Page 69 of Gates of Rapture (The Guardians of Ascension #6)

A moment later, James began to disappear, and Braulio re-formed. James was Braulio, and Braulio was James.

“Holy shit. Well, this isn’t so bad. And, hey, Thorne can morph like this.”

“Unfortunately, there’s a big difference,” he said, sitting on the coffee table again. “I have to become James at least once a week to release that part of my altered DNA, or I start to go insane. This is always true, for me and for you. For Greaves as well.”

“So, if you don’t like the form you take, too bad, you’re stuck with it?”

“Exactly.”

“But why did you choose ‘James’ then, for an alternate shape?”

“A lot of reasons. James is a harmless persona and has served me well in approaching Alison, for instance, while she was in her rite of ascension. I’ve also served more recently as the gatekeeper to Third Earth in James’s form.

Again, the less threatening shape has given me a strong advantage when challenged by powerful Third Earth entities. ”

“You’ve battled on Third Earth?”

He shrugged. “ Battled isn’t quite the right word since I’m not allowed to battle. I argue and threaten, and when provoked, I offer a display of power that is sufficient to turn away any Third aggressor.”

“You’ve been busier than I thought.”

“I do my part.”

“But now I have this virus. I suppose next you’ll tell me this has something to do with the little peach.”

Braulio dipped his chin. “And the ability within the next hour to become whatever you need to be in order to survive.”

“The next hour,” she repeated. She didn’t ask him to explain. She knew. She felt it in her bones. She’d be facing off with Greaves over White Lake, probably not long after Alison worked her magic with the Third portal.

She stood up and held his gaze for a long moment. “You going to tell me how this battle ends?”

“We’ve seen several outcomes. But I’m not allowed to interfere and I won’t. Just take everything I’ve said into consideration. I’m sure right now Greaves is plotting what to do with his morphing ability.”

“Fuck.”

His expression grew even more serious. “Exactly.”

Then he smiled, and before she knew what he intended, he blurred toward her, took her in his arms, and kissed her. She didn’t fight him this time because she was a woman going into battle and she wanted the feel of his arms around her.

His voice was suddenly in her head with resonance. Endelle, Endelle, Endelle. He kept whispering her name until her lips parted.

He groaned heavily as he pierced her mouth and began plunging his tongue into her just the way she liked it, the way she remembered him doing all those millennia ago.

Sweet Christ, the vampire had her number. His hands roved her flight suit. She was just about to fold the suit away, or tell him to rip it off her, when Braulio drew back.

“Sorry, sweetheart. Time to rumble.”

***

Greaves stood in his peach orchard and flexed his claw. He held several Seers reports in his right hand and alternately moved from reading them to snapping his claw, then trying to figure out his next step. And back again.

He might not have Stannett’s help anymore, but the reports out of Mumbai and Johannesburg were similar enough to give credence that a war-changing battle would take place over White Lake this morning.

He had already informed his generals and ordered his special death vampire regiment to be ready to fold at his command.

These elements were clear in the future streams: an army at the ready, and a death vamp force poised to engage in battle. According to the Seers reports, he would soon be flying over the lake, with his death vampires supporting him, and engaging his number one foe all these years: Endelle.

Yet in the past several days, he’d lost so much ground that he felt as though the pavers beneath his feet were made of quicksand. He’d started sinking when Grace returned, and the more he’d tried to pull himself out of the quagmire, the faster he’d gotten dragged under.

He still couldn’t believe that he had failed to destroy the colonies. Somehow he hadn’t imagined obsidian flame being able to stop the burning away of Diallo’s interconnected mist—yet the triad had done exactly that.

He shuddered. The dark wave of his future was still pounding him, despite the care he had taken to gain every advantage in his bid for world domination.

He still had two serious advantages in hand.

The first was his secret force of Third Earth death vampires that he would be moving very soon through the breach in the portal.

The other was his ability to shape-shift.

The latter, however, had a serious drawback in that whatever choice he made would be permanent.

Whatever he decided to become in the next few hours, he’d be forced to continue each week for the rest of his life.

Yet these two elements had the possibility all by themselves of wresting Second Earth permanently away from Endelle and her allies.

The claw had been an experiment, but it had fit with his lifestyle, since he liked to do a lot of hurting when he made love.

However, a claw was one small, manageable appendage. If he chose, during this battle to risk everything by engaging Endelle at last mano a mano, then he might just have to choose a larger form that guaranteed a win against her but would be an unfortunate choice for a weekly transformation.

The only question that remained was simple: How badly did he want to win this war?

When he folded back to his Estrella Complex, he found his generals clustered around the largest screen at the end of the room.

Greaves got an uneasy feeling. “What’s going on?” he called out.

His aide moved toward him quickly. “We’re not sure. Parts of White Lake have disappeared from view.”

Mist. Then he felt it. Endelle’s mist. Fuck.

He glanced at the papers in hand. Nothing had been prophesied about this. So what the hell was going on that he didn’t know about? What critical information had Marguerite’s teams blocked from him in the future streams.

He felt the quicksand around his ankles again. Maybe he’d been hasty in killing Stannett after all.

***

As Alison floated in the air just above the blue-green waters of White Lake, she realized that the dreams she’d had of the lake had shifted over time. But perhaps that was a reflection of the nature of life. Paths were chosen and discarded. The journey branched and new roads were taken.

One dream had showed her backed by nearly twenty women; opposite the women were almost twenty warriors at Warrior of the Blood status.

But in recent days the dream had changed to involve obsidian flame, one of the most powerful elements to have emerged in Endelle’s administration ever.

As she flapped her emerald wings and set her gaze above her, the blue vortex appeared. Kerrick floated opposite her, a protective presence, her original Guardian of Ascension. His white wings were magnificent in the midday light. Imagine vampires living fully beneath a strong desert sunshine.

Leto floated beside Kerrick, ready to assume his duties as the new gatekeeper to Third.

Her throat grew tight looking at him, so different now.

He was deeply fulfilled and more powerful than ever.

She knew that look. Kerrick had become this man when he’d completed the breh-hedden with her, more determined than ever to do his duty and to be all that he could be.

She remembered her battle with Leto, how frightened she’d been at the impossible task of fighting a Warrior of the Blood with three thousand years of experience.

Kerrick had downloaded his battle memories—that was one of the reasons she’d won the battle.

The other reason had been more complex: She had relied on her own gifts and abilities so that in the end she had defeated Leto and saved his life, by reversing a pocket of time and creating shields that his sword could not penetrate.

Now she was here, a vampire and a breh, executive assistant to Madame Endelle, and saddled with the ominous task of opening the gateway to Third Earth. She was a healer of the mind and had been during her adult years on Mortal Earth.

She could see the blue vortex now swirling above her, calling to her as though from the time of her ascension the portal had been living inside her, a task to fulfill when the time called.

James had explained what needed to be done, yet how strange to think that she was the one to do it, of all ascenders, the youngest, the least experienced.

Her nerves, however, felt like a car with the revs too high. She took numerous deep breaths.

Behind her, obsidian flame waited to support her.

Finally, she felt the timing was exactly right. She turned and nodded to Grace.

This was it.

Grace had already dipped within Endelle’s soul and acquired her levitation ability.

Alison felt obsidian flame’s power come to life behind her. She rose in the air and a moment later she was speeding toward the vortex, a stream of power lifting her up and propelling her at the same time.

She opened her mind, focusing on the portal to Third. She spread her arms wide and, as though the portal had always been part of her, she held her power open.

She then invited Grace to enter her soul and to acquire the same ability to connect with the portal.

Grace dove within, which made Alison smile because the woman had incredible gentleness as her blue flame power slipped into Alison’s soul.

She could feel the slight pressure deep within as Grace found the lock to her portal ability, inserted her preternatural blue flame key, and acquired the same ability.

A moment later, Grace departed, leaving behind a strange emptiness. Grace then sent, What would you have us do?

Alison took a deep breath. She knew instinctively what needed to be done, so she returned, Do what you normally do. When the triad feels the need to connect with the portal, just let the power flow.

Understood.

Alison waited, but it couldn’t have been more than seconds before she could feel the rumbling beneath her.

The obsidian power began to stream like a vast wave of energy, moving through Alison and past her, amplifying the connection to the portal until a slivery stream of light shot in the direction of the gateway.

The result was music, like a heavenly choir humming the most beautiful harmony she had ever heard. The music swirled around her and through her. She cried out in a kind of spiritual ecstasy.

The blue vortex spun faster and faster and suddenly blossomed, for she could describe it no other way. She could feel that the portal was opening—and at the same time she could also see the breach that Greaves apparently had created to bring his Third Earth death vampires through.