“That’s fine. So, Elonora and Kailani, you’re on the search team,” Rose agreed. “Who else?”
I caught a glimpse of Mom and Dad standing next to Hazel and Tejus. They seemed worried, but they both gave me soft smiles and faint nods. Deep down, they knew they wouldn’t be able to sway me on this. Once I set my mind on something, that was it.
Based on what Ben and Rose had told us, there were two possible scenarios forming in my head. The first was the nasty one, in which something might’ve happened to Derek, Sofia, my grandparents, and the rest of their crew. The second was that they’d gone off exploring like the raucous teenagers they’d probably turned into upon first setting foot on Strava—my grandma had a history of getting herself in all kinds of trouble.
I wouldn’t have been surprised if she’d dragged the others with her, too.
Either way, I needed to be there when we found them. I needed to make sure they were all okay. For myself, for my parents, and for everyone else in The Shade.
Vesta
From the moment Ben and Rose said they wanted to get a search crew together for Strava, I knew I’d volunteer. My hand stayed up for about a minute, in a sea of many. After Elonora and Kailani had come forward, others in our age group had offered to help. I felt so tiny in the crowd, yet I hoped I’d get picked.
Ben’s gaze wandered across the assembly hall, trying to filter through the hundreds of sudden volunteers. Everybody in GASP—Shadian, Eritopian, and Nerakian alike—wanted to help.
“For the sake of efficiency here, I’d like to ask those with non-water-related abilities to put their hands down,” he said. “It’ll make the selection process easier. We’re not going to war here; we’re just looking for our grandparents.”
“You make it sound like you lost them at a mall, or something,” Dmitri muttered, slightly amused despite his visible concern.
Ben raised an eyebrow, then scoffed. “They’re your grandparents, too, pup. Get up here. You’re joining the crew.”
“But he’s not skilled with water in any way!” I blurted, eager to get myself on the team. I had no idea where the spirit of competition was coming from, but I really wanted to help. Whether I was trying to prove something, or I was just eager to fit in, I wasn’t sure yet. The one thing I knew for a fact was that they needed me. “I’ll be happy to take his place.”
Dmitri scowled at me, somewhat confused. “Nah, I’m going.”
“Take us both!” I said, keeping my chin up high.
My mother and father were right behind me. Mom put a hand on my shoulder.
“Honey, are you sure?” she asked.
“Please, think about it before you go off to some distant place,” Dad said.
I gave them a warm smile, looking over my shoulder. “Don’t worry, I’m a big girl,” I told them. “I’ll be okay. It’s just a search mission.”
“We all know our collective predisposition to trouble,” Vita said, her hands resting on her baby bump, as she stood next to Bijarki and my parents.
“Vesta, Dmitri, you’re in. Come up here,” Rose announced, making my heart perform an ambitious somersault in my chest.
“We’ll talk later,” I whispered to my parents, then rushed to the podium, where I joined Dmitri, Elonora, and Kailani. “Thank you,” I said to Ben and Rose.
Rose smiled. “Your enthusiasm was impossible to ignore,” she replied.
“Yeah, you can say that again.” Dmitri chuckled. Elonora gave him a sharp nudge, following it up with a grin.
“She’s right, though. You can barely swim to save your life,” Elonora muttered.
“True, but I’m the finest tracker you’ve got,” Dmitri shot back with a confident smirk.
We all nodded in agreement.
“Fair enough,” Ben said, then looked at the crowd again. “Ridan! Please.”
We all followed Ben’s gaze and saw Ridan as he made his way through the crowd.
“I know we said we need some water-friendly creatures, but, at the same time, we need a dragon,” Rose replied. “Only for a worst-case scenario where we may need some brute force and plenty of fire.”
Ridan was tall, well-built, and clad in ropes of muscles. I had no choice but to appreciate his impressive physique, his broad shoulders and long legs—tempered by his brown, medium-length shaggy hair and his stone-cold gray eyes. In his humanoid form, Ridan could break a handful of hearts with just a smile. I could only imagine the damage he’d do as a dragon. I’d spent enough time around Blaze to know that dragons, whether fire- or ice-based, were not to be messed with.
He joined us on the platform, offering a polite nod to Ben and Rose.
“I’ll come along,” he said. “The fire dragons of The Shade hold Sofia in high regard. We’ll do whatever it takes to get her and the others back in one piece.”
Hunter broke rank and jumped onto the podium, his gaze dark and firm, accompanied by a nervously ticking muscle in his jaw.
“Hunter, you don’t—” Rose tried to speak, but Hunter cut her off.
“My dad’s out there, with my mom, my sister, and everyone else I hold dear,” the white werewolf said. “Don’t think you’re going anywhere without me.”
“Besides, two trackers are better than one!” Dmitri agreed quickly. “Oh, and let’s not forget that Hunter’s quite special, since he can turn wolf whenever he wishes. That might come in handy.”
That was a fair point. It was one of the things that really set Hunter apart, besides his gorgeous white wolf form. Before Bastien, we’d never come across a wolf who could change at will, but it seemed there were others out there who had it as a natural ability—one that didn’t come from black witch magic, as Bastien’s had done.
Rose looked at Ben first, who nodded, then smiled at Hunter. “That’s fine, Hunter. You have every reason to go with us.”
“I’d like to put someone forward for this mission.” Jax spoke up as he stood in the front row, next to Hansa, Avril, and Heron.
Right behind him was Zeriel, gorgeous king of Tritones and the reason my heart started galloping and struggling against my ribcage all of a sudden. It took me a while to get my breathing under control, hoping no one close to me had noticed. Jax tapped him on the shoulder.
Zeriel groaned, then rolled his eyes and came forward.
“I could’ve sworn I’d get thrown into this from the moment they mentioned water-friendly creatures,” he muttered.
“Think of it this way, my friend,” Jax replied. “Do this for me and consider our Pyrope over.”
Zeriel stilled, gawking at him. “You’re serious?”
Jax nodded. “You didn’t raise your hand to volunteer for this, so I thought I’d sweeten the pot to make sure you’re extra willing to go.”
“Say no more. I’m in!” Zeriel shot back, then hopped onto the podium and stood next to me.
There were only a few inches of air between us, and I could feel the electrical charge increasing with every second that passed. I breathed deeply, measuring each exhale and keeping a straight face. I did my best to avoid eye contact, but, before I even realized it, I was already staring at him. His profile would’ve made sculptors jealous that they’d been unable to create something as beautiful as him.
“See something you like?” Zeriel asked, and I immediately begged for the earth to swallow me whole. His azure eyes drilled holes through my soul. I scoffed, then looked away and crossed my arms, trying a hostile pose in defense. My social skills crumbled in his presence—not just my self-control.
“Thank you, Zeriel,” Rose said, offering a curt bow to the Tritone king.
He smiled in return. “I’m not comfortable with the idea of leaving my lagoon, not to mention the entire galaxy,” he replied. “But A, our friends are missing. I should’ve raised my hand for this, but, hey, it’s me we’re talking about. And B, I get to no longer give Jax my blood. Which is fantastic because I think I’m developing an iron deficiency.”
Jax smirked, then shook his head slowl
y. Avril chuckled.
“You are such a drama queen,” she said, then nodded at Nevis, who was just a couple of yards away to her left. “Speaking of which, Nevis…”
The Dhaxanian prince looked at her, slightly confused.
“I’m sorry?” he asked.
“Remember that big favor you owe me?” Avril replied.
As soon as Nevis realized what this was about, he exhaled sharply. “Why, Avril?”
“Because I wish I could go myself, but I can’t,” she said. “There’s a Druid-killer at large on Persea, and they desperately need Heron and me. We’ve been preparing for this mission for days now, and I can’t pull back.”
“No one tracks better than Avril,” Heron interjected. “Ryker and Laughlan will join us on this. The situation on Persea is more serious than they originally asserted.”
“Five Druids have been killed already,” Avril added. “You’re of much more use on Strava, given the circumstances and current team, than I am. I’m delegating you to go on my behalf and make sure my parents and the rest of our family come back in one piece.”
Nevis thought about it for a minute, then nodded and came toward the podium, motioning for his guards to stay back.
“You’re too emotionally invested in this Strava mission, anyway,” Nevis replied. “I’ll go. Besides, from what I understand, chances are they’re all wandering the woods somewhere on a seemingly not-so-deserted planet. What could possibly go wrong?”
There was plenty of sarcasm in that last line. After Neraka, the question itself was rhetorical.
Ben and Rose smiled at Nevis, welcoming him into the fold.
“Thank you, Your Grace,” Rose said.
“Please, call me Nevis,” he replied, prompting Elonora to huff and roll her eyes. Nevis gave her a sideways glance. “Is there something bothering you, Miss Goode?”
“Besides you? Nope. We’re cool,” Elonora shot back.
I stifled a chuckle, as Rose drew attention to the matter at hand.
“We’ve got enough people for our search crew,” she said. “We depart at noon today, and we’ll be on Strava by midnight. Prior to takeoff, I want us all to go over the mission brief in the main meeting room,” she added, looking at us.
“The mission objective is quite simple,” Ben replied. “Find our parents and their group and do a proper survey of that cave and its pods.”
It sounded simple. Strava was uninhabited—except for the five hundred and five unidentified creatures that had come out of those pods. I braced myself for the pep talk I’d get from my dad. This was the first time since Neraka that we were going to be apart by forty-something light-years, after all. They’d lost me before, and they dreaded the possibility of losing me again.
At the same time, they knew I was strong-willed and perfectly capable of holding my own on this mission. My only concern was Zeriel. With him on board, I knew for a fact I’d have to work twice as hard to keep my wits about me. On one hand, my heart fluttered at the thought of being around him. On the other, I had my work cut out for myself.
Kailani
(Granddaughter of Corrine and Ibrahim)
The briefing session was relatively short, since we didn’t have much information regarding my grandparents and their friends’ disappearance. Our search radius started with the resort and the island of Noagh, and, based on Dmitri and Hunter’s tracking, it was going to expand.
“Do you think they’re okay?” I asked Ben.
He stood in front of a screen with aerial images of the resort, his arms crossed, and his brows furrowed.
“I’d like to give you a wholehearted yes, but I can’t. Not at this point in time, anyway,” he replied. “I’m sorry, Kailani, but we’ll know more once we get there.”
“Think about it this way,” Dmitri chimed in. “We’re talking about Derek and Sofia here, not to mention the rest of the crew. I mean, my grandparents alone could tear into five hundred whatever-type-of-creatures came out of those pods. Add your grandparents into the mix, and it would be a bloodbath.”
Hunter raised an eyebrow. “He makes a fair point,” he said. “What if they went looking for the pod creatures? What if they went back to the cave in the morning, saw the pods cracked open, and decided to extend their stay to find them?”
“That’s also a possibility,” Rose replied.
We were all geared up and had our backpacks stuffed with swamp witch magic ingredients, healing potions, and other tools we’d need for both the search and the cave study. Dmitri carried most of the tech stuff, along with Hunter and Ben. From our group, they were the ones most familiar with Phoenix and Jovi’s gizmos.
Jovi, Phoenix, my mom, and Shayla had joined us in the meeting room to give us last-minute advice and indications.
“Telluris doesn’t work on the surface of Strava,” Jovi said, “but we’ve recalibrated Bowie. It should work now as a mini-command center,” he added, then handed each of us a small earpiece. “These work on radio waves. They’re linked to one another, and they also feed into Bowie, over a three-mile radius. As long as you can hear each other, you’re good.”
“They link back to Calliope, too,” Phoenix added. “We’ve set up a comms base here on Mount Zur.”
Jovi nodded, then pointed at my earpiece. “That’s right. You’ve got two channels there. Press the small green button to talk locally, on Strava, and the blue one to reach out to us. Every message is recorded in case we’re not around.”
I put the earpiece on. It fit and settled perfectly. Jovi then brought over a couple of satellite phones.
“What are those for?” Rose asked.
“We modified them. They’re earthly satellite phones,” Jovi explained. “You can use these to send SOS signals back to Calliope if the earpiece and Bowie fail. They’re kind of old-timey, but they’re supposed to work seamlessly across such a distance if you stick to Morse code. Use the one key for the line, and the zero key for the dot.”
“I know Morse code,” Dmitri replied with a nod. “I’ve got it.”
He stuffed both phones in his backpack. Shayla and Mom stepped forward.
“We’ll have the second telescope up and running by morning,” Shayla said.
Mom came over with a handful of small hypodermic syringes. “I need to collect blood samples from each of you,” she said. “We’re fitting the lenses with a swamp witch tracking spell, and we require something from you.”
Dmitri sighed. “A lock of hair wasn’t good enough? You have to puncture me?”
“Scared of needles?” I shot back with a grin.
He shuddered, then put his arm out. “Just make it quick.”
I chuckled, watching as Mom drew a bit of blood from Dmitri first, then from the rest of us, storing the syringes in a small, cylindrical cooling box. We’d been bringing some of the human technology to Calliope, as it was easier to maintain and reproduce manually than magic and swamp witch charms. Cooling systems were going to be gradually introduced into the Eritopian society over the next couple of years, anyway, as part of GASP’s effort to help the galaxy evolve.
“Okay, I think we’re ready to go,” Ben said. “We will be gone for a couple of days, tops, but you’ve got eyes on us, and comms are all working.”
I hugged Mom. She covered my face in kisses. “You be good up there,” she whispered. “And don’t do anything you’re not sure you can pull off, okay?”
“What do you mean?” I asked.
She gave me a weak smile. “I know something happened the other day, during your swamp witch trials,” she murmured. “I also know you won’t talk to me about it. But I’m not blind, either. It’s done something to you, though I can’t tell what, exactly. All I’m asking is that you be careful, honey. That’s all. Don’t get carried away. Stay on top of the magic.”
My stomach churned. I’d felt horrible for not being able to talk to her about what I’d experienced in my sensory-deprivation capsule. It would’ve been hard to describe, anyway. I was still looking for
words myself.
All I could do was nod slowly.
“I promise, Mom,” I said to her. “I’ll be careful.”
I was carrying a difficult and heavy burden. The Word had spoken to me, but I’d yet to decipher its message. I carried it with me, seared into my brain. It haunted me in my sleep, and it applied painful pressure on my shoulders. I had a feeling it would get easier, once I understood what the message was. Until then, however, I was sworn to secrecy and due to resume my training once we got back from Strava.
An hour later, Lumi and Viola prepared an interplanetary travel spell around the four space pods, which had been brought up to the launch pad on top of our Mount Zur base. The purpose was to go in via swamp witch magic, then use the pods for flights around Strava, if needed. Lumi had fitted the travel spell with additional protections, making sure it would pierce any type of atmosphere and that it would resist any magic shield.
“The planet is safe, though,” Rose said, watching as Ben and the boys in our group loaded our backpacks and gear into the pods. “I doubt we’ll have issues.”
“Some things can change in a matter of hours or days,” Lumi replied. “It’s best if you’re all safe and prepared for whatever comes at you. It’s also imperative that you all get to Strava in one piece.”
“Like Phoenix says, it’s better to have it and not need it than desperately need it and not have it,” Viola chimed in, smiling as she added the last symbol to the pentagram.
The others in my crew bid their families farewell. My mom and dad stood back, keeping Shayla company. Lumi came up to me and took my hands in hers.
“Kailani,” she said quietly. “Your mother gave you good advice earlier.”
“You heard that?! Where were you?” I gasped, since no one was supposed to have heard what my mother had said to me in the meeting room. Especially since Lumi had been nowhere nearby at the time.
Lumi smirked. “Darling, I hear everything within ten miles,” she said. “I’ve made a habit of shutting it all off, but ever since I’ve taken you under my wing, I admit… I’ve been eavesdropping a little bit, just to make sure you’re safe.”