“Yes, I suppose it kind of is. A lot of our work happens from here and a few other sites like it across the world, but it is also a settlement of sorts. Lighthunters call this place home. It is a sanctuary as much as it is a lair.”
The hot summer sun was beating down on us, and I was grateful when she gestured us toward a shaded table outside a café. She ordered food and drinks for everyone in Greek as we settled in.
“How many languages do you speak?” Josh asked as Ethan fanned himself with the menu. Alec and Tyler sat back, looking relaxed, but I knew they were watching everything closely.
“Twelve,” Nina answered as if it were no big deal.
My eyes bugged out. “Fluently?”
“Yes. French is my native tongue, and my accent is stubborn, but I speak, read, and write the other eleven languages fluently.”
Before we could ask more, the food was delivered. We all dug in, Ethan the most enthusiastically.
After half his meal was gone, Tyler leaned forward. “You said there was something underground?”
“Yes, about twice as much as you see above ground. Most of the dwellings and everyday life is above ground—cafés, shops, the school, the library, and so on. Below is a large bunker, offices, a server room, surveillance, our secret texts and teachings. Our work is below ground, safe.”
Tyler abandoned his food, his full focus on Nina. “What’s with all the secrecy? How is this even possible?”
It was killing him that there was something he didn’t know—that an entire organization managed to exist without his knowledge.
“At the start, it was about protecting ourselves.” She waved her hand dismissively, speaking around mouthfuls of food. “We’re talking about hundreds of years ago, when it was believed the Light was a gift from God and Lighthunters were kind of like prophets. We had a connection that no other mortal being did. We understood it, saw it like no one else could. Eventually, some assholes figured out they could make money from this. Between the snake oil salesmen—the ones pretending to be Lighthunters and charging a fortune to send hopeful young Variants on veritable goose chases—and the more sinister practice of capturing, torturing, imprisoning, and exploiting Lighthunters . . . yeah, we decided to go to ground.
“At the time, we were led by a charismatic man named Father Lightwood. He believed we were truly God’s prophets, sent here to guide the masses to better live according to how God wanted us to live. He convinced us the best way to do that was silently—that our work was too sacred to risk having it perverted. We withdrew from society, disappeared from the villages and emerging cities, took all our texts and any other texts we could with us.
“Over the years, we continued to erase any trace of ourselves from history. We worked in secret, orchestrating the meetings of Variants and Vitals by setting up scholarships, overseas exchange programs, and job offers to bring them into proximity with one another. We only stepped in where we felt we needed to—like the incident in Thailand.”
“I’m amazed you’ve managed to keep this a secret for so long.” Tyler shook his head.
“What happens when a Lighthunter is born? Do you take them from their family?” I questioned.
Nina smiled. “That is not necessary. We are not like Variants and humans. A Variant can be born to entirely human parents and vice versa. A Lighthunter can only be born to Lighthunter parents—our gift is hereditary. Not every child is born with the sight, but no child outside a Lighthunter family is ever born with it. There are one hundred recorded bloodlines of Lighthunter families. Sixty-six remain to this day. It is frowned upon and very rare for us to marry outside the community.”
I nodded. “I guess not living among the rest of the world would help with keeping the secret.” All the kids running around made much more sense now. This wasn’t just a hippie commune on steroids or a headquarters for a secret society; this was an entire civilization, living in secret.
Nina smiled sadly. “You have to understand, for us, this secret and the work we do is sacred. We have evolved with the rest of the world—hell, some of the technology widely available now we developed first and then leaked—but our traditions are strong and lasting. The fact that we are even having discussions about getting more involved is momentous. People are scared, but it is time for change. We have the