Total pages in book: 140
Estimated words: 131364 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 657(@200wpm)___ 525(@250wpm)___ 438(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 131364 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 657(@200wpm)___ 525(@250wpm)___ 438(@300wpm)
Saoirse rushed forward with a device that was nothing more than a glittery headband with a circular metal piece on one side and other metallic filaments curving out from the circle. “Had to borrow Malia’s headband,” she said, and slipped it on over Eleri’s head, pushing back her hair as Ashaya came around to situate the circular bit against the bone behind Eleri’s ear.
“Nothing,” Eleri ground out, disappointment heavy in her gut. “I’ll step back.”
But Ashaya Aleine’s blue-gray eyes, so striking against the rich brown of her skin, were focused on the piece behind her ear. “It’s not switched on yet.” She turned to Saoirse. “Position?”
Saoirse looked at her scanner. “Yes, I think so. Go.”
A tap on the circle.
The pressure of the psychic noise grew heavier and heavier…and was just…gone right before Eleri’s legs would’ve crumpled, Adam already preparing to catch her.
She snapped upright, touched the side of her head where the circle buzzed very, very quietly. Around her, everyone was holding their breath—everyone but Adam. Who gave a huge “Whoop!” and picked her up to spin her around.
He was her mate. He felt her pain. And he felt her lack of pain.
Ashaya and Saoirse stood side by side, both literally biting their lips as they read things on their organizer and frantically checked two different scanners. Bayani, who’d been standing around the corner with the rest of the El-Shield team so as not to crowd the area, now ran into view. “We heard the whoop!”
“It works,” Eleri whispered to him, before turning to Bram and the others. “It works!”
“Holy fuck.” Saffron’s eyes were huge. “Are you serious?”
“Saoirse, can Saffy try this?”
“Wait. We have to calibrate.” An absent statement. “How’s that?”
The buzzing went quiet, became more a faint vibration against her skull. “Not irritating,” she said. “It’s almost comforting being able to sense it.”
Neither engineer nor M-Psy smiled.
Not then.
It took testing the device on Saffy, then Bram, and finally a Yúzé who was amazed enough that his cool exterior actually cracked, for the two women to turn to each other in an enormous hug as they said things that were incomprehensible because both were also crying.
So was Eleri.
Adam’s own tears were ashine in his eyes as he bent so their foreheads touched. “Do you have a fear of heights, mate?”
When she shook her head, he said, “I bought you a glider. So we can go flying together.”
Bursting into sobs, Eleri threw her arms around his neck. “I’ll fly with you into every sky.”
He picked her up, held her tight, and it was perfect.
It was life.
And it was happiness.
• • •
Eleri asked the shield team to name the shield the Ultrasonic in honor of its chiropteran cocreators, to the team’s enthusiastic agreement. Its final design involved no sparkly headbands—unless requested—to Bram’s great relief.
The circle piece that tucked behind the ear, against the bone there, became sleeker while retaining its comforting hum that told the wearer it was active, while the arcs of metal across the skull were fine enough that they could be merged into the hair if desired.
Methods of retaining it on the head went from the initial sparkly headband—which Saffy had chosen—to a much finer band for Eleri, which she integrated into her hair. Yúzé had gone for the same with a playfulness that was startling but made Eleri happy to see.
“I can rock it,” he’d said.
She knew better than to think he was all better, but it was a start. Because WindHaven had embraced all three other members of the Cartel as family, because they were her family. Yesterday, she’d found Yúzé in the children’s play area, coloring with them with a patience unexpected.
She’d stepped in to join them, only to find herself drawn to a child-sized acrylic paint set—where little Ollie had also joined her. They’d painted together for an hour, and at the end of it, Ollie had put one tiny paint-covered hand on her shoulder as he stood beside her seated form and said, “Wow, Eri, you paint.”
To the littles in the clan, she was just Eri, and it brought her infinite joy.
Feeling shy, she’d nonetheless shown the piece to Adam, who’d whistled. “Baby, you can paint. This is the Canyon looking up from Raintree.” A glance up. “You have a talent.”
It was a strange feeling to know that she could become a painter if she so wished, or a plumber, or a teacher, or anything else that she wanted. Yúzé could follow his passion for tech and lose himself in code, Saffy could design clothes, and Bram…Bram could discover who he wanted to be beyond the protector of their small family.
“I can sleep now, think now,” he’d said, it having become clear while they were still in the cave that his issues with sleep could be ameliorated by a shield—no longer fighting to just survive, his brain was able to reroute the necessary messages through undamaged neurons.