Interion (The Jupiter Chronicles #1)

Prologue

A heavy silence inhabited the tunnels beneath the city.

The kind of cold, suffocating silence that seeps into children's dreams and tears them from their beds screaming for their parents.

There, in those tunnels, the stillness was as horrifying as death's shuffling gait, and not even the hungriest, most desperate rats ventured into that place.

It covered every millimeter of the filthy walls and possessed every molecule of the dense air; it was a void so black that beings from other dimensions sensed its rot and were tempted to crawl toward it.

Everything and nothing were lost in that silence, like a black hole draining the life around it, a cancer living in the depths of civilization and threatening to destroy the world.

Then the sound of hurried footsteps shattered the sepulchral stillness, and in the darkness, a woman ran past, splashing fetid water in all directions.

Her young heart pounded frantically in her chest as she felt her way toward new paths.

Ravena was fleeing, and as surely as dawn would come, she knew she would die that night.

She was searching for something, but her face bore the wild desperation of someone being cornered.

If she stopped for even a minute, she would see him on her trail: a man in a red and black uniform. The same as hers. But at some point in the last twenty-four hours, she had ceased being his ally and become the target of an execution order.

“Why?!”

The man spoke inside her head, nearly splitting her skull in two. They shared the same gift, but Ravena trembled whenever Serguei spoke in her mind. His power was on another level.

“I didn't betray our people,” she shouted mentally. “I'm saving us!”

“You must be joking. Because of you, our people are surrounded by the Interian Army. Out there, swords are pointed at every descendant heart. How is that saving anyone?”

“Our people don't need to stay in Interion. There's a safe place for all of us…”

“At what price?!” The warrior's cry echoed through her bones. “What was the point of every battle, every victory, and every life lost if it all ends here? What good is a safe place for our people when you've condemned us to death?”

“You're wrong! This isn't the end—it's the beginning. The dawn of the descendants begins now!”

Ravena kept running through the labyrinth of tunnels, needing to buy time to find what she was looking for. But how could she find something that didn't want to be found? Her hands groped along the sticky walls, and with each turn, she stumbled on the uneven rocky floor.

“Why?!” he demanded again. The image of Interion's throne replayed in his mind. The king's body abandoned in a pool of blood, his head resting on the scarlet throne seat, the royal guard dismembered and arranged around it like art on display. It was an assassin's work—Ravena's work.

“You're not just a traitor to Interion—you've become a traitor to your own people. You betrayed me.”

Serguei's hands clenched into fists, and pain grew where his heart should be, as if an abyss had opened in his chest. He wanted to scream, curse, and damn all the gods for being forced into such horror.

“We can create a different world, Serguei. We can…”

“Enough lies!” He drove his psychic claws into Ravena's mental barrier, trying to ignore the emotions threatening to overwhelm him.

A scream was stifled in the darkness. The woman's protections were crumbling under the force of Serguei's power, but she kept running. She needed to hold on a little longer.

“You know not everything was a lie. I always loved you—none of that was an illusion,” Ravena murmured. She didn't care about the rest, as long as she made him understand this.

“One more sweet lie.” Serguei laughed bitterly at himself, feeling foolish. A fool who, for love, had been made a pawn in a game he didn't know how to win.

A tear ran down Ravena's face, making her flinch at the hurt that crossed the mental barrier.

In that moment, she rounded another corner and heard a waterfall.

She quickened her steps toward the sound and saw light ahead.

She decided not to respond to the man—after all, her objective was complete: there really was a fragment here.

Ravena entered the gleaming cavern, its walls covered with white, irregular crystals.

At the center, she saw a spring of crystal-clear water, a wide, well-lit pool.

At the bottom, she spotted the green fragment she was looking for.

Her duty was to send the location's coordinates once she found it.

Taking a deep breath, she organized her thoughts like a letter.

But when she opened her mind to send it, her gift hit an invisible wall.

“What the fuck is this?!”

“Did you really think I’d leave your mind free after what you did?” Serguei demanded, his voice dripping with revulsion as he walked slowly into the cavern. Despite the disgusted tone, his eyes were bloodshot, and the woman thought she saw tears on his cheeks.

Ravena leaped away from the man, searching for an exit, but the only way out was past him. The problem was she wouldn’t stand a chance in a physical fight.

With each step he took forward, she took one back.

Quick as a snake, Serguei drew the dagger from his belt and lunged at her.

She reacted before the blade found its mark.

With a firm slap, she deflected the blow and twisted his wrist, forcing him to lean sideways.

In the same motion, she delivered a precise kick to the psychic’s left leg, making him stumble.

She seized the opening and wrenched the dagger from his hands before thrusting at his abdomen.

Serguei ducked at the last instant, dodging the attack, and with a quick spin, swept Ravena’s legs out from under her, taking them both down.

The impact was hard and sudden. They rolled across the floor amid curses and kicks, grappling for dominance until Serguei managed to pin Ravena to the ground.

His body pressed down on hers, his hands pinning her wrists above her head.

In the struggle, he noticed a blood-red stone in Ravena’s right hand.

Fearing it was some kind of weapon, he slammed her wrist against the ground, knocking the stone loose.

It bounced across the rocky floor and plunged into the pool near their heads.

“No! Don’t you understand?!” Ravena’s voice came out ragged with effort.

The thought of failing the task she’d risked so much for terrified her.

“The fragment will save our people...” Her face was red, the veins in her forehead bulging as she struggled to breathe and speak while being crushed against the ground.

“With its power, we’ll win our freedom.”

A faint tremor rose from the depths of the water, where the two stones joined together.

“You’re the one who doesn’t understand!” Serguei glared at the face of the woman he had once loved.

Loved, he thought with disgust, laughing at his own misfortune.

He still loved her so much that every part of him ached from making her suffer.

He was forcing himself to ignore the feeling, because Ravena had to be stopped, and he was the only one with the power to face her.

“Our people are already saved. Our home is here. You’re conspiring against your own brothers. ”

“You spit on our ancestors by following his orders.” Ravena tried to scream and kick, but his weight crushed the air from her lungs, cutting off her voice.

“I would never bow to the tyrant who fears my brothers, our power, and everything we represent.” She gasped for breath. “We’re better than this, Serguei.”

The man knew this conversation was pointless.

Even though killing her would destroy him, it was the only way to keep his brothers from being condemned to death.

The future was already decided, and he was only delaying the inevitable because he was weak enough to still love her.

Talking only complicated things and was starting to erode his resolve, letting doubt creep into his mind.

He wasn’t there to question—he had to kill her.

Otherwise, the new king would slaughter his people.

Serguei decided to finish Ravena off quickly, before the situation destroyed him first. He forced against her mental protections, making her barrier crack like glass. The sound of those cracks seeped into the psychic’s core, spreading like fire through the eternity of his memories.

While she was running, Ravena had known she would die and had prepared herself for it. But now, trapped beneath him, she couldn’t accept death. She wanted desperately to see another tomorrow, and realized too late that she wasn’t ready to leave this life.

For five seconds, she felt the impact against her mind, then gathered her strength to strike back.

The assault was powerful, but she had no idea what she would find when she threw herself against Serguei.

To her despair, she discovered that his mental barriers were thick and impenetrable to her power.

With one final blow, Serguei broke into the fae’s mind.

The glass shattered in all directions, and the sound of the violation reverberated through his being.

He would never forget that haunting noise, not in a thousand years.

The psychic took control of Ravena’s mind, and soon her body went limp in his arms.

The world slowed its spin; waves broke against the distant rocks; sand and salt scattered on the wind. Serguei wanted to be rock, to withstand the crashing surf, but he was born a storm. In his eyes, tempests threatened to consume the world.

“I’m sorry, Ravena.” A treacherous tear escaped his eyes and dripped onto her cheek. He caressed her face with his fingertips, as if touching something precious and delicate. “I love you so much.” His voice broke, choked with tears. “You’ll go first, but I promise I’ll find you soon.”

Serguei expanded his consciousness and took hold of the woman’s mind. Soon he found the core of her being. The sphere radiated the glory of her essence, the power of Ravena’s soul. Looking at that flame, he could have sworn it was the center of his own universe—the sun illuminating his darkness.

He stared into her green eyes—the eyes of the woman he loved, the person who had always given meaning to his days.

She met his gaze with a mixture of desperation, fear, and pleading.

He caressed his beloved’s cheek and pressed a kiss to her lips, lips that had once sworn to love him forever.

Then he did the hardest and most unthinkable thing of his life: he crushed her mental core in his grasp without letting himself think, because storms don’t think—they only strike.

It was like flipping a switch.

But before everything ended, Ravena hurled one last remnant of her consciousness into his head. Memories exploded against Serguei’s mental barrier.

Little Ravena, six years old, playing with him on the lawn.

Serguei falling from the swing, and her reaching out to him.

The girl’s hands pulling him up as she smiled and the sun bathed their bodies in light.

In that memory, Serguei’s irises, through her eyes, were like whole constellations—brilliant and infinite.

The memories rushed forward in a blur of images—Serguei growing up—then sharpened again.

Now it was a memory of the two of them at fourteen, learning to fight side by side.

Of Ravena discovering that the tiny feeling for her friend, though small, was overwhelming in her chest—and it was called love.

Then she saw the two of them at eighteen.

Him changing clothes while she watched and, in secret, desired him.

Serguei commanding the Night Squadron. And then image after image of him leading, being her personal hero.

The feel of his body as he held her on a cold night, after they’d fled from soldiers.

Finally, the night they were together. Endless images of how their bodies worshipped each other; fragments of countless encounters and the thought that she was complete.

The images moved through the years and stopped at a mission Ravena had done alone—one that kept her away for years. Her belly growing and the face of a child. Pure love overflowing for that small creature. Then, the face of a woman they both knew and a basket with the baby inside.

Finally, the last image: Serguei on top of her, pinning her to the cold floor in that cavern that reeked of rot and radiated a sickly silence.

Yet instead of a monster, she saw only the man she loved.

Her last thought was that his eyes were the most precious sight in the world.

They had the same tones as their son’s irises—the son she could no longer protect.

“Forgive me,” she whispered in his mind.

Serguei couldn’t say whether the words were for the child or for himself. The images vanished in a snap, like a rope suddenly severed. Ravena, limp in his arms, had lost the only thread connecting soul to body.

Serguei felt something stretch and snap inside his chest. The rupture seemed so vast he didn’t even notice the tremor shaking the cavern’s structure—perhaps it extended to the world outside.

He was dazed, tears streaming down his face like waterfalls.

He was lost, and the pain was so great he could barely breathe.

He watched his plan crumble to ashes: he couldn’t leave with his beloved.

There was a child whose eyes were identical to his.

— A son, by the gods, how? — He couldn’t think.

He held Ravena’s body tight and buried his face in her black hair, breathing in the scent of wild blackberries for the last time.

Then a scream of pure pain echoed through the cavern, filling the tunnels and recesses below.

The outburst of pain faded until it reached total and absolute…

Silence.