Justice smashed the door open and ran in with his sword drawn, then skidded to a halt. "What is it? Are you wounded? Tell me, mi amara."

Keely finally stopped screaming and mutely held up the torn remnants of the blanket so the words on the sheet beneath it were clearly visible. Hateful words drawn in black charcoal, as if to mock the survivors huddling in the burned-out village.

WE HAVE THE CHILD.

SAN BARTOLO AT TWILIGHT.

OUR TURN TO BARTER.

Justice lowered his sword, but his sword arm was shaking as if with some immense inner pressure. "They took her. Eleni."

Keely nodded, unable to force words out past the pain-filled lump in her throat. Then she pointed a shaky finger at the object that had caused her to scream. There, lying half hidden in the tangled sheets, was Eleni's poor dead mother's bloody slipper.

But some of the blood on it was fresh.

Justice roared, a hideous, wrenching sound of fury and pain, and Keely flinched and covered her ears. She couldn't hear him. Couldn't bear it. Couldn't stand this feeling that her heart, finally given freely, would be ripped out yet again.

Her brain stepped in and ruthlessly clamped a lid on Keely's emotional meltdown. Coldly, logically, she began to plan. Because there was no way in hell she was going to sit there on her ass when there was a child to save.

She blinked furiously to clear her vision, scrubbed the tears she hadn't known she was crying from her face, took a deep breath, and stood up. "So now we figure this out," she said flatly.

"Now we figure this out," Justice echoed, ice coating his voice.

An hour later-an hour closer to dusk-and Justice wanted to kill something. Real bad.

They'd huddled all the remaining children into the building and set armed guards inside and out. They'd ignored the old women who'd tried to bully them into eating. One of them, a sour-faced crone, had attempted to put forth the idea that Eleni was some kind of devil child and not worth saving. Keely had lit into her so savagely that the old woman had run away, muttering something about "guarding the children who deserved to be protected."

At the table, they'd argued, they'd planned, they'd wasted sixty precious minutes, but they still hadn't reached an agreement as to how they would handle the so-called barter.

Keely and Alejandro were to the point of shouting at each other when he'd finally had enough. "That's enough."

The words came out harsher and louder than he'd intended, but right at that moment, he didn't give much of a pile of miertus .

Everyone fell silent, staring at him. He realized his hand was on the hilt of his sword and forced himself to release it. These people were not his enemy.

Finding one lost child is also not our mission, the Nereid said. We need the Star of Artemis. To return it to the Trident and take our rightful place as prince of Atlantis. The child's fate is unfortunate, but children are dying all over the world. We can't save them all.

"We can save this one," Justice said fiercely. Alejandro, Keely, and the others turned puzzled faces to him, and he realized he was doing it again. Arguing with himself out loud.

We can save this one, he repeated, but this time in his mind. I hate to pull out a bad cliche, but you're either with me or you're against me, and I'm just a single one of Alaric's mindfucks away from getting rid of you forever.

The Nereid fell silent, so Justice decided to talk to all the people who didn't live in his brain.

"Look, we've been over this and over this for an hour. This discussion is useless and mind-bogglingly irrelevant."

He pointed at Alejandro, whose dark eyes were flashing fire and vengeance. "You want to bulldoze our way in there, guns blazing, with every man we've got. Go before twilight and surprise them and snatch Eleni. Have I got that right?"

Alejandro nodded. "Si. It's the only way. We overpower them and-"

Justice cut him off. "It's the only way, all right. It's the only way to get the rest of your men killed. Vampires never take stupid chances. Their sense of self-preservation is matched only by their cowardice and depravity. They wouldn't have taunted us with that note unless they had far superior numbers. Obviously they've got human or some kind of nonvamp help, or they couldn't have taken Eleni during the middle of the afternoon. They sure as the nine hells won't be sitting in the middle of the meet place playing jump rope with her."

He looked at each one of them in turn. "We go in hard and fast and they kill us hard and fast. Then they kill her, wherever they've hidden her. Then just for kicks they come here and slaughter the rest of your people."

Keely nodded, rubbing her reddened eyes. "I've been telling him-"

Justice cut her off, too. "You've been telling him that we threaten the vamps. Reason with them. Tell them that the P Ops patrol should be here tomorrow and if they give us Eleni, we won't rat them out. Is that about right?"

Keely nodded, her eyes narrowing. She probably figured she wasn't going to like what he said next.

She was right.

"Vamps don't do logic and reason when they're angry and want revenge. We can threaten them with P Ops, sure. They'll cut their losses and move on somewhere new, to a nesting ground where we can't find them. Of course, they'll drain Eleni first and leave her dead body for us as a present, but they'll be gone."

Keely's face went dead white at his cruelty, but he just added it to the list of his sins, the inner whip of self-flagellation cutting mercilessly into him. Yeah. He was a foul bastard who'd abandoned these poor villagers for an afternoon of selfish pleasure, and a tiny child would pay the price.

An orphan, like he'd been an orphan. But he'd at least had adoptive parents who'd loved him. Eleni had nothing but pain, torture, and death in front of her, unless he fixed it.

He was good at fixing things.

He unsheathed his sword and carefully placed it on the table in front of him. "This is the plan. Either get on board or get the hells out of my way, but this will be the plan. They want me, I'm guessing, since I'm the one with the nifty explosive trick."

Alejandro slammed a fist down on the table. "They want me! The use of the word 'barter' was deliberate. If you are planning any solo trip to the vampire camp, you are mistaken. These are my people, and I failed them while I . . . while I-" he shot an anguished look at Maria who sat, sobbing, at the end of the table. "While I shirked my duty," he finished, a dull flush on his cheekbones.

Justice met Alejandro's gaze in a moment of perfectly shared understanding. They were both warriors who had failed to protect their charges. They both would die to make it right.

Fine. Let him come.

"What is the plan, then?" The bruised-looking skin under Keely's eyes emphasized her stark, drawn pallor. "You're the mighty Atlantean warrior, so why don't you tell us all about it?"

Where there had been love and laughter in her eyes only a few short hours before, now there was nothing but desolation. Keely's guilt must be as crushing as his own, he realized.

Not only Atlantean warriors carried the weight of innocents on their souls.

"They want to barter, so we barter," he said flatly. "Me for Eleni."

A chorus of dissent broke out around the table, but Keely looked down at her hands resting on the table and said nothing, although she flinched as if from a blow.

"They'll kill you," Alejandro said. "Kill you first, then Eleni, and then the rest of us. I have no illusions that we can hold off a blood pride of angry vampires with a few shotguns."

"Maybe. But if so, I plan to take them with me," Justice replied, never taking his eyes off Keely. "Anyway, plan A is that nobody dies but vampires. I suddenly have a lot to live for."

Keely finally looked up at him, and the black emptiness in her eyes scared him more than the idea of facing a hundred vampires.

"Give me a shotgun," she said.

"You will not come anywhere near that nest," Justice began. "I'll-"

But it was her turn to cut him off. She ignored him as completely as if he didn't exist and turned to Maria, who was still weeping. "If you can shut up for five minutes, get me a shotgun," she said with icy disdain. Then she lifted something from her lap and placed it on the table in front of her in an eerie echo of Justice's action of mere minutes before.

It was the bloody slipper.

Maria, shocked into silence, traded a long look with Keely and then squared her shoulders and hurried off. Keely selected a piece of bread and started chewing it with grim determination.

"We need to eat," she said, still in that utterly flat tone. "We haven't eaten all day. It's still an hour until twilight, and I won't fail Eleni again because I was too damn stupid to put fuel in my body before I went to rescue her."

Justice, who could function at full capacity for up to six days with no food, decided to follow her lead. Maybe letting Keely feel in control of something, even something as meaningless as the decision to eat bread and cold stew, would help her find her way back from her own personal hell.

She swallowed the piece of bread and began on her previously untouched bowl of stew, slowly and methodically eating one spoonful after another. It was like watching a zombie or one of those robots in the movies Ven liked to watch. There was nothing of human emotion about it, no trace of fear or sorrow.

Just spoonful after spoonful of cold stew.

His mouth dried out so much he was almost unable to swallow the bread. If by his folly he had lost both the child and Keely, there was nothing left for him. His mind tortured him with visions of a world without Keely, and a Void blacker than any Anubisa could conjure yawned like an abyss at his feet, beckoning.

Alejandro looked from Justice to Keely and then nodded as if reaching a decision. He broke off a hunk of bread and started chewing.

Keely dropped her spoon in her bowl and metal rang against metal; a hollow, haunting sound. Then she turned those dead eyes on Justice again and something in his soul shriveled.

"You told us what you're going to do," she said. "Now tell us how we can help."

Chapter 39.

Just before twilight, San Bartolo The men from the village had hidden themselves as best they could in the trees and grass surrounding the temple, but the plan for them to cover Justice with protective gunfire was a dismal failure. The topography didn't lend itself to any real cover; in order to see their targets clearly they'd have to come into the open or they'd be firing blind and take the chance of hitting Justice or Eleni.

Of course, if the vamps forced him to take the meeting inside the temple where the mural was, all bets were off. He'd be entirely on his own.

Keely, shotgun ready and aimed, lay on the ground on her stomach just over a slight rise in the ground, hidden by the tall grasses. Alejandro flanked her, kneeling, and between the two of them a pile of ammunition lay ready for reloading. Justice had tried to hold her, just for one last embrace before he went down to face the vampires, but she'd been stiff and resistant in his arms. He'd kissed the top of her head and let her go, hating that their last moment together would be like this.

He crouched down beside the two of them. "It's time. Are you ready?"

Alejandro swore virulently, shaking his head. "No, we're not ready. We're nearly useless here. I need to go with you."

"No. We've been over this. If I fall to them, I'll need for you to come get Eleni and keep her safe. Keep Keely safe. I need your word," Justice said.

Alejandro looked like he wanted to argue, but finally nodded. "You have my word. I will protect the child and your woman with my dying breath. Right now I'm going to check that everyone is in place. I'll return within two minutes."

Justice nodded and Alejandro slipped away as silently as one of the jaguars that roamed the jungle.

Keely watched him go, too, and then looked up at Justice, that flat, dead look still in place in her emerald eyes. "I can protect myself, and I'm nobody's woman. You do what you need to do. We'll take care of our end."

Justice wanted nothing more than to take her and fly away from this miserable place, far from vampires and death and stolen children. He'd finally found the true mate to his heart, to his soul, and he would lose her so quickly. He knew the optimistic plan he'd fed the others had no chance of succeeding. The vampires would be more than ready for him.

He'd stepped into situations like this before, but always with his brothers and the rest of the Seven at his side. They could handle all of it as long as they were together.

Alone, he was nothing but vamp fodder.

There were so many things he wished he'd had the time to say. Abruptly he stood up, forcing himself to move. "Keely, know this. No matter what you are thinking or feeling, you have no blame in this. It was I who stole you away for those hours, I who failed to protect this village and the child. I am tasked with protecting humanity, and yet I chose selfishly instead of honoring my duty."

A flicker of life moved behind her eyes, and she slowly shook her head from side to side. "I knew how much she was suffering, Justice. She's just like me, except she was orphaned and treated like a pariah. I knew, and still I abandoned her."

Tears welled up in her eyes, but her face was hard and unyielding. "If you fall, I will follow you and rescue that child, no matter what it takes."

He took the shotgun from her hands, pulled her into a fierce embrace, and kissed her with every bit of love and longing his soul cried out to give her. Forcing himself to release her was the hardest thing he'd ever done in his long, bleak centuries of existence.

She caught his arm as he turned away. "Justice," she said, so quietly he nearly missed it. "I love you, too."

He said nothing. Words were beyond him, as his soul prepared for death. He simply began the solitary walk down to the San Bartolo temple, a condemned man walking to his own execution.

But he'd save the child first. When they remembered his worthless life, they would know that Eleni lived.

There was only one final act he must at least try. He stopped walking and closed his eyes, mustering every ounce of energy and power he possessed, and then he called for the portal.

This time it answered his call. Fickle godsdamned thing. As the familiar ovoid shape appeared and shimmered and stretched into shape, he saw the startled faces of the guards on the other side as they recognized him and lowered their weapons. When he made no move to enter, one of them called out to him.

"Lord Justice? Your brothers will be very happy to know that you're back. The portal hasn't opened for any of us, not even Alaric, since you left."

Ah. That answered one question. They'd known he was in San Bartolo. Part of him had hoped-no, expected-that they would show up to save the day, as Ven liked to say.

"My lord? Are you entering?" the other one asked him. "Is there trouble?"

"Yes," Justice finally answered. "Yes, there is trouble. Tell Conlan and Ven . . . Tell them to send help. Tell them we need reinforcements. Tell them the Star of Artemis is here but it's guarded by a nest of vampires."

"We will cross over right now to assist you," the first guard said. He took a determined step forward and the portal's magic shot something that looked and sounded like a high-wattage electric jolt at him, smashing him back and onto the ground.

"No, it looks like you won't," Justice replied, oddly unsurprised. "For whatever reason, the portal wants me to do this on my own, which makes me think Poseidon has set me some particularly vicious test."

"But-"

"Tell Conlan and Ven . . ." Justice had to force out the words. "Tell them that I love them. Tell them that I'm proud to be their brother and that I'm sorry. That's all."

"Lord Justice!"