Sebastian nodded. "A wee bit strong too."
"Perfect," she whispered and lifted it from the tray.
Brie looked around the room and shook her head. Aiden, bless his heart had a drink in each hand, and Meryn had a serving size bowl in her lap with two spoons. Aiden sipped from one of his drinks. "It had to have started around the time the perimeter went up. That's when they first appeared in Lycaonia."
"Let me text René Evreux. He is the Committee member for Lycaonia," Magnus said, lifting his phone.
Meryn growled. "No. He's a huge jerk."
Magnus gave a half nod. "He is not the best when dealing with others, which is why I made him the Elder for Lycaonia, the most diverse of the four pillar cities. Of all people, Meryn, I thought you would see that about him."
Meryn's lips were pressed in a straight line. "He said that my baby and Penny made him sick."
Magnus scrubbed his hands over his face. "It is his gift, Meryn. He can see the true nature of a person. We now know that you were missing your light. It was normal for you, but how do you think that registered to him? Also, you are carrying a mixed race child, similar to Penny. He has admitted to me on more than one occasion that he sees both essences, and it gives him motion sickness. He is rude, crass, and tends to despise anyone not a vampire, but he is learning."
Meryn's mouth dropped. "He's not a douchebag?"
Magnus winked. "He absolutely is, but he is not evil."
"Meryn, I believe that it was René that snuck me the necklaces for testing. He was also the one that saw through Rowan's deceit and freed me to save the Alpha Unit," Kendrick admitted.
Meryn held up a hand. "I will need time to realign him in my brain."
"Understandable," Magnus said, looking down at his phone. "He said he was one of the last ones to be approached. Jourdain Régis put his name forth as a candidate last August, and he was officially asked to join in September."
Meryn frowned. "That was months before I even moved."
Aiden sat back. "You're right, baby, this was before you." He looked around. "But it lines up perfectly to when the spell was cast to bring the warriors their mates."
"That spell's reach has yet to be determined," Thane said.
"What if that wasn't the only thing the spell did?" Meryn hypothesized.
Kendrick leaned forward. "Go on, Meryn, this is where you usually shine."
Meryn scooped up another spoonful of pudding. "Well, it's kinda like when you send out a massive update to multiple computers. You have to make sure everyone has turned on their systems, they have to leave them on overnight, you have to push the packets. Pain. In. The. Ass. So, usually, higher ups and tech supervisors are like, if we're going to dedicate this much manpower for this update, let's get a lot of other stuff knocked out at the same time, like OS updates, removing certain installed games, adding VPNs, the whole ball of wax, s
o that when they're done, they're good for a while." She looked around. "What if this spell had some huge component that had to be obtained, and they just made sure that they got their money's worth."
"Sonofabitch," Justice whispered, collapsing back into his chair.
Law shook his head at his brother's disbelief and pointed to Meryn. "I told you she's a genius."
Kendrick held up a finger. "So, what was the intended spell and what was added on? Was the primary purpose of the spell to seamlessly add the Committee to our society without question or was it to bring the warriors their mates for culling?"
Anne smacked her mate. "Did you have to word it like that?"
He shrugged. "Either way, it's terrifying."
"I wonder if it's neither," Meryn said, eating another spoonful of pudding.
Even Kendrick looked ill at her statement. "What do you mean?"
She held up her spoon. "Remember the demon guy?" She smiled. "Dude was seriously hot, by the way. Ouch!" Meryn rubbed her shoulder where Aiden nipped her. "Anyway. He said that the necklaces were just a means to an end. What if everything is moving us toward an endgame we don't even know about?"
"Meryn, please don't take this the wrong way, but I hate you right now," Kendrick growled.
She shrugged. "We don't have all the pieces, so trying to nail everything down and make sense of it all is pointless. All we can do it address what is right in front of us and do what we can to mitigate the damage."