Suddenly Santiago’s sword was in his hand, the ruby in the crossguard winking as he swiped the sword twice through the air. He swished it finally in a long strike in front of Thorne so that the point touched the carpet at his feet. “My fealty is with the Warriors of the Blood. I would never leave them or desert them.”

Thorne nodded and a smile eased over his lips. “Well said, except for one thing: Man will always let you down. Even you might have to make decisions that will seem wrong to you.”

Zacharius came forward to stand beside Santiago. He put his hand on Santiago’s wrist. “This is what I’ve been trying to say to you. We are none of us perfect, and when one falters, the rest of us rise up and do what we must. You can’t be so pigheaded about this. You’ve only served for a few hundred years. Thorne has served for two thousand years and look what Marcus went through.” Marcus had left the brotherhood for two centuries because his sister had been killed by death vampires and he’d blamed Kerrick for the death. The war had taken its toll—and how was that a surprise? Marcus had fought death vampires as a Warrior of the Blood for four thousand years.

Alison spoke up. “Thorne, I think after battling for two millennia, you’re allowed a few weeks off.”

For some reason, the room seemed to settle down at her words. Even Santiago didn’t look quite so mulish. But then this was Alison’s primary gift, her empathy and her ability to give ease just by her presence.

Marcus’s voice filled the space, which caused Zach and Santiago to turn in the direction of the couch. “Zach’s right. None of us is perfect, and each has a breaking point when things must change, or the future feels intolerable.

“But I do know this. I wasn’t idle while I was away. I built an empire, and that has helped me to change Endelle’s administration’s profile to all of Second Earth.” Marcus’s efforts had slowly gained the confidence of the High Administrators still aligned with Endelle. For the past fifteen years, High Administrators had been leaving her alliance at an alarming rate thanks to Greaves’s advanced PR methods. He was a genius at propaganda and as the owner of most of the mineral wealth of Second Earth, he had a monstrous fortune to throw at the heads of those wavering in their loyalty to Endelle.

Marcus had slowed the process of defection to barely a trickle.

Marcus met Thorne’s gaze and asked, “What did you gain by being away?”

But it was Marguerite who spoke. “Thorne has emerging powers. We both do.” All eyes shifted in her direction.

“What powers?” Kerrick asked, leaning to look around his wife so that he could see Marguerite.

Marguerite shifted. Baby Helena’s hand now hung beside Marguerite’s arm. She was fast asleep. Despite the subject at hand, a tremor went through Thorne, a quickening that stunned him, not of his groin, but of his heart. He felt a profound need to get children by Marguerite, as though this was part of his destiny.

He’d felt the same way earlier, when baby Helena had all but crawled into her arms, demanding her presence and attention. Sweet Jesus, what the fuck did this mean?

Marguerite said, “Obsidian flame. We are both obsidian flame, but Thorne’s power is different. Mine is meant to combine with Fiona’s—and there’s something more. Grace is the blue variety of obsidian flame.”

Alison whispered, “Oh, my God.”

Santiago asked, “Is all of this true?” He turned to Thorne. “Since you were gone, you have now become obsidian flame? What the fuck does it mean? And Grace, too, that gentle soul?”

Thorne rose to his feet and glanced at Santiago’s identified sword. “How about you put your weapon away.”

Santiago nodded. The sword vanished.

Thorne explained what had happened. Certainly not all of it, or that the breaking of the membrane had occurred when he and Marguerite were naked in his bedroom. “The truth is, I don’t know the meaning yet. I don’t know what value it will be to the war effort. It’s all too new for that.”

He met Marguerite’s gaze. She nodded in agreement, but she looked so serious.

“Right now,” he said, “we’re taking this whole thing one horrible minute at a time.”

A general rumble of understanding went through the couples who had already been through the enormous changes that came with the breh-hedden.

When the children are well-tended,

A society thrives.

—Collected Proverbs, Beatrice of Fourth

Chapter 20

Marguerite swayed and rubbed without thinking. The sleeping baby was a solid weight against her now. Still, she moved in a gentle comforting rhythm that must have been as old as time. It gave her as much solace and ease as no doubt it did the baby.

She glanced around the power-laden group, the warriors first, imprinting face to name and back again. She had never been in a room with so many muscle-packed men before.

But it struck her suddenly that she didn’t feel like she would have just a few days ago, on the hunt and so hungry for masculine attention she could have killed for it.

Being with Thorne had changed that somehow. Perhaps being inside his mind, perhaps fighting with him, maybe even essentially bringing him back from the dead when she busted his power open.

She had the weirdest sensation that she belonged here, among these people—something she had never felt in her entire life. Pieces of her past began clicking into place, even the way her father’s brutal concept of religion had forced her from that community forever. Even the way Grace’s friendship and her nonjudgmental nature had made her feel comfortable in the woman’s presence despite the fact that they were at opposite ends of the spiritual spectrum.

She felt the power around her as a living, breathing entity, as something that was unified while at the same time belonging to each individual separately. And she was part of that.

Thorne was part of that.

“Maybe you should tell everyone about Leto now,” she suggested.

He nodded then proceeded to relate everything, beginning with Grace having pulled Leto out of Moscow Two at the exact moment that Greaves had planned his demise. He spoke for a long time, about the hidden colony, about Diallo, even a little about his fight with Endelle. That part of his story brought a heavy silence to the room.

He pressed on. He expanded on Marguerite’s ability to reach pure vision with the help of the Seer Brynna, a vision that had led to yet another rescue not just of Leto but of Grace as well, since apparently Greaves had wanted her dead for interfering in his plans. Then he spoke of Grace as the blue variety of obsidian flame. Essentially the triad’s members were now accounted for, he added, though no one really had any idea what their joined power could mean for the war.

He only slowed down when he got to Leto’s revelations about the size of Greaves’s army. Marguerite almost blurted it out but thought better of it.

It was Luken who finally prompted him. “So, what exactly did Leto do on behalf of the fucking little peach?”

“He built his army. Two million strong.”

Marguerite glanced around the group. She heard faint hisses, a number of curses, then just a fearsome silence. The air in the room seemed to vibrate. When she glanced back at Thorne, she saw that it was coming from him.

What’s going on? she sent.

I’m angry.

Well, you’re almost glowing. You might want to calm down.

He laughed, but he put his forehead in his hand and rubbed the temples. He squeezed his eyes shut. Marguerite watched his shoulders rise in a deep breath until he let his hand fall away, opened his eyes, and said. “Leto had to do this in order to keep up the illusion. I don’t fault him. How can I? He believed he was acting in the interests of all Second Earth. If any of us had been approached by a Sixth ascender, would we have refused? No, of course not.

“At the same time, I want him to come back to us, but he’s not well. There’s a good chance he won’t survive his withdrawal from dying blood. He won’t take it again and for some reason he’s become very weak, almost at the point of death.

“Only Grace’s sustenance has kept him alive over the past twenty-four hours, but just barely.”

Santiago, still standing near Thorne, said, “But I thought it was impossible to die from a lack of dying blood, at least so soon. I thought you could starve to death, but that such a death would take months.”

“Not in Leto’s case, but we’re not sure why—unless…” Marguerite once more watched him take a deep breath. “Unless it’s because he’s caught in the breh-hedden.”

No one asked the who of it. News traveled fast among the warriors. Nor did anyone ask why it might be affecting Leto that way. The breh-hedden was no picnic.

The deep sigh she took lifted her shoulders and the baby with it. Helena shifted and sighed as well, but she remained in the heavy weight of sleep. Marguerite kept a slow gentle rub up and down her back like she’d seen Alison do.

“You okay with that, boss?” Luken asked. From the corner of her eye, she watched him push away from the doorjamb. He was big, this warrior, more muscled than any of the other men. “I mean, Grace is about the gentlest soul I’ve ever known. I never thought she’d hook up with a warrior.”

Thorne’s smile was crooked. “Well, she kind of put me in my place about it. She may be gentle and kind but she doesn’t lack spirit. Make no mistake about that. As for if I’m okay with it, no, of course not, because it’s one helluva rough ride and I wouldn’t wish that on anyone I loved.” But as his gaze made its way around the room, it landed on Marguerite. “The truth is, I’m beginning to think there is infinite wisdom in the breh-hedden. I don’t know of anyone who would have been strong enough to bring my obsidian power online, except for this woman.” He didn’t elaborate on how it all happened or that she’d all but brought him back from the dead.

Marguerite released another heavy sigh. She’d come a long way since she’d dropped down to Mortal Earth. Now here she was, looking at Thorne and wondering. It looked like Thorne was a little farther down the road than she was, though.