Born of Legend (98 page)

“And what about you?”

“My loyalty is here. To you and my family.”

“No, it isn't. You're divided.”

“Not divided at all. My first priority is, and will always be, Ushara. Then you.”

“And your brother?”

Jullien looked away. “That's guilt. Plain and simple. Not loyalty.”

“I'm proud you recognize that.”

“I have no delusions where my birth family's concerned. I've never lied to myself about who and what I am or what I feel.”

Trajen looked to the photos. “Family is a complicated thing, Jules. Careful where it leads you.”

“I know. But no one will take me from my wife or children.”

Nodding, Trajen fell quiet for several minutes while he considered the request.

Finally, he spoke. “You win. I'll do this for you. But only because
you've
asked it. You know how I feel about fighting in a political war. And I trust you alone to lead us. When you've had enough and you're done with them, we're out.”

“I'll let Jory know we're in.” Jullien inclined his head to him and started to withdraw.

“Hey, Jules?”

He paused to look back.

“Thank you.”

That earnest gratitude confused him. “For what?”

“You think that I saved you by letting you stay here and earn rank. But the truth is, we both were given a shot out of a dark place. And Thrāix, too. He and I had died, we just hadn't found our tombs yet. Or maybe we had. At any rate, we owe you as much as you think you owe us … maybe more. Just so you know.”

Jullien grimaced. “So what? Are we going to kiss now? Gah, just don't fondle me in my marital bed again. I'm still having nightmares that Ushara's going to find out and geld us both.”

Trajen laughed. “Get your cantankerous Andarion ass out of here.”

“I'm going,” Jullien said with a laugh of his own.

Still smiling, he left Trajen's house and headed for Ushara's office to let her know that they were now officially part of the Alliance against The League.

He'd just headed that way when his link buzzed. Assuming it was the babysitter telling him to come home and help with the twins, who were probably climbing up the walls again, he tapped his ear. “Admiral Samari.”

“Hey, Dagger, this is Kareem Venik. Are you where you can talk free and clear?”

“Yeah. What's going on?”

Static answered him for a minute before Kareem dropped his voice two octaves. “Look, I got some intel, and I don't know what to do with it.”

“What do you mean?”

“I overheard something I wasn't supposed to, and I'm not sure it's important, but given how it was said, and who said it, I'm certain it was. That being said, if anyone finds out I know it, or that I breathed a word to someone else … let's just say I need some real discretion.”

“Okay.”

“Anyway. It was something about the
skyva
being plowed down and replanted for the
lyfera
to return from the ashes.”

His mind raced at what Kareem was saying. The
lyfera
was the mythological creature that decorated the Anatole family Warsword and coat of arms. A winged dragon, it was believed to burst open the womb of its parent, which it then consumed until nothing was left of its mother but ashes. Thereby, the child
lyfera
absorbed and took its first nourishment and life from its mother's essence and knowledge. Of course, family tradition said that it symbolized the fact that a new tadar or tadara couldn't ascend the throne until the death of their parent, after they stood over the funeral pyre to take their inheritance.

Skyva
was the Andarion word for a Warsword's scabbard or for the main palace in Eris that “held” the royal family.

A bad feeling went through Jullien.…

“I'm sorry, Kareem. Could you repeat that?”

“The
skyva
is going to be plowed down and replanted for the
lyfera
to return from the ashes.… Does that make sense to you?”

His heart pounded as he checked the date on his link.

Six days.

Oh shit.

“Yeah, Kareem. It makes sense. Thanks for telling me. I need to go.” He cut the transmission.

Six days …

His breathing ragged, he ran to Ushara's office as fast as he could. As soon as he flew past Zellen's desk, Zellen gasped but didn't say anything.

Jullien hit the release for Ushara's door and didn't speak until it closed behind him.

She swallowed and set her drink aside, then scowled at his eagerness. “Rare look for you. Holy terror? Haven't seen it on your face since you thought Mira had fallen and skinned her knee. What's wrong?”

“My grandmother's going to bomb the Andarion palace in six days.”

Ushara froze as those words hung between them. “Trajen tell you this?”

“Kareem Venik overheard it.”

“From?”

“I'm assuming Nyran.”

“But you don't know … so it could be a trap.”

“It's not. Shara, I know it's going to happen. Six days. That's Eriadne's birthday. And it's not just that. It's the way the message was coded.…
Mia,
you've just got to trust me on this. I know it's solid.”

“Okay, so we tell them.”

“You know they won't believe us.”

Stubbornly, she shook her head. “They can fortify themselves. They have an army.”

He raked his hand through his hair. “It didn't work last time. Shara, you know it's not that simple. I know the players involved and how they do these things.… She's going to kill my brother's family while he's away and can't protect them. Even if he believed us and turned around right now, he couldn't get back before her fleet would reach them.”

Jullien ground his teeth at the cruelty of what his grandmother intended to do to her own blood kin. “It's a blow to him that he'll never recover from. And she knows it. This will destroy his life and his soul. Do you understand? I heard from Jory just last night that Nyk's on his way to the Ports, and he's having to fly dark so that The League won't pick up their transmissions. He thinks his wife and kids are safe with my idiot mother. His youngest daughter's what? Seven, eight months old now? The rest aren't much older. Kiara's a
minsid
moron. She's not you. She has no idea how to fight or survive, never mind protect those kids. They won't see this coming. If we call, they'll hang up on us like they did last time, and do nothing. They'll all be dead in less than a week.”

“So what do you suggest?”

Jullien's brain whirled as he considered how to deal with this. “I have to kill Eriadne.”

“Great plan. Little shy on details. As I recall, you've been trying to do that for years now. Hasn't really worked out.”

He gave her a peeved glare. “Fine. Take the kids and do what we planned last night before I got Trajen to agree to cooperate with The Alliance. You head on to the Ports for the meeting with Jory and the Danes. I'll get Nyk's wife and kids and meet you there, with them in tow.”

“What about your mother?”

“I don't give a
minsid
shit what happens to her. She's on her own. Like you said, she's got an army. My only concern is protecting my brother—after what I personally did to him, I owe him that much. I've done him enough harm. I will not let that bitch gut him this way. Not when I can stop it.”

“You're just getting Kiara and the children?”

“Swear it. In and out. Small strike force. Walk in the park. Then we're headed straight for you, and everyone's happy.”

“Okay. But only because there are babies involved. And I want you to take Thrāix with you, in case something weird happens.”

“Yeah, that's not going to happen. You can't pry him off Mary. He hasn't come up for air since her return.”

“He will go with you. Mary will see to it.”

He laughed. “In that case, I believe you. She's the only one who could make him. But damn, Shara, he's going to be an irritable, unmanageable ass the whole trip. Why would you do that to me?”

She gave him a gimlet glare. “Because I love you, and you will
not
get hurt. You hear me?”

“Yes, Mistress Tormentor. I will
not
get hurt.” He spoke in the tone of a mindless android.

“I mean it, Jules.”

He winked at her. “So do I. I want all of you safe and protected, too. No chances.”

She released a voice that said he was being ridiculous. “You know me better. Besides, I'm not the one who finds trouble in every shadow I cross. I swear I know where the girls get it.” She rubbed her stomach. “May the gods have mercy on us all if this poor boy has one tenth of your proclivity for danger.”

He kissed her cheek. “He won't.”

“Better not. Otherwise, I'm beating you every time
he
gets into something he should have left alone.”

“Me?”

“
You,
since it's obviously something genetically wrong with
your
bloodline.”

“Oh yeah,” Jullien said in a tone saturated with sarcasm, “'cause
your
brothers
never
do
any
thing wrong. Your gene pool is
so
perfect.” He choked and scoffed. “As I recall, when you picked me up in jail, I was handcuffed to one of your brothers.”

“You're not helping yourself out of the dog house,” she called after him.

As usual, he paid her no heed.

Ushara watched as Jullien left her office with a devilish grin that made her a lot hotter than it should, given her level of agitation at him. Anyone else would be grounded for that cocky swagger and the fact they'd pissed her off and ruined her mood.

Why she found his insolence adorable and charming, she had no idea. There was something innately affable about him whenever he chose to let that side of his personality out.

Sadly, he kept it hidden most of the time behind a wall of impenetrable suspicion. It was a shame, really. That kind of charisma was so rare. And with it, he could have been one of the most influential rulers in history.

Instead, he was content to be Trajen's eyes and ears on their fleet. Her heavy hand and enforcer whenever she needed it. While she was grateful that the gods had given him to her to have as her own, his wasted potential bothered her at times. The injustice of it.

But what truly made her ache was the shadow in the back of his eyes that never left. Even at his happiest, it forever lurked there, and nothing banished it completely. Like the real Dagger Ixur of their mythology, it was as if his family had splintered his heart and kept a part of it with them. A part that wouldn't allow him to live in peace.

Over the years, she'd done everything she could to make him forget them. To bring him home to her and their children.

Yet that other missing piece forever called him back to Andaria. Back to the cruelty that had birthed him.

He always denied it. And still she saw it clearly, even when he did his best to hide all traces.

Her greatest hope was that one day he'd wake up and think of them no more. That the light would shine again fully and that the missing piece would return so that his eyes would glow with a soul restored.

You're a dreamer.

That
restoration of her own heart
,
she owed solely to Jullien. Chaz had crushed that part of her soul. He'd made her a pragmatic military commander. Jullien had taught her magic again. He'd returned her sense of whimsy.

So yes, she now believed in dreams once more.

And one day, she was going to exorcize those demons from her husband's heart.

*   *   *

Worried, and dreading the thought of what lay ahead, Jullien carried the twins on board their mother's ship, with Vasili trailing behind him. The boy had been complaining every step of the way here, until his voice rang like a cacophonous symphony in his ears.

“I don't understand why I have to fly with Mum. Why can't I come with you? I'm assigned to the
Pet Hate.
I'm your crew, Paka.”

Jullien sighed. “I know, Vas. But I need you to guard your mom and sisters for me. I can't be in two places at once. So I have to depend on you for this.”

Vasili rolled his eyes in typical teenage exasperation. Probably because he knew Jullien was lying and this was as much about keeping Vasili out of danger as it was keeping Ushara and the girls safe.

Mira snorted. “Vasi don't like that answer, Paka.”

“Yeah, I know.” He kissed her cheek. “And I need you two to be on your very best behavior for your matarra and Vasili. No making your brother crazy. Okay?”

“Okay.”

He turned to her sister. “Viv?”

“Okies, Paka. No crazy.” She stuck her tongue out to roll it around her mouth, then in and out, and her eyes around and around in a way that made him choke on his laughter.

Clearing his throat to conceal it, he forced himself to appear stern. “Good girls. Now, give me a kiss.” He squeezed them and savored their embrace for a moment before he reluctantly let go.

He stood to face his irritated teenaged son. “Yes, it sucks. But…”

Vas sighed in resignation. “I'll miss you. Be safe.”

“You, too.” He hugged him. “Don't kill your sisters.”

“I won't.”

“And no locking them in a closet.”

“That's too many restrictions. Now you're just being mean.”

Jullien laughed at Vas's devilish grin. Ruffling his hair, he left him and went to say good-bye to Ushara. She was with Zellen and Unira. “Stay safe. Fly outside their tracking.”

“And you.”

Jullien took her hand in his and kissed her knuckles before he gently kissed her lips. He placed his hands around her stomach so that he could feel Vidar frolicking. “He feels like he's ready to lend a hand.”