Dragon's Storm (Legion Of Angels #4)(58)

“Seth Battlestorm and Razeel Silverwing are hell’s best reprogramming experts.” Harker waved his hand, and a frozen wall shot out of the ground. It crashed down, slamming against the Dark Force’s trucks, pushing them back across the ice.

“Reprogramming?” I asked. “Like brainwashing?”

Harker nodded. “The Dark Force uses them to capture and corrupt supernaturals and Legion soldiers. And, when they’re feeling ambitious, an angel. Battlestorm and Silverwing are the strongest telepaths of all the dark angels. And they use that magic to warp their prisoners’ minds.”

“If they’re powerful telepaths, that explains how they captured Colonel Starborn’s mind in her dreams.”

“Yes,” Colonel Starborn said, stirring beside me.

I helped her sit up.

“I was overworked, up too late every night, digging too deep in magic that drained me,” she said. “I thought I could handle it, but I couldn’t. I should have realized what was going on, what these images of the Fire Mountains meant, why I felt compelled to go there. They controlled my dreams and planted that idea in my subconscious.” Anger burned inside her eyes. “I left the castle. I put everyone in danger.”

“It wasn’t you,” Harker told her as we drove under the wall. We were now safely on the right side of the world. “You thought you were dreaming when you left the castle.”

She shook her head. “That’s no excuse. I messed up, and I have to fix it. You need to bring me back to Storm Castle. Now. The other Dragons need me. Without me, the castle is not safe. The defenses are not secure. The magic is not balanced. I have to get back!”

I held her back before she tried to fly to the castle herself. She’d never make it there in this state.

“It’s all right,” I told her. “Captain Somerset is filling in as the Fire Dragon. She’s keeping your element in sync—and the castle safe.”

Colonel Starborn sighed. She looked relieved—and sad.

“What happened back there?” Harker asked her. “What did the Dark Force want with you? The usual, to turn you?”

“No, not the usual.” She shook her head. “Not the usual at all. They didn’t want to make me a dark angel. When angels go dark, they gain dark magic but lose their light magic. The Dark Forces wanted to turn me into an angel who could wield both light and dark magic.”

“Such an angel, one with complete power over both light and dark, would be doubly powerful,” Nero realized.

“Doubly powerful, and doubly resistant to light and dark magic,” Colonel Starborn said.

Nero frowned. “They would be powerful soldiers and perfect spies.”

“If you were in the Fire Mountains, you must have encountered the monsters there,” she said.

“Encountered and killed,” I told her.

“All of them?”

“Yes.” I hadn’t felt a single monster since we’d fried the horde against the base’s barrier. “Were those the Dark Force’s monsters?”

“The magic at the heart of the Fire Mountains is very potent. Powerful enough to turn regular monsters into perfectly balanced light-dark specimens,” Colonel Starborn said. “The Dark Force was trying to do the same thing to me. It didn’t go as they’d hoped.”

“The dark magic didn’t take because your light magic is too strong,” Harker said.

“It didn’t work because it’s not possible,” she retorted. “Monsters are one thing, but people are another. Our magic is considerably more complex, especially the magic of a Legion soldier. We possess both light and darkness inside of us in varying degrees, but no one can wield both light and dark magic. It’s simply not possible. Nectar and Venom are jealous, volatile poisons. Only one can exist in a body at once.”

“That’s not entirely true,” Harker said, glancing at me.

Colonel Starborn looked from him to me. “What do you mean?”

Harker shook his head. “Never mind. Just rest. You’ll need your strength when you return to Storm Castle.”

“I’m afraid to fall asleep…after what happened the last time I closed my eyes,” she admitted, trembling.

Harker set his hand on her shoulder. “I will watch over you. No one will hurt you,” he promised.

He spoke with such devotion, such loyalty. It reminded me of why I’d liked him. He loved her like a sister, and I had no doubt in my mind that he would do anything to save her, even if it meant challenging the gods themselves. I couldn’t blame him for not extending that same loyalty to me. He’d only known me for a month when a god told him to give me a vial of Nectar that would kill me. No, I didn’t blame him, but I didn’t forgive him either.





18





A Perfect Soldier





I sat beside Colonel Starborn’s bed in the medical ward of Desert Rose’s Legion base. Nero was off interrogating the dark angel Razeel Silverwing. I debated going back to the elemental magic training rooms but ultimately decided that Colonel Starborn needed me more than I needed another solid ass-kicking. The base’s doctors had healed my fractured ribs, but the angel’s injuries were far more extensive.

“Leda Pierce.”