Crystal Tomb (Starfire Angels: Dark Angel Chronicles Book 3) (35 page)

["Stay alert,"] she said in a hushed
voice.

Her wings tight to her back, Raea
pressed close around the doorway with Nare behind her. At least the
door was open, but that left a bad feeling eating at her
insides.

Inside the chamber, Raea's
eyes went up to the observation glass—No one. That didn't mean
squat.
Camouflage.

Yeah, that. Man, she hated that. She
hated this even more. In that moment, she wished she was an
ordinary human and had no connection to the Starfire whatsoever.
Sure, most of the time, it had been cool. Flying was a thrill, or
had been with Elis. But it came with a burden.

Focus.
Right. The Starfire.

She ran across the short space to the
monolith in the center.

["Impressive."] Nare's voice came from
behind her.

A smile tugged at the corners of
Raea's lips. Nare had only heard her description of it, until
now.

["You know how to release it?"] Nare
studied the giant disk.

While standing in front of it with
Nare, Raea saw a vision of the controls in her mind.
["Yes."]

She reached out for the grooves in the
characters etched into the fake stone and slid her finger along
them in the order shown by the vision.

[Thank you,
Raea.]

Ignoring Atia, she continued the
sequence to the last and held her breath.

Nothing happened. Not a hum. Not a
light. Nothing.

["You're sure you have it
right?"]

["I know I did."] So, why didn't it
work? ["Maybe it's too old and the power source is
drained."]

["I suppose. It
is
twelve thousand years
old."]

But Atia had insisted and the Risaal
had not detected the crystal. There must have been power yet. It
had to work! She hadn't come all this way for nothing. How would
they release the Starfire trapped within now?

The scuff of steps in the silence
stopped her heart and made her whirl. A section of the wall
separated and changed before her eyes. Several more did the same,
weapons pulled from behind their backs.

Oh, God, no. She
knew
it had been too
easy.

"Welcome back, Inari." The cool voice
sent a shiver down her spine. It came from one of the Risaal as he
changed into the man she recognized as Nakor Surik. That cold,
calculating tone could only be him.

Her wings tightened, as did Nare's
next to her.

"I wouldn't try that," Nakor Surik
warned.

Try what?

Oh. Hell.

Raea grabbed Nare's nearest glowing
hand. ["Don't. Unless you can take them all out at once, they'll
kill us first."]

Nare's lip twisted into a snarl, but
the glow faded.

"I was going to send a team to
recapture you, but you came flying back to me…Why?" The smugness on
Nakor Surik's human face hardened. "What do you want with the
monolith?

Why wasn’t it
working?
Come on, you old machine.
It stood ominous and dead.

"What do
you
want with
it?"

Oh, no. Nare did not just challenge
him. Crap. The memory of his grip around her neck made Raea
swallow.

Nakor Surik's expression darkened and
he lifted his weapon.

Raea had to do something
before this erupted into a firefight. "You want your
precious
D'Nuvar
?"

Nakor Surik blinked, his eyes shifting
to her. "You have it?"

Raea glanced aside at Nare. Should she
say it? Nare's eyes questioned her judgment, but she said nothing.
It was a stupid idea, but it was all they had. "I know where it
is."

"Tell me."

"Only if you let Nare go." No one else
would be hurt because of her, especially with the crazy idea
forming. It would destroy the Risaal, but might take her with it.
She wouldn't risk Nare.

"What…" Nare turned on her. "No. Raea.
I'm not leaving you."

"You must. I can do this."

"No!"

If she could throw Nare out, she
would, if only to save her from the crazy idea Raea intended to
execute. Of course, that idea depended on the stupid machine
operating as it should. What had gone wrong?

And just when everything had been
going so well too. There was always a snag.

Or not. A click sounded behind her
from the monolith.

A crack formed in the stone and slowly
spread in a jagged line from the central red stone to the edge with
a second crack forming to cut out a piece of the pie. The stone
must have cured so long that whatever mechanism opened the machine
housing the crystal had gotten stuck.

Revelations

Raea!

Elis swore time stopped on that moment
of seeing her, like the first time upon his arrival in McClarron
seeing her walking home from school. Forget Nare, the annoyance
with her. In his eyes, he saw only Raea in all her beauty and the
fire of her determination surrounded by Risaal. Dar Lorel had been
right.

He'd wanted to say something in the
corridor when he saw her but didn't want to draw attention to
himself yet. He saw now why no Risaal had stopped them; they had
been waiting, expecting her to return to the monolith.

She must have learned something about
it while she was gone. How else would she have known to touch it as
she had?

Pride swelled within him. His Raea had
figured out the mystery. Somehow she had learned its
secrets.

Raea had triggered the mechanism, but
they were surrounded by Risaal with no way out. He had to do
something.

A section of the monolith slid open,
sending bits of stone thumping to the floor to reveal a metal
surface rising from the disk.

"Watch out!" Nare jumped back,
grabbing Raea's arm to pull her out from beneath the section. The
clatter of heavy metal rang through the room.

The Risaal howled, many of them
dropping their weapons to cover the sides of their heads. They were
sensitive to certain frequencies.

He could do it now.

There were too many.

But they were
incapacitated.

Only for a few seconds.

Long enough.
Now!

Elis sprang forward, wings tight to
protect them while the resonance already burned in him. He released
the energy in several blasts. Some missed, while others hit their
mark.

"Elis!"

Raea's gasp made him pause and meet
her eyes.

A distraction he couldn't afford. A
shot burned into his lower leg, knocking him to his
knees.

"Enough!" Nakor Surik's voice rang
out.

* * *

Oh. My. God.
It couldn't be. This had to be a trick.

No. No trick. She'd know those black
wings and that gentle face anywhere, even through the tears
blurring her vision. It was him. He was…alive!

How?

Despite the new ache in her right leg,
Raea knelt next to Elis, trembling to embrace him, even as he
leaned over hands and knees. "You're alive." Her voice came in a
whisper, choked by the emotions clogging her throat.

"Oh, God. You're alive." And he felt
good in her arms, the black feathers of his wings tickling her wet
cheek where she laid her head on his back. Grief and disbelief
tangled in her heart with the reality of his warm body and the
musky smell she remembered.

This was real, not a vision or
memory.

"You have caused me a great hardship,
Inari. For that, you will die…and stay dead." Nakor Surik marched
forward, his weapon held ready.

One of the other Risaal stepped
towards him, his weapon pointed at Nakor Surik. "Not
yet."

Nakor Surik's skin along
his neck broke apart briefly and reformed. "
Rikku
Ronur Kalas."

"Get up," Elis whispered.

Reluctantly, Raea released him to let
him sit up. He winced and she saw it—the small gash along his right
leg. The shot had barely grazed him, unlike the scar on his chest
still red and crusty but only the size of a dime, a far cry from
the hand-sized wound she'd last seen. His leg wound bothered
her.

His right leg.

Her
right leg.

Her chest aches…Raea put a hand to his
bare chest and he smiled, those deep purple eyes brightening. Had
she been feeling his pain, even from so far away?

The stroke of his fingers along her
cheek sent a rush of longing through her heart. His other hand
lifted to put a finger to his lips.

"They are still useful to us. We
haven't yet discovered the Eye."

The Eye!

Elis tipped his head down slightly and
up again. Did he know? Questions burned on her tongue to learn more
but she bit it firmly. What did he know about the
Risaal?

How had he survived? He was
alive.

He was alive! Nothing in the world
could have given her such hope and joy to rival the brightest
day.

Nakor Surik hissed.

"Let them finish, Surik."

"
Kan Rikku
Nakor Surik." Spikes shifted
along his neck.

"No more. The Nakor are the minority
now. You have no power over us."

This sounded like a fight amongst the
Risaal. What was going on?

A sly smile lifted the corners of
Elis's mouth. She knew that look—he planned something.

Nakor Surik changed to his true form,
the four nostril slits widening. His fingers shifted on his weapon,
his eyes sliding to another. A split second later, he whirled, his
gun firing, but Nakor Surik fell to the ground at Ronur Kalas's
feet with a smoking wound in his back.

A determined woman stood in the
doorway bearing one of the Risaal weapons. Raea recognized her, but
she was Risaal.

Ronur Kalas looked up. "Well done, Dar
Lorel. Now I know where you went."

Dar Lorel's weapon aimed at Ronur
Kalas. "I didn't do this for you." Without taking her eyes off
Ronur Kalas, she tilted her head towards Raea. "Finish what you
were doing."

"Don't, Raea." Nare stood before the
opened monolith, determination hard on her face. ["It isn't for
them. You told me yourself."]

["Do it. Free the Starfire,"] Elis
said.

Free the…

Wait a sec. Did Elis just say what she
thought he said? ["You know about the crystal inside?"]

["I…heard them. Dar Lorel doesn't want
the Risaal to get it. She'll help us."]

["You trust her?"] Uneasiness climbed
through her but the softness of Elis's expression pulled at her
heart. Doubts tumbled through her mind, especially those about any
Risaal. Human form or not, they were still the aliens who had
attacked Inar'Ahben twelve thousand years ago with the intent of
destroying it. This group had been among them. How could she trust
any of them?

["She's one of the
rebels."]

A rebel, as in one of those who passed
the Starfire to the Inari?

"Hurry, Raea." Dar Lorel's eyes fixed
on Ronur Kalas.

None of the others made a move. Risaal
had a strange culture if they allowed such a coup. They all had
weapons.

[Listen to her, before the
others
do
react.]

Yeah. Yeah. All right. No pressure or
anything.

What of Elis?

"Do it." Man, those purple eyes could
make her melt, especially with that soft, deep voice. He'd always
been right before. When she didn't listen, bad things happened.
She'd learned her lessons.

If he said do it, then this was
right.

She still could hardly believe he was
alive, but it felt now like the other night had never
happened.

Reluctant to leave him, she stood up
slowly and joined Nare before the device.

["You're sure about this?"]

Raea met Elis's steady gaze.
["Yes."]

["You can't be serious."] Nare gave
Elis a dirty look. When would she give it up? ["What if he's…if
he's brainwashed to convince you to do things their way? You can't
let them have the crystal."]

["I won't."] She bit her tongue on
telling Nare to shut up. She needed silence to figure this out…if
she could.

["Then again, he's not exactly the
brightest star, more like a black hole."]

["Enough!"] Raea whirled on
the blue-haired woman, her heart raging to strangle her while
reason controlled her hands. Nare had been so sympathetic when she
thought Elis was dead, but now that he was alive, she reverted back
to bashing him? Raea struggled against the desire to scream at her.
["Elis is the most intelligent person I know. If I had listened to
him, I would never have suffered fighting the Shirukan, and
you
would not be alive.
I'll listen to him because he's always right."]