Chapter 17
They put the cola ash dude in the bunker.
What bunker, you ask? The bunker that, of course, existed here.
And who wouldn’t have a bunker on their property?
Why was I even asking? I wasn’t allowed to go down there, and Charles hugged Kinnek close when he told us there was no chance of the Koa Esher getting out.
That first day after that was pretty tense, and Inkiri, who’d been happy to let me walk around the homestead before without going all clingy, suddenly didn’t want to leave my side.
The only time I wasn’t within arm’s reach was when he went to take care of a monster that was testing the wards or the times when he was on guard duty down in the bunker.
Guard duty was a thing now that everyone other than Kinnek and me were doing. I was sort of happy no one would even trust me with an apple peeling knife, much less with guard duty. It sounded super boring.
It went on like that for over two weeks.
The thing was, if I hadn’t known that there was a bunker with an evil mage stuck inside, I’d never even have suspected.
The guys didn’t talk about it, Charles wasn’t chatty to begin with, and there were no noises, no screams or whatever was to be expected when you kept someone in a bunker under your backyard.
The guys did their morning workouts like normal, and sometimes Charles joined them, dragging Vergis along every now and then. Kinnek and I worked on magic and my Lugarra skills. It was surreal, and I could’ve written the cola ash guy’s arrival off as a dream.
For our magic lessons, Kinnek would pull Vergis in more often than not these days. We’d do smaller things, like parting and passing through the veils around the property, but for our first lesson together, Kinnek sat us down at the kitchen table with a large pot filled with water in front of us.
“As a magic dispenser, you need to practice dispensing, and Vergis needs to practice using you. In a consensual, mutually beneficial way, of course.” Kinnek gave each of us a bright smile.
It was a scorching day in July, and he was wearing hot pink shorts that Gran would’ve called “indecent in the best of ways.”
Vergis gave me copious side-eye. “Dad, unless you let me gag him, I don’t see where the benefit lies.” He was being Vergis like effing always.
“Must the bagu be so base?” I said in halting Lugarra.
From the looks both Kinnek and Vergis gave me, I had overacted. Or asked why the bagu had to be so smelly. I really wasn’t sure. Some of the words were similar sounding.
“A gag, you say?” Kinnek’s brows quirked up, and for a second there, I wasn’t sure he was joking.
Vergis glared. “Big gag.”
Kinnek tapped the edge of the bowl. “Muffin, I know you’d rather water the vegetable garden and help your dad picking herbs, but how about you can each have a strawberry popsicle if you do well? Your daddy made a big batch yesterday, and you’d be the first to try them.”
Vergis eyed me. “Fine. Dispense away, Princess.”
So I did, as best as I was able, and instead of me freezing and unfreezing water, Vergis did it using my dispenser magic. I wasn’t sure whether it was the prospect of a popsicle or the relief of not being made to do manual labor that had him complying, but it wasn’t actually that bad.
Still, through all this magic practice, a part of me couldn’t let go of the anxiety that came from knowing some dude was being kept prisoner in the bunker outside. After all, there was always another shoe, and it had to drop sometime.
When it did, it was another very hot day toward the end of July.
The sky was a vibrant blue, cloud free, and the sun was high overhead.
Fellisse, Inkiri, and I were picking tomatoes behind the house.
The plants had grown taller than a bagu.
I hadn’t known they did that, city kid that I was, but it was nice, being out among the fragrant leaves that were so greedy for the sun that they left someone my height with a decent amount of shade.
Even so, Fellisse looked like he couldn’t decide whether to rush inside and get my hat or carry me indoors bodily where my hat was so I could put it on and be safe from sunstroke sickness. The warmer the weather had gotten, the more of a nag he’d become about that.
“Rory…” Fellisse said, and I mentally prepared.
“Hey, Fellisse, do you think you could go and get me my hat?” I batted my eyes at him. We were still living in the apocalypse, after all, and I needed to work on my survival skills.
Fellisse beamed. “Gladly.”
He left Inkiri and me with the tomatoes, but before he even made it to the stairs, Charles rushed outside, taking the stairs two at a time.
Inkiri looked up from the yellow tomato plant he was working on. “Charles, what’s happening?” He took my wrist right away, almost casually, but I knew I’d never be able to make him let go now.
Charles’s strides were long, and he looked really focused, like he was at the store and in a hurry to grab the last pack of toilet paper. “Saw something on the camera system. You wanna come along.”
My hand froze, halfway to an especially juicy-looking heirloom tomato. “Wait—camera system? Is that new?”
I barely had time to put the picking basket down before Inkiri said, “Sadir, let’s go with him.”
“Nah,” Charles said when we joined him, Fellisse falling into step as well.
Charles was one of those fast walker types, and sadly, so were the two bagua with me.
I had to jog to keep up. “Always had it, but didn’t have constant coverage, just motion sensors that activated when something came close.
Fixed that after the raspberry incident. ”
“That’s what we’re calling it? The raspberry incident?” I looked back over my shoulder. At least this time, I had left the picking basket where it was instead of dropping it. “We’re having a tomato incident, aren’t we?” I immediately reached out to the presence.
Does anyone want to kill us?
It stretched and blinked blearily, or that was what it felt like to me. It looked around like someone not quite awake yet.
Not them. Their leader is your mate’s blood.
I looked up at Inkiri. “The land says they don’t want to kill us, but the leader is related to you. Does that ring a bell?”
Charles looked at us curiously. We were passing the area where they usually did their sparring. The apple tree already had small fruits weighing down the branches, and soon Kinnek and I would be able to sit there and munch on them while we watched our guys.
Inkiri groaned. “Zeddira. You might be wrong about him not wanting to at least attempt murder.”
I cleared my throat. “Should we…bring Vergis?”
“Should we bring me where?” Vergis asked, and if Inkiri hadn’t been holding me, I’d have faceplanted all over again. As it was, I yelped a tiny little bit.
“Where’d you come from?” My voice had gone slightly high, so I cleared my throat.
He was behind us and walking soundlessly. Shrugging, he said, “The lettuces. There was an issue with snails. There isn’t anymore.”
I wiped my slightly sweaty palm on my shorts. “Mothertrucker.”
Charles chuckled.
“Who is Mother Trucker?” Fellisse asked, which got Vergis to join in the chuckling.
I looked up at my mate, who was…trying to stifle a grin as well.
I remained cool and decided to have mercy on Fellisse. “Just… I’ll tell you later. It’s not important right now.”
We cut through the rows of raspberries and toward the pumpkin field beyond it.
A group of black- and taupe-clad bagua was walking around the field, eyeing the pumpkins warily as if they thought they might rise up from the soil and attack them.
Maybe they’d seen some tacky Halloween movie at some point.
Inkiri bent down so he could whisper in my ear. “Sadir, no matter what Zeddira does, you stay by my side. Hold on to me. Do you understand?”
I had no idea why that would be an issue, but then Inkiri let go of me.
I gave him a quick nod and put my arm around his waist, not caring whether that was considered proper by other bagua or not, but the group of them—all Raikengana, by their looks—didn’t give any indication that they thought I was doing something improper.
The leader person was pretty easy to spot.
His robes were gray rather than plain black or even taupe, and he had a thin string of shimmery fabric in the same color wound around both dark blue horns.
He had darker hair than Inkiri’s, but wasn’t quite as fair, more cornflower blue where Inkiri’s skin was baby blue.
In fact, I’d never have guessed the two of them were related.
Kinnek and Vergis looked way more similar than those two did.
We walked right up to them, meeting in front of a particularly large turban squash. The leader made his way to the front of the group, face smooth and pleasantly smiling.
Vergis said something in Lugarra that was too fast for me to catch, and so, to my shock, did Charles. I’d never known he spoke it fluently.
Zeddira looked at both of them in turn before he addressed them, then he said something to his brother.
When his eyes settled on me, he smiled. I wasn’t the right person to pick up on subtleties in most situations, but I knew that smile.
It was the one my parents had used on me when they were trying to get me to do something they wanted.
I’d always thought of it as their handler’s smile.
A bagu to the right of Zeddira started talking. “The second high counselor is glad to see his brother’s mate recovered. He wishes to welcome you into the Raiken and into the House of Livim and assures you that both are your home.”
“Uhm. Thanks. I mean, thank you. That’s very kind. Of the second high counselor.”
I sidled closer to Inkiri. Zeddira was still looking at me. He had yellow eyes with flecks of dark blue in them, and his attention made me feel very exposed, as if I were on stage.