These people reminded him of the American colonists he'd been fighting to save back on that long-ago night when he'd carved Keely's fish. Brave and stubborn. Willing to live their lives here in the wild, by no man's-or government's-rules or constraints. They were farmers eking out a subsistence living, but they were proud. Alejandro perhaps the proudest of them all. He'd done the work of ten men, ordering and cajoling his people to work quickly to save all that could be saved and barricade the building so they could hide the women and children inside when darkness fell again. Proud and courageous, both. Alejandro would make a fine warrior.

They are fools, the Nereid sneered in his mind. No protection from the Guatemalan Paranormal Ops patrols this far out. They're nothing but bloodsucker bait.

"They radioed P Ops this morning after the vamps left," Justice said. Then he realized that he'd just answered himself out loud. "Okay, now I'm ready for the Temple protective rooms; that's for sure."

Keely walked across the charred ground toward him. Her face was smudged with dirt and ash, but to him she glowed like a flame. She'd tied her wealth of hair back away from her face, and he wanted to let it loose and bury his face in the silken strands. Inhale her sweet scent after so many hours of the smell of burning filling his nostrils and lungs.

"Did you say Temple protective rooms? What are those?" she asked, always the inquisitive scientist, even bone weary as she must be.

He bent his head to kiss her, because he could do nothing else. A feeling so huge coiled inside him that the pressure would surely burst his rib cage. There was nothing more important than Keely, no moment in his life from this day on that he would not spend thanking all the gods for her. He closed his arms around her and pulled her so close that he could feel her heart beating against his chest.

But a warrior preparing for battle must plan strategy with his head, not with his heart, and so he reluctantly let her go.

"I want to get you out of here," he repeated for the twentieth time since they'd first arrived. "I have tried and tried to call to the portal, and it will not answer my call. Perhaps I am too damaged and the Atlantean magic will not recognize me again."

"Never," she said firmly, sending a wave of warmth through him. She believed in him, and though he could not credit her with any good sense for doing so, he offered his thanks to Poseidon that she did.

"I can't reach Conlan or even Alaric, either," he admitted. "They are too far, or perhaps they have turned against me. They know we are here; you told them the Star was in San Bartolo. I cannot believe they have not come to our aid, unless I truly am exiled."

"They're your family, Justice. They won't give up on you," she said. A flash of remembered pain crossed her face, but she shook her head at whatever thought had caused it. "I know about families and abandonment, and your brothers were willing to die for you. Don't give up on them, because they won't give up on you. I can feel it."

Hope tried to send up a tentative flare, but he ruthlessly crushed it. Better to be surprised than to have to live with the anguish of shattered expectations. "We can discuss that another time, mi amara. If the vampires return again, I cannot bear for you to be anywhere near this place. If you are harmed, then I will drown the earth itself in my rage. Perhaps not even these villagers will be safe."

She folded her arms across her chest and lifted her chin. "I trust you. You just worked all afternoon to help them; you'd never harm them. Don't make me have this discussion with you again. I'm not going anywhere until you can get us all out of here, and you admitted that your energy is nearly gone."

It was true. He'd used the Nereid power of transport to take a wounded child and his mother to the nearest medical clinic, and the use of his new power had exhausted him so much that he'd nearly lost himself in the energy stream on the return trip. Once the particles of his being had been scattered and spread across the universe, he never would have returned to himself.

Never could have found Keely ever again. Terror knifed through him at the thought. No, he would not risk travel in that manner until he was sure his energies had returned.

She put a hand on his arm. "If you could travel by mist again, or do that super-speed thing, or anything that would help move these people, that would be one thing. But you're not superhuman-"

Suddenly she stopped speaking and laughed tiredly. "I guess you are superhuman, though, aren't you? It's not like the average human can do any of the things you've done today. Eleni even calls you Senor Superman."

"Yeah, well, my cape is at the dry cleaners," he said savagely. "I'm no superhero, Keely; I'm a monster. Part of me thinks these people are fools and sheep who deserve to be abandoned."

Stepping closer to him, she put her hands on his cheeks and pulled his head down to hers. "But you won't do it, and the choice is what makes you different from the monsters."

Slowly, smiling up at him, she lifted her face and kissed him gently. He let her take the initiative and stood perfectly still, exquisitely sensitized to the feel of her lips on his. She feathered kisses on his lips, chin, and jaw until a flash of heat seared through his body like a stroke of lightning, and he couldn't bear it anymore. He lifted her in his arms, flashed across the clearing as quickly as he could, and withdrew to a spot a few feet within the trees, so they were blocked from view.

"Justice," she said with a little gasp, but he swallowed her gasp and lifted her, pressed her back against the tree, and caught her mouth with his own. He kissed her and every ounce of finesse, every art of gentleness he'd ever known deserted him so that he was as rough and clumsy as a school-boy.

He wanted her more than he'd ever wanted any woman. How could he be so unrestrained? The need was too great, too overpowering, and if he didn't have her wrapped in his arms and naked underneath him soon, the pain would take him again, back to madness and burning and the dark. Every ounce of his being was centered on his lips as they devoured her and on his cock as he bucked against her.

He must have her, or he would be lost forever.

But he was saved; he was whole. She was his well-being and his heart and his home. She was kissing him back, and all was right with his world. The warm taste of her mouth, sweet from the cup of hot chocolate she'd drunk with their meager dinner of canned goods, teased and tortured him and swept sea-tossed tempests of longing and hunger through him. His body actually shuddered with the enormity of his need, and he raised his head, gasping for breath.

"Keely, I need-I need-"

"Senor Justice?" The small voice came from behind him, but it took a moment for it to register in his frenzied mind.

"Justice, put me down," Keely whispered urgently. "It's Eleni."

He clutched her tighter for an instant, then reluctantly released her, breathing hard and trying to regain his equilibrium. Keely ran over to the child and knelt down in front of her.

"Are you okay, Eleni?" she asked in her beautifully accented Spanish. "Is anything wrong?"

Eleni clutched that pitiful slipper to her and shook her head. "They're coming, Keely. The bad ones are coming back and they're almost here."

Chapter 34.

Keely lifted Eleni into her arms and wished desperately that she could take the child far, far away from danger and superstition.

Justice's face hardened and he drew his sword from its sheath, grimacing at the blackened blade. "I would have thought they'd be sated from last night's raid for at least a week," he said grimly. "Either there are more vampires in this blood pride than Alejandro knew, or these are very greedy bloodsuckers."

Eleni shivered and Keely shook her head at Justice. The child didn't need to hear about it; she'd lived through it and lost both parents to the vampires. He inclined his head in acknowledgment and then strode out of the trees and back toward the village. She followed, holding Eleni, who clung to her like one of the native monkeys, her painfully thin legs and arms clutching Keely and the ever-present slipper, stinking of the rust-like smell of old blood, between them.

The village was almost tranquil in the dusky shadows of twilight. A few scattered people moved about or stood in small groups, talking quietly. Two men stood guard, shotguns at the ready, scanning the perimeter. They reflexively raised their weapons when they saw Justice and Keely, then lowered them again, nodding their recognition.

Alejandro appeared suddenly, almost materializing out of the dark. "I am not of a mind to rest our guard until we are safely ensconced in the vehicles of the P Ops unit," he said. "I know you have done the work of five men, and I do not know how much using such amazing powers tires you, but would you be willing to take a shift? Your sword-"

"They're coming," Justice said flatly, cutting him off. "Eleni warned us, and we're going on the assumption that she's right. Round up every able-bodied man-"

"And woman," Keely interjected. "It will take all of us to fend them off."

Justice glared at her but didn't respond to her comment. "You said there were no more than a dozen last night, Alejandro?"

"Yes, and that was the most they've ever sent. I think that was the entirety of the blood pride."

"A dozen vampires is what we call 'a good beginning' in Atlantis," Justice said, grinning wolfishly. "You and I and two or three of your best marksmen will easily handle them and make them regret ever stepping foot in Las Pinturas."

The white gleam of Alejandro's teeth flashed, startling in the growing dark. "I find that I like you very much, although I reserve judgment on your claim to be from the continent beneath the waters."

"Yeah, well, let's get all girly and talk about our feelings later," Justice said. "Keely, to the safe house. Now. Take the girl with you."

"She can stay with the others," Keely protested. "I'm a damn good shot and I can help."

"I don't care if you can shoot out the eye of a bloodsucker at two hundred yards," Justice snarled. "You need to be safe or I will lose my precarious hold on sanity and destroy everything and everyone that moves for miles around."

Alejandro froze, his hands tightening on his shotgun. Then he turned to Keely. "I do not doubt that he means it, senora. Please do as he says."

"Fine," she snapped. She wasn't going to waste valuable time arguing when the minutes until the vamps arrived were ticking down. She'd get Eleni to safety then find a gun. No way was she huddling in a corner like a scared rabbit.

As she ran across the clearing, she heard Justice and Alejandro shouting orders behind her. The men came running, weapons in their hands and grim determination on their faces.

One of the women met Keely at the door and held her arms out for Eleni. "Come to me, little one," she soothed. "Let the doctor be for now."

Eleni cried out and dug her heels into Keely's kidneys. "No, no, no. Want Keely!"

"It's okay," Keely said, moving into the room and looking for a pile of blankets where she could deposit Eleni. "Eleni, you have to listen to me. I need to help Justice-"

"Senor Superman does not need our help," Eleni said mu tinously. "You stay with me."

Keely knelt down on the floor and tried gently to pull Eleni's arms from around her neck. "Please, sweetheart. I promise to come right back to you, okay? But even Superman needs help sometimes."

Abruptly, Eleni let go of Keely, wrapped her arms around herself and started rocking. "You won't come back. Nobody ever comes back to me."

Keely hugged the child, but she'd gone as stiff and unyielding as a board. "I will. I promise you."

But Eleni's eyes had gone wide and shocky; she began humming a discordant tune to herself and Keely knew she didn't have time to break through to her. Only returning as she'd promised would reassure the child.

The kind woman who'd met them at the door knelt down beside Keely, a shotgun in her hands. "I will care for her, Dr. McDermott. I am not as superstitious as these others. You take this and help protect us from these devils."

Keely nodded her thanks, unable to speak over the lump in her throat. She pressed a kiss to the top of Eleni's head and then took the shotgun from the woman and ran for the door, hoping she wasn't too late.

Justice called for water and was relieved when it immediately answered his call, trembling in wait at the edge of the clearing as he'd commanded. At least one of his Atlantean powers had not been lost, then, even though the capricious magic of the portal to Atlantis would not respond to him. Twilight had turned to full dark and the rich, earthy smells of the jungle pressed in on him, counteracting the residual stench of burned buildings and charred dreams.

Alejandro knelt behind an overturned cart a dozen paces away, leveling his shotgun in the direction that the attack had come from the night before. Of course even bloodsuckers knew enough to vary their methods and directions of attack, but it was a matter of seconds to turn to meet the threat.

"I can hear them coming," Justice said quietly. "Be ready."

Alejandro nodded and passed the word to the other men, who stood strong and resolute, even though their faces were pale with dread. All of them had lost family members to the vampires. They knew what they faced, and they had no powers other than their simple shotguns and a pile of wooden stakes next to each man.

The trick was getting close enough to use one of those stakes.

I have a surprise for you, if you insist on helping these pathetic humans, the Nereid said smugly.

What is it? And it had better be fast and useful, Justice warned.

You decide, the Nereid replied, then flashed a series of visions-of knowledge-through Justice's mind so fast that he nearly stumbled with dizziness.

Suddenly he knew. It was as if he had always known. Known how to access the power of his other half, of his Nereid ancestry. He could wield water as an Atlantean.

He could wield madness as a Nereid.

As both, he could bring utter destruction to the vampires who chose that minute to soar through the trees and land on the ground not ten feet in front of him. Madness and confusion, and it would be so easy.

Still, he did love the feel of his sword in his hands.

"You do not belong here," the vamp in front of the group hissed at him, as Justice counted nine more laughing and skulking around to try to flank their group. "You are no villager, nor even native to this land."

Justice raised his sword and the vamp took a step back, suddenly hesitant. "I belong nowhere and everywhere, bloodsucker. You, though, bear the stamp of the Mayan heritage, yet still you torment these countrymen and women of yours. That is the worst kind of treachery."

Alejandro stood up, leveling his shotgun at the vamp's head. "I propose a barter," he said calmly.

The vamp barked out a chilling burst of laughter. "What barter could you-"

The shotgun bucked and roared and exploded the vamp's head into acidic chunks of skull and meat. Justice shot a look at Alejandro, who shrugged as the vampire's headless body fell to the ground, dissolving in a flood of slime. "My shotgun shell for his head. Seemed fair to me."

Then he aimed almost without looking and took off another one's head, still with that eerie calm.

Justice raised his sword and yelled a battle cry. "Las Pinturas!" Then he dove toward the vampires, hacking, slashing, and slicing, a study of grace in motion, centuries of training and practice evident in every move. No matter what Anubisa had done to him, no matter what battles the disparate sides of his heritage fought over possession of his mind and soul, he was an Atlantean warrior. A Warrior of Poseidon.

And these vampires were all going to die.

Two of them dove for him in a coordinated move, and he sidestepped the first, slashing into its neck as it flew by him, then circled around in a smooth motion to drive his sword into the next. As the vamp screamed and died, a rush of power so hot and powerful shot through the sword's blade and rushed into Justice's arm that he nearly lost his grip on it. Instead, he raised his arm into the air and shouted out his fierce joy as the sword gleamed with an inner light; first the symbols on the blade that he'd seen in the Void and then the entire blade transforming from the hated dull black to silver-blue fire.

"For Atlantis!" he shouted, and then he called the water that he'd held at bay and threw his left arm forward, pointing at a group of the remaining vampires. The water obeyed his command and shaped itself in deadly arrows of glittering ice and shot toward the vamps in a hail of sharp-edged death.

As the three fell, their heads rolling off to the sides, he heard the sounds of two different shotguns going off. Alejandro had claimed another, blowing its head off, and another villager had punched a hole in one of the vamp's chests. Unfortunately, it had missed the heart, and the wound was closing before their eyes.

A third shotgun blast sounded, this time from behind him. Justice whirled around to see Keely standing in front of the door to the safe house. Not five feet away from her, another vampire dissolved into the ground in a pool of green slime.

Keely stood there, shaking, her hands firmly holding the shotgun to her shoulder, her eyes enormous as she looked up and met Justice's gaze. "I . . . I got it," she said in a shaky voice that unleashed the fury of a thousand monsters in Justice's mind.

Hatred larger than the world swelled within Justice at the idea that one of them had come so close to her. Fury deeper than any ocean pulsed through the Nereid in waves of ice and fire.

"We're done playing with you," he said, and he dropped his sword, lifted his arms into the air, and roared out a sound that shook the trees themselves. Slicing his arms down through the air, he blasted a shock wave of concussive force through the clearing, knocking the villagers on their asses as it traveled straight to the vampires.

Like water crashing against the rocks, the wave of his fury smashed through the remaining vampires, and every one of them exploded into a bloody shower of acid and flesh. Justice heard screaming but he didn't know if it came from someone else or from his own throat as the force of the power he'd harnessed tried to shake his mind free from its moorings.

Madness laughed at sanity and the power, the power, oh, by all the gods, the power of it beckoned and seduced until he began to whirl around, dripping with acid and chunks of spattered vampire, laughing and laughing and laughing. The cosmic stream of the universe flowed through him and around him, inviting him to dance a waltz of the ages.

Why didn't you tell me? We are all-powerful! We will kill them all and take anything and everything we want! Justice demanded of his Nereid half.

The Nereid was strangely silent for a long moment. Then he finally replied. But what if everything we want is something that must be given to us, not taken?

Justice stopped spinning, frozen to immobility by the words. Then a quiet voice broke through the madness.

"Justice, come back to me. We need you. I need you. Please come back to me."

He forced his eyes to focus on what was right before him, instead of gazing out at the energy stream of the universe. He released the colors and light long enough to figure out why the voice called to him so powerfully.

It was her. It was Keely, and she was crying. "Please. Please come back to me. You're frightening them, and me, too."

The sight of her crystalline tears tracing a path down her cheeks cut directly into his heart. Abruptly, he released the power and pushed through the madness.

The Nereid inside him offered up a sensation of intense joy and need. She is ours, and she has given us her love. What else can matter?

Justice held out his arms, and Keely walked into them, heedless of the mess covering him. "Is it true?" he demanded, not caring that several villagers were surrounding them, many with shotguns held at half-mast. "Do you love me?"

She clutched his shirt for a moment, then stepped back from him and looked up at him, disbelief plain on her face. "Do I love you? Do I love you? Are you freaking kidding me? Do you think I'd go through hell like I have for the past few days for just anybody?"