Jessica Andersen - Storm Kissed

“Help me!” she screamed as the maelstrom sucked her down, taking the other two with her into the nothingness.

Coatepec Mountain

Strike jerked at the sound of a female scream, audible even over the burr of shield magic and buzz-swords, the screams of the makol and the roar of the Nightkeepers’ magic. He looked wildly around, didn’t see the source, but then felt a sick surge in his magic followed by a stomach drop of epic proportions. Then he heard words: Help me!

It was Anna’s voice.

“Anna!” he shouted, and bolted toward the sound.

“No! Rabbit, help me!” Leah grabbed his arm, slowing his mad charge.

“It’s Anna! She needs me!” He tried to free himself, but then Rabbit got his other side and the two of them dragged him back against a stone pillar and pinned him there.

The screams died out; reality returned. And he realized that he had started to head out into the makol. Leah was plastered against his chest, looking up at him, her eyes asking in silent agony, Is this it? Is this where it ends?

His head was suddenly pounding. He couldn’t get enough air, couldn’t get control. He hated this, wanted it to fucking stop. And by all that was sacred, he didn’t want to die. He wanted to stay with Leah, with the Nightkeepers. Gods, please not now.

Wrapping his arms around Leah, he held her close, leaned into her. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean ... I’m fine.” He wasn’t fine; he was losing it. “It was just—”

It happened again without warning: a stomach drop, a surge, a skitter of his malfunctioning ’port magic. Son of a bitch. Bile soured the back of his throat. But there was something else now, he realized. Because for the first time, the heavy thud of his heart was echoed in a thrum of magic, a tingle in his bloodline mark.

Rabbit was moving in to help, but Strike held up a hand. “Wait. Hang on. There’s something . . .” He trailed off as it connected.

He had been dreaming that he had lived the massacre through his father’s eyes, had heard whispers that weren’t his. Then there were the odd power surges, strange lesions in his mind, and the ghostly connection that he could almost feel but Sasha couldn’t track . . . Because a healer couldn’t track the blood-links of her own line. Oh, holy shit. It had been a blood-link all along. Anna’s subconscious had reached out to him through their shared DNA, giving him part of her injury and taking part of his power in return. He hadn’t known it, but he’d been helping her heal. And now she was in trouble.

“I’ve got to go after her!”

“What?” Leah tightened her grip. “What’s going on? Talk to me, damn it!”

“It’s the Triad magic.” He gave her a quick, hard kiss as excitement burst inside him. “I love you. And I’ll be right back, I promise.” Then, trusting that she had his back, always and forever, even when she thought he was losing his everfrigging mind, he left his body behind and sent his consciousness into the magic, into the neverwhen of transport leading to the barrier. He went in without a destination, without forethought, diving after the tingle in his blood and leaping straight into the storm.

Gray-green lashed at him instantly, slamming him in one direction and then another, flipping his consciousness end-over-end. But he wasn’t alone—he glimpsed something yellow-gold trailing nearby, sent himself after it, suddenly feeling strong and sure, and completely in control of his power and himself.

The teleport line was tangled around someone. Several someones. He caught the end, reeled them in even as he was buffeted by the blurring force of uncontrolled’port magic. Anna was clinging to the string, but so were Reese and Lucius, their terror palpable. Jesus gods, what was going on here? Doesn’t matter. Get them out of here.

He could do that. He touched his magic—suddenly strong and pure and perfectly in control—and returned to his body, taking them with him.

As the gray-green whipped past, he fell into a waking vision.

Footsteps moved away behind the king, the sound echoing off stone and bloodied water as he turned to face the lava monster. And as he raised his weapon, his heart was heavy with the realization that he had been wrong all along.

The king’s greatest sacrifice wasn’t his mate’s life, after all. And it wasn’t his own life, either.

And suddenly, Strike knew what the ultimate sacrifice was meant to be.

Then air whoomped away and they materialized in the middle of the firefight, scaring the shit out of the others and sending Sven’s coyote skittering between his legs, growling. Leah jumped back and went for her gun, then checked herself as it registered that Anna, Lucius, and Reese were tangled together at Strike’s feet, gasping.

Jade gave a low cry and rushed to Lucius’s side as he lurched up and then stumbled on his bad leg, his crutch nowhere to be seen. The other magi looked shocked as hell but stayed at their posts, holding the shield and keeping the makol in check.

“Where the fuck did they come from?” Michael demanded as Sasha dropped down beside Anna, partly to check her over, partly to just hug her.

“They were pretty close to being lost for good in the barrier,” Strike answered, his voice breaking as his emotions threatened to overload from the weight of his father’s final revelation. But then, knowing the time for that would come, he focused on the here and now. He reached for Leah, caught her against him, and whispered into her hair, “It was Anna’s blood-link making me sick. We’re both okay now.”

She gave a glad cry and clung to him fiercely for a moment. “Thank the gods.” Her voice was low and fervent, her eyes wet. “But why are they here?”

“Because it’s a damn sight better than where they were.” Delayed reaction set in at the thought of how close the three of them had come to simply disappearing. Boom, gone. He dropped down beside Anna, balancing on his heels. “No offense, big sister, but what the hell were you thinking?”

Her eyes filled and she turned and clung to him, shuddering. “It was the only way,” she said. Her voice was nearly lost beneath the tumult of the battle, as the others fought to hold the makol line. But it was her voice. And that was her inside those eyes, for the first time in a long time. “I couldn’t get them all the way here,” she whispered against his neck. “I thought I could, but I lost the thread. And then I couldn’t find you.”

He held her tight. “That’s okay. I found you. But why did you try it?”

“The serpent needs help.”

“No!” Reese screamed. Strike’s head jerked up as she slammed her fists into the serpent shield, face etched with horror. Inside the temple, Iago rose over Dez’s motionless body with the serpent staff raised for a killing blow. “Dez!” she screamed. “No!”

Bruised, battered, dizzy with blood loss, and close to dead, Dez thought he had crossed the boundary, that he was having a last sweet fantasy of Reese’s amber-whiskey eyes locking on him, her hands reaching for him, her voice calling him.

Time seemed to slow for a second as he rasped through his bruised throat, “I’m sorry, sweetheart. So fucking sorry.” Sorry he hadn’t gotten it right the first time around for them, sorry this time had turned out to be too late. Sorry their timing always sucked.

Then he saw her mouth go round in a scream, time sped back up, and he knew it wasn’t a dream. She was there, reaching for him. Screaming his name even as another part of him whispered: Use me. I am and will always be a part of you.

A last spurt of energy flared through him. He had lost his knife and his muscles were quivering, but as Iago swung down, he lunged up, jamming his fist into the Xibalban’s solar plexus, holding the star demon so the pointed statuette protruded between his fingers. The statuette drove up and in as the serpent staff cracked into his shoulder. He felt sickening pain. But Iago, too, was hurt.