Hand down by his side, Jake waved for Cael to stay out of sight around the corner. Better yet, run back to the weapons lab and barricade himself in.
"Oh he's around somewhere." Jake walked across the landing and draped an arm around the shorter guy's shoulders as though they were the best of friends. The two guys with Gregor exchanged wary glances.
"Hmm." Gregor puckered his lips. "Ya know I'd really like to see him, make sure his pretty little face didn't sustain any permanent damage. I feel really bad about what went down."
Jake patted Gregor's chest. "I'll be sure to pass on your apology when I see him."
"You do that." Gregor smiled. Tiny crinkles at the corners of his eyes stood out lighter in his sun-weathered skin. "Come to think of it, maybe you can pass on something else to him as well."
Gregor's friends grabbed Jake from each side, but he stomped down on the instep of one of their feet. Tweedle-dee fell, but Tweedle-dum shoved Jake into the wall. He'd never last several rounds against the superior strength of one of the Anointed, never mind three, but his dad had taught him how to fight fast and dirty. His bent knuckle struck the tender hollow of Tweedle-dum's chin, wrenching his head back at the same time Gregor punched Jake in the stomach, folding him over with an "oomph". Squeezing his eyes shut, Jake let the Anointed hit him again, stalling. He just needed to give Cael time to get out of Dodge. Except...
"Let go of my brother."
Every head snapped up. Jake's heart sank to his toes. Cael's expression was stone cold fury.
Gregor kept a fist curled around Jake's shirt. "Well hey, shrimp, we were just talking about you."
Cael didn't say a word. He walked over, nudging himself partway between Jake and Gregor. Jake grinned at the way the darker haired Anointed had to tip his face upward. Kid had grown in the last couple of months. Gregor's hand dropped away.
"Come on." Cael steered Jake between the three Anointeds. "We're done here."
"We haven't gotten started," Gregor snarled, grabbing for the back of Cael's collar.
Cael spun so fast, Jake swore he felt the air move. He slammed Gregor back into the stairwell railing, fists knotted into the stockier teen's collar. "You really want to go at me?" He leaned closer in, his voice steely quiet. "Don't forget, I know what really happened."
Jake's eyes widened.
All the color leeched out of Gregor, but he quickly recovered. "Think anyone will believe a vengeful little half-blood?"
"My mom will."
Nostrils flaring, Gregor shoved Cael off him hard enough that the younger teen flew back into Jake.
All three Anointeds lunged at the brothers, going down into a heap of flying fists and gouging fingers. Jake rolled to his knees, trying to throw them off.
"Enough." The tired voice rang out with all the power of an echo traveling through a canyon.
Everyone stilled. Jake blinked up at the slender woman at the top of the stairs, Kiene and Lisi behind her. This night kept getting better and better.
"This behavior is unbecoming of warriors of the Anointed."
Jake wrenched his head sideways, pulling his hair out of somebody's loose grasp. Their three attackers scrambled off of them. Tweetle-dum's head bobbed. "Yes ma'am, er, Princess."
"Administer," Tweedle-dee hissed.
Gregor got up more slowly. "Administer Celalundria." He lowered his head in a deferential nod, arms rigid, brown hair hiding his eyes.
Cael grabbed Jake's arm, pulling him to his feet.
"You're excused." Long fingers clasped together in front of the Princess's prim powder blue pantsuit. "Retire to your quarters for the duration of the evening."
"Yes, ma'am." The Tweedle goons stammered, heading up the stairs, then apparently thought better of edging past the Princess and hurried down the other way.
Gregor stared up the stairway, and then pushed between Cael and Jake, turning so his back was to the women. "Your mommy won't always be around," he whispered.
"Is that a threat?" Jake growled.
Gregor pasted on a smile, lifting palms in innocence and spun around, climbing past the Administer. A look of betrayal flicked across his face when he glanced over at Kiene. And then he was gone, the sharp clicks of his boots moving across the tile above.
Jake shifted beneath Celalundria's impassive gaze, stepping back when her face suddenly softened and she held her arms out.
Cael went immediately to her. "Mom."
Her features softened. “You’ve grown so much.”
Jake eased back against the railing, and crossed one leg over the other, watching his mother and sibling together. They embraced quickly and then her hands cradled Cael's face while she looked him over. The difference between them was striking. Her long fall of straight black hair and bright green eyes contrasted vividly with Cael's blond mop and brown eyes. His brother took so much after their father, exotically human, he'd become a target of Anointed bullies at the outset of beginning their training. But this hatred Gregor held for the teen…that went well beyond simple bullying.
He felt Kiene's gaze on him. Dark brows pulled together. She must have hauled ass to intercept Celalundria and Lisi and lead them to the back stairway.
Celalundria held a hand out toward Jake as she and Cael turned to go. "Jacob."
He followed after her, but didn't take her hand. The two girls settled into step beside him. A few steps ahead, Cael casually draped an arm around their mother's waist as though she had never sent them away, light and dark heads together as they spoke in hushed tones.
Their little entourage got several stares as they made their way through the long foyer. It was still drizzling outside, making little wet dots bloom on their mom's light pantsuit, but she didn't seem to mind. A wisp of a smile crossed her lips at the sight of the mud-splattered Jeep TJ, or maybe Jake just imagined it. She turned to Jake. "I need you boys to stay out of Karavel for a while. Don't return until you hear from me."
"Why?" Cael took her hand. "Is it the demons almost getting in? We can help with that."
"No," she said swiftly. "Stay away from the pass-throughs. Just keep doing what you're doing."
"But we can…"
"Caelen." Her tone clipped off his argument like scissors. "It's not that. The Anointed can handle a little demon influx. It's the political climate here. I'm hitting opposition on all fronts…"
Jake grunted low in his throat. Right, and part human children were an embarrassment she didn't need while working the political game. Celalundria stared at him as though she knew exactly what he was thinking. Crossing his arms over his chest, Jake stared right back.
She turned back to Cael as though she knew she wasted breath, trying for Jake's sympathies. "People who have been loyal to me for years are questioning my every decision. Even Lord Salah has turned his support elsewhere."
Gregor's father. Now that was a surprise. Though Gregor was an irritating nuisance, his dad had always struck Jake as a fair and honest type.
"With things so uncertain, I don't want either of you caught up in the political upheaval. If I can't nip it in the bud, it could get ugly." The princess caught Jake's eye again, conveying the seriousness of what she was saying.
Cael shook his head. "We should be here for you then, show a united front."
Celalundria smiled, and stroked a palm down the side of Cael's hair. "Not this time, darling. But soon. I promise."
Right. Jake stopped himself from rolling his eyes and pulled the door to his Jeep open, waiting for Cael. Kiene frowned at him like he was a little boy throwing a tantrum. Well, she could just keep her pretty little nose out of his family business.
Celalundria sighed and pulled a couple of kremloc blades from her bag and handed them to Cael before placing a kiss to his cheek. "Take care of yourself."
Cael nodded. "You too."
Celalundria smiled. "Jacob."
He turned back toward her and waited.
"Stay well," she said simply.
He nodded respe
ctfully—he wasn't a total nub—and slipped into the driver's seat, turning the ignition when Cael slid in beside him, and he pulled out of the parking space and onto the road, not looking back.
"I don't get you," Cael said after a few minutes.
"What's to get?"
"You defended Mom to that demon, but barely speak to her."
Jake shrugged. "She doesn't want us around, Cael. We're a hindrance to her position."
"That's not true. You know why she sent us to dad."
"Yeah." The answer was abrupt.
"I thought you loved tracking. You want to stay in Karavel?"
"Gods, no."
"Then what is your problem?"
"No problem." Jake pulled around a hover-car. The things were cool, but slower than spoiled milk.
"Really, because it looks like you have a pretty big problem."
"I don't have a problem with Mom, okay?"
Light raindrops splattered on the windshield just enough that Jake flipped the wipers on for a second.
"What I do have a problem with though is you, stepping between me and Gregor. What were you thinking coming around the corner like that?"
"I was thinking my brother was gonna take a beating in my place."
"Not in any dimension. I can handle them."
"And you think I can't?" Cael twisted sideways in his seat to face Jake. "What? I'm supposed to cut and run while you take on a bunch of Neanderthal punks?"
"Yes."
"Then you're stupid. Demons are a lot stronger than any Anointed and we take them on all the time."
Jake curled his fingers around the steering wheel. Cael had a point. Jake just didn't like it. There was just something about Gregor that made all his protective hard-wiring go crazy. "I know, man, it's just…Gregor…he has it out for you."
"So? He's an idiot."
An idiot who wasn't getting ten feet near his brother again. Jake let a beat pass before glancing sideways at Cael. "What was that all about anyways?"
Cael shrugged, turned back in his seat and looked out the passenger side window. "Same old."
"That's it." Jake slammed on the brakes and pulled roughly to the side of the roadway. Seeing Gregor tonight, then Kiene, then Mom, had wrung all his emotions out like a soapy towel. "Something more went down that night that you never bothered to tell me. And I think part of why Gregor is so hell-bent on terrorizing you is because he wants to keep you clammed up. So spill."
"Jake, you already know everything."
"I know I found my kid brother in the middle of the woods beaten so badly I couldn't recognize you." He took a breath, the horrible bloody memories clawing against the back of his eyelids. "Do you have any idea…?" He broke off. "You were incoherent, holding tightly to a dead kid, I couldn't tear him from your…"
Cael stared at his hands resting on his thighs. "Iason. He was only fourteen," he whispered.
Everything in Jake softened. "So were you."
"Jake?" Brown eyes lifted to his. "Can't we just drop it?"
"No. I'm sorry. Not this time." Not after he'd seen panic cross Gregor's face when Cael said he knew what happened. Jake didn't know how far the Anointed would go to keep Cael quiet, but he wasn't taking the risk.
Cael's gaze slipped away. "It was an initiation that got out of hand."
"So you've said before." Cael had stuck to the same story every time he told it. "I'm not buying it this time."
"What does it matter? It was two years ago."
"It matters. You were laid up for three months. Mom sent us to Dad so fast my head nearly swiveled off… Wait. Did Mom know what really happened?"
"No!"
One side of Jake's mouth curved. Cael pushed his head back against the headrest, realizing he just admitted he'd been lying all this time. Turning sideways in his own seat, Jake waited him out.
Cael sighed. "You really want to know?”
Jake nodded. “Been wanting for years. Years, Cael. It’s time to open up.”
Kid’s lips tightened. “I followed Iason that night. He'd been excited about being invited to the older boys' initiation ritual. I knew I'd never be invited to one and I was curious." One shoulder lifted in a half-shrug. "I also had a sour pit in my stomach, like something wasn't right and I felt responsible for the guy. Turns out they set Iason up."
Jake listened without interrupting. So far it was the same story Cael had told him before. "Set up how?"
"It wasn't an initiation. At least not for Iason. By the time I got there they had him staked out on the ground."
Jake's hand squeezed around the Jeep's automatic shifter between them. "Like bait?"
Still not looking at him, Cael nodded.
"Sonsabi…" Jake controlled his tone, knowing outbursts weren't going to help. He'd barely gotten Cael to talk as it was. "Bait for what? Except for a few boar, there's nothing in Karavel to go after bait that large."
Cael glanced up at that. "They brought something in."
Jake stilled.
"Juncoir. They cut Iason."
Jake's mind raced ahead. Iron nail-like claws, spike-edged teeth, an appetite drawn to the smallest amount of blood. A young boy staked out and helpless. A bleeding cut would make the beast ravenous. And young eager Anointeds skulking in the shadows itching to prove themselves as the next great hunter in front of their peers.
"I tried…" Cael's fingers scrabbled at his jeans. "I tried to untie him, but they caught me."
"That when they beat you?"
Cael's Adam apple bobbed. "I wouldn't stay still, wouldn't be quiet. Didn't matter. The juncoir found Iason and—" Cael gulped, staring at the glove compartment. "And—"
Jake brushed Cael's arm, pulling him back from what the kid was reliving. "It's okay. Skip that part."
Cael stopped and Jake let him alone until he was ready. "While the juncoir was…you know…the initiates charged out of the bushes. It fled and they chased after it. Except Gregor. He said the other trackers would never be able to run it down, but he knew how to lure it to him. Now that Iason was—" Cael's chest started heaving. "Now that Iason was—"
A cold hard stake was pushing into Jake's gut, slogging out bile that rose up into his throat. Cael had so many wounds, Jake had dismissed the chafing on his arms as minor, nothing of real concern compared to broken ribs and shredded leg muscles, but he should have paid attention. They hadn't been just more abrasions. Rope burns. His worry had made him blind. He was going to be sick. "Gregor used you as bait."
Cael didn't move a muscle.
Fumbling for the door, Jake made it out of the 4x4 in the nick of time to vomit all over a blossoming bush on the side of the road. Gregor had tied Cael down. Gregor had used his little brother as juncoir bait. He was going to rip Gregor's head off. Oh Gods, what if that geeky little friend of Cael's and Iason's hadn't tipped him off to where they'd gone? What if Cael hadn't had his pocketknife and been able to cut himself free in the first place? Finding his brother beat to hell had been the worst night of Jake's life, but he'd had no idea exactly how much worse it could have been.
A water bottle slipped into Jake's line of vision where he crouched, shaking.
"I'm sorry, Jake." Cael stood beside him.
Jake took the offered water. "Why…why didn't you trust me with this?"
Cael sank down beside him. "It wasn’t about trust."
"What then?"
"Look, if I'd told you, all you would have done is gone off to kick their asses. You're always trying to protect me."
"Of course I would."
Cael smiled. "And I appreciate that. I do. But you can't protect me from everything. You couldn't protect me from that. By the time I could move my jaw enough to speak again, we were already with Dad. What was the point?"
"The point? You could have died. Gregor almost got you killed."
"What was done was done. It was over and what good would running off after them and getting you laid up for three months do?"
"I could've taken him."
/>
"Yeah. But I didn't want you to."
"What they did was illegal. Bringing a juncoir into Karavel. That's grounds for dismissal from the Academy. But using that young boy as bait... That's murder. Don't you think Iason deserved justice for that instead of being written off as an initiation gone wrong?"
Cael stood and walked to the back of the Jeep, the rear lights casting a red glow over one side of his body.
Jake swallowed back a curse. He shouldn't have said that. Knowing Cael, the kid would have already beat himself up over that. Probably this whole time. Jake stood and went to Cael. "You tried, didn't you? To tell the truth."
Cael tilted his head back to look into the dark sky, uncaring of the little drops of rain sliding down his face "Like Gregor said, no one would believe a half-blood."
"Did Mom know?"
"I don't think so. It's hard to remember exactly, everything got murky and the healers said I'd dreamed the entire thing, that I was confused, my mind making things up. It was getting harder and harder to think."
Jake remembered. For a while it seemed that Cael wasn't recovering, but getting worse. They nearly lost him. That was when Celalundria had suddenly whisked the boys away, meeting their father on the mortal side of a bridge where their lives had abruptly changed. Dad had taken Cael to a military hospital where the delirium he'd been in steadily melted away and his overall health improved. A cold sweat broke out across Jake's forehead. It had been a cover-up. It could have been the healers, someone related to one of the initiates that had been involved, or an order from one of the Administers, or possibly even Gregor had slipped something into Cael's doses. That was certainly a possibility. Whether their mom knew about what was happening or not, she had at least suspected foul play and got Cael out of there before…
Jake choked on that last thought. No wonder Cael never told him any of this. Jake was ready to turn the Jeep around and tear out Gregor's lungs through his throat.
"Come on. We're going back."
"What?" Cael spun around. "No, Jake. No. We can't."
"We can't let them get away with this."
"What exactly are you going to do about it? Storm in and tell them Gregor killed Iason. He wasn't the only one there. Half the senior Academy was in on it. And they'll all say that the juncoir was never meant to get close to Iason."
Kid had put a lot of thought into this.
"But that's bull."
"Who are they going to believe?"
Jake opened his mouth to argue, but didn't have anything to back an argument up with.
"Let's just go." Cael looked like he'd already been ground beneath a millstone today.
Jake squeezed his eyes closed for a moment before yanking open the driver side door. "Fine, but this isn't finished. Gregor's dead meat. He just doesn't know it."
"Fine. But we got to do this smart. The right way or it could have repercussions on Mom."
Jake rolled his eyes. Like Mom's career took precedence over this. "I hate Karavel."