the glow of the security light.
I dabbed at a thin trickle of blood from the thorns on a rosebush that had caught my arm. “Syd and I found something.” I handed him the chart. “You knew about this, didn’t you?”
“Knew what?” He unrolled it and glanced over it. “A map of the earthquakes. So?”
“Take a good look at what the locations of each of the earthquakes form as a whole.”
He stared at it for a few seconds; then his eyes widened. “The royal Tazavorn crest.” He studied the locations, and then reached out to place his hand over the thorn scratches on my arm. The places where the thorns cut me healed instantly.
Jerk or not, ego or not, every time the guy touched me, it made my body crave more. It was hard to focus on what was important when the desire to jump him kept cropping up every time I was around him. I must have let out a groan or something because he looked at me.
“What are you thinking?”
Yeah. Like I was going to tell him that.
“I was thinking about the crest,” I said with a straight face, hoping he couldn’t sense anything.
“What about it?”
“Is this is a message? A warning? Did your people leave behind a way to destroy the Earth? That was King Ide’s plan with the Night of Grief. Did he find another way to get it done?” I expected him to deny it, but his silence grew a ball of worry in the pit of my stomach. “Jason?”
He traced his finger across each of the lines I’d mapped out. “Not at all.” He smiled at me but the smile was phony. He was hiding something.
“You’re lying.” My mouth dried out, and I snatched the chart back. “If you know what’s going on you have to tell me. Now.”
“I don’t take orders from humans.” His expression hardened. “I don’t have to tell you anything.”
“I helped you with the artifact.”
“And I killed the Ragespawn that was tracking Micah.”
“Oh. I didn’t know. You didn’t tell me.”
“I wasn’t aware I needed to check in with you.” He crossed his arms. “You helped with the artifact, I took care of the Ragespawn. We’re even.”
“No, we’re not. I’m taking the bigger risk by not telling my father what you are. Any human who knows of an alien’s existence is—”
“Subject to the same penalties the alien is. I know the laws. So?”
I raised my voice. “It doesn’t bother you that helping you risks my life?”
“Helping you risked my life, but like I said, we’re even now and the mutual relationship we had is over. You return to your life and I return to mine.”
“No.”
“No?” His voice was a low growl. “Do you know what I can do to a human?”
I waved my hand. “You’re not going to hurt me.”
He rubbed his jaw. “Why am I not going to hurt you?”
“Because.” I poked my index finger hard in the center of his chest. “Underneath all your alien badass bluster, you don’t like hurting people.”
“Cassie, don’t—”
“No. You don’t. Tell me what you know.”
I thought I saw a grudging respect in his eyes for standing up to him but in the dark, I couldn’t be sure.
He ran his hand through his hair, then down the back of his neck. “When I put my hand on the floor in the library, I felt the vibrations of the Earth. They’re not the same as ordinary earthquakes.”
“I don’t understand.”
“In ordinary earthquakes, seismic waves cause the shaking you feel. The one I felt was caused by power. Extraordinary power.”
“What kind of power?”
“Alien power.”
I swallowed. “Then we have to find the root of it and stop them from happening. Do you know where to start?”
“No,” he said quickly. Too quickly.
He was lying again. I shook my head. “I want to trust you, but I can’t when you don’t tell me the truth.”
“I don’t care if you trust me or not. What you think of me doesn’t matter.” He took the chart. “You can’t keep this at your house because your father might find it.”
I snatched it back. “This is mine.” I backed up a step. “You know what I think? I think the Void has something to do with the earthquakes. Those supernatural prisons absorbed alien power for years. I’ll bet that power contained below the Earth’s surface is the problem.”
“Could be,” he said.
“I’m going to look around the area of the Void.”
His eyes narrowed. “You want to go near the most dangerous place on Earth?”
“Why does that make you angry?”
“I’m not angry. I’m cautious. That entire area is off-limits because it’s unstable.”
He didn’t want me close to it and I’d bet it had nothing to do with my safety. I tipped my head to the side, studying him. “You’re not cautious. You don’t have to be with your power. There’s something there you don’t want me to know about. Does it have anything to do with what was said on the hologram?” I explained about that.
“I want to see it,” he said quickly.
“It disappeared from my father’s computer after I watched it.” The disappearance added to the danger we were both now in. When my father realized it was gone, that would ratchet up his suspicions. “There was a lot of information about the Void on the hologram. I figured out it must be because there’s something important about it. Now, tell me the truth. Why you don’t want me to go there? Please.”
He hesitated as if he was fighting a silent battle with trusting me. Finally, he said, “According to the coordinates given by the artifact, I suspect our spaceship is somewhere around the Void, but I have to be careful. You have to be careful. If the government agents know that we’re looking around there, they’ll start searching, too. If the spaceship is there like I suspect, they could find it first and damage it trying to move it to their facility.”
“You’re not worried about the earthquakes?”
He shook his head.
“Well, I am. I have to tell my father that the Void is causing the earthquakes.” I started to leave.
“Cassie, wait. Will you please calm down?”
Why did guys say stupid things like “calm down?” It never calmed girls down. At least not me. All it did was make me angrier. “You want me to keep quiet about the earthquakes that affect millions of people for what reason? To protect a spaceship?”
“You need to leave this alone, Cassie. You’re messing with something that’s going to get you hurt or killed.” His ferocious expression softened. He lifted his hand toward my face, then abruptly lowered it. “I don’t want anything to happen to you.”
I inwardly rolled my eyes while trying to fight off the pheromone I suspected he was using. “Stop lying, stop trying to use your power on me, and back off. I’ll figure this out on my own. I don’t need you.”
He growled and the sound shocked me. It sounded animalistic, just like the sound I’d heard the night I’d gone camping. My courage evaporated. I stepped backward and my butt brushed against a bush.
“Stop looking at me like that. It makes me feel like a monster.” His deep voice was a mixture of irritation and exasperation.
I raised my hand to my cheek, absently feeling the scar. “I don’t need you,” I reiterated.”
He shot me a pissed off look. “Don’t make me prove exactly how badly you need me. If you go up there near the Void and get into trouble, I’d have to come and save you.”
“I’ve survived without you for this long,” I said, lifting my chin.
He moved whisper-close and I swallowed. There wasn’t enough oxygen. Every inch of my skin tingled.
“You need me,” his voice washed over me.
I breathed his scent in. He stared down at me, this powerful alien that could crush me and yet had said he’d come save me. “Why would I need you?”
“You’re being hunted.”
I hadn’t expected him to say that. The blood rushed from my face. “Hunted? You know that for sure now?”
“Yes. By the same aliens that were hunting Micah. I learned that the Ragespawn want the spaceship and they think you can lead them to it.” His smile was grim.
“If they find me… They’ll torture me until I tell them where I think it might be.”
He tipped his head back to look at the night sky. “Yep.” He looked back at me. “Please stay away from the Void.”
“I can’t. I have to go to the Void. I can’t explain why I feel like I have to… It’s like fate or something.” Expecting him to scoff or laugh the idea of fate off, I looked down at the ground.
“Oh,” he said.
I looked up. “You believe in fate?”
“I do.”
“Okay, then, since you’re right about the Void being dangerous, I’ll let you come with me. I guess we’re stuck with each other for a little while longer.”
He cupped his hand on the outer edge of his ear like he couldn’t hear me. “Did I hear the human know-it-all say I was right?”
“Every time we have a conversation, you—”
“Be quiet.” He looked off into the distance, his entire body stilling. Closing his eyes, he inhaled the wind.
All I could get from sniffing the air was the smell from a nearby pine tree and the lingering scent of someone’s dinner cooking.
He opened his eyes and they were changing colors.
“Danger?” I whispered.
“I can’t tell. Your perfume is masking it.” He took me by the arm and turned me, propelling me out of the gate. “Go home for now.”
“We should—”
That’s all I got out before one second I was standing there talking to him and the next, he’d picked me up and moved in a flash to my car and yanked open the door. “Something is close. Get in and get out of here. Now.”
Again the growl. His face darkened and his eyes were almost black.
I managed to get the key in the ignition on the second attempt. I shoved the gas pedal to the floor and the car zipped off toward the end of the street, hoping Jason would be safe.
JASON
There was a Ragespawn nearby. I could smell it. The hair on the back of my neck stood on end. I dropped to my haunches, ready to jump if I needed to. I had 20/20 vision as well as night vision in the dark. The Ragespawn didn’t have that ability. I breathed in and from a distance several feet away, a leaf crackled, settling deeper into the ground.
From the pressure of a foot standing on it. I kept my gaze trained on the trees on the other side of our backyard. A shadow separated itself, looking at my house, not yet seeing me, giving me time to see what human the creature had hosted in. It was dressed in a suit, white shirt and dark tie. A badge glinted from a belt loop. An agent.
Wanting the surprise of going on the offensive, I stepped into the circle of light cast by the streetlight, and faced him, He was two cars’ lengths away. I walked toward him, and the defensive side of my power kicked into high gear. The agent ran toward me, his lips pulled back over his teeth. When he drew close enough for me to see his narrow, reptilian pupils, he stopped.
I couldn’t risk any of the neighbors seeing a fight between the creature and me and coming out to investigate. The Ragespawn would turn on them and then the Alien Eradication and Defense Department would show up en masse. I had to draw him back into the shadows. I ran as hard as I could toward a gathering of trees close to our home with the Ragespawn giving chase. I could hear it panting behind me as if fought to catch up. As soon as I was sure no one could see us, I turned and raised my hands, letting a burst of power flow from the center of my palm toward the creature. The hit landed on the ground in front of his feet.
He stopped. “How did you know?” His voice was thick with the decades of hatred that had caused multiple wars between our species.
“I smelled you first, then I saw your pupils.”
He cursed. “My contacts. I knew I forgot something.”
I took a step backward as he advanced. “Which agency are you with? FBI?”
He laughed. “You wish. Those people are complacent in their belief, in their need to believe humans are alone on the Earth. I would never infiltrate there. I’m with the Alien Eradication and Defense Department.”
“How’d you’d do it?”
“Gullible humans. So busy looking outside the agency for aliens they failed to look within.” He blinked and pulled his lips back in a macabre smile. “I’m here for you. I know you’re the only one with enough power to fire up the ship. Take us there, and live.”
“You want me to take the remnant of your kind left after the war to our ship and hand it over?”
“Remnant?” He laughed, a harsh, jarring sound that raked across my nerves. “There were eight of you left behind and four of us. The humans’ nightmare dozen. Only we multiple faster than you can eradicate us.” He laughed again like he thought he was funny. “We outnumber you now.”
I kept my face impassive so he wouldn’t see my surprise. If the creature continued to host, they could gain the numbers they needed to create an army.
While he was talking, I directed another shot of power at him, catching him on the side. He snarled in rage and charged me. Drawing him closer, I let him get within arm’s reach. I fired as soon as he was close enough, and struck him in the abdomen. My energy ripped through his clothes, burrowing deep within his body, seeking out and destroying his organs.
His mouth gaped open in surprise. “You’re just a boy. How can you have such power?” Falling over onto his side, he clutched his wound. His eyes widened in horror when I knelt beside him and he let out a terrified scream. “You’re the Tazavorn mentioned in the ancient scrolls. ‘The stolen one.’ The one whose power is forged from the ancient realm of the ancestors.”
His words splashed over me like a bucket of ice water, chilling me to my soul. “What are you talking about?”
His skin began turning gray. “The root of all Tazavorn power was given to you at birth. I’ll bet you can absorb power from others, can’t you?” He gasped for breath. “Ask the thieves who raised you.”
Thieves who raised me? He was lying. Trying to mess with my head. I slammed my fist onto the ground beside his head. “Where are the others like you?”
“Where you least expect them and they’re watching you. Your family is going to die.” His lips curled into a mocking smile before he breathed his last.
I rocked back on my heels. Not sorry he was dead, but sorry I hadn’t been able to question him longer.
I searched his pockets, found a note, but didn’t take the time to read it. I was worried his scream might have alerted the neighbors and one of them would have called the police. I stuck the note in my pocket, then rose, and raced back to the house. When I burst through the door, it startled everyone. Dad leaped to his feet. “Jason?”
I doubled over and put my hands on my knees, trying to catch my breath. “I killed a Ragespawn. He’s by the gathering of trees to the side of the house.”
“We have to get rid of the body before the humans see it,” Carl said. He and Dad rushed out.
“What did it want?” Mom asked, nervously toying with her necklace. Her dark eyes held a mixture of fear and suspicion. Her normally sleek bob was in disarray as if she’d run her fingers through it. “Was it after you?”
“Yes.”
She bit her lip and glanced fearfully out the window.
“Why did he call me the ‘stolen one?’”
Gasping, she swung her attention back to me. She stammered, “I don’t know what it was talking about.”
There was no mistaking the guilt on her face. “He called you thieves.”
“Jason.” She stood and reached for me, but I held my hands up and took a step away.
“What am I?”
“Honey, you’re our son, that’s what you are.” Her voice dripped with concern. I didn’t believe her and held her gaze until she dropped hers to the floor.
Dad returned in the middle of our conversation.
“Carl is taking care of it.” He sent Mom a worried look. “The Ragespawn was with the Alien Eradication and Defense Department.”
“Do you think the others are there, too?” Mom asked.
“I don’t know. Maybe. We’ll warn Evonie and Eli.” Dad looked around the room. “We’re in defensive mode as of this moment.” He stopped talking as if just now recognizing the tension in the room.
“What is it?” he asked.
“The Ragespawn said I was the Tazavorn talked about in the ancient scrolls. The ‘stolen one.’ He said my power is forged from the ancient realm of the ancestors.”
Dad sighed. “Now is not the time—”
“Now is exactly the time,” I yelled. “What am I? Don’t say I’m your son.”
“Your mother and I have raised you from infancy. You are our son, but you are not our biological child. Your parents were descendents from the ancient realm.”
The foundation of my world was crumbling. Falling down around me, shaken in a personal earthquake. “What does that mean? Ancient realm?”
“The ancient realm existed long before any of the kings of our world. Your bloodline is one of courage and strength. Wisdom and honor.” He smiled and his eyes gleamed.
“Where are my real parents?”
“Your parents were killed. Slaughtered by a rebel Tazavorn faction as they left the hospital with you. I witnessed the attack. Saw your mother toss your baby carrier behind a car in the parking garage. I knew from the moment I saw your eyes what you were.”
My mother wrung her hands. “We felt as if we were chosen and it was—”
“Our duty and our honor to raise and protect one with such a purpose as yours,” Dad interrupted.
“Purpose?” I asked.
“As one born from the ancient realm, you are the keeper of the power. You have been given the ability to grant more or take what we have from any one of us. Your powers will continue to grow and someday, when you strip a Tazavorn of his or her power, you will be able to hold on to it for yourself.”
“That’s my purpose in life?” I said dully, still reeling from learning these weren’t my parents.
“No, being the keeper of power is your strength. Your purpose is to destroy every enemy planet and kill those who oppose us, including this one.”
“That’s my purpose. To be a killer of humans and other species?”
“Yes,” Mom said as if I should be excited by the idea. “You haven’t even scratched the surface of what you’re capable of.” Mom joined Dad and smiled up at him.
“I won’t do it,” I said. My words ricocheted around the room.
My parents stopped talking between themselves to look at me.
“I won’t destroy planets. I don’t care if they’re our enemies or not. I will not cause the destruction of entire species.”
Mom smiled. “Honey, you already have.”
My heart beat faster. “What are you talking about?”
She came closer and smoothed a lock of my hair. “Remember when you were a child and we used to take you on those camping trips and let you play with your power by firing it at the ground?”
“Yeah.”
“Those camping sites were built over the top of Voids. Your power went directly down into them and it’s too great for any of the Voids to contain. To protect itself, the Void began to tear into the Earth’s mantle.” Mom looked back at Dad again.
He nodded. “You set the earthquakes in motion, son.”