Chapter 2
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C yan Lowell moved swiftly through the trees, heading toward the castle, trying to avoid the other visitor in this crazy world.
She didn’t know who was moving down there, didn’t know if they were friend, foe, or something else altogether, but she got a suspicion of someone hidden—or trying to stay hidden—and that made her immediately wary.
She’d sent out a probe to check the visitor’s energy, and what she’d sensed surprised her.
She hadn’t been able to get a lock on it, but she might know that energy.
Just not well enough to trust him,… at least not here in this scenario.
She’d sent a message to Terk months ago that she would be heading his direction soonish , but soonish had ended up taking a whole lot longer than she’d expected.
He hadn’t responded other than to just acknowledge that she was coming, was welcome at any time, and, for Terk, that was enough.
Most people would need more explanation.
Not him.
Terk read things, saw things, heard things, and understood things that most people couldn’t even begin to address.
She lived in his world but separate, at least until he’d sent out this damn Beacon call.
Now she’d followed the Beacon, curious to see what he was doing. Also wondering if he’d lost his mind…
They’d made a lot of enemies over the years, and she’d always been in the background, somebody off in the distance, sending him little warning messages, whenever she picked up something too real, too close, too much like the world she had left behind.
He often asked her to work with them, and she always refused, stating she was done with that lifestyle.
He had smiled in understanding and had pointed out that it didn’t matter what she wanted.
The world remained out there, and it wasn’t above taking prisoners.
Either she looked after herself and joined up with those who could help or she stood alone in a world that quickly would be divided between those who could and those who couldn’t.
At the time, she’d laughed, not wanting to acknowledge the truth of his statement. Now here she was, moving through the darkness, aware that someone was out there, hiding in the shadows, and he … She froze, then nodded.
It was a male, though that wasn’t a big surprise with the males dominating the energy-working world. What was a bit of a surprise was her recognition of his energy. Not a lot else resonated and, in this weird space, definitely not much was clear-cut.
The women in this special energy-working world were usually outnumbered by the men, two to one—at least that had been her experience.
Still, just because people had been gifted with these special abilities, it did not make them trustworthy.
And the men she’d met in her line of work?
Those with abilities were hunters, pure and simple.
As if by instinct they understood how much of an advantage they had over others, even those who could work energy.
Like so many men, they went for the jugular.
In most cases, they all had had tough experiences, with very little give or take in them.
So Cyan came to slowly understand Terk and to accept that part of him over time.
However, with Terk also came something trustworthy, an ethical standard that seemed lost in the greater world today.
Now, Cyan had obviously had a heavy history of her own tough experiences, usually where the world looked to be a stacked deck against her, with men as predators and the men with abilities as apex predators.
So who was in these woods with her?
She scanned her senses toward this huge mausoleum in front of her.
She knew Terk was there, likely behind the castle’s stone walls.
She also sensed young energy, as in very young, but the entire area around that castle quivered with energy that combined and joined into something completely unusual, hard to explain, and in many ways unbelievably powerful.
Also some powerful energies were outside the castle, ready to play against whatever Terk had created as a fortress.
He’d created it, but she didn’t know if he had any idea just how vulnerable it truly was.
She took several steps forward and ran into a wall of energy, literally a barrier or a blockade, some defense system. She almost smiled.
A test for her and for others? Or was this truly Terk’s way of keeping everybody out that he didn’t want in?
Send out the Beacon signal, bring the people to him, then run them through a series of tests to ensure only the right ones made it in?
She’d never seen anything quite like it, but that wasn’t enough to deter her.
She wondered whether a defense system was behind this barrier that would result in her getting blasted by something, or literally just Terk’s way of saying, Hey, you want in? You’ll have to work for it .
She was up for it either way.
And, with that decided, she closed her eyes and got to work.