All Chapters of The voss inheritance : Chapter 11 - Chapter 20

The white light from Lydia’s eyes filled the circular chamber. It was not the angry violet of the Voss blood. It was something else. It was clean. It was cold. Julian Voss stumbled back, shielding his eyes with a withered hand. The silver knife clattered to the floor."Impossible," Julian hissed. "The sequence... it shouldn't be inverted."Lydia stood up. She did not feel the weight of her body anymore. She did not feel the fear. The room was humming, but the machines were no longer draining her. They were overloading. The glass walls of the underwater lab began to moan under the pressure of the lake. Small cracks spiderwebbed across the ceiling."You spent forty years looking for a god," Lydia said. Her voice sounded like it was coming from everywhere at once. "But you forgot that gods don't like to be owned."She stepped toward the stone basin. The purple fluid began to boil. Lydia reached out and touched the stone. The liquid turned clear in an instant. The chemical scent vanished.

The High District was a city built on top of a city. It sat on massive concrete pylons that rose above the smog of the Lower District. Up here, the air was scrubbed clean by giant fans. The streets were paved with white stone. The people moved with a quiet, expensive grace. They didn't look at the shadows. They didn't have to.Lydia sat in the back of the van. Case had managed to skin the vehicle in a holographic wrap that made it look like a high-end grocery delivery truck. He sat in the front, his face pale in the glow of three different tablets."The White Room isn't a hospital," Case said. His voice was a frantic whisper. "It’s a black site owned by a holding company called Aethelgard. They are the primary investors for the Voss family. If Julian was the face of the mutation, these people are the brain."Lydia checked the clip in her pistol. She didn't like using guns, but her energy felt thin. The child was quiet, coiled deep inside her, saving its strength."How many guards?" Ju

The fog in Oakhaven did not lift with the sun. It clung to the rotted wood of the cottages, tasting of salt and old iron. Lydia sat on the porch of the shack, watching June sharpen a piece of rebar into a spear. They were low on ammunition. The High District breach had cost them most of their hardware.Inside, Adrian was sitting up. He was wrapped in a heavy wool blanket, his eyes fixed on the small fire. He looked stronger, but his movements were stiff. The silver scars on his spine were healing into jagged ridges. He looked like a man who had been put back together by an amateur."Someone is coming," Case said.He was standing on the roof of the van, holding a pair of digital binoculars. He pointed toward the single dirt road that led down the cliff.Lydia stood up. She felt the child tighten in her womb. It was not a violent surge, but a low-frequency hum. It was a warning.A lone figure was walking down the path. They weren't wearing tactical gear or a suit. They wore a heavy, hoo

The air in the cellar shifted. The ancient, sterile peace was shattered by the rhythmic, mechanical thud of breaching charges detonating on the surface. The stone walls, thick with decades of Voss secrets, groaned under the pressure. Dust filtered down like gray snow, coating the silver cradle and the rows of amber vials."They aren't using gas," Case’s voice crackled through the intercom, sounding thin and terrified. "Lydia, they’re dropping thermite. They’re trying to melt the cooling towers into the foundation. They want to bury the cellar!"Elara didn't flinch. She stood by the stone basin, her blue eyes reflecting the flickering emergency lights. "Julian’s ghost has many hands. These are the Purge squads. They don't want the data. They want silence.""June, get the back exit!" Lydia shouted.June didn't hesitate. She lunged for a heavy iron lever near the rear of the vault. With a scream of rusted metal, a section of the stone wall ground open, revealing a narrow, lightless tunne

The geothermal basin of the Northern Shelf was a sanctuary of steam and stone, a hidden lung breathing against the frozen ribs of the world. Inside the main dome, the air was thick with the scent of damp moss and medicinal herbs. Lydia sat on a low bench carved from black volcanic rock. Her hand rested on the curve of her stomach, where the heartbeat of the child felt like a physical weight, a rhythmic anchor in the shifting white of the tundra.Adrian sat across from her, his face illuminated by the soft, bioluminescent glow of the moss crawling up the glass walls. He was cleaning the silver satchel, his fingers moving with a precision that had finally returned. The tremors were gone. The cold of the north seemed to have captivated the jagged scars on his spine, turning the violet inflammation into a pale, silent silver."They call this place 'The Embers,'" Adrian said, his voice low. He looked toward the center of the dome, where children with solid black eyes played silently with s