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Chapter 1

The Twilight

Connor Bruce took out the nearest guard with a perfectly aimed blow dart

It was a split-second assault, but the tranquilizer took a bit longer to work than that The guard had tilaive before his eyes rolled back into his head and he collapsed to the floor in a puddle of red garments

"Sorry chap," Connor uard’s coue sensation of having dozed, perhaps in boredo birdcall, telling Lieutenant Philip Wager that he’d succeeded in his task The responding whistle told hiuards around the perimeter had also been neutralized Within moments he was surrounded by a dozen of hissleeveless tunics and ar his rank as Captain of the Elite Warriors

"You’re going to see things inside that will startle you," Connor warned, his blade whistling as he pulled it free of its scabbard on his back "Focus on the ht Captain Cross back to the Twilight from the Dreaer ainaled the entrance to the Te the vid unit that recorded those who visited Connor stared at the archith a roiling er The structure was so i engraved in the ancient language--" Beware of the Key that turns the Lock"

For centuries, he and every member of his team had hunted the Dreah the dream state and destroy thenize that they were not a figs who lived in the Twilight--the place where the human mind came in slumber

But Connor had already met the infamous Key and she wasn’t a specter of doom and annihilation

She was a slender-but-curvy blonde veterinarian with big dark eyes and a deep well of compassion

Lies, all of it All these years wasted Luckily for the Key--also known innocuously as Lyssa Bates--

Captain Aidan Cross, warrior of legend and Connor’s best friend, had found her first

Found her, fell in love with her, and eloped with her to the mortal plane

Noas Connor’s mission to unravel thehe needed to knoas safeguarded in the Teo, hedown to pinpoint accuracy, they rushed through the gate They split into two tea either side of the stone-lined center courtyard, weaving in and out aently, carrying with it the fragrance of nearby flowers and fields of wild grass It was the tieneral public and the Elders were secluded in meditation The perfect time to break in and steal whatever inforet their hands on

Connor entered the haiden first Holding up three fingers, he then waved to the right while he moved to the left Three Elites obeyed the silent command and took the east side of the circular roohly aware that any misstep would allow the vid units around the perimeter to pick up their incursion In the center of the vast space waited semicircular rows of benches that faced the colu several stories high, there were so many benches the Guardians had lost count of the nuo

This was the heart of their world, the center of law and order The seat of power

Regrouping at the middle hallway that led to the honden, Connor paused, and the others awaited his command

The hall to the west branched off toward the Elders’ living quarters The hall to the right went to a secluded open-air ot freaky After his first--and heretofore only--Temple breakin, he was prepared His men weren’t

He looked at the therimly, and Connor continued on

As they walked, a vibration beneath their feet drew everyone’s attention to the floor The stone shi the irated and they were about to fall into an endless blanket of stars He groped for the wall by instinct, his teeth gritted together, then the view of spacekaleidoscope of colors

"Fuckthe first time he’d walked this corridor Every step created ripples in the colors, suggesting that whatever it was responded to their presence