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My hands flew up at my sides. “He just disappeared?”
“No,” Triaten said. “Someone obviously had to move him.”
I looked to my right at the door to the apartment, my eyes narrowing. “Fucking bitch Helen.”
“Yes, Helen. She would be the obvious culprit.”
My breath seething, my gaze shifted to my uncle. “Then we need to go put screws into her skull until she talks—tells us where Damen is.”
Triaten heaved a sigh. “Except you’re asking us to somehow make right the fact that we just let the leader of the malefics not only onto our mountain, but deep into our inner sanctum. That isn’t going to fly with the mass of elders below in the parlor. That’s a betrayal that will not be looked upon lightly. And it involves all of us—me, Aiden, Skye. Helen knows that.”
“Fuck.” My hand slammed down into the cushion next to me. I tried to convince Damen to stay behind at the castle, then at the hotel in Denver, but he refused, not willing to let me out of his sight.
Stupid. I never should have listened to him.
Triaten straightened and took a step back, his hand running through his hair. “Some will be on my side, but we can’t cause civil war amongst panthenites—it’s not the time.”
I sank a glare into him. “Will it ever be the time?”
“It sure as hell is not now.”
“If not now, then when?”
Triaten’s teeth gritted. “It’s not now because it’s Damen—he’s not the catalyst I need to implode the elders. He’s the enemy—I shouldn’t have to remind you of that.”
I jumped to my feet with the sliver of space in front of me, desperation driving my rage. “The enemy? You never would have sent me to him if he was the enemy. Damen is the best fucking chance you have for the future you want—powers balanced between the species. How do you not understand that?”
The door to Triaten’s apartment opened and Charlotte rushed in, breathless, her right hand under an enormous baby belly that looked ready to pop.
Triaten had told me she was pregnant, but I didn’t know she wasthismuch pregnant.
Even pregnant, her face was the same as I remembered. Thin, elegant, gorgeous, with her long blond hair half pulled to the crown of her head. She slammed the door behind her. “I know where Damen is.”
Triaten spun around to Charlotte. “What? How?”
She moved to the three of us, standing next to Aiden. “I talked to Tom at the airfield. He said a plane took off a half hour ago, headed for Mykonos. Unscheduled.”
Aiden’s brow furrowed. “How’d you get him to tell you that?”
Aiden had always been a falcon, ready to swoop down upon any slips or holes in the panthenite defenses. Including loose-lipped air traffic controllers.
Charlotte shrugged. “He likes me. He despises Helen. Plus, I took out his daughter’s appendix last year and saved her life.”
I looked to Triaten. “Why Mykonos?”
Triaten’s lips pulled tight.
“Uncle Tri—what in the hell is in Mykonos?”
He sighed, his thumbnail working against his forefinger—which meant he was deciding how much he wanted to tell me. “Genora. Helen is delivering Damen to Victor Genora, who is working with Perseus Folotto to take control of the malefics.”
“What?” Shock rolled through my body, making me momentarily weightless. “What? Perseus? His brother? How do you know that?”
“We know as much as we can.” He looked at me like I was five again and was bothering him with too many questions. But then he continued on. “The Genoras have been plotting to usurp Damen for the last two years. He’s stayed on top of it. I’ve helped him stay on top of it because it behooves us for him to stay in power. Damen is stability. The Genoras are not. The elders were in accordance on that. Or so I thought. Helen has gone rogue on this one. I don’t know what she’s planning.”
“She thinks you’re too powerful, Tri,” Charlotte said. “I’ve been saying it for years. She’s terrified she is the past and you are the future.”
Triaten’s jawline hardened. “I am the future.” He looked around the room at Aiden and Charlotte. “We are the future. Skye is the future. Helen knows that.”
