Blood Redemption (Blood Destiny #9) (21 page)

Norian probably didn't want me to kill the guy, but I did it anyway. No way was he going to live after raping a nine-year-old. That brother of the New Dawn got sent to Tykl in two pieces, just as dawn was breaking there. He got to keep company with the poisoned mole operatives.

* * *

"Lissa Beth, if you're done now, we need to have a few words." Norian was back to hissing after I dropped eight children off at an emergency room and sent them inside, some of them nearly unable to walk, they were so brutalized.

Rych took himself out of our hotel suite so Norian could have his few words. I figured the words were going to come from his side and all the listening was going to come from my side. Well, I had experience with this. I thought about sending him to work with Gavin for a while.

"Lissa Beth," Norian paced in front of me. I'd chosen to sit on a nice sofa inside the living area of our suite. If he intended to yell, I wanted to be as comfortable as I could be while he did it.

"Norian Keef," I muttered.

"Lissa Beth, I want to hug you and yell at you at the same time," Norian stopped his pacing for a moment and stood in front of me. "They'll know something is up when one of theirs disappears. You should have left the prisoners there," Norian began his chastisement. "You need to learn control. We have to take them unawares, if we can. This will allow them time to pull together and form a battle plan."

"Then why didn't you stop me before we went? You know I'm not going to sit still and watch them mistreat babies."

"I know why this upsets you so much. Please try to see it from my perspective. It is my duty to take them down. Half of them could be on their way off-planet by now and we'll lose contact with them. I have a handful of my men at the space station, but we don't have all the names involved in this yet. Do I need to point out the problems with a blown cover?"

"No, you don't have to point that out," I turned my head away from him and hugged myself as tightly as I could. "But you killed six moles yourself, earlier. Do you think your cover wasn't already blown?"

"We haven't moved against them yet. Until now. They thought the moles were protecting them. Now they'll try to make contact and none of the moles will respond. New Dawn will know for sure. If they don't attack that bogus hotel suite we set up by tomorrow night, then they're incompetent."

"We can be there, waiting on them as mist," I offered.

"Lissa Beth," Norian ran a hand through his hair in a frustrated gesture. "Neither I nor Rych like to be mist for more than a few minutes at a time. We've talked about this—we're used to being more solid and substantial."

"You just don't want to give up control," I grumped.

"That, too," Norian nodded at my assessment. "We've been doing this for a while and turning to mist is an unsettling experience."

"Then why drag me into this? You don't like the way I do things—leave me at home. I have enough crap happening there to keep me busy for a while." I still wasn't looking at him.

"I know your life is complicated and I know you're not spending enough time running things on Le-Ath Veronis. Nevertheless, you're our best bet for taking these Solar Red spin-offs down quickly and quietly. I have to use what I have at my disposal."

"And the Queen of Le-Ath Veronis is at your disposal, because the Founder and Twenty Charter members thought she should be." I turned to look at Norian, now. "Don't think for a minute that I don't see their hand in this. I don't jump when they say, they can dump Le-Ath Veronis and we'll be out of the Alliance. Why don't you just go ahead and say it, Norian?" I laid all my fears before him. It had worried me from the beginning; I just hadn't said anything about it until now.

"You make it sound as if they're blackmailing you."

"Aren't they?"

Norian gave a frustrated sigh and turned away. "Lissa Beth, they use whatever they have to protect the Alliance. Surely you can see the reason in that."

"Uh-huh. I just used what I had to protect some children who were being tortured. You let me know by mindspeech when you need me the next time, Norian Keef." I went straight to mist and then to energy and got the hell out of there.

* * *

"I don't know where she is." Norian sat across the tiny café table from Rych and sipped his tea.

"Boss, I don't like to tell you your business, but you probably should have told her what you wanted in the beginning." Rych was venturing onto uncharted seas by pointing out what he considered Norian's flaw in the plan.

"Hmmph," Norian grumbled.

"You think she'll really come if you call?" Rych went on.

"I hope so," Norian stared into the dark liquid inside his mug. "If she doesn't, I'm not sure what to do—what we can do. She told me she feels coerced and that's not what I wanted. She thinks Le-Ath Veronis will be thrown out of the Alliance if she doesn’t jump and run when we tell her to."

"Boss, none of the others did anything close to what she's done for us. If not for her, I'd probably be dead and some look-alike would be sitting across from you right now. Where do you think you'd be, then?"

"Most likely headed toward oblivion," Norian muttered. "I figure I'd be dead too, if you want the truth."

"What are you going to do?"

"I'll contact the one and see what he says."

"I don't envy you."

"I know." Norian shrugged into his heavy coat and Rych was right behind him as they left the café.

* * *

"You've become a liability, since the ASD knows the real thing is dead." Seturna Odnard examined Tork's face as he stood on the other side of the Seturna's desk. The study had been lavishly decorated—Odnard intended to have a long and comfortable stay on Trell.

"Then send me elsewhere. I can still benefit the brotherhood."

"Perhaps. But there's something I'd like you to do, first," Seturna Odnard steepled his fingers and smiled at Tork.

"Name it and it will be yours," Tork nodded. He knew how precarious his position had become with Odnard and the others. He was lucky he wasn't already inside one of the temple's dungeons, awaiting torture of some kind. They all took pleasure in it—it was what drew them to the religion in the beginning.

"Good. We lost one of our brothers earlier tonight and several of our prisoners. We want you to kill the Director of the ASD—we feel he is behind this. Unusual for him to tip his hand so early, but perhaps he is playing a deeper game. We'd like him killed before the plan goes into full effect. Money is currently keeping the crown quiet. Eventually we'll control that, in addition to everything else here. Kill Norian Keef for me and you'll not have to worry about who your face resembles."

"How would you like him to die?"

"As painfully as possible."

"I think I can manage that." Tork gave a quick nod and left Odnard's study.

Odnard waited for a few moments before tapping a code into his private communicator. When it was answered, Odnard gave a short message. "I have a tail on the director—I expect him to be dead by tomorrow evening."

"Good," came the one-word answer.

* * *

Tork cursed quietly when he discovered the hotel information he'd been given led him on a false trail. The room was empty. The hotel staff informed him that a meeting was held there earlier, but no clothing remained, or any other indicator that the room had been occupied. He'd have to locate his contacts and do some tracking to find the target. He'd paid the hotel staff well for this information, too, which made him even angrier.

* * *

"Bring her here—I'll explain things," Ildevar Wyyld sounded frustrated.

"When, Deonus?" Norian wasn't sure what to think about this turn of events.

"As quickly as you can get her back. Arrange for a ship if you have to—it wouldn't hurt to leave things as they are on Trell for the moment. Let them worry that you'll strike again and when they can't find you, so much the better. Let them spend their energy trying to track you and the others down."

"Of course, Deonus." Norian nodded to the image on the vid screen. The screen went dark—Ildevar Wyyld terminated the communication from his end. Norian blew out a breath. He was about to find out if mindspeech would summon his little Queen.

Norian was worried, too, that he might have fractured any chance at a relationship with her. He'd always heard it wasn't a good idea to work with a mate or even a potential mate. That fact was staring him in the face and he didn't like the looks of it, if the truth were known.
Lissa Beth
? He sent out mindspeech. He was about to learn the truth, one way or another.

* * *

"We can afford to lose a few," Tetsurna Prylvis agreed with Viregruz. "None of mine suspect anything. You're sure this will be over quickly? Our target will not have time to escape?"

"Absolutely," Viregruz steepled his fingers. "How many do you have, there?"

"Less than three hundred. All easily replaced."

"I only have a handful, now—my main operatives died in the battle outside ASD Headquarters. At least the Vice-Director was killed. That was our objective, after all."

"Our people performed very well together," Prylvis agreed. "Their sacrifice will serve our purpose completely."

* * *

It had only been a few hours since I'd left in a snit. Honestly, I didn't expect him to come calling so quickly, yet the mindspeech reached me in some far-off corner of the universes. I knew he wasn't in trouble with the senses I had while I was energy. I'd told him I'd answer his call, so I kept that promise. "What do you need, Norian Keef?" I appeared in front of him only a few seconds after he'd sent out the call. He looked somewhat frazzled to me, but then he'd pissed me off, so I wasn't about to go to him and try to make him feel better.

"Lissa Beth, we've been called to Wyyld—Deonus Wyyld wishes to speak with you," Norian informed me.

"Oh, so they want to give me my walking papers already?" I wasn't in a charitable mood to begin with and this just made it worse.

"Breah-mul, I don't think they have any intentions of doing that. Deonus Wyyld wants to talk to you. Maybe set your fears at rest over this. Honestly, I had no idea you thought we were blackmailing you."

"What was I supposed to think, Norian? You walked into my palace like you owned the place and started throwing orders around. Tell me how else to respond to that? I have a lot of people on Le-Ath Veronis who came, simply because we were members of the Alliance. I have no desire to let them down after we persuaded them to come."

"Lissa, there's a ship waiting to take us as soon as we can get to the space station. No, I don't want you to take us in that way you have," he raised a hand to hold off the comment I was about to make. "Rych and I will come with you, if you're worried about Ildevar Wyyld."

"I'm not worried for me," I grumped. "Am I supposed to pack up?" I turned toward my bedroom inside the suite.

"Rych already did that for you. He and our bags are waiting at the station."

"Not wasting any time, then," I muttered, turning back to him.

"Cheah-mul, I would like nothing better than to erase this night from both our minds. All I want is to come and hold you against me and that's the last thing I think you want right now."

"Norian, do not try to make me feel guilt over this. Do not," I said and folded both of us to the space station.

The trip took twelve hours and I didn't speak to Norian or Rych the entire time. We arrived on Wyyld in the middle of the night, so we were taken to a guesthouse outside the palace and allowed to go to bed. I guess we'd gotten three hours' sleep—if we slept—I kept waking up, thinking it was because I was so angry with Norian. I should have
Looked
. Should have. Would it have changed anything? Probably not, because any interference on my part would have definitely changed the timeline and that was forbidden. It didn't keep me from screaming and cursing, not only at Norian and anybody else I could think of, but at myself as well, for not being there to do what little I might have been able to do when Black Mist blew Trell to tiny bits with a Ranos Cannon.

* * *

"How can you stand there calmly, when six-hundred-million people just died?" I was shouting at Belen and Kifirin now, who'd both shown up. Norian was afraid to approach me when I started having my fit, and I was worried that I might be forced to reimburse Ildevar Wyyld for rebuilding the inside of his guesthouse. I'd shredded the place.

"Avilepha, you had no control over this. Those people would have died, whether through this attack or due to another cause. Be assured that the decisions the Trellian aristocracy made had them well on their way to destruction. Whether it was now or in ten years' time, it would not have mattered." Kifirin was holding a hand out to me.

"But this is my fault." I sat on what was left of my bed and tried to stop shaking and crying.

"Little sister, you did not order those deaths. One whose soul is filled with hate did that," Belen said. "What you need to see to now is the one who revealed your location to your enemies. This came from Le-Ath Veronis, beloved. You must find the source before you consider going back there."