Warriors of Poseidon 04 - Atlantis Unmasked

accepting, but he held her tightly as if he couldn‟t bear to release her.
     
    Suddenly her breath and balance were smashed away, and she was falling—falling and tumbling and twirling—over and over into the darkness. Into pain, and torture, and fire.
    She cried out, seeking for an escape, but there was no way out. There was only the falling and the flames.
     
    She smashed into a barrier that was harder than steel but with a peculiar elasticity to it.
    She knew it couldn‟t be real. Knew with some rational part of her brain that she still sat on the bed with Alexios.
     
    But if this were her imagination, it had just served her a whopping dose of crazy.
    Because she was suddenly walking through flames, and Alexios was on the other side.
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    But it wasn‟t the Alexios she knew. It was an Alexios whose skin was unmarked by any scarring. An Alexios who looked younger. Less grim. Less cynical.
     
    And then he screamed.
     
    Shadowy figures skulked and lurked at the edges of the flames, holding objects she was somehow sure she didn‟t want to see clearly. She caught flashes of steel and the snap of a whip, and Alexios, chained to a dark and glistening wall, screamed and screamed.
     
    “No!” she shouted. “No, no, no, no. I don‟t want to see this. This is private; these are the secrets of his soul. I don‟t want to see his—and I don‟t want him to see mine. If this is Atlantean magic, make it stop.”
     
    As if her words had carried weight with whatever dark power had thrown her into this, she began to rise. Up and away from the flames, up and away from the hideous shapes slashing their whips. Up and away from the phantom of Alexios‟s torture.
     
    She rose up and up until the darkness began to shimmer with light and color again.
    These colors were far different from the flames. There was the deep cerulean blue of the ocean on a calm summer‟s night. There was a fresh, springtime green. Glimmers of a bright sparkling ruby red danced at the edges, offering carefree joy to the palette as if the colors were the heralds of emotion.
     
    But not just the colors appeared to her as she floated upward. Layers of knowing—of knowledge —of Alexios‟s inner being permeated the colors and sank into her soul, as though she were traveling on a journey into his.
     
    Integrity. Loyalty. Honor.
     
    Courage so unshakable that it formed the bedrock of his very existence. This was a man who had offered up everything he had and everything he was for centuries, all in Atlantis Unmasked - Warriors of Poseidon 04
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    the name of protecting others. He had kept nothing for himself—had wanted nothing for himself.
     
    Until now.
     
    Distantly, she felt him release her, and then the movement as he stood up and backed away. The colors took a few moments to dissipate; it was like living inside of a fireworks display in the sky—as if she herself were the Roman candle. She actually looked down at her chest, to see if lights were exploding inside her, before she shook her head to clear it of the fancy and the remnants of the experience.
     
    She said nothing for a long time. There weren‟t words.
     
    Finally, from where he‟d backed himself clear across the room and against the wall, he spoke. “I bet you‟re wondering what just happened.”
     
    She laughed and was relieved to be able to draw the breath to do it. “Thank you, Captain Understatement.”
     
    Relief chased surprise across his face, and then he laughed, too. “I should have known.
    Always expect the unexpected with you.”
     
    “I want to know what just happened,” she said, but the exhaustion had intensified tenfold during the experience with Alexios and she could no longer sit upright. She collapsed sideways onto her pillow, with her feet still on the floor. “But maybe I should rest first, because I‟ve got nothing left right now.”
     
    He leapt across the room and lifted her feet one by one, removing her boots and then placing her legs on the bed. He drew her blanket up from the foot of the bed and over her and tucked it over her shoulders, then caressed her cheek. “Yes, you must rest and, yes, I will explain the soul-meld to you in the morning. You have the right to know Atlantis Unmasked - Warriors of Poseidon 04
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    everything but please carry this thought into your sleep: This was not something I did to you. It was a gift that the gods granted to