Total pages in book: 131
Estimated words: 121389 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 607(@200wpm)___ 486(@250wpm)___ 405(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 121389 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 607(@200wpm)___ 486(@250wpm)___ 405(@300wpm)
Canto had been known to mutter that Ivan was more like Ena than any of them: a Mercant who kept his own counsel and who shared information only when he decided it was time.
Ena respected that. But how he’d been of late … as if the light inside him had dimmed … that disturbed her on a level beyond flesh and bone. Because Ivan’s light had almost been snuffed out once. She’d had to cup her hands around it for years, protecting it from the winds of pain and the storms of scars, until the light was strong enough to survive on its own.
He held her gaze, so much quiet power in him that it hummed in the air, then glanced away. “I can’t talk to you about this, Grandmother.” His eyes returned to her. “It’s not a thing about which I can speak.”
There it was, that inviolable core he’d always kept separate from everyone, even Ena. She’d never been able to work out whether it was conscious or a result of wounds inflicted long before he was this powerful man who could hold his own against the world.
There was no point pushing him. Not when he’d given her an unusually forthright response. That alone told her that whatever had happened, it’d had a profound impact on him.
She stepped back so he could exit the bedroom. As she fell in beside him on his walk to leave the suite, she said, “You know I’ll always be here if you change your mind.”
Opening the door, he paused, met her eyes again. “I know, Grandmother.”
Then he walked out, her grandson tall and strong and deadly. She hadn’t wanted the latter for him, had wanted him to have a life of calm and peace. But Ivan would not have it. He would not allow her to choose for him a life in the light … because he believed he’d been born to walk in the dark.
15 MONTHS EARLIER
Chapter 2
The child’s attachment to the family unit—and associated loyalty—is absolute. His ability to form bonds with those outside this small circle remains an unknown, but it is my view that when he does form any such bond, it will be one without boundaries—he does not appear to have the capacity to limit his loyalty once given.
—Private PsyMed report on Ivan Mercant, age 14 (9 November 2065)
IVAN BRACED HIS hand against the tree trunk, the forest hushed around him, then looked down at the cut on his calf. He’d tied a tourniquet above the cut, but the bleeding showed no signs of stopping. If he hadn’t known better, he’d have said the fall onto the sharp edge of rock had severed a major artery.
But he did know better—he’d done enough first-aid courses, had enough knowledge of anatomy and of his own body, to judge this wound as disabling but not dangerous. It should, however, have stopped bleeding by now. If it kept up like this, he’d have to call for assistance and drop out of the training course for the day.
If there was one thing Ivan preferred never to do, it was to ask for help. His reticence was bad enough that he was conscious it could end up a fatal flaw, but even knowing that, he had to be on the edge of endurance before he’d reach for a helping hand—because sometimes, being aware of a problem wasn’t enough to fix the reason it existed.
Ivan had instead used this awareness to make himself as self-sufficient as possible. It was why he’d taken those first-aid courses when he was the furthest thing from a healer that anyone could imagine. It was also why he’d made an effort to learn basic computronic engineering, as well as gaining a flight certification.
Languages had never been a problem for him, probably because of how many he’d been exposed to as a small child, but he’d made the conscious effort to become fluent in three aside from the Russian and English used interchangeably within the family.
Some would call him obsessive. Ivan called it being prepared.
He’d have made the perfect mercenary had Grandmother not asked him to put his skills to use overseeing the family’s overall security instead. The title of security specialist was still one that sat awkwardly on his shoulders, but if there was one person on this Earth to whom he would never say no, it was Ena Mercant.
His grandmother had earned the right to ask of him what she wished.
But his title didn’t change what he was—a born killer. A born monster. Not even Grandmother, with her indomitable will and ruthless devotion to the family, could change that. All she’d been able to do was redirect him into a task that was about protection rather than violence. And it was for that reason that he was in this dark green landscape.