Chapter 21
~Velra~
My fingers tightened around the rattle to the point of painful pressure.
Blackline Protocol had been amplified and that resonant hum had now become an undeniable reverberation. The additional intensity was only to last for a few hours as Ryker used the system to disperse the Dark Fae mind-meddling antidote.
The deadline for anyone who didn’t want it to touch them had passed.
Only handfuls had contacted the Guardian Movement to reject it.
So soon most of the supernatural world would be immune to it going forward.
Not only that, once the antidote was ingested via the magical sweep of Blackline Protocol that Ryker was embedding it within, anyone infected would also be cured, be free of that control.
But that majorly good news and all the relief that went along with it had been wrecked to pieces two hours ago when Lazriel had come bursting in here to report that Sylas had been taken.
By Morien Morgrave and Gregor Varsellis.
Sylas had sent the baby rattle to the closest one of our foursome to his geographical location at the time, which had been Lazriel.
That act alone had signaled that he’d been in dire straits, believing that he would fall, because the rattle was vital to our unborn baby’s wellbeing.
He wouldn’t have given that up under normal circumstances.
Since then both The Shadowed and then the Guardian Movement had determined where it had been sent from—very close to Ryker Morgan’s former home.
They’d picked up both Morien’s signature and Gregor’s, along with a mass amount of black magic and Celestial power. No wonder they’d been able to incapacitate Sylas. It took a fuck of a lot, and that combination was certainly it.
Ryker had gone there himself and even brought Ketheron along, and they’d picked up on something else as well—energy reads that shouldn’t have been there.
That shouldn’t be anywhere. They were messed-up versions of revenants that had been there, dozens of them surrounding Sylas.
Beings that were beyond death-touched, and should have been inside the Valley of the Dead.
But they’d come through to the living world, indicating that the damage to the Valley had worsened. Majorly.
Ryker was with Gabriel trying to determine a patching solution until the place could be healed properly.
There was also an issue between Ryker and Remnant right now, despite them starting to get to a good place with Ryker’s proposal in play.
Ryker knew Remnant and The Shadowed were in possession of something that could heal the Valley of the Dead—with the assistance of death magic from a learned necromancer—but Remnant was refusing to hand it over to Ryker.
He wouldn’t until Sylas was back in the picture.
He only trusted it in his hands and with the addition of Sylas’ necromancy.
Cassius, Ketheron, and Ariana were at Haven Initiative briefing the children on the plan to pull Celestial magic from all non-Celestial beings like Morien, Gregor, and their army.
And with black magic master, Ambrose Wisteryn, still missing and having not answered any of Sylas’ communications, Kai and Nyx were currently inside Kai’s lab here at Solumira with Lucian Black working on a way to gather the black magic users that Corvin Morvain had used before his death months ago.
Their plan was to use them to intercept black magic that was infused in the Celestial power being used by those fools, so it didn’t connect with the children.
The idea was they could soup-up Lucian’s coercion ability as an Ancient so he could make them do what we’d intended for Ambrose.
My phone buzzed as I rose from the couch inside Ariana and her love’s home after finishing feeding the baby the necromantic energy from the rattle.
I pulled it out to see a text from Lazriel.
Lazriel: Vorzyr and I have a trace we’re following now.
My heart leapt into my fucking throat.
Velra: You’ve managed to pick up Sylas’ scent?
Lazriel: Yeah. Ryker’s idea of having Jaxon with us to clear the magical interference away has made it possible.
The trace is really weak, though, so it’s gonna take time, and it keeps petering out, causing us to have to double back.
But wanted to tell you there’s hope there now that we can find our almighty necromancer.
Velra: Thanks. It is hope.
Lazriel: You okay there, love? The baby?
Velra: Baby’s just been fed. I’m fine. Thryne will be here soon.
Lazriel: Smart idea bringing them in to track the Dark Fae illusion aspect. Not just everyone focusing on Morien and Sylas’ signatures. Makes so much sense with them having a massive chunk of Dark Fae in what’s left of Puritas.
Velra: And illusionary magic is distinctive, more than the random and differing scents of vampires, wolves, and the other magic-wielders making up Puritas.
Lazriel: This is gonna work. We’re gonna find him.
Velra: I know we will.
Because it couldn’t be any other way.
It just fucking couldn’t.
Lazriel: Everything okay with Cas? Soul Brand check-in?
Velra: He’s doing well, focused. Him, Ketheron, and Ariana are readying for the massive undertaking ahead.
Lazriel: Good. Really good.
Velra: Please be careful out there.
Lazriel: I’ve got Jaxon right here, Immortal Descendant-Alpha Wolf, along with Vorzyr. And The Shadowed are covertly following my every move.
Yeah, I knew all of that. I just… he’d been taken once. And now Sylas too.
But the logic was what I needed to hold onto. Lazriel was as protected as if he was here within Solumira’s powerful wards created by Ariana.
Lazriel: I love you, Wraithqueen.
Velra: I love you too. So much.
I smiled as he sent several heart emojis through, then we said our goodbyes.
I pocketed my phone and headed on out of the house and down the porch steps.
As my boots hit the grass, I put the rattle away with a spark of my magic, then ran my hand over my belly.
I wasn’t showing yet, but I’d taken to doing it already.
It had become both a form of connection to my baby, and also comfort.
And a reminder that the four of us would have this—our growing family, our peace.
It would come.
We were just in the eye of the storm right now.
I jolted as a slew of angry curses caught my attention, then I swung my head to see Kai stomping around the side of the house, having left his lab for the first time in hours.
He was shoving his hands through his hair and muttering to himself.
His angry pacing had him inadvertently reaching me, and he jolted when he noticed me there, and pulled up short.
“The spell’s mixing,” he told me. “Everything will be fine. We’ll bring Sylas back.”
“You just don’t like things taking undue time to reach fruition?”
“Something like that.”
“Or could it partly also be because you know there’s another way to find Sylas?”
Intrigue sparked in his eyes and he seemed both surprised and impressed. “Yes,” he admitted. “There is another way. One that they’ll all realize soon. The delay in that realization being a lack of deep necromantic knowledge.”
“But with you spending so much time working with Sylas lately, you’ve picked up a great deal more knowledge in that area.”
He lifted a shoulder.
“A Blood Trace. That’s the other way,” I stated.
“Something that won’t even be entertained beyond theoretical state.”
“You’re about logic, not emotion.”
“Correction: I was. I’ve struck a much better balance now.” He folded his arms across his chest. “Sylas wouldn’t want this, sweetheart.”
“It could find him without any of the rest of this.”
“Technically, yeah. But it would also alert Morien, which could cause a knee-jerk reaction that could severely harm, if not kill, Sylas. Not to mention, to perform this spell it would have to draw from your unborn child’s blood.
Even with you to absorb the toll of such a spell, it’s still brutal.
You’ve seen it performed on Lazriel and he can take an inordinate amount of pain.
We’re not just dealing with you here, it’s what the child can take before…
before the damage is irreparable and even fatal. The risk is too high.”
“There’s no way to do it without it being so brutal, to shield my baby?”
“No.”
He wasn’t telling the whole story.
Which meant, there might be, but it would require experimentation, which was a danger in itself. And I’d never allow a child of mine to be experimented on.
“You don’t want this either, you wouldn’t allow this, so why bring it up?” he asked me.
“Like we said, it’s not just us who will come to realize this is an option.”
His gaze softened. “You won’t be forced into anything, the baby neither.”
A flash of blue hair caught my attention before Nyx rushed out, headed toward us. “Damn fucking straight it won’t,” he said, almost seething with it. “The number of us powerful beings anyone would have to go through to force that… there’s no way in hell.”
I smiled out at him and he came to me and wrapped his arm around me.
“There’s always gonna be crisis situations like this, situations where the stakes are sky-high.
But there has to be a line when we make decisions in the midst of the madness,” Kai spoke.
“If we cross those lines, we betray ourselves, we lose our humanity, and nothing and no one is safe or sacred. That’s an unacceptable state of affairs.
It’s not about doing whatever it takes, consequences be damned, just because we can with the power and knowledge we hold—it’s making the hard choices as to when we shouldn’t.
When we should pull back and hold the line. ”
“Wow,” Nyx breathed. “I can’t imagine you saying this a couple of years ago.” He grinned. “Proud of you, brother.”