CRYSTALLUM (The Primordial Principles Book 1) (38 page)

With a push, she flew up, past the cliff face and toward the ledge where Cole stood, eyes wide in disbelief, and alarm. It was definitely alarm. Something she’d been afraid of. The reason she was afraid to tell him the truth. Her pure white, feathered wings lowered her softly to the ground in front of Cole, but no amount of angel's wings would ever cover her demon's face.

Cole's gaze traced the protrusions extending from her jaw, underneath the wells of her eyes, her temples, and her wings,
fluttering around her like a protective cage.

“‘I heard an Angel singing/When the day was springing/'Mercy, Pity, Peace/Is the world's release.’ William Blake.” Cole gasped. “Oh…god. Kade.”

Kade searched for fear in his eyes, or shame, some sign that would let her know what he was thinking, but his expression only showed one emotion: Awe.

"I won't hurt you," she felt the need to say, as he stared at her.

He looked her up and down, taking in the red and black spikes covering her face, her long dark blond hair, white, feathered wings extending from above her head and shoulders, her hands, curved into black claws, and his gaze kept roaming. Taking in her normal jeans and converse shoes, her bare shoulders, and her upper torso, covered in white feathers.

“Wow.”

"I'm not...bad,” she said, eyes downcast.

A grin drew up the edge of his lip. "I know that."

"Do you hate me?" she asked, afraid of his answer. "Now that you know this is what I am. A monster." It was hard to say that word out loud, but she forced it out even though her voice was shaking.

"Monster?"

She held her gruesome hands out at her sides. "That's what I am.
This
is what I am. And whatever this is, it isn't what you are. Or what Giselle is."

"Have you seen Giselle's true form?"

"No, but, I know she isn't
this
." Kade glanced down at herself. "No one is
this
. No one is like me."

"Did Dracon tell you that?"

"Yes."

Cole smiled, shaking his head, and the gesture took her
completely off guard. "He was right."

"Who was right?"

"My dad. They thought he was crazy, but he was right." He shook his head again, still grinning. "And you're right, Giselle isn't like you."

Kade bowed her head, wanting to hide her face.

"And, you're not like I am, either,” he went on.

"You do hate me, then," she whispered.

"But you used to be." He walked toward her.

She glanced up.

"And now I know why Dracon wants you so badly, why he hasn't hurt you, or tried to turn you into one of them."

"But, look at me, I am one of them."

Cole reached for her right hand, opening it, palm facing up. He opened his right hand beside hers. Red lines swirled on both like tendrils of ink. "They match."

She nodded. "I saw the lines on you the day I fell in the stairwell, and..." Kade wanted to apologize for not showing him the same lines on her hand, but she figured it was just some Primordial thing.

"It's okay. Do you have your crystal on you?"

She withdrew it from her pocket, handing it to him.

"Is this the one you always carry?" He moved it between his fingers, holding it up to the light.

"Yeah. I have a larger one that I chip pieces from if I lose one."

"A
larger
one?"

"Yeah."

"Can I keep this?" Cole held the crystal.

"Yeah."

He dropped in his pocket and reached for her left hand. With the same motion, she exposed her palm, the moon staring up, and Cole placed his left hand alongside hers.

"I saw this at your house yesterday, and I wasn't sure then, but now I am."

"Sure of what?"

"Look at our hands, the marks, as closely as you can."

On the outer edge of the moon's mark were the faintest of points. Five of them. Like a five pointed star.

"Oh, my god." Kade let out a breath.

"The crystal you own isn't the crystal you were born with," Cole said. " The crystal you have is a fusionem crystal." He held his right hand up again. "It did this to me. When I rescued you from the snow that night, I couldn't find your crystal anywhere in your room, so I used mine, or I thought I did, but it was actually a fusionem crystal that Danny and I found in a Hive we were investigating. It was in my pocket, and it was dark in your room. Anyway, the red lines, they aren't normal, if that's what you were thinking."

"It was."

He shook his head. "Fusionem crystals were used thousands of years ago by the Devil's Children in hopes to create amalgamations. That's their only purpose. To alter the blood of a Primori. The Ward rounded them up and destroyed them all. Or they thought they did."

"Amalgamations?"

"Hybrids."

Kade let out a breath.

"Over time a fusionem crystal will either do nothing and fade away, change a Primori into a Primeva by tainting their blood, which is how the Primordial ended up being split up into classes, or...it creates something like you." He gazed at her. "Something that, until today, no one ever believed could, or did, exist. Except for my dad."

"You're losing me. You're saying I used be like you? When?"

"When you were a baby. You said Dracon came to you for the first time when you were five?"

She nodded.

"And that's when you lost your
Astrum
necklace?"

Her hand went to her mouth.

"My beautiful, little sparrow." Cole tilted her head up to look at him. "You're a true born Primori. Like me. I knew it."

"You mean I used to be." Kade wanted desperately to believe what he was saying. "But... I'm not anymore. I'm not a...bird like you. I'm
this
."

"You are, though. You always have been," Cole said. He hummed softly, "His Eye Is on the Sparrow." He brushed her hair from her shoulders, and his thumb swept the back of her neck,
causing shivers down her spine. "Did you know you have a scar on your neck?"

"No."

He tilted his head. "Look at my neck."

"I know." Kade knew what she would find. The tattoo of wings. Falcon's wings, she realized. "I saw your tattoo the other day in the hot spring. Lindsey has one like it."

"They aren't tattoos. And Lindsey doesn’t have falcon wings.”

"Oh..." Her pulse sped up.

"We all have one in accordance to our natural form." Cole brought his hand back to her neck. "And I can promise you that a sparrow's wings used to be right here."

"So...I'm a hybrid? Half Primori, half Primeva?"
What the hell?

"You're not half Primori, half Primeva. You're an Anamolia. Which creates a whole other problem that has nothing to do with the fact that your blood has been tampered with."

"An Anamolia?"

"It means devil god. It's also who the Shadow I killed in Crystalline said would destroy us all." He smirked. "An Anamolia is both dark and light, heaven and hell, god and devil. They have the power to control both positive and negative fields of energy. All the Leygates in the world. The entire grid."

Her breaths weren't coming out right anymore. "What?"

"Which is why Dracon needs you. You can bring down the Araneum."

Her head was spinning. "I think I need to sit down."

Cole put an arm around her. "I'm sorry. This is too much at once."

"Just keep talking. I want to know the truth."

He exhaled. "The Araneum is the most heavily guarded Leyline site on the planet. It's where all the lines converge into one point. If that one point gets tampered with, it will destroy the Planes, Earth, the Primordial race, everything we know. And Dracon needs you to bring him there because you can blow it sky high.”

COLE WAS A FALCON.
No matter what he explained to Kade about her being an Anamolia, and everything he knew about the
Araneum, all she could think was, “Cole is a falcon.” The most bad ass bird on the planet. The fastest animal on earth, a bird that could take out any other bird in a matter of seconds. The avian alpha. No wonder he had a chip on his shoulder all the time. It made complete
sense.

Cole opened another book as they sat in the Brotherhood's immense library. He knew where every single book was located in the entire room, and had read them all. Kade realized why he had such a smart mouth. Because he had the ultimate brain and brawn combination to back it up. She was dating the smartest guy in school who was also the hottest.

Crazier, he kept staring at her like she was some kind of real angel, which was odd because she was in complete awe of
him.
She still had no idea what he saw in her. How being a devil god, hybrid, thing could possibly be good...she didn't know.

"Will you stop staring at me for five seconds?" He grinned. "You're giving me a complex."

"Whatever complex you have wasn't brought on by me staring at you." She kissed his cheek, and he put his arm around her, pulling her closer.

He glanced at the clock on the wall. ”We only have about twenty minutes before Plumb and the rest of the house start showing up. At which time, we must disappear."

"And then what?"

"And then we find Danny." He read over the last page of the book.

"And how will that go?"

"I truthfully have no idea, but we're going to need his help since the Warden took me off the investigation." Cole opened another book.

"Is that normal? Do you usually investigate the leads you find?" Kade thought he and Danny did that sort of thing all the time.

"It's not normal, no." He scanned the pages.

"Why doesn't he want you to investigate then?"

Cole glanced at her, and a trace of pain lined the planes of his
face. "Since the Araneum is the most heavily guarded Leyline site on the planet, its location is a secret, and because of that, the
Daemoneum are always searching for it."

"Makes sense. Wouldn't they want extra eyes helping? Make sure it stays hidden?"

Cole released a breath. "There are only a few Primordial in the world who know its location, and they're the ones guarding it." He rubbed his forehead. "Three years ago there was an attack on the site. It was unsuccessful, thankfully, but a lot of people died." He paused. "My dad was one of them. And my mom disappeared during the attack. Principals have been searching, but there’s been no trace.” His gaze went toward the table top.

Kade let out a breath. "Cole...I’m, god, Cole I’m so sorry.” She squeezed his arm.

“Thanks.” He put his hand over hers. “Anyway, the Warden was convinced the attack was related to my parents being there, and now that it's come up again he's worried I have my own agenda, and I'm out to prove something, or take my revenge."

"Are you?"

He didn't answer the question. "I want you to look at
something." Flipping to one of the pages, he turned the book to face her. "Have you ever seen this before?"

The egg with the serpent coiled around it looked back at her.
"Et mortali spiram."

Cole stared at her, eyes darkening. "Say that again."

"Et mortali spiram."

He leaned in close to her mouth. "That is the sexiest thing I have ever heard."

She burst out laughing. "Latin or the Mortal Coil?"

"Latin, off your lips, definitely Latin.” He kissed her.

"You've heard that language all your life." She grinned against his lips.

"Not from your mouth." He kissed her again. "Maybe you need to stick to English."

"Anyway." She blushed. "This is the symbol of the Devil's Children. The snake coiled around the egg." Kade pointed to the picture. "I'm sure you know that."

"How do
you
know that?"

"Because I've seen it. Dracon has a ring with that symbol on it, and I asked what it meant once."

"And?"

She shrugged. "The gift of life ends in death. From Shakespeare."

"The Daemoneum referencing Shakespeare," Cole chuckled. "That's new. I’ll have to up my game. What else?"

"He said something about a nexus and the beginning of a new world."

"
The
Nexus?"

"As opposed to some other nexus?" She lifted a brow.

He kissed her again. "I love your smart mouth. And yes, there is only one nexus that matters to us. Nexus is another word for Araneum, or spider's web. The entire Leyline network protecting the Mortal Plane. They're all the same."

"I guess that's probably what he meant then."

"Anything else?"

"He said something about the stars and moon aligning. He always said weird stuff like that, and honestly, I never knew what any of it meant. But, wait..." Kade stared at him. "That symbol,
Et mortali spiram
, it rests above the doors into Crystalline." She zoned out for a second. "Which makes sense because..."

"Because the Nefarius were there," Cole answered her thought. "Danny and I tracked them there from an abandoned church in Salt Lake City the night we met."

"Utah?"

"Utah. That's where we found the fusionem crystal. In the
balcony of an abandoned church."

Kade's mouth fell open. "You mean...where I told you I used to play?"

"Not sure how many other fusionem crystals are in old church balconies in Salt Lake City. So, Crystalline? Looks like we found our
first lead." Cole gathered the books. "We should get out of here
before we have to explain why we're together to a house full of Primori." He stood up.

"But I'm a Primori," Kade pouted. "Somewhere inside of me."

"And whatever you do, don't ever forget that." He placed the books back into their appropriate places on the shelves. "No one will ever know we were here."

"You're kind of sneaky." She came up behind him.

"It's kind of my job to be." He turned to her.

"So, dating me undercover is no big deal to you."

"In regard to doing it without getting caught? No, it's not a big deal." He put his hand on her hip. "In regard to knowing that guys like Jake will continue to hit on you?" His other hand went to her waist. "In regard to not being able to shout to the world that I'm crazy about you, and that you're mine?"