Exalted by Ella James Read Free Book Online Page A

what about Meredith?
You don’t trust her with a vicious Hunter, do you?”
    Nathan’s blood—what remained of it, anyway—had boiled.
“What do you know about Meredith?”
    “I can help you rescue her, and I can help you find The
One.”
    “Who the hell are you?” Nathan had moaned.
    In answer he saw a horrifying mental image of Meredith,
gutted with a blood dagger in his bedroom from childhood.
    “Are you Chosen?” he bit out, though he knew there wasn’t a
Chosen who could plant such a powerful vision in his head.
    Edan scoffed, then healed Nathan and gave him a time and
place.
    “What do you get out of this? Who are you?”
    “A friend of your enemy’s enemy.”
    Nathan had assembled his team with trepidation, but Edan’s
information had been legit. Nathan had captured Julia and locked Meredith
safely away, where she'd be unable to make her usual errors in judgment. He’d
tried to forget the being that aided him, but now he had no choice but to find
out more about Edan.
    It was a bold move, approaching The Three with a question,
but Nathan wasn’t sure what else to do. If he didn’t get the Chosen under
control, things would go from bad to worse. The ones who’d worked themselves
into a fervor could start a riot, putting everyone, including Meredith, in
danger.
    There were pale stone doors on either side of the
torch-lined hall, spaced apart at odd intervals. It was impossible to be sure
he’d taken the correct route down; unlike at the compound, the paths here never
changed or disappeared, but there were dozens of them, and Nathan wasn't sure
if each descent led to the same place. He wondered what was behind the pale
stone doors. Holding chambers? Meeting rooms? Everything here was so much
more…primitive than at the compound. It made sense; the pyramid at Alexandria
had been The Three’s home in ancient times. But as Nathan walked softly down
the cramped hall, his chest felt tight with dread and fear.
    He tried to banish the feeling. He trusted The Three. His
powerful ancestors were ancient and wise, and despite their tendency toward
frightening displays of gift and rumbling gruffness, Nathan thought they had
always seemed judicious.
    Meredith’s wide, concerned brown eyes flashed in his mind,
and he recalled what she’d told him about Julia and her headaches. If it were
true, she was most likely overstating the harm, or misunderstanding what,
exactly, was happening.
    The Three had chosen Julia. She was to be honored, not
harmed.
    They did tell me to apprehend her any way I could.
    But they didn’t want him to hurt her.
    And he hadn’t. Even Shea hadn't, with the illusion that
helped him capture Julia.
    Dizzy had.
    Nathan shook his head, thinking of the sick girl. Although
she'd sneaked away, he’d been informed that Dizzy had ignited the angry scene
that he’d had to break up in the commons. And she seemed to take a perverse
pleasure in hurting The One. There was also the insidious rumor that Dizzy was
a more direct descendant of Methuselah, a rumor Nathan was sure Dizzy had
minted herself.
    The hallway leveled off, and Nathan’s heart hammered. At
the compound he’d had to cross the water to reach them, always an unpleasant
experience. Here, he simply had to follow the hall that cut through the center
of the pyramid down, down, down, through many doors, around many curves, until
it narrowed further, he passed the stone doors, and he began to feel their
presence.
    He rarely showed up uninvited, almost never without some
kind of summons. Often if he had a question, he would simply find himself
summoned. The summons was more a feeling than anything else.
    Nathan had a bad feeling now. It made his arm hairs stand
on end. Another step and the bad feeling materialized into faint screams. His
feet moved faster as his chest pumped. The screams were male, and they were
punctuated with moans.
    The Three’s chamber was at the end of the hall. Water and
fog. Everything down here smelled like dirt.