Shards of Hope Read online

  Berkley titles by Nalini Singh

  Psy-Changeling Series

  SLAVE TO SENSATION

  VISIONS OF HEAT

  CARESSED BY ICE

  MINE TO POSSESS

  HOSTAGE TO PLEASURE

  BRANDED BY FIRE

  BLAZE OF MEMORY

  BONDS OF JUSTICE

  PLAY OF PASSION

  KISS OF SNOW

  TANGLE OF NEED

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  SHARDS OF HOPE

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  ARCHANGEL'S SHADOWS

  Anthologies

  AN ENCHANTED SEASON

  (with Maggie Shayne, Erin McCarthy, and Jean Johnson)

  THE MAGICAL CHRISTMAS CAT

  (with Lora Leigh, Erin McCarthy, and Linda Winstead Jones)

  MUST LOVE HELLHOUNDS

  (with Charlaine Harris, Ilona Andrews, and Meljean Brook)

  BURNING UP

  (with Angela Knight, Virginia Kantra, and Meljean Brook)

  ANGELS OF DARKNESS

  (with Ilona Andrews, Meljean Brook, and Sharon Shinn)

  ANGELS' FLIGHT

  WILD INVITATION

  NIGHT SHIFT

  (with Ilona Andrews, Lisa Shearin, and Milla Vane)

  Specials

  ANGELS' PAWN

  ANGELS' DANCE

  TEXTURE OF INTIMACY

  DECLARATION OF COURTSHIP

  WHISPER OF SIN

  An imprint of Penguin Random House LLC

  375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014

  This book is an original publication of Penguin Random House LLC.

  Copyright (c) 2015 by Nalini Singh.

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  eBook ISBN: 978-1-10160521-9

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Singh, Nalini, (date-)

  Shards of hope / Nalini Singh.--First edition.

  p. ; cm.--(Psy/changeling ; 14) ISBN 978-0-425-26403-4 (hardback) I. Title.

  PR9639.4.S566S53 2015

  823'.92--dc23

  2015000809

  FIRST EDITION: June 2015

  Cover art by Tony Mauro.

  Cover hand-lettering by Ron Zinn.

  Cover design by George Long.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Version_1

  CONTENTS

  Berkley titles by Nalini Singh

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Cast of Characters

  Smoke and Mirrors

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Chapter 47

  Chapter 48

  Chapter 49

  Chapter 50

  Chapter 51

  Chapter 52

  Chapter 53

  Chapter 54

  Chapter 55

  Chapter 56

  Chapter 57

  Chapter 58

  Chapter 59

  Chapter 60

  Chapter 61

  Chapter 62

  Chapter 63

  Chapter 64

  Chapter 65

  Chapter 66

  Chapter 67

  Chapter 68

  Chapter 69

  Chapter 70

  Chapter 71

  Chapter 72

  Chapter 73

  Chapter 74

  Chapter 75

  Chapter 76

  Chapter 77

  Chapter 78

  Chapter 79

  Chapter 80

  Chapter 81

  Chapter 82

  CAST OF CHARACTERS

  In Alphabetical Order by First Name

  Key: SD = SnowDancer Wolves DR = DarkRiver Leopards BE = BlackEdge Wolves

  Abbot Arrow, teleport-capable telekinetic (Tk) Aden Kai Arrow, telepath (Tp)

  Amara Aleine Psy member of DR, former Council scientist, twin of Ashaya, mentally unstable Amin Arrow, telepath (Tp)

  Andrew "Drew" Kincaid SD Tracker, mated to Indigo, brother of Riley and Brenna Anthony Kyriakus Psy Councilor, father of Faith Ashaya Aleine Psy member of DR, former Council scientist, mated to Dorian, twin of Amara Axl Arrow

  Blake Stratton Arrow

  Bowen "Bo" Knight Security Chief, Human Alliance Carolina Arrow child

  Council (or Psy Council) Former ruling council of the Psy race; no longer extant Cristabel "Cris" Rodriguez Arrow, sharpshooter, teacher DarkMind Neosentient entity and dark twin of the NetMind Devraj Santos Leader of the Forgotten (Psy who defected from the PsyNet at the dawn of Silence and intermingled with the human and changeling populations), married to Katya Haas Edward Arrow

  Faith NightStar Psy member of DR, gift of foresight (F), mated to Vaughn, daughter of Anthony, cousin to Sahara Ghost Psy rebel

  Gregori BE Lieutenant

  Griffin BlackSea Changeling, Lieutenant Hawke Snow SD Alpha, mated to Sienna

  Ida Mill Psy, leader of group that believes the Silence Protocol is the only right path and that the empaths should be removed from the gene pool Irena Arrow

  Ivy Jane Zen President of the Empathic Collective, married to Vasic Zen Jaya Empath

  Jen Liu Psy, matriarch of the Liu Group Jojo Leopard cub

  Judd Lauren Psy member of SD, Lieutenant, former Arrow, mated to Brenna Kaleb Krychek Leader of the Ruling Coalition, psychically bonded to Sahara Kyriakus Lara SD Healer, mated to Walker

  Lucas Hunter DR Alpha, mated to Sascha, father of Naya Malachai BlackSea Changeling, Lieutenant Max Shannon Human, Security Chief for Nikita Duncan, married to Sophia Russo Mercy DR Sentinel, mated to Riley

  Miane Leveque Alpha of the BlackSea Changelings Mica Arrow, Lieutenant of Zaira Neve, based in Venice Ming LeBon Form
er Psy Councilor, military mastermind, cardinal telepath Nathan Ryder DR Senior Sentinel, mated to Tamsyn, father of Roman and Julian Naya Hunter DR cub, daughter of Sascha and Lucas Nerida Arrow, telekinetic (Tk)

  NetMind Neosentient psychic entity said to be the guardian and librarian of the PsyNet, twin of the DarkMind Nikita Duncan Former Psy Councilor, part of the Ruling Coalition, mother of Sascha Pax Marshall Head of the Marshall Group, grandson of Marshall Hyde Pip Arrow child

  Riaz Delgado SD Lieutenant, mated to Adria Riley Kincaid SD Lieutenant, mated to Mercy, brother of Drew and Brenna Ruling Coalition Formed after the fall of Silence and of the Psy Council; composed of Kaleb Krychek, Nikita Duncan, Anthony Kyriakus, Ivy Jane Zen for the Empathic Collective, and the Arrow Squad Sahara Kyriakus Psy (uncategorized designation), psychically bonded to Kaleb Krychek, niece of Anthony Kyriakus, cousin to Faith Samuel Rain Psy, genius, robotics engineer who developed experimental biofusion Sascha Duncan Psy member of DR, cardinal empath, mated to Lucas, mother of Naya, daughter of Nikita Selenka Durev BE Alpha

  Shoshanna Scott Former Psy Councilor, head of Scott Enterprises Sienna Lauren Psy member of SD, cardinal X, mated to Hawke, niece of Judd and Walker Silver Mercant Senior aide of Kaleb Krychek, in charge of worldwide rapid response emergency network that spans all three races Sophia Russo Former J-Psy, married to Max Shannon, aide to Nikita Duncan Tamar Civilian member of the Arrow Squad, financial and data analyst Tamsyn "Tammy" Ryder DR Healer, mated to Nathan, mother of Roman and Julian Tavish Arrow child

  Vasic Zen Arrow, teleporter (Tk-V), married to Ivy Jane Zen Walker Lauren Psy member of SD, mated to Lara Yuri Arrow, telepath (Tp)

  Zaira Neve Arrow, telepath (combat)

  Smoke and Mirrors

  SPRING IS IN full flower in the year 2082.

  It has been four months since the fall of Silence, the protocol that bound the Psy race to a cold, emotionless existence. Telepaths or telekinetics, strong or weak, the Psy are now free to feel, free to love and hate, free to laugh and cry. Emotion is an intoxication to many, but to others, it is a deadly threat.

  For the Silence Protocol was put in place for a reason.

  The ten-year debate preceding the implementation of Silence was fractious and raw for a reason.

  Millions of Psy decided to condition all emotion out of their young for a reason.

  The Psy gave up joy as well as sadness for a reason.

  That reason was the violence and madness endemic within their race. To be Psy was to have a far greater chance of criminal insanity, a far greater chance of striking out in a moment of uncontrollable anger and ending the life of a loved one. To be Psy was to be cursed.

  In 1979, Silence was a beacon of hope. To a desperate people on the verge of a violence-fueled extinction, it was the only hope. They ignored the smudges on the beacon, the flickers of darkness within, the whispers that perhaps Silence was all smoke and mirrors. Driven by love for the very children they were condemning to a loveless existence, the Psy accepted the harsh tenets of the Protocol, accepted the hope held out by their leaders.

  Today, the smoke has dissipated, the mirrors have shattered.

  And the darkness at the heart of the Psy race is once more a vicious truth no one can ignore. For what happens to the murderers and the insane in this new world? What happens to the broken?

  They still exist.

  They still kill.

  Chapter 1

  ADEN WOKE ON a cold, hard floor, his head throbbing. Another man might have hissed out a breath, might have groaned, but Aden's training was so ingrained that his sole response was to lift his lashes a bare sliver, only fully opening his eyes once he realized he was surrounded by darkness. He wasn't, however, alone. He could hear breathing--quiet but jagged. As if the other person was trying to maintain silence, was unable to do so for reasons Aden couldn't yet identify.

  Remaining exactly where he was, he scanned outward with his telepathic senses . . . and had to capture a scream before it traveled to his vocal cords. The pain was blinding, the agony leaving his vision white. Controlling his breathing and his body through sheer strength of will, he fisted his hand, gritted his teeth, and made a second attempt, this time to reach the PsyNet, the sprawling psychic network that connected all Psy in the world but for the renegades. A Net connection would give him a viable way to alert the squad about his capture.

  The backlash of pain almost led to a blackout.

  Quietly lifting his arm when he could function again, white spots burning in his vision, he reached to the back of his head and the center of the starburst of pain. He expected to find blood-matted hair that denoted a cracked skull. What he discovered instead was a raised bump close to the lowest part of his skull, near the area that housed the cerebellum and beyond it, the brain stem. No, it wasn't a bump but a scar--it shouldn't have been there and it still felt tender.

  That wasn't the only anomaly. From the dryness in his throat and the stiffness of his limbs, Aden calculated that he must've been unconscious for hours. Long enough for the squad to realize he was missing and to locate him. Vasic alone should've been able to accomplish that. Except it appeared even the best teleporter in the Net hadn't been able to lock on to his face, using it as an anchor to get to him.

  The only other times Vasic had failed to lock on to people was when those individuals had created complex shields designed specifically to thwart teleporters capable of locking on to people rather than simply places, or if the individual concerned didn't know his or her own identity--such as those whose minds were broken.

  Aden's mind was whole, but whatever it was that had been done to his brain via the barely healed incision he'd discovered, it had screwed up his psychic wiring. Vasic's absence told Aden his psychic signature must've also been affected on a deep level. He knew of no surgical technique--or technology--that could achieve that aim without a full psychic brainwipe, but he didn't make the mistake of thinking he knew everything.

  He ran a mental checklist of his body and the items on it. All his weapons were gone, as were his belt and his boots. Whoever was behind this had been thorough.

  Having maintained an ear on the other person breathing in the room, he crawled silently toward the rasp of sound. His cellmate hadn't moved the entire time, and there was something in the unsteady rhythm of the breathing that had him certain the individual was hurt. With his eyes having adapted to darkness ameliorated only by a thin edge of light that came in under what must be a door, he could see that his cellmate's body lay in a corner of the windowless room--as if it had been thrown there. That body was small and with the wrong proportions to be a man. Either a child or a woman.

  Close enough now to see the curve of her hip, the fine line of her jaw, he realized it was a woman. A woman who smelled of blood. He moved his hand to her face, brushed away the dark curls that were impossibly soft . . . and found his wrist gripped in a punishing hold. "Move and I'll rip out your throat."

  "Zaira," he said in the same low whisper she'd used. "It's--"

  "Aden." She released his wrist. "I'm injured."

  "How bad?"

  "I was shot." Taking his hand, she placed it on the viscous stickiness above her stomach, her thin but should-have-been-bulletproof top soaked with blood and her lightweight body armor missing. "It passed through the left side of my abdomen."

  Aden might not have any equipment or supplies, but he was still a trained field medic. "Do you have any source of light on you?" It was possible their captors had overlooked something.

  "Negative. No tools or weapons. They even took my boots."

  He shifted so close to Zaira that, under any normal circumstances, he would've been invading her personal space. When he pushed up the long-sleeved black top that hugged her body, she didn't protest. Her skin was clammy under his touch, and though he felt the edges of a bandage, it had clearly been an inexpert job--blood had soaked through, was continuing to do so. "I need to touch your skull."

  "No need. I've been cut, something done
to my brain. I'm psychically blind. Any attempt to use those abilities results in extreme pain." She took a shallow breath. "Since rescue hasn't arrived, I'm assuming you're in the same position."

  "Yes." He checked her head wound to make certain it wasn't bleeding, too, discovered a roughly sealed incision identical to his own. Their unknown captors had the technology to do brain surgery advanced enough to block psychic abilities, yet they'd left Zaira badly hurt and in pain? "They want you weak."

  "Yes." Her next words were so quiet he heard them only because he was close enough to feel the soft warmth of her exhale. "I didn't know it was you, but now that I do, I think our captors plan to use me to break you. One entered the room earlier, said, 'He'll talk or we hurt her,' to another individual."

  "Arrows aren't so easy to break."

  "And you aren't fully Silent, Aden. You never have been." Another strained breath. "Everyone in the squad knows that--now someone outside the squad has figured it out."

  Aden decided he would correct her about his Silence later. "Conserve your strength. I need to be able to count on you when we escape." There was no "if." They would escape.

  "If you can get me a weapon," Zaira said, "I'll cover you as you go. I'm weak, will slow you down. You'll do better on your own." She said that as if it was a simple fact, as if she wasn't talking about the end of her own life.

  Leaning in until their noses almost touched, until she could see his eyes as he could see the jet-black darkness of hers, he said, "I don't leave my people behind." He knew what it was to be left behind, and though it had been done for the best of reasons it had marked him on a primal level. "We'll go together."

  "You're being irrational."

  It was a complaint he'd heard multiple times from her. And not because her own Silence was flawless.

  The truth was that Zaira had never needed Silence. What had been done to her in childhood had caused her to retreat deep into her psyche, shoving her emotions into a dark hole in a bid to survive. In their place had grown an iron will and a harshly practical mind. Silence had only ever been a tool she used to create a civilized shell.

  Without it, she was close to feral but no less ruthless, her brain having learned long ago to put survival above all else.

  It made her the perfect soldier.

  Some would say it also made her a psychopath, but they didn't understand--unlike a psychopath, Zaira had the capacity to feel the full range of emotions. That capacity was in permanent cold storage, but it gave her a conscience regardless. It also gave her the capacity for unflinching loyalty: because Zaira's violent survival instincts didn't always equal her own survival. She'd already walked into the path of a hail of bullets aimed at him during an operation three years before, had barely survived her injuries. He wasn't about to allow her to sacrifice herself for him again.