Warriors of Poseidon 03 - Atlantis Unleashed

reality now?
    She pushed the doubts aside and drew in a deep, shaky breath. Gathering up what remained of her battered courage, she finally looked directly at him. Up close, he was even more terrifyingly feral and—though it made no sense at all—even more compelling. Although he stood straight and tall before her, he gave the impression of a predator crouched to spring.
    Which brought her back to the uncomfortable sensation of being his prey.
    All those years of studying the past, and now she was confronted with primitive savagery in all of its raging glory. The man was an ancient warrior come to life, not one buried in the sands of history, as she‟d always assumed.
    The rags he wore seemed to be the remains of a simple shirt and pants that either had seen battle or else had been run through a shredder. His thickly muscled chest was clearly visible under the tattered fabric, although both were streaked with blood and dirt. Her stomach flipped threateningly and she quickly looked away from the blood.
    She was tough; she‟d always had to be tough. But right now her equilibrium was not happy with anything about her situation. It didn‟t make her a coward not to want to stare at that poor man‟s blood.
    A leather strap crossed his chest and attached to the top of the sheath on his back. He‟d wielded the sword as though it were an extension of his arm, and it was evident that he‟d used it many, many times before.
    The strands of hair falling around his face and the ragged braid that hung to his waist were blue, as she‟d known. But no simple blue, this. The hues of his hair ranged across the entire spectrum—from deepest midnight to the pale blue of a summer sky. At least from what she could tell, underneath the dirt and blood that covered almost every inch of him.
    The taut lines of his face were classically perfect. She‟d seen Roman statuary that would have suffered in comparison. And his eyes were either black or so darkly blue that light didn‟t touch them at all. His lips curved in the merest suggestion of a mocking smile, and she realized that she‟d been staring at him like some starstruck coed for longer than she wanted to admit.
    Or like someone in fear for her life.
    “I can provide more light, if you would examine me further, my lady,” he said, voice husky.
    “However, I find that my control is not what I might wish after the events of today, and your perusal is not helping me refrain from acting upon my baser impulses.”
    “You don‟t sound insane,” she blurted out, then groaned. “I‟m sorry. Really. I‟m not trying to antagonize or upset you in any way,” she said, trying for a calm and level tone, even as she stepped back a few more paces. “Although, you‟ve gotta admit that you have some explaining to do. But let‟s start with how we got here and how we can get out, okay? Then we can move on to more complex questions, like how it is that you know me.”
    She considered showing him the carving and asking him about it, but decided against it. Not yet. Establishing some connection between them, no matter how tenuous, didn‟t seem wise considering his present state of mind.
    Reason with the crazy man now; break down in hysterical panic later. Check. All those times she‟d stayed up alone at night to guard against potential tomb robbers, she hadn‟t been scared then. Well, okay, she‟d been scared spitless. But the experiences now allowed her to pretend a calm she was miles away from feeling.
    He waved a hand, and a row of lanterns that circled the cavern lit up with softly glowing blue-green light. She gasped a little, not at the parlor trick with the lights, but at the vast expanse of space revealed, including a large pond-like body of water that must be the mineral spring she‟d smelled earlier. Turning slowly in a circle, she studied the cavern and the sparkling gemstones built into the walls all the way around them, scientific curiosity almost overcoming her very sensible fear of what he might be planning to do with her. Or to her.
    “Is it some kind of geode?” she murmured, mostly to herself, but he answered.
    “Yes. Partially. The chamber directly above us is a geode and used in the healing rituals of the Temple. But this is a simple cavern, although the walls themselves are embedded with, as far as I remember, examples of every gemstone ever known to Atlantis,” he said, slowly moving toward her. “You are more beautiful than I‟d imagined.”
    The abrupt