He motioned for me to take a seat in the swivel chair in front of the crystal panel.

  “Place your right hand here.”

  Cormac pointed to a black square that seemed to be made of something glossy and gel-like. I was hesitant at first, but the second I touched it, the gel formed to the exact size and shape of my hand.

  “What does this do?” I asked with awe.

  “What doesn’t it do is more the right question,” he said, smiling like a kid. “Think of anyone you want to talk to. Pick someone in the castle you can just say hi to real quick.”

  My heart skipped a beat for a moment as I remembered that Jackson and I were hoping to have a chance to talk tonight. I would have loved to call him up on that ship right now and tell him how the command center was coming along.

  Instead, I thought of Mary Anne. I needed to check in with her about the new homes for the refugees, anyway.

  “I just think about her?” I asked. “How does this work?”

  “Just focus on your connection to whoever it is,” he said. “Picture their face or hear their voice in your head.”

  I put Mary Anne’s face in my mind’s eye, and immediately, a medium-sized ruby crystal in the center of the panel lit up and Mary Anne’s voice came through as if I’d called her on my cell phone and put her on speaker.

  “What’s up?” she asked. “I thought you were checking out the rose portal.”

  “I am,” I said, wide-eyed as I glanced at Cormac. Was I even doing this right? And how had the crystal read my mind like that?

  He simply nodded toward the stone.

  “Have you seen this command center?” I asked. “I’m talking to you right now on some kind of panel of crystals. This thing is wild. You have to come check it out.”

  “Brooke and I tested it out yesterday. Cormac’s a genius, right?”

  “Definitely,” I said, wondering what else this panel could do. “I just wanted to check in real quick about the refugees and housing. Is everything going okay?”

  “We’re all good here,” she said. “Extending the dome was the right thing to do. We should have plenty of room for everyone who joined us from the Resistance, plus about three thousand more demons if the need should ever arise. The last of the houses are going up this week, I’d say, and most of the Resistance refugees have chosen their spots and moved in already.”

  Pride swelled in my chest. We were really making a difference, and it meant so much to be able to keep everyone safe.

  “Thanks for everything you’ve done,” I said. “I’ll see you at dinner tonight, I hope.”

  “You bet,” she said.

  “We will be there,” Essex said, his voice coming through loud and clear.

  He was never too far from her side.

  “I’ll see you then.”

  I looked at Cormac, confused. “How do I hang up an interdimensional crystal call?”

  “You already did it,” he said. “The crystals know your intentions. So, just as a warning, you might want to think through what you want to accomplish before you put your hand on the gelpad.”

  “This is incredible,” I said, amazed as he walked me through some of the other features.

  “With this, we should be able to keep an eye on all of the main places of importance, including this forest, places like Winterhaven and Blackwood, and even Venom.”

  I raised an eyebrow.

  “Rend know about that?”

  He gave me a look. “What do you take me for? A fool? Yes, I obtained permission from Rend before I tagged his club,” Cormac said. “The one place I think we might want to monitor that I haven’t gotten permission for yet is the King’s City in the northern kingdom.”

  “Lea said no?”

  For the first time since I’d gotten here, Cormac shifted uncomfortably, his eyes darting to the side. “Not exactly.”

  I laughed.

  “You were too scared to ask her?”

  He made a face, but I knew I’d nailed it.

  “So, you have no problem talking to a vampire known for literally tearing people apart, but you’re terrified of a princess?” I asked.

  “She’s intimidating,” he said. “I was hoping you’d ask her for us.”

  I rolled my eyes. “I should make you do it. I can’t have my head of security being afraid of one of our closest allies. Lea’s fierce, but she’s on our side, always.”

  Cormac just stared at me until I shrugged and agreed to talk to Lea when I saw her tomorrow.

  “Thank you,” he said. “If she agrees, just ask her to put these beacons in the places indicated on the bottom. One goes in the center of the city. One in the castle itself. And another at the main gate of the city.”

  I took the three beacons and placed them in my bag.

  “You’ve done good work here, Cormac. I appreciate this,” I said, glancing at the screens to see one focused on the newly-rebuilt wing of the castle where Zara’s cocoon once again rested high above the gardens. Every time I thought about my dear friend who had sacrificed everything to save my life, more than once, tears flooded my eyes.

  “Pay particular attention to that room,” I said. “Let me know if you see any movement at all, okay?”

  He nodded, and I turned away to swipe at a stray tear.

  Not very leader-like, but what could I say? I missed her, and I was feeling particularly vulnerable since Jackson left.

  Or was it the fact that I’d almost died, yet again, that made me feel so vulnerable?

  Lying there on the floor of Blackwood’s holding room, my blood flowing onto the floor as Illana opened a portal to the High Priestess’s ritual room, I had resigned myself to the fact that it might truly be the end for me. If Jackson hadn’t come through with a power strong enough to blast through that door, it would have been the end.

  I still didn’t even understand how he’d summoned that strong blue light, but there were enough mysteries to solve right now. Besides, even though he did save my life, I was still working to move on from the terror of that moment.

  “Is everything okay?” Cormac asked.

  “It is today,” I said, lifting my chin and smiling. “I can’t answer for yesterday, and I certainly can’t tell you anything about tomorrow, but right now, yes. Everything is more than okay. Hopefully your work here will help it stay that way.”

  I left the small command center and looked around the area where my mother’s favorite flowers had become such an important symbol in our fight for freedom.

  I loved this place, and it gave me hope to stand here, seeing everyone working together to make it safe and strong.

  In many ways, though, I missed the simple days when Jackson had first brought me to Brighton Lake. But there was no going back to that sixteen-year-old girl who had no idea who she truly was or just how evil the Order of Shadows could be. Not that I would have wanted to.

  I had grown up so much since our first real date on the lake.

  And deep down, I knew that simpler, happier days were out there waiting for us somewhere beyond this war.

  Stronger Than You Think

  Jackson

  I gripped the axe with both hands and squinted against the bright light of the five suns on the horizon.

  The ship sailed smoothly through calm waters today, which made it easier to look confident than it had been the day before, when the waves had knocked me off-balance more times than I cared to admit.

  “Again,” I said, preparing my stance the way Aerden had shown me.

  This time, when he came for me, I was ready, shifting at just the right time, focusing on the weight of the weapon in my hands as I reformed behind him and swung with all my might.

  He turned with such grace and ease, countering my attack with only a split second to spare.

  “Good,” he said. “Now, when your opponent counters you with all their weight focused in one place, you shift again. Always seek to use their own momentum against them. Force them into one stance, and then come at them from the opposite direction to throw them off. Like this.”

  He went through the next set of moves, standing at my side to show me how he would double-counter the move. He dropped the axe low and shifted, grabbing it just before it hit the ground and attacking from the side this time, his momentum adding to the strength of his swing.

  I nodded, my heart racing as he moved back to his starting stance.

  I took a breath and went through the full set of moves once in my mind before he ran toward me. I shifted, keeping my mind one step ahead of my body as we moved together.

  Our weapons clashed, but instead of standing there like I normally would have done, waiting for my opponent’s next move, I immediately shifted, dropping my axe just as he had done.

  I could see the brilliance of his strategy the moment I released the axe. An opponent would be expecting the resistance of my weapon against theirs, throwing their entire body weight against it. The second I dropped my weapon, their own force threw them off balance.

  Aerden stumbled slightly, and I reappeared beside him, grabbing the weapon I’d dropped and swinging it back toward him. Because he knew my next move, he was able to shift and disappear just before the blade of the axe buried itself in his side.

  Someone who hadn’t expected it, though, would never have reacted so quickly.

  “You’re fast,” he said, out of breath as he reformed a few steps away.

  “Where did you learn all of this?” I asked.

  In the two weeks we’d been at sea, he’d taught me dozens of techniques like this one. Things we’d never practiced as shadowlings, sparring along the black cliffs.

  “I know you weren’t doing all this when we were young, and it’s not like you had a lot of time to practice since then.”

  Aerden laughed. “The mind is a powerful thing. Especially when it’s all you have,” he said. “Let’s just say I had a lot of free time over the past hundred years to think through different potential strategies.”

  He said it so lightly, as if those hundred years hadn’t been pure torture for him.

  “Well, it paid off,” I said. “Show me something else.”

  “You know, you’d be able to do a lot more if you could wield that thing with one hand, instead of two.”

  I narrowed my eyes at him. Now, he was just goading me. I wasn’t strong enough yet to wield this powerful of an axe with one hand, and he knew it. I liked to think I was pretty strong in general, but sparring with him now made me feel like I’d been wasting the last hundred years of my life.

  Like my brother, I hadn’t had access to my full powers for a long time living in Peachville, but unlike him, I’d had my body. I could have at least asked Ella Mae to buy me a weight table or something.

  I’d lost hope and practically given up, but all that time, while Aerden had been locked in that statue, he’d been dreaming up ways to beat the crap out of people if he ever went free.

  He’d made much better use of his time than I had.

  “You’re stronger than you think,” Aerden said, his eyes suddenly taking on that far-off quality he sometimes got when he was thinking about things beyond the surface. He seemed to shake it off, but I couldn’t just let that go.

  “What?” I asked, lowering the axe.

  “Nothing,” he said, motioning for me to get back to work. “Let’s go again. Show me you’ve really got it down, and then I’ll show you a three-move combo that will help you defeat anyone, even if they’re a lot bigger or stronger.”

  I knew better than to push, because all it took with him was one word too far, and he would completely shut down on me.

  Later, though, after more than three hours of training in the heat of five suns, I caught him in a more open mood as we cooked a modest lunch in the galley kitchen below deck. He seemed to enjoy the simple things like cooking or just sitting in the sun, feeling the wind on his face, which was no surprise, really.

  He never took a second for granted, it seemed, and I admired that about him.

  “You said something earlier that caught my attention,” I said, trying to ease into it a bit while not being too obvious that I was watching each small reaction.

  “Oh?” he asked, sliding a piece of perfectly-seared fish onto my plate, along with the last of the vegetables we’d brought along. “What was that?”

  “You said I was stronger than I think I am. What did you mean by that?”

  His eyes cut toward mine, and his lips curled up slightly.

  “Have you been waiting all morning to bring that back up?” he asked. “And I thought I was patient.”

  Okay, so he got me. I still wanted to know why it had seemed to affect him so much when he’d said it.

  “It’s just something Sabine said when she showed up that night we rescued Andros,” he said. “She told me we were both more powerful than we had ever imagined. And then she placed a single fingertip on my forehead.”

  He mirrored the motion, remembering it with that same far-off, bewildered look.

  “It was as if she unlocked something inside me,” he said, shaking his head and trying to make sense of it. “That strange golem of light appeared instantly, with no effort at all, as if it truly were a part of me. I think she knew exactly what she was doing. She knew exactly what I could do.”

  “But you’d never met her before, right?” I asked, even though I already knew the answer to that question. Aerden would have had no reason to deal with Sabine in the past.

  “Never,” he said. “How do you think a powerful fae like Sabine found out about me?”

  I took a bite of the fish, impressed with Aerden’s cooking skills and at the same time, completely confused by Sabine’s presence on that battlefield. It seemed so unlike her to just appear to help someone without specifically having been summoned or called there.

  Hell, I’d needed her desperately for months before I trudged through her death swamp, and even then, she’d taken one of the most precious things in the world from me in exchange for her help.

  Yet, with Aerden, she’d simply appeared out of nowhere to save his life. No questions asked. No favor demanded in return.

  Why would she do that?

  And how did she know he’d be there in that cave at that exact moment? Had she been watching the battle, waiting to see what happened?

  Or had she known he’d be captured by the diamond hunters because of the ability she’d taken from me?

  “Harper met Sabine when she was caught in the past,” I said. “Back when she was first creating Venom for Rend. Sabine looked through her memories, so maybe that’s how she knew about both of us.”

  “Maybe,” Aerden said. “But that still doesn’t explain how she could have known about my golem. That’s a new ability for me. There’s no way Sabine could have seen that in Harper’s memories, because I hadn’t even manifested it yet.”

  He shook his head, his expression darker, making me wonder if I’d ruined the light mood of the day by bringing it up.

  “What are you thinking?” I asked.

  “Just that there’s more at work here than I can make sense of,” he said. He met my eyes. “Have you ever known another demon who could do that? Create a magical creature out of light?”

  I swallowed, my whole body tensing at his question.

  “I’ve only seen something similar to that once before,” I said.

  His eyes widened. “Where?” he asked, leaning toward me. “Who?”

  “I didn’t have a chance to tell you about this before, but after Tulianne died, I was so angry at the ruby priestess that I went down into the dungeons of the castle, ready to kill that witch myself for planting those bombs,” I said. “But when I got down there, she was suspended in some kind of portal.”

  I explained how Magda had somehow gotten pulled into a dark room made of pure obsidian stone. I told him about the pentagram embedded in the floor, similar to the ritual room at Peachville and other gates. How this room had one of each of the five colored stones of the Order of Shadows embedded in the floor at each point of the star with a large diamond in the center of all of it, raised above everything else on a pedestal made of the same obsidian that lined the walls.

  “Both that day and when Harper was being held in that room with Illana, I accessed something new inside myself, too,” I said. “Nothing as cool as a giant being made of light, mind you, but a bright blue light that was more powerful than anything I’d ever cast before. Like it came from something new I didn’t have access to before.”

  “It would only make sense that if something new awakened in me, you’d have access to the same or similar type of power,” Aerden said, nodding. “The question is, where does it come from? And how come we never had access to it before now?”

  Questions neither of us knew how to answer.

  After a long silence, Aerden finally spoke.

  “I’ve been thinking about it a lot,” Aerden said. “The way Sabine just touched my forehead and ignited that power inside me. No effort. Just pure light, expanding inside me. There’s something about it that changes everything somehow. I just can’t quite fit all the puzzle pieces together. Maybe this power is part of the reason…”

  His voice drifted and he turned away, but I knew what was still unsaid between us.

  Despite two weeks at sea alone together, we’d never discussed what happened that night at Blackwood with Illana or what happened in the King’s City shortly afterward.

  We’d lost our entire family, in more ways than one.

  “Look, I know you were hopeful our mother was just some pawn to the Order and that we could save her, the same way Lea saved her father, but—”

  “I really don’t want to talk about it,” Aerden said, pushing away from the table and practically throwing his metal plate into the small sink.

  Usually, I just let him go until he’d cooled off a bit, but this was something we were going to have to face before we hit that storm, and he had to know that every bit as much as I did.

  I couldn’t just let him walk away from me again.

  I stood and grabbed his arm, blocking his way out of the kitchen. “We have to talk about it,” I said. “You’re not alone, trapped in a statue of stone or some witch’s body, anymore. You don’t have to go through all of this alone, anymore, and I shouldn’t have to, either. I need you, brother.”