Blue Abyss: Timewalker Chronicles, Book 3 (The Timewalker Chronicles) by Michele Callahan Page B

came easily. She’d most likely be dead shortly. Last time she checked, corpses didn’t talk.
    “Give me your non-dominant hand.”
    Mari held out her right hand and Celestina grabbed on, linking them together. “This will take care of the Triscani guards.” Celestina’s hand heated and her skin turned pink, then red, then silver as if her skin were made of metal. The metal swirled and pooled into a ball about the size of a marble before leaping onto Mari’s flesh. Celestina let go and Mari watched in fascination as the silver spread out and flowed over her entire hand like a hot wax glove.
    Holding her hand up in front of her face, Mari flexed her fingers and made a fist, testing it out. Nothing happened, other than her hand feeling a bit hot. “What is it? What does it do?”
    “It’s an energy implant, a weapon. It will graft to your DNA. No one can remove it from your hand, and no one else will ever be able to use it.” Celestina’s gaze was glued to Mari’s hand as well.
    “Have you ever given this to anyone else?”
    “No. Traditionally, we gift to one descendant only, usually a daughter.” Celestina’s smile was sad. “I have no daughters, but I can think of no better daughter than you, and no better purpose than to kill the Triscani that threaten us all.”
    “What does it do, exactly?” Not that she didn’t appreciate the gesture, but it was alien, and starting to hurt.
    Celestina held her hand, palm out, toward the water-filled tank on the opposite side of the room.“Focus your mind and see a beam of light erupt from your palm, like this.” A blinding blue-silver light shot from Celestina’s palm into the tank. Bubbles and steam rose from the churning water in a giant strike of heat. “It is one of the few weapons that can disrupt the Triscani’s energies and send them to the eternal night.”
    Mari looked back down at her own hand, shocked to see perfectly normal, tanned skin. “It’s gone.”
    “No, it has grafted to your cells and will always be yours.”
    Wow. Holy freaking wow. Mari pointed and imagined a beam of bright light shooting from her palm like a superhero with laser power. It took a few seconds to build in her mind, then she felt the magical moment when it popped into reality and the fiery light burst from her palm to the water tank.
    “Very good.”
    “Okay, so I can shoot the bad guys. I still don’t know what’s down there in the alien stronghold.” Was she really having this conversation? Really? It sounded like a bad Star Trek episode, and she felt like the extra redshirt ensign.
    Just kill me now.
    “You must save Raiden. That is all I know.”
    “Why?” Even as she asked the question, a sharp pain shot from the deep recesses of her eye sockets into her brain, like seven-inch-long hot needles had just been shoved through both eyes at once. More of Celestina’s telepathy. “Hey!”
    “I am sorry for your pain, Marina. It will lessen as you grow into your new abilities.”
    Mari breathed through it as an image appeared inside her head, an image very similar to the markings she’d found in that cave. The circular shape from the cave wall appeared in her mind. “What is that, his symbol?”
    “No. It is yours and now marks your flesh.”
    “Mine?” What the hell? Celestina pointed to her left shoulder, to the top of her deltoid on her left arm.
    “Yes, Marina, I know you can feel its burn on your arm. The Mark is yours, yours and Raiden’s. You are his and he is yours. That is why you are the only one who can find him and heal him.”
    “No pressure.” Mari rubbed the top of her left arm, where something did, indeed, feel like it was eating into her skin like acid.
    “Save Raiden. He will know what to do.” Celestina frowned and tilted her head to the side, as if listening to a conversation no one else could hear. “It’s time for you to go. Bran won’t be able to hold the portal much longer. I have done all I can. Do not fail, Timewalker. Do not