Total pages in book: 149
Estimated words: 138217 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 691(@200wpm)___ 553(@250wpm)___ 461(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 138217 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 691(@200wpm)___ 553(@250wpm)___ 461(@300wpm)
That was when Pax knew what had happened.
Theo had mated.
Which meant she had the entire StoneWater clan behind her, a primal rush of wild changeling energy pouring into her from the practiced hands of the healer.
His sister would never again be alone.
Pax didn’t care that the new bonds in her life would take her further from him. Didn’t even care that the bears would likely shun him. He just cared that she was safe. The bears would keep her safe long after he was gone.
A sudden gasp, Theo’s eyes snapping open.
Chapter 66
“We are the foundation.”
—Payal Rao, representative of Designation A on the Ruling Coalition in the PsyNet Beacon (29 June 2083)
KALEB FINISHED TRANSPORTING all parties but two to the StoneWater den infirmary. “I left Pax Marshall and his teleport assist at the site.” Pax didn’t need to have internal images of the StoneWater den, the home of the clan’s most vulnerable.
Valentin rubbed his face. “Chert, what a complication. Trust Yasha to fall for a woman with Pax Marshall for a twin.” Harsh words, but worry pumped off the alpha. “I’ll deal with him. Spasibo for coming so quickly.”
“I try to be a good neighbor.” StoneWater was also not in the habit of asking for his help—which was why he’d cut short a critical meeting to respond to Valentin’s SOS. “I apologize for not answering my phone. I had it on silent during a meeting.” In the end, it was Silver who’d contacted him via the PsyNet.
Valentin waved off his apology. “You came. That’s all that matters. We owe you one.”
“Yes, you do,” Kaleb responded, because being a good neighbor didn’t mean being foolishly noble. A favor from StoneWater was valuable coin. “Good luck with the wounded.”
Teleporting back to his home on the remote periphery of Moscow, he glanced outside and saw that the rain had stopped for the time being, so he stepped out onto the rain-washed deck before returning to his meeting on the PsyNet. “Apologies,” he said to Payal, whose mind was laser bright next to his. “Emergency teleport request from an ally.”
“I understand,” said his fellow member of the Ruling Coalition, and a woman who also happened to be a cardinal telekinetic. “Everything all right?”
“I left them in an infirmary.” Marshall’s sister had lost so much blood that Kaleb had his doubts about her chances of survival. But he’d done all he could, and now he had to return to a problem where millions of lives hung in the balance.
He looked once more at the island on the other side of the chasm in front of him and Payal. That island was no longer an opaque blank. Rather, it sparked with energy, the connections within flickering in and out of visibility in sharp flashes—but that was because the man at the center of the island was still learning how to manage the energy that poured through his brain, then back out into the system.
“So?” he said to Payal.
“The Substrate flow is clear. Anchor energy from the main network is feeding into the island and vice versa.”
“Stable?”
“Stable.”
Kaleb continued to watch what was, at present, Ivan Mercant’s personal fiefdom. Sahara had laughed when he’d put it that way. “He’s mated to a healer, my gorgeous Mr. Krychek. He couldn’t turn into a dictator if he tried.”
She was right, of course, but that didn’t obliterate the fact that, as of now, one man held two thousand and twenty-three lives in stable orbit around him. Which wasn’t necessarily a bad thing—it was the reason why he and Payal were standing here, deep in the shadows of the Net.
“When we first brought up breaking the PsyNet into smaller units,” he said, “you were adamant it wouldn’t work because of the dearth of anchors.” Anchors maintained and upheld the foundation of the PsyNet, the Substrate. Invisible to all but designation A, it was nonetheless the most critical structure in the Net. Should it collapse, so would the PsyNet—leading to the effective extinction of the Psy race.
Payal, ruthless CEO of the Rao Conglomerate, was the anchor representative on the Ruling Coalition.
“If any designation has the leverage to set themselves up as dictators, it’s A,” Sahara had added during that same conversation, while in the process of knotting his tie while she stood barefoot on their bedroom carpet dressed only in one of his shirts. “Lucky for us that they just want to be left alone.”
While it was tempting to think about how he’d pulled off the tie soon afterward and asked for his shirt back only to throw it on the bed and haul her laughing, naked body against his, it would have to wait. Right now, his focus had to be on the continued disintegration of the psychic fabric on which he stood—because Sahara had asked him to walk in the light, to save the PsyNet rather than burning it down to the ground.