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With zero warning or the slightest nibble, the line jerked with enough force to send me sprawling. “Hold onto it!” I yelled to Pellini then scrambled up to one knee, wrapped the strand in both fists, and braced against the pull. Szerain’s signature resonated through the connection, though with no hint of the others. Breath hissing through my teeth, I tapped the nexus resources and drew the strand toward me, hand over hand. It thinned to little more than a glowing thread yet held strong. Szerain’s presence intensified. I almost had—
The balance tipped. I let out a shocked urk! as Szerain’s aura enveloped me, dragging me forward.
“Kara!” Pellini yelled.
This was so not part of the plan. I fought to hold on, invoked the nexus, and anchored strands, all to no avail. This had the feel of an attack. What the hell was Szerain doing? Did he not want to be rescued? Had I been wrong about him this whole time?
Szerain yanked me through what felt like viscous snot loaded with razor blades. Before I could form a mental scream, I collapsed face down on a cool, glassy surface. Blinding golden light flared, seeming to penetrate all the way to my bones before settling into a soft glow. Twinges of pain skittered through my limbs like electrified fleas on speed. I tried to scramble to my feet, but my muscles didn’t want to cooperate.
Strong hands gripped my upper arms and hauled me up. Szerain.
While my body refused to obey my orders to struggle, he crushed me in an embrace and hugged my head to his shoulder. “You foolish, headstrong, insane, brilliant woman.”
Whew. Not an attack. Still a good guy. “You forgot pushy bitch,” I croaked. The pain eased, either through Szerain’s doing or on its own. I still fell like a ragdoll, though. “Something went wrong. I thought I had you, but—”
“Kara, you did. I mean, you would have if I’d wanted to come through.” He pushed me out to arm’s length and eyed me critically. His features were Szerain’s, and the gold-flecked green eyes were the same as Ryan’s, though somehow they held more vitality despite the dark circles beneath them. “I reversed your hook and dragged you here.”
“Here” was a golden bubble surrounded by darkness and not much larger than a stall in a public restroom. A dimensional pocket, I assumed.
“But why?” I asked, perplexed. “Don’t you want to be rescued?”
“Not without preparation on both ends. We’d be sitting ducks for Xharbek.” He released my shoulders, but kept a supporting hand on my arm.
“No, see, Mzatal turned my nexus into—”
“I know about your nexus,” he said. “We felt it when Mzatal created the link to Rhyzkahl. But it’s not enough.”
I sighed as my plan crumbled. “Where are the others?”
“Still in our stronghold. It was safer for Ashava if I came out and met you.”
“How is she?” I gave him a worried look. “Jill is going crazy.”
His eyes lit up as he smiled. “She thrives. She’s strong and clever. Smarter than me, I’m certain.”
“Well, so is Fuzzykins.”
Szerain laughed. “All right. Smarter than Mzatal.”
“That’s pretty smart.” A pang went through me at how much I’d missed this kind of back-and-forth. “What about the others? Is Sonny doing okay? Has Zack recovered at all?”
“Sonny is coping with the situation as well as can be expected, and he dotes on Ashava. They’re good for each other. Zakaar . . .” Deep worry shadowed his eyes. “Zakaar continues to fade.” Grief tinged his voice. “We’re on alert twenty-four seven, which means he’s had no recovery time.”
His bleak expression shouted what he hadn’t said: Even spending weeks lounging stress-free in Tahiti wouldn’t be enough to save Zack. He needed more than mere time. For the fifteen years of Szerain’s submersion as Ryan, Zack had not only been his guard and guardian, but his lifeline to sanity in the inhumane prison. And now it tore at Szerain that he couldn’t do a damn thing to save him.
“I’m so sorry.” Without thinking
, I pulled him into a hug, same as I’d do for any other friend going through a hard time. And, like any other friend, Szerain accepted the comfort and returned the embrace. “Let’s bring him home,” I said. I didn’t add an empty promise that we’d find a way to help him. I held on to hope, but that wasn’t the same. “What preparations do I need to make on my end?”
Szerain briefly tightened his embrace then released me. “I can’t determine the timing and nuances until I have a update on everything that’s happened since Katashi blew the PD valve. However, I can start laying out the basics.” He lifted his hand, and a spiral notepad and pencil appeared in it out of thin air—or, rather, out of a handy dimensional storage pocket.
“You should teach me that trick,” I said. “I need a place to store my summer clothes, plus I could finally clear out the shed in my back yard.”
His mouth quirked into a sly smile. “How can I amaze and mystify if I give away my secrets?” He flipped to a blank page and began to sketch interlocking sigils. “You’ll need to create a matching trio of diagrams on your nexus then reach for us, as you did just now, and pull us through. The nexus setup will act as a temporary bunker until we can raise the needed protections to keep Xharbek at bay.” He paused and met my eyes. “In the meantime, Zakaar, Ashava, and I have much planning to do.”
Ashava, planning? I had a sudden mental image of a baby wearing an Army general’s uniform, moving miniature tanks and soldiers around a map.
On the other hand, the kid had only been a few minutes old when she kicked serious ass at the Beaulac PD and prevented the valve explosion from being exponentially worse. Maybe Ashava’s involvement in the planning wasn’t so ludicrous after all.
