"Alec? Is he here? Is he all right?" I stopped, refusing to go any farther. "If you've hurt him—"

"Stop treating us as if we are fools," Kristjana interrupted. "Yes, your Dark One is here." A slow smile crept across her face. It wasn't particularly nice. "He has not been cleansed… yet. But I very much look forward to watching him embrace the light."

"If you strike us down, you will simply bring more of the council upon your heads," Kristoff said, breaking his silence. "We do not act alone. Nor will we tolerate your persecution."

Kristjana spat at him, literally spat at him, moving around him but being careful, I was interested to note, to stay just out of his reach. "We will purge the earth of your kind just as the light was purged of darkness."

"Rhetorical gibberish," Kristoff said, and probably would have continued if Mattias hadn't slammed his head into the wall.

"Stop that!" I yelled, starting toward them, but Kristjana jerked me back.

A moment of sadness gripped me as her face lit with a pleasure bordering on the fanatical. I wondered if she was mentally stable, or if her belief in the Brotherhood had consumed her past the point of reason. "You will watch when the light cleanses your Dark One. You will see as I have seen how the darkness can be stripped from them."

That pretty much answered the question. I kept my voice calm and soothing as I said, "I understand why you think they are evil, but I assure you, Alec and Kristoff are not. You might have good intentions, but where they concern these two men, you're way off base. If you would untie us, I'd be happy to sit down and explain everything to you."

"The time for talk is past," Kristjana said with dismissive self-righteousness. "Now is the time for action. We will be conducting three cleansings tonight?"

The question was asked of Frederic.

"Who do you expect will conduct the ceremony?" Frederic asked in his soft, French-accented voice. "You just declared the Zorya tainted."

"And you cannot deny that!" Kristjana cried. "You can't deny that she was unsuitable for the job from the very beginning. Look at how she's deceived us! By the light, Frederic, she's a Beloved!"

Frederic said nothing as he strolled down the last of the stairs, merely nodding toward a door. Mattias shoved Kristoff up against the wall, whipping out a set of keys to unlock the door.

"I told you that I'm not dating anyone—" I started to correct Kristjana.

She spun around. "Oh, shut up, you ignorant fool. A Beloved is not a girlfriend, it is a so-called savior of Dark Ones, not that they can be saved by anything but the purity of the light."

I decided the best defense was a good offense, and whirled away from her, taking an assertive stance in the middle of the room. "You will not talk to me that way! I am the Zorya, not you, and you will treat me with the respect and honor due someone in my position!"

Kristjana slapped me. She just reached right out and smacked me smartly across the left cheek. "How dare you! You pollute the very air we breathe, and you expect us to treat you with respect? You, who have betrayed everything we stand for. You, who have aided the Dark One we hold by promising him salvation. Well, we shall see that he has it—but it will be true salvation, not the farce you call redemption."

Kristoff made a low, growling noise. "Hypocritical diatribe. You murder my people, then claim to save them, hiding your true intentions behind a cloak of righteousness, but not even your precious light can hide the truth about your actions. You deal in death, not divinity; torture, not salvation."

"I will enjoy watching you cleansed, too," Kristjana said, her face as rigid as a mask. "But I think you should be given the chance to see the truth when your friend receives the light first."

I stared at her in horror, the zeal in her voice raising goose bumps on my back as I had a mental image of the sort of light Alec would be forced to endure. "Please, listen to me. I swore to Anniki that I would right the injustices done her, and I am trying to do that. But she was wrong—you're wrong—about Alec and Kristoff. If they were what you say they are, I'd do everything in my power to help you, but you're damning them without reason."

She straightened up, clearly about to launch another physical attack, but Frederic's soft voice stopped her. "That will be enough, sister. You will not strike Zorya Pia again."

"She is not worthy of the name Zorya," Kristjana spat.

"That has yet to be determined," Frederic said, eyeing me. "We will leave that to the Zenith to decide."

I turned to him as a bastion of sanity. "May I see Alec, please? I'd like to make sure he's all right, then I would like to explain to you what's been going on."

Frederic looked thoughtful for a moment, then nodded toward Mattias.

Mattias shoved Kristoff through the door he'd unlocked and slammed it shut, locking it before he marched over to the door on the opposite side of the room, quickly opening it.

A maw of darkness gaped open before me as he flung open the door.

"Alec?" I said, taking a hesitant step toward it.

"Pia?" From the obsidian depths a shadow appeared, stumbling out. "Love, is that you?"

"Love?" Kristjana said, her voice dripping with scorn.

"Are you hurt?" I hurried over to him, but Mattias leaped in front of me, his normally placid face hard and unyielding. "Mattias, please."

His eyes narrowed on me. "You marry me, but you are his Beloved? I did not believe that of you, Pia."

"I'm sorry about that, but there were… reasons…"

"I'm all right, just a bit bruised," Alec said as I stopped. He peered over Mattias's shoulder at me. Like Kristoff, he'd been handcuffed, although his hands were bound in front of him. "I'm sorry I didn't give you enough time to get away, however."

"I did. We came to rescue you," I said with a wry smile.

"We?"

"Kristoff is here, too."

"He always did have more brawn than brain," Alec said, his gaze warm on me despite the circumstances. He turned to consider Frederic. "I take it you have plans to use Pia to destroy Kristoff and me?"

Kristjana started to answer, but Frederic held up a hand to stop her. "You are Dark Ones. We are obliged to purify you. However, the Zorya has asked for a chance to speak, assumedly in your behalf."

"Yes, I would like to do that." A tiny little flicker of hope rose despite the situation. "I think if you could get to know them as I do, you will see that they are not the murderous, vengeful monsters you paint them."

"Just yesterday two of our brothers were injured, and a third killed. By all accounts, the murderer was the Dark One you name as friend."

"There were extenuating circumstances," I said, licking my dried lips. "Your people attacked Kristoff and me without provocation. The man who was killed held a knife to me and threatened to kill—"

Frederic raised his hand again. "We will save this discussion for the Zenith to hear."

"You're not going to let her go?" Kristjana asked in outrage.

He looked thoughtful for a moment. "I believe that would not be wise. However, we will allow you to have your say, Zorya Pia. As you know, the liturgy of light is to be held tonight, to endow you with the powers of Midnight Zorya. We will hold a convocation then to bear witness to all you wish to say. Following that…" His gaze went to Alec, who glared back at him. "We shall see."

"I'm glad someone is willing to listen," I said, holding up my hands, which, unlike those of the two men, had been bound together with duct tape. "I'd appreciate it if you could take this off me. It's beginning to chafe."

Kristjana looked like she wanted to chafe the rest of me, most likely with a chainsaw or large tub of explosives, but Frederic simply gestured toward Mattias.