Alyssa Day: Atlantis Rising

Conlan held up a hand for silence. "I think it may be the vamps' front yard, in fact, if the sound of screaming is any indication."

He waited while they all strained to pick up on what his Atlantean hearing had already caught. Someone was being tortured.

And somebody else was doing a damn thorough job of it.

The instincts that had served him well for nearly three thousand years were telling Barrabas that something was wrong. He just couldn't figure out what .

He should have been well content. The Atlantean called Micah was bleeding on the floor in front of him, near death, and Barrabas could still taste Micah's blood in his mouth. Reisen hadn't found his way back to consciousness since Drakos had smashed his head into the wall.

And yet, a tiny niggling tremor of doubt snaked through him. He stared at Drakos, who gazed implacably back at him. The general had outlived his usefulness. No battle strategy, no matter how brilliant, was worth this constant suspicion.

Especially for one who was not even of his blood pride. Thinking of them made him reach out to them with his mind. Reassurance from his guards would go a long way toward…

There was no response.

Nothing in his mind but a blank space where his vanguard should be. He whipped his head around to find Drakos.

Who stood near the chamber door, smiling.

"Your reign is over, damned one," Drakos said. "Prepare to meet the future."

Before Barrabas could utter a sound, Drakos yanked the door open, and a swarm of warriors poured through. The one in front had hair and eyes as black as the deepest hell, and death was written on his face.

"I am Conlan of Atlantis, Barrabas," the warrior shouted out. "Prepare for your death!"

No, no mere warrior. Not with that regal air of command.

This must be the prince. Barrabas hissed, called out with every ounce of his being to Anubisa.

Come to me, my goddess! Your Atlanteans are here to recover the Trident I captured for you — I beg for your assistance .

With that, he sent another mental command, and every one of his blood pride asleep in their coffins in the room below him rose and began the rush to his aid.

"You think attacking at dawn is any detriment to a master vampire of my power, princeling? We are deep under the earth, blocked from the sun by tons of concrete!" he screamed. Then he dematerialized, laughing, right from under their Atlantean noses.

Conlan watched as Barrabas did exactly what he'd expected, and he slashed a hand down in a signal to Alaric. Alaric threw his arms into the air and called water with such torrential force that the walls themselves seemed to reel under the power of it.

Barrabas rematerialized, bouncing off one of the walls.

And Conlan laughed. "Didn't your goddess mention that Poseidon's power over the element of water is the light to your dark? We cannot kill you with the mortus desicana , for your undead tissues have no living fluid to surrender."

He unsheathed his sword. "But we can block you from the use of your power. Prepare to die, bloodsucker."

Barrabas pulled a sword of his own. "I don't think so, little boy. Didn't you take a moment to see what I did to your friends?"

He pointed to the far wall, and Conlan glanced over to the shadowy corner. Reisen hung by one wrist from a manacle chained to the wall, bloody and broken. Another warrior lay near him, in similar condition.

"Ven! To Reisen!"

As Ven, daggers unsheathed, ran across the room, a grinding noise in the floor underneath warned Conlan in time to leap to the side. A panel in the floor opened up, and a black wave of vampires rushed up and into the room.

Justice and Denal ran up to flank him, swords at the ready, and he heard Jack's full-throated roar from behind him. Then he was too busy to notice anything else, as five vamps headed straight for him, fangs and claws bared.

Riley! Get out! Get to safety!

Her voice came back to him immediately.

I think Poseidon promoted one of his pawns.

He tried to see over the warriors and vampires battling all around him, but couldn't see her. Desperation tore at the last shreds of his sanity. "To me, Warriors! For Atlantis!"

And he sliced the head off the vamp in front of him, trying to work his way through to Barrabas. "For Atlantis!"

Riley watched while the floor opened up a doorway from hell and devils came pouring through to attack Conlan. She held the gun out in front of her, but couldn't shoot. Everywhere she looked, vamps and warriors and freedom fighters were locked so closely in battle that she had no chance of a clear shot.

A second wave of vamps broke through from the corridor. Quinn had been right about Daniel, at least. He was fighting against the vamps, using their own tricks against them. She shuddered at the sight of his bloodied fangs ripping into yet another of them.

Alaric flashed into the space in front of her, pushing her and Quinn behind him and against the wall, as more of the vamps headed for them. Alaric threw out wave after wave of the energy bolts, but the vamps kept coming as fast as he could mow them down. One of them threw a dagger and Alaric leaned over to snatch it out of the air.

But it must have been a ploy of misdirection, because the vamp whipped a second dagger through the air on Alaric's other side, and it pierced Quinn in the thigh. Quinn screamed, and Alaric's attention jerked around to her, the sound distracting him.

Useless, trembling, Riley saw the vamp aim his sword at Alaric. She fired the gun, but missed him completely. Almost in slow motion, she watched the point of the blade drive deeply through Alaric's chest. He fell forward, onto Quinn, and Riley screamed again as the point of the sword, driven clear through Alaric's body, impaled her sister.

Heard Quinn's voice, weak, in her mind.

It's burning like acid, Riley. Poisoned, probably. If you've been touched by a god, now would be a good time to page him.

In front of her, she saw Jack transform in a roaring frenzy from man to tiger and tear into the vampires with teeth and claws. Conlan and Ven fought side by side in the midst of a dozen or more of them.

She didn't know what to do. Didn't know how to call a god. Didn't know magic or have powers or anything . She was a social worker, damnit. She stood there, sobbing, anguish and fury searing through her, and heat and power climbed through her, raged through her, until she thought she might detonate from it.

That was when the hand wrapped around her throat.

The pure evil of the voice rang through the room. "I have your woman, Atlantean. What value do you place on her life?"

All sound and motion stopped as if the world had frozen around him, and Conlan zoomed in on the source of the voice he most despised.

It was Anubisa, and she had her fingers on Riley's throat. Conlan's vision sheared a brilliant blue-green, then grayed out to almost black. As the vampires groveled and cringed their way to the sides of the room, genuflecting to their goddess, he saw Alaric lying on the floor on top of Quinn. A sword run through their bodies.

Their blood pooling on the floor.

He fought the howl of utter despair rising from his soul at the sight of Riley held helpless in the hands of a creature who could kill her with a breath.

"Leave her," he commanded. "She is nothing to me. Are you so weak you make war on human females now?"

She laughed, and the sound rang with pure malice, so dark and twisted that Riley moaned and tried to put her hands over her ears.

As Conlan watched, trickles of blood began to drip from Riley's nostrils and the corners of her eyes. A killing rage swept through him. A memory, a vow, burned through him.