Part 1 (2/2)

He felt warm, he felt felt human. He breathed. He obviously bled. His heart tried to pump, but it was weak and erratic. He was definitely a man. human. He breathed. He obviously bled. His heart tried to pump, but it was weak and erratic. He was definitely a man.

”Use the crystal.”

Selena stiffened so sharply she nearly lost her balance, catching herself with a palm on the rug. She turned. ”What did you say?”

Clara had somehow s.h.i.+fted to sit up in her bed. Her eyes in their youthful face were full of wisdom and clarity. ”They told me to tell you to use your crystal.”

Heart pounding, Selena rose slowly to her feet. No one knew about the crystal except Vonnie. ”Who?”

Clara smiled and made a sharp, jerky gesture to the corner near her bed-where her guides, or angels as she preferred to call them, usually appeared. They weren't there, or at least weren't visible to Selena at that moment. ”You know,” the girl told her. Her smile grew broader, almost beatific. The blue cloud billowed.

Then, suddenly, the light in her eyes faded as if a dense fog slid in front of the sun. A pang of fear stabbed Selena in the gut and she ran.

She got to Clara's side in time to touch her hand. ”Clara.” No, oh no. No, oh no.

It was hard enough watching life ease from the eyes of any person, but it was the most difficult with children. Yet, they were always so brave, so clear-eyed about it. The death haze had deepened; and as she sat there next to the little girl, feeling herself pulled into Clara's blue cloud, she could see Clara's parents in the fog, waiting to help her, and her aunt as well, their images wavering in the distance. Her throat dry, Selena closed her hands over each of the girl's smaller ones and felt warmth ease from Clara's fingers.

At least she would be with her parents now.

As the life slipped away and Clara's muscles relaxed, waves of her memories came to Selena. Images, visions, feelings; in short, jerky vignettes and dreamlike moments flooded into her mind, p.r.i.c.kling like a million pin-needles as she absorbed them. She fought back tears and accepted them. This part of her calling was the most intimate, the most difficult ... and yet, the most beautiful.

At last, the little girl's hands went soft and limp. Her breathing stopped. Her little heart rested.

The blue haze disintegrated.

And Selena closed the young, wise eyes with two gentle thumbs, then wiped her own.

She didn't know how long she sat there, looking down at the serene little face with its wispy hair brushed back from the temples, doing her private grieving, her prayers and memorials, but suddenly a gasp from the corner pulled her out of her silence.

Selena was up and away from the small body in a flash, but by then it was too late. The dragon man gave a violent shudder, his eyes closed as if in pain, and a last desperate breath. And then ... nothing.

She bent, tucking her ear to his chest. Silence. No heartbeat. No faint heave from the lungs. The haze disintegrated, leaving nothing but a few last sparkling dust motes in the air.

He was dead.

And she didn't know who he was or where he belonged.

Chapter 1.

”What the h.e.l.l do you mean, you lost lost Theo?” Lou Waxnicki heard his own voice rise and crack, not with age but with fear and disbelief. He looked up at the ma.s.sive man looming over him. For once, Fence didn't have that devil-may-care glint in his eyes. Theo?” Lou Waxnicki heard his own voice rise and crack, not with age but with fear and disbelief. He looked up at the ma.s.sive man looming over him. For once, Fence didn't have that devil-may-care glint in his eyes.

In fact, the guy looked downright miserable, and the misery had nothing to do with the streaked blood dried on his coffee-colored face or the way he cradled his left arm. Lou saw the red and swelling flesh on his chin and arms and knew it would turn purple and green with bruising by the next day. He'd been in some h.e.l.lacious fight, but the real misery was in his eyes, bloodshot and dull with pain.

”And Quent? Where the h.e.l.l is he?” Lou demanded, but in a marginally lower voice. ”Did he find his father?”

Theo was Lou's twin brother, and Theo and Fence had insisted on going with Quent on his suicidal mission-to find Quent's father, one of the leaders of the immortal Elite.

Sage rose from her computer chair and placed her cool hands on Lou's shoulders, a thumb brus.h.i.+ng the edge of his gray ponytail. ”What happened?” she asked, squeezing gently in a silent suggestion of patience. Her fingers, strong from working on keyboards day after day, were firm and sure.

And how frail he felt, even to himself, under those slim fingers. How old and frail. Both he and Theo were seventy-eight years old, but through a crazy twist of fate, Theo had been affected physically so that he'd hardly aged in the last fifty years. He still looked the same as he had when the cataclysmic events of the Change had occurred, leaving Lou to appear more like his grandfather than his twin.

”We were captured by one of the bounty hunters and Theo was shot. Bad. In the chest,” Fence said, looking at Lou steadily. ”The only hope was to get him back here to see if Elliott could save-uh, fix-him 'cause there wasn't anything else to be done. Quent went on to find Fielding while I brought Theo back here to Envy. He was bad off, and I was goin' so fast when I-”

A little tone from the computer in the corner had Lou and Sage both glancing over. The chime played the first few bars of the Mission Impossible Mission Impossible theme-one of Theo's little jokes since he knew how much his twin hated the Tom Cruise movie-but even from where he sat, Lou could see that the email wasn't from Theo. It was an automated update from one of the thirty network access points that had been secretly installed around a fifty-mile radius of Envy. theme-one of Theo's little jokes since he knew how much his twin hated the Tom Cruise movie-but even from where he sat, Lou could see that the email wasn't from Theo. It was an automated update from one of the thirty network access points that had been secretly installed around a fifty-mile radius of Envy.

His sharp peal of hope ebbed.

”Long story short, I had to put Theo down and hide him.” Fence had continued as if nothing had interrupted the conversation-but then, he probably wasn't as attuned as Lou and Sage were to every single sound made by the dozen PCs and Macs. ”I was fixing to come back for him right away, but then I did a number through the floor of the building. Banged my head pretty good. When I woke up, I had to climb my a.s.s out of there, and when I got back to where I left him, Theo was gone.”

”No clue where he went?”

”He sure as s.h.i.+t didn't get up and walk away, Lou. And it wasn't an animal that got him, or a zombie, 'cause they'd have left evidence.” Fence's temper, which, truthfully, seemed more aimed at himself than Lou, appeared to abate as he smoothed a hand over his bald head. ”I looked everywhere but couldn't find hide nor hair of him. He disappeared good.”

”But he was shot,” Lou said, taking care with his words. Because the reality was starting to sink in. ”He wouldn't last long without medical treatment.”

”No.” Fence's voice was a barely audible whisper. ”I can't see him making it without Elliott's help.”

Which was the big guy's way of saying he was dead. Theo was dead.

No.

Theo was indestructible. He had more lives than a cat.

No.

Lou pulled to his feet, feeling every seventy-eight-year-old joint creak in protest. Some days he felt as young as his brother looked-which was to say, thirtyish. But on a day like today, he felt older than G.o.d.

”I'll get Jade and Elliott,” Sage said, already starting toward the exit of their secret subterranean computer room. ”Simon will want to go too, and Wyatt ... to look for Theo.” She glanced at Fence.

He nodded, his dark face weary but his eyes sharp. ”Yeah. It's a day trip from here.”

”I'm coming this time,” Lou said, his voice flat. ”I'm not staying back here again.”

Sage opened her mouth to argue, but Lou wasn't about to listen to her. ”I'm f.u.c.king going. End of story.”

And then he closed his eyes for a moment and felt. Reached out for that tangible thread that connected him and Theo, that same thread that had told him his twin had survived the Change too. The thread that had drawn him closer and closer to his brother until he'd found him.

For the first time, he felt nothing. The thread was broken.

Lou opened his eyes and realized that he was alone.

<script>