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Adaht you ured out how to use the Alabaster Arch to get to the Grand Nexus," Adam said

I felt ram downloaded a lot of infor on the arches Apparently, there’s a pattern you trace on the er the Alabaster Arch’s coordinates"

I remembered what the arch operator had tried to tell me the day we’d first run into Kassus and his men "What’s the pattern?"

"Remember e accidentally appeared in the Grand Nexus?" Shelton said

"How could I forget that?" I asked, ht of control room full of cherubs

"Yeah, e noticed a symbol that looked a lot like the Cyrinthian character for zero, except instead of just the circle with the upside-down "V" in it, it also has a horizontal line across the center" Shelton took out his arcphone and displayed it for me "Darkwater discovered this is the pattern you have to trace on thethe Alabaster Arch"

"Why haven’t they cleared it of cherubs then?" I asked

Adam chuckled "Did you see how many are in there? It’d be impossible without some serious manpower"

"Yeah," Shelton said with a nod "No e’re going there until we figure out how to handle that horde"

I blew out a breath "At least we know Daelissa can’t get to it"

"Yet," Shelton said

"Yeah" I grinned "Awesoroaned "Maybe we shouldn’t have told hiht I kept things casual, doing my best not to wonder about the dubious future which lay ahead I went outside bythe cool breeze as it cleared my senses The front door opened, and I turned to see Mom She sat on the front stairs next to me, and pecked a kiss on my forehead

"I’m amazed at what you’ve acco her head slowly "You’ve surrounded yourself with so ether despite their differences" She took a sip of wine "I tried to do what I could on my own, but Daelissa always seems a step ahead"

"Ivy wants to coet Kassus’s blood" Tho him away in the specially built cells beneath the Te her here as soon as possible" She raised an eyebrow "If that’s okay with you"

"Yeah," I said with a grin "I’d like that" A sigh escaped hts turned to someone else "What about Dad?"

Her smile faded "There’s a lot you don’t know about him So much I swore an oath not to tell"

"Is he really an evilKassallandra is a good idea?" Supposedly, he’d been betrothed to the red-headed Daemas before he met Mom I wasn’t so sure anymore it was the truth

She took a sip of wine, and looked into the dark "He wasn’t entirely truthful to you about a lot of things He’s far more capable than he lets on"

"Can you elaborate?" I asked, tired of the word games that passed for answers

"It’s better if you ask hi was close on the horizon, I wanted to confront him soon

Confront, or ask?

I bit my lip A lot would depend on him Another question pestered iven the Cyrinthian rune to Daelissa?"

"Ah," Mo about him I feel I should know My memory of the past is still so fuzzy and faint in many ways I’m not sure if that’s due to Daelissa’s mind tricks, or simply due to the Desecration I know the answer to who he really is h the haze" She sighed, shook her head "I don’t kno you’ve ed so far David and I kept you in the dark about so much, and yet, you’ve overcome obstacle after obstacle"

Not all of thehtliss I would talk with her Perhaps we can help each other re her in the eyes "Are you being honest withup more barriers? It wouldn’t make me very happy to find out later that you’re intentionally hiding things fro you all I know," she said, squeezing my hand "You can trust me, Justin"

I nodded "I want to You can understand if I’h"

She returned a sad smile "I do understand" Mom kissed me on the forehead "We’ll talk later, son"