Warriors of Poseidon 03 - Atlantis Unleashed

whether to laugh or cry.
    Then the full force of Justice‟s love swept into her from the rock, so powerful it permeated her glove, lifting her up and washing her away with the currents.
     
    “I. Don‟t. Want. To. Die. Like. This,” Justice gritted out, as he ripped one of them off him by the jaw. The vamp‟s fangs took a chunk of skin with them, but at least that was one fewer. He smashed his elbow in the face of another, and suddenly his arms were—for just a moment—free.
    He threw them up in the air and roared out a single word. A word in the ancient language of the Nereids. A word he didn‟t even know that he knew, but that had suddenly swelled in his heart and soul, dangerous and sharp and deadly.
    The word called power to it and turned tangible as it left his mouth, hanging in the air above the place where he lay on the ground, dying.
    Being murdered.
    He watched, his life‟s blood draining out of him from so many, many wounds, as the word took shape and became real and raised in dark and terrible beauty the fearsome power of the universe.
    A thundering boom shook the land and the trees and even the sky, and a shock wave visibly poured out from the word in concentric circles and turned the world to crystalline shades of blue and silver.
    All around him and on top of him and even somehow underneath him, the vampires exploded, not into their usual acidic slime but into fountains of clear, pure water.
    He raised his head with the last of his energy and looked around and saw that everywhere the same thing was happening. Miniature geysers of pure water sprang up wherever a vampire had stood. Last to go was Gultep‟can himself, who screamed his defiance to the very end.
    “Some grand gesture,” Justice said, his head thumping to the ground as his neck could no longer support the weight of it. He turned toward the small hill and saw Keely, his beloved Keely, glowing like a flame. She had her arms around Eleni, but she was starting down the hill toward him.
    So they lived. They both lived. It was enough.
    Justice smiled a little, full of regret but also content. He‟d saved them.
    It was enough.

Chapter 41
    Keely stood in awe as the vampires exploded, one after another, into beautiful whirlpools of silvery blue water. Justice had done it somehow. She knew it.
    Then she saw him, lying on the ground, so bloody that it was impossible that he still lived.
    She started downhill, picking up pace until she was running, barely even noticing that Eleni ran behind her.
    “Justice! Don‟t you dare die on me! You have to live. You have to live for me!” She kept yelling meaningless nonsense all the way down the hill, until finally she skidded to a stop in front of him and fell to the ground.
    At first she thought he was dead, and pain knifed through her so intensely that she doubled over from the force of it. Then she saw his head move, just a fraction of a centimeter, but it was a movement.
    “Please, please, please, come back to me,” she begged, stroking the top of his head, which seemed to be the only uninjured part of his entire body.
    Alejandro ran up to them. “Is he—”
    “No!” Keely shouted. “No, he is not. And don‟t you dare say it!”
    “Keely, you should take Eleni back to the village,” Alejandro said, kindness and sympathy warm in his voice. “There is nothing we can do for him. That one gash is so deep, it must have cut into his lungs.”
    “No. I won‟t leave him. You take Eleni back.” She kissed Eleni‟s forehead to reassure the girl, as much as she could be reassured after an experience like this. “I‟ll come back for you. But right now I must be with Justice so he‟s not alone.” Her voice broke and she hugged Eleni, her bitter tears falling into the girl‟s hair.
    Alejandro spoke again, but somehow this time it was not Alejandro. Keely didn‟t know how she knew this, but she did. She jerked her head up to stare at Alejandro, who suddenly seemed to shine with silvery light.
    “I CHOSE WELL WHEN I GIFTED MY SWORD TO JUSTICE,” thundered a voice that held all the power, glory, and mystery of the seas.
    “Poseidon?” Keely knew. She‟d heard that voice before, in her visions.
    “YES, OBJECT READER. I AM THE SEA GOD WHO CLAIMS THIS WARRIOR AS
    MY OWN. KNOW ALL PRESENT THAT NOW THE SWORD THAT FULFILLED ITS
    DUTY SO WELL AT HIS HAND SHALL SERVE TO HEAL ITS WIELDER.”
    The silvery light spread from Alejandro and formed an iridescent dome over Justice, Keely, and