THE PERFECT TEN (Boxed Set)

on me?”
    Mathias kept speaking quietly, every word forced from deep inside. “Yes, I haven’t been completely honest, but you’ll soon understand why I had to do this. And just as I have lied to you, you will lie to the others as well when the time comes.”
    “No, I will not .” Callan quivered with anger. “ You said we are to be leaders. Leaders do not lie to their people.” 
    Mathias grimaced as if Callan had cut him with his blade. “Listen. I could not tell you what would happen before now or you would have focused on the wrong things. Your duty is to keep their spirits up and convince those children they are going home. If not, they will not survive. I was here for eight months longer than you. I watched our children lose their will to live without hope and they died.”
    I heard things in Mathias’s voice that weren’t coming out in his words. He still hid something from Callan.
    Crossing his arms, Callan snarled, “I have believed you, trusted you. And now... now you tell me you won’t come back? Tell me the truth, all of it.”
    “I always did tell you to be prepared for anything, including my not being around to help.” 
    Walking several steps away, Callan muttered, “But I thought you meant if a croggle killed you. I would never have let that happen.” 
    “I–” Mathias choked on the word and his shoulders jerked straight as if he stood at attention, muscles clenching. Sweat broke out on his skin.
    Callan spun around and stared at him, lips moving but no words coming out.
    I lifted a hand toward Mathias and he shot me a warning look. “I did not bring you to interfere.”
    “Why did you bring me?”
    “To understand why you must not break your word.”
    Callan took a step toward Mathias who shouted, “Don’t touch me!”
    “Why?” Callan shouted back and took another step toward him, a cautious one. “What’s happening? Talk to me.” 
    Mathias gritted out his next words. “I am not the first to turn eighteen in the Sphere. Anatoli arrived with me.”
    “I know that name. He’s of the Cultivation House.” 
    “Yes,” Mathias continued. “And he reached his BIRG Day a month before you arrived.”
    Callan’s eyes opened wide. “Where is he? He should have told the House leaders about us or stayed here to help us.”
    “He’s not to be blamed for anything and you will not tell the children where I’ve gone when you return to the village.”
    “Anatoli left and...”  The struggle to understand what was going on carved anxiety in Callan’s face. “Did SEOH send Anatoli to a prison a telepath can’t reach into? Being G’ortian, maybe I can help. Tell them to take me.”
    “No, SEOH hasn’t figured out how to do that, but he has proven to be far more sly than any of us anticipated.”  Mathias’s body jerked with a spasm. Sweat now dripped from his forehead and arms, as if his body wrestled with something. He groaned.
    Callan rushed forward, but at that moment, Mathias flew up ten feet off the ground with his arms stretched above his head like a puppet whose master had yanked the strings. He hung there in midair.
    Callan roared, “ Mathias! ”
    I reached for the heat within me to do battle and called out, “What holds you? How can I kill it?”
    Sweat poured down Mathias’s face when he lowered his chin, speaking through gritted teeth. “I’m sorry I lied, Callan. You’ve been a brother to me, but now you’ll know why I could not tell you. I did what you must do. Lie to protect the others.”
    A howling noise started deep in the forest and gained volume. Like a killer wind bent on destruction. But what was it?
    Callan shouted, “What are we fighting?”
    Mathias looked right and left, terror riding his gaze. His body shook. He yelled back, “Give Rayen her freedom. Trust her to use it wisely.”
    Streaming bands of black energy shot through the opening, whipping past me. Heat built inside my chest, rolling through my body. I lifted my arms into the energy shooting around us on the ground. Sparks crackled with contact between my power and the attacking energy. Something clasped my wrist and yanked me up a foot off the ground.
    Mathias screamed.
    Steel bands of strength latched onto my waist, pulling my body backwards. The force holding my arm drew me up, threatening to rip my body in half.
    Mathias shouted, “Noooo, Rayen. Your word.”
    My heart thundered in my chest. I fought tears over the pain tearing through me.
    Callan yanked on my body,