Gates of Rapture (The Guardians of Ascension)

Zacharius slammed his ax into a log, leaving it there, then moved to stretch out on a blanket on his side. He threw small bits of something into the fire. The bits would flare and more sparks would rise. Santiago walked over to him and handed him a Dos Equis.

  Grace couldn’t help it. She extended her hearing in Santiago’s direction. “It’s just you, me, and Luken, hermano.”

  Zach smiled up at him and clinked Santiago’s bottle. He smiled. “Yep, just the three of us. I’ll want to hit the Blood and Bite in a few.”

  “I’m with you.” Santiago dropped down to sit beside him. He sipped his beer, and he, too, had that dark look.

  But Grace had a sudden strong impression that the breh-hedden wouldn’t be far behind for either of them. And why would it be? They were Warriors of the Blood, some of the finest vampires on the face of the earth, some of the most powerful both physically and preternaturally.

  Which made her think of Luken. He had politely refused to join the party. He insisted that at least one WhatBee show up at the Borderlands, that it wasn’t right for Seriffe’s Militia Warriors to shoulder the burden alone, even for one night. But Grace knew the truth. Luken still had a thing for Havily, and in this kind of environment, where brehs would be affectionate—well, Grace wasn’t surprised he’d made his excuses.

  As for obsidian flame, they were accounted for. Jean-Pierre sat on a log, off to Grace’s left, with Fiona on his lap, his long fingers stroking up and down her bare arm. He kept whispering things into her ear, and she would giggle, looking very young, almost carefree. The word was that Fiona was pregnant, though the pair was keeping it quiet for now.

  Grace thought the couple ought to have children, a dozen of them, and maybe they would over the centuries to come. The war looked to be over, though there was massive cleanup to be done, with thousands of death vampires still roaming Second Earth.

  Despite that, a new spirit was everywhere: hopeful when a few days ago it seemed impossible to win a battle against Greaves. Now he was on Fourth Earth and no longer a threat.

  She watched Marguerite approach the bonfire. She had fashioned a very long stick for herself so that she could prod the wood-based coals at the bottom of the bonfire, dragging some out and building smaller bonfires. She seemed to be enjoying herself immensely. But then why wouldn’t she? Her young life had been filled with horror, and she’d never really gotten to be a child. Apparently, Thorne encouraged her to just play, in the same way Marguerite in turn encouraged him to relax and let things go.

  She was so happy to be in the same circle as her brother. She would be an aunt to Thorne’s children and couldn’t wait. Thorne would one day serve as the ruler of Second Earth—that much she felt in every bone of her body, though no official announcement had been made nor had Endelle given a hint that she was stepping down. And Marguerite, as Supreme High Seer of Second Earth, was almost single-handedly overhauling the entire global Seer process, beginning with what she was calling her Seers’ Bill of Rights. With Owen Stannett dead, very little stood in the way of Marguerite’s reforming the corrupt Seers Fortress system.

  Grace patted Thorne’s arm. “This is a great group, you know.”

  He smiled down at her, looking deeply content, a warm light in his eye.

  Oh, Creator in heaven, she thought, thank you for giving him peace. His hazel eyes were clear and beautiful, especially in the flickering light of the bonfire.

  He nodded. “Yep, some of the finest men and women you’ll ever know.” He glanced around. “Isn’t Leto back yet?”

  “He wanted to make sure that the boys were all right. We got a babysitter, but he said he just wanted to check things out. He feels very protective of them. I never thought I would see this, but he and Casimir seem to have formed a bond.”

  Thorne shook his head. “We’ve entered a time of miracles, that’s what I think.”

  Grace smiled. “And Marguerite has become your miracle.”

  “In every possible way.” His gravelly voice had dropped at least half an octave, so it wasn’t a surprise that Marguerite turned to him, the long stick quiet for a moment, her brows raised.

  Grace could tell they were communicating telepathically. Marguerite dropped her stick and launched herself into his arms. Grace had the good sense to shift to the end of the log just to give the couple some room, laughing as she did so. Marguerite kissed him. It was such a beautiful sight, to see her worn-out brother so restored and so deeply in love.

  She sighed. Leto hadn’t been gone very long, but she missed him. She was almost ready to go to him, but a shimmering in front of her brought Thorne to his feet his sword in hand.

  But there Leto was, having returned to the bonfire, and near him was Casimir and … Patience.

  Grace blinked at her sister, who stood smiling beside Casimir, her arm hooked around his.

  “Patience?”

  Thorne folded his sword away and drew close to Grace. “Is that you? Patience?”

  She nodded. Tears swam in her hazel eyes.

  “I can’t believe it,” he said. “I thought you were dead. I found so much blood in that gully that I was sure you were dead.”

  Patience shook her head, and as tears tracked down her cheeks she told of James having ripped her out of the sky to serve on Third at the portal with him. She had been able to tell James when Greaves created the breach and just how many Third Earth death vampires he had ready to help him in his bid to take over Second Earth. “I wish it could have been done differently, because I know my sudden disappearance wounded you both.”

  Grace reached out to her and took her hand. “I knew you weren’t dead, but you’re right, it hurt so much to lose you.” She glanced at Marguerite and reached for her hand as well. “But you see how everything has turned out. We have a new sister, and we will become aunts to her twins.”

  Patience admitted that one of the advantages of her situation was that she had been able to know the significant events of her siblings’ lives. She couldn’t have stayed on Third helping James without some information.

  “I suppose now that Greaves is contained on Fourth, James allowed you to come here.”

  “Yes.”

  She then looked up at Casimir. There was such a soft light in her eye that Grace said, “Am I seeing what I’m seeing?” She glanced from Patience to Casimir.

  He covered Patience’s hand with his own. “The moment I arrived at the portal, I scented her.”

  “Oh, my God.” Grace put her fingers to her mouth as her eyes filled with tears. She felt Leto’s arm surround her shoulders.

  Are you okay with this? he sent.

  She turned to him. “More than okay. Don’t you see how perfect this circle is?” Of course, she had one concern and shifted her gaze to Patience. “But you do know that Casimir and I—” She found the words impossible to say.

  But it was Patience who rolled her eyes. “Grace, I was never celibate like you. And I’ve had many wild centuries. Casimir knows that. We’ve talked it all over. As for your relationship with him on Fourth, we’ve agreed that without you having taken him there, he would never have entered the redemption pools and would never have agreed to serve as Leto’s Guardian of Ascension. I met him, essentially, because of you, so I regret nothing.”

  Grace looked from one to the other. She could see the breh-bond forming between them. Once more her eyes filled with tears. She just couldn’t believe that Casimir, of all ascenders, had brought Patience home.

  A long series of embraces followed. Patience would return to Second Earth, and Casimir stated without hesitation that he wanted to make his home on Second, not just because of Patience but because of his boys as well. “After all,” he said, “I promised Kendrew and Sloane that Auntie Grace would always be in their lives.”

  Grace smiled. “You know, I always promised to take them camping in the Cascades.” She took Leto’s hand. “I hope we can do that soon.”

  Leto pulled her close. “Absolutely.”

  Casimir frowned. “And the
new school term is about to start. I’ll need to get them enrolled right away.”

  Grace stared at Casimir for a long moment. It was hard to remember the man he had been. Never in a thousand years had she thought she’d hear him speak about enrolling his kids in school.

  She thought of Greaves. If Casimir could be redeemed, maybe it was possible that Greaves could be transformed as well.

  * * *

  Beatrice sat in her favorite chair in her living room, the one with the footstool that Grace had occupied while helping Beatrice to roll her balls of yarn. She missed Grace and wished the younger woman was here. She needed some comfort.

  She leaned forward and covered her ears. Tears began leaking from her eyes. She was trying to be strong, but her son’s screams could be heard all over her floating estate. His agony, his rage, his remorse had erupted from the moment he’d touched the water of the first pool, the gentlest pool, the one that was meant to ease the sinner into the process.

  Instead, Darian might as well be bathing in fire.

  How great were his sins.

  More than could be numbered.

  He was the author of blood slavery, he had led countless ascenders into addiction to dying blood, and he’d used his squads of death vampires to kill any who stood in his way.

  Her son had no conscience.

  And so he screamed.

  Beatrice covered her ears and wept, unable to fathom how many years or decades or even centuries would be required to wash away the last ramification of all his evil deeds.

  * * *

  Grace had forgotten the trials of childhood. A vampire’s long life had created a nearly infinite distance between the sufferings of the two decades required to reach adulthood and the almost boundless challenges of living as a mature ascender.

  She glanced at Leto, who stood on the opposite side of their small campsite, in a clearing in the forest on Mortal Earth, deep in the Cascades. He’d built a large campfire that had roared and crackled and was only now settling down.

  She sat with Kendrew on her lap. He was the elder of Casimir’s boys—six years old now. Sloane sat in his kiddie camp chair, but he had drawn as close to her as he could get and held her hand tight.

  These boys had had a rocky beginning, but their lives were beginning to smooth out and Grace was part of that, as she had promised.

  But it was Kendrew who had brought up the current offense. He had entered the first grade in the Seattle hidden colony’s school and—children being what they had always been—one of his schoolmates had already brought up a supposed past crime of his father’s. He had told Kendrew that Casimir had been the instigator of a bomb attack in Las Vegas Two that had nearly killed twenty thousand people.

  “I know for a fact that is completely untrue,” Grace said.

  Kendrew twisted in her arms and looked up at her. “My papa didn’t do that terrible thing?”

  “Not at all, and you can tell your friend that Fiona was there, Warrior Jean-Pierre’s breh, and she told me that it was Greaves who had ordered his death vampires to blow up the building. Your father hadn’t even known about it.” Greaves had intended for Casimir to die as well, but Grace didn’t think Kendrew needed to hear that.

  Kendrew smiled and turned back around to face the fire. Sloane now leaned against her arm. It was getting late, and the boys were tired.

  Grace shuddered inwardly on Kendrew’s behalf. Maybe the six-year-old who had attempted to malign Casimir had gotten the facts wrong in this case, but one day someone would speak the truth about his crimes; then what would Grace say? Casimir’s list of wrongdoings was long, horribly long, and the truth one day would be out.

  She leaned down and kissed the top of Kendrew’s head. He had curly hair like his father. “Your father is one of the bravest men I’ve ever known because he saved Leto’s life and almost died doing it. There is nothing greater on earth than laying down one’s life for another.”

  At that, Kendrew once more turned into her and looked up at her. “He is brave.”

  “Oh, yes. And smart, so very smart. And he has the funniest sense of humor.”

  Sloane’s hand grew slack in hers. She could feel his body sinking against her.

  “And now, my darlings, time for bed.”

  Kendrew didn’t protest, but slid off her lap. Sloane, on the other hand, at three, could barely walk he was so drowsy.

  She called to Leto. He turned and smiled that beautiful smile of his, now full of affection for her, of love. She inclined her head in Sloane’s direction. He moved swiftly and lifted the three-year-old as though he were a feather.

  The boys’ tent was at a right angle to theirs and held two cots. She tucked Kendrew in and kissed him. She put her hand on his forehead and offered a prayer and a blessing.

  She left the tent and Leto performed a similar ritual with Sloane, though the younger boy’s eyes were closed when he put his large hand on the small forehead and offered another blessing and a prayer.

  When Leto zipped down the front of the tent, he led her back to their larger tent. Before going inside, he glanced around. “I was going to put a dome of mist over our campsite, but then I realized it wasn’t needed. The colony is safe, and the one vampire powerful enough to break through Diallo’s mist is corralled on Fourth Earth.”

  In the distance, she heard wolves howl, a long plaintive cry in the dark. She loved that sound. She loved Mortal Earth, where all life had begun, humankind and vampire-kind alike. She loved the hidden colony as well. She would have been content anywhere, in any dimension, with Leto, but she confessed she was happy in this quiet, secret ascended world, happier than she would have been on Second Earth.

  This was a good place to begin her life with Leto, camping with Casimir’s boys. She wanted to have children, and maybe one day she would.

  * * *

  An hour later, Leto was buried inside Grace and trying not to laugh. Making love to her and attempting to keep as quiet as possible in order not to awaken or frighten the boys had given his woman the giggles.

  “I’m just not used to this,” she whispered, laughing all over again.

  “Hush,” he said, but his smile was broad. “You’re not helping, and if they wake up we’ll have to stop.”

  At that, she grabbed his bare ass and sunk her nails. “Oh, please don’t stop,” she whispered back.

  He thrust hard into her just once, which made her entire body arch and her mouth fly open. He crushed what he knew would be a loud moan, by kissing her and driving his tongue into her mouth.

  She gave up her laughter then, and with her own hips met his pelvis in answering grinds. But her moans started anyway. Ah, well, it couldn’t be helped. Grace was very vocal, and he loved it. Better to just make it quick.

  By now he knew her body well. Because of the breh-hedden he could feel her responses, the pleasure she felt with each thrust, just as she had to be experiencing what it was like for him to have her body encase him and pull on him.

  Heaven, he sent.

  Yes, oh yes. I’m so close.

  I can feel that you are.

  He felt her orgasm ride through her body, which caused him to speed his thrusts just a little bit more. Sharp cries left her mouth. So much for keeping their lovemaking a secret from the boys. Hopefully they were sleeping deeply enough.

  He came then, pleasure streaking through his cock so that even he, despite his self-control, uttered a long low moan. But his pleasure brought her again, so he sustained the rocking until her body grew quiet and slack beneath his.

  Her hands were on his face, something she had done from the beginning. “I love you, Leto.”

  “I love you, too.”

  “You’ve made me happier than you’ll ever know.”

  But he thought he knew. If she experienced even a tenth of what he felt, the joy, the deep sense of peace, and even a feeling of purpose in their breh-hedden union, then he did know something of her happiness.

  Later, as Grace fell asleep in his arm
s, Leto gave thanks for the life he’d been given, for a life that had been returned to him in full measure. How far he’d come from Moscow Two when he was on the brink of death. Now he stood, and perhaps would forevermore, at the gates of rapture.

  ASCENSION TERMINOLOGY

  AAF pr. n. Allied Ascender Forces, Endelle’s army.

  ALA pr. n. Ascenders Liberation Army, the name Greaves assigned to his army.

  answering the call to ascension n. The mortal human who experiences the hallmarks of the call to ascension will at some point feel compelled to answer, usually by demonstrating significant preternatural power.

  ascender n. A mortal human of earth who has moved permanently to the second dimension.

  ascendiate n. A mortal human who has answered the call to ascension and thereby commences his or her rite of ascension.

  ascension n. The act of moving permanently from one dimension to a higher dimension.

  ascension ceremony n. Upon the completion of the rite of ascension, the mortal undergoes a ceremony in which loyalty to the laws of Second Society is professed and the attributes of the vampire mantle along with immortality are bestowed.

  the Borderlands pr. n. Those geographic areas that form dimensional borders at both ends of a dimensional pathway. The dimensional pathway is an access point through which travel can take place from one dimension to the next. See Trough.

  breh-hedden n. (Term from an ancient language.) A mate-bonding ritual that can only be experienced by the most powerful warriors and the most powerful preternaturally gifted women. Effects of the breh-hedden can include but are not limited to: specific scent experience, extreme physical/sexual attraction, loss of rational thought, primal sexual drives, inexplicable need to bond, powerful need to experience deep mind-engagement, etc.

  cadroen n. (Term from an ancient language.) The name for the hair clasp that holds back the ritual long hair of a Warrior of the Blood.

  call to ascension n. A period of time, usually involving several weeks, in which the mortal human has experienced some or all of, but not limited to, the following: specific dreams about the next dimension, deep yearnings and longings of a soulful and inexplicable nature, visions of and possibly visits to any of the dimensional Borderlands, etc. See Borderlands.