Eternal Rider - Larissa Ione [54]
Regan led Arik down the hall, past the main offices, the conference room, the labs, the stairs that led to the containment cells… aka dungeon. The Aegis didn’t experiment on demons the way the R-XR did, but they did extract information from them. No doubt The Aegis was as good at intel-gathering as the R-XR was.
Finally, they arrived at a secured door that required Regan to enter a password into the keypad on the wall.
What the hell did they have in there? Arik was used to extreme security measures in the R-XR, but The Aegis seemed to rely more on magic and their own inflated sense of invincibility, so passwords inside an already secure area seemed odd.
“Kynan’s inside,” Regan said. “Don’t touch anything.”
“First time I’ve heard that from a woman,” he drawled, mainly to annoy her. But it was also true.
“Asshole,” she muttered, as she spun on her chunky-heeled boots and sauntered away, her long ponytail bouncing against the back of her neck.
Smiling to himself, he entered the room… which was more of a warehouse than anything. Rows of numbered shelves laden with boxes, bags, and tagged items stretched for what seemed like miles. Along the ceiling, cameras mounted at regular intervals formed a grid that no doubt covered every inch of the room, which was temperature- and humidity-controlled. To his right was a washing station and surgical gloves.
“Arik!”
Kynan raised his hand from where he sat in a recessed area that resembled a library study. Dozens of books and scrolls formed a mountain on the table where Kynan was working with a laptop computer.
“What do you guys keep in here?” Arik asked, as he pulled up a chair across from Ky.
“Ancient and religious artifacts, magical items, demonic objects… you name it.” Ky cocked his thumb at another space that was crammed with bookshelves. “That’s our entire history. Everything ever written about The Aegis, no matter how small the account, is there. What we know of, anyway.” He sat back in his leather chair. “Heard anything from the R-XR?”
“An Australian plague is affecting sheep with a hundred percent mortality rate, and it’s spreading faster than one of their wildfires. Twenty percent of the native population of Madagascar has been wiped out by some demon strain of bubonic plague. And in the Marshall Islands, everyone on Lib Island has been blinded by what the WHO suspects is a parasitic infection. The military has been deployed to four continents to suppress growing violence over the flu pandemic and to assist the UN in quarantining as many affected areas as possible. Problem is that there are too many, and dozens more pop up every day.” Arik blew out a long, tired breath. “What about The Aegis? What’s new with you guys?”
“Some Guardians have disappeared. We lose them every once in a while… they get killed by demons and dragged away, but we’ve suddenly lost two dozen within a matter of weeks, snatched right out of their homes. And tension is firing up between the born and turned wargs again. The truce I negotiated after the battle in Canada finally fell apart.”
Arik studied his friend, noted the dark crescents framing his eyes. “You look like hell.”
“That’s because all I’ve been doing is research. Gem hasn’t been feeling well lately, and I have to fucking be stuck in Aegis headquarters going over crap that makes no sense.”
“What’s wrong? Is it the baby?” Gem was about eight and a half months pregnant, and Kynan was so devoted to her that being away couldn’t be easy even if, thanks to Kynan’s ability to use Harrowgates, something normal humans couldn’t do, he was only minutes away from her no matter where he was in the world.
“Gem’s exhausted. The unrest in the underworld is creating a lot of patients for Underworld General, and she’s working overtime. The baby’s fine.” He grinned, and the dark circles vanished. “We can’t wait.”
“Do you know if it’s a boy or girl?”
“Nope. Like Luc and Kar, we wanted it to be a surprise.”
Luc, a warg paramedic at UGH, and his mate, Kar, had delivered their baby girl just last week. “I’m guessing you’re not doing