24. Chapter 24
A subdued shot whistled through the air. Simon screamed. Both echoed in Izzy’s ears. Time slowed. Where’d the bullet hit?
Raz wrestled with Yuller. The silencer of the handgun gleamed in the light, pointed down.
Acting as a shield, spirit energy at maximum, Izzy pressed herself against Simon’s sitting form. His knees dug into her back.
Raz chopped his arm down on Yuller’s hand and wrenched the weapon free. Ramming his shoulder into the other man, Raz knocked him backward. He stumbled away a few steps.
Raz aimed the gun at Yuller’s head. “On the ground, puppet.”
Relief flooded Izzy’s veins. The link shook, red and fiery with fear and anger. Even with the distance, she and Daxton could still feel each other’s emotions.
Hands trembling, Yuller lifted them to his ears. “Think about what you’re doing.” He kneeled on the road. “I’m a federal officer.”
“Izzy?” Simon clutched her arm.
Izzy flexed her tense fingers. “I’m okay. You?”
“Bloody wanker has great aim,” he hissed through gritted teeth.
Izzy whipped around, breath lodged in her throat. Simon hunched, holding on to his right shoulder where blood seeped through the cracks in his fingers.
“No!” She pressed her unsteady hands against the wound.
“I don’t feel so…” Simon’s head lulled to the side, and his body fell limp.
His weight collapsed onto her, and she pushed him over against the ambulance. “Simon!” She jumped into the back of the ambulance and shook his face, needing to see his eyes open. They did, but only to roll around. He was losing too much blood. That gap in her mind opened, encompassing her.
“Izzy…” Fotios’s phantom voice said over the sound of Raz’s orders. “You can’t. Not here.”
Fotios lay before her on a cot, brown hair soaked to his pale forehead as he squeezed her fingers until they numbed.
The scent of death, spoiled wine, and urine saturated the air.
Others groaned and screamed as the physician bent over Fotios’s strips of flesh that had once been legs.
Nausea turned her stomach as she dared not look into Fotios’s eyes.
Her own brimmed with tears she held at bay just like the thought that he was here because of her.
He whispered, “Emotions are—”
“Shut up!” She pulled energy from the feathers of her wings and granted a miracle—healing his legs as much as her limited feathers would allow.
It didn’t take long for others to notice.
The Athenian army threw accusations of godliness in her direction.
When men grabbed her from behind to take her from the camp, it only began a long physical and psychological abuse that taught her Fotios was right. Emotions were a weakness.
Stop! She shoved the darkness aside. I will save Simon. The feathers of her hidden wings tingled with power. She touched his shoulder and mentally shoved Simon through the timeless Spirit Dimension using the gift of the Fallen—the ability to grant miracles.
Her feathers lost energy as she used the law of displacement to send his body to a time when he didn’t have injuries. Five feathers fell to the floor of the ambulance. The cut on his forehead sealed closed along with the bullet wound.
Simon paled, lips a sheen of blue that dispersed quickly as the Spirit Dimension froze anyone that traveled through. He awoke gasping, curling into a ball as if someone had sent a kick to his chest. Shivering under the blanket, he tugged it against himself.
“W-W-why d-d-did you d-d-do that?” Simon asked.
“You would have died.”
He swallowed, eyes wide. “But around others?”
“The benefits outweighed the risks.”
His flinch stung the heart she’d tried to keep out of this situation. She lifted the feathers that had fallen by their rachides and pushed them against the truck floor. The force caused them to burst into dust.
“Is he good?” Raz asked, his attention still on Agent Yuller, who watched them with avid interest.
Izzy sighed. “He’ll be okay.”
Raz nodded and applied heated dominance to his voice as he asked Yuller, “Where’s the Tattered One?”
A cold smile spread across Yuller’s face. “You know my master?”
Shivers racked Izzy’s frame.
Raz tightened his grip on the gun. “What does he want?”
Yuller’s eyes swiveled to Simon. “The hacker. Wrapped. Packed. And shipped.”
Izzy leaned over Simon, her heart racing with renewed fear, but she asked Yuller, “Where to?”
Yuller gagged, coughed, and said in a menacing tone not like his own, “Where Isi tried to build a better future without us.” He lunged for the gun.
Raz swung it, butt end cracking against Yuller’s temple. He fell limp to the ground.
Izzy glanced around. The few people down the road distracted by the fire didn’t pay them any mind.
“Move so I can stash him.” Raz bent and hoisted Agent Yuller over his shoulder with a loud grunt.
Izzy dragged Simon away by the arm. Her thoughts whirled around Yuller’s last words, not making any sense out of them.
Raz threw Yuller into the rear of the ambulance and closed the doors. “Come on. We need to get out of here.”
“What are you going to do with him?” Simon asked.
“We’ll rehabilitate him from the Archfiend’s Illusion.”
Simon clutched Izzy, and they staggered with Raz up the road.
Raz pulled a walkie-talkie from his pocket. “Guys, I left a puppet in the bed of the ambulance. Lewis, I need that car now.”
Around the bend, a pair of lights flooded the street and blinked. “I’m here,” a man said over the walkie.
A junky gray sedan screeched to a halt beside them. Lewis, a rich, dark-complexioned man, maneuvered his burly body out of the driver’s seat. “She’s all yours. We’ll rendezvous later.”
“Thanks,” Raz said, climbing into the front seat.
Izzy slid into the back with Simon.
Raz put the car in gear and gunned it, jerking Izzy against the seat. An earthquake rumbled along the link when Daxton yanked on their connection.
Worry coursed through the link along with a longing to see her. He could wait, but Izzy had to fight the urge to seek his comfort.
“I’ll be okay,” Simon said as if reading something on her face. He pulled her into a hug.
Izzy stilled. The muted texture of his body stirred a sense of reassurance only a home could.
“You shouldn’t have wasted your feathers, but…thank you.”
Simon’s hold tore at her heart, but his words shocked it back to life. Tears pricked at her eyes, and she pulled away from him and the emotions he wrung from her. “Don’t you dare put yourself in danger like that again.”
“He’ll be safe,” Raz said. “We’re heading to Dyamur Territory.”
“Thanks. I’ll see you soon, then.” With weight pressing down on her chest, Izzy turned into her light form and focused on the path to Daxton.
In her human body, she raised her head. Daxton sat next to her where Serephina had once been, eyes drawn with concern.
Every emotion she’d kept at bay welled up.
Heart accelerating, she clung to her pants as if the fabric could keep her tears from falling.
The Archfiend had hurt and threatened Simon.
“Izzy…” Daxton reached as if to grab her. “I’m sorry.”
“About what? Simon is safe with Raz now.” She resented the hitch in her voice as she scooted the chair backward and headed to a bookshelf. That book…I need to find that book. She trailed her fingers over book spines, the titles blurring too much to read.
What if Raz hadn’t saved Simon? Her lungs ceased as if forgetting how to work. Her legs wobbled as dizziness swept in.
I can’t breathe.
Daxton’s warm hand rested on her shoulder. She gasped in a breath.
“Can I show you something?” he asked.
She nodded, wanting any distraction. He led her to the back of the library, where a staircase spiraled to the upper floor.
The metal clanged as she followed him with wobbly legs to the top.
When he opened the door, the outdoor breeze caressed her warm face, cooling it.
Fresh mountain air filled her lungs. He stepped outside onto the porch.
“There’s no railing,” she said.
“They cause a hindrance to landing dragons.” Daxton offered his arm.
That makes sense. She stared at his arm. On one hand, touching him seemed like a bad idea given all the emotions she was already unable to suppress, but on the other, she wasn’t sure she could trust herself not to trip or fall. She laced her arm with his, and he guided her out toward the edge.
Sunset crept over the surrounding trees; the reds and violets were more vibrant than she’d seen before. The chilly air sent goosebumps across her arms. She breathed easier, and the sadness that had tried to consume her earlier was easier to deal with.
Daxton stood beside her, a pillar of strength and reassurance. His bronze eyes blazed with understanding, the kind born from losing someone—and recognizing that same ache in her. Her heart lurched painfully. She straightened her spine but kept her hand tightly wrapped around his arm.
“What happened? Who was Yuller? I heard him on the phone,” Daxton said.
She released a shaky sigh and told him about the attack. “A detective who probably set the bomb and tampered with the cameras. I can’t believe he was that far gone. How many puppets do Archfiends normally have?”
“It’s hard to tell. If they’ve been planning this for a while, they could have multiple puppets.”
This was too elaborate a scheme to just want her power.
That trap had been for Simon—not her. “I don’t understand what they want.
I wish I knew who the one that attacked me is.
” She wanted this over with, but until the Archfiends showed themselves, they couldn’t find them.
She stared past Daxton’s form, thoughts in disarray. Silence held the space between them.
“Izzy.” He bit his lip and ran his hand over his growing beard. “You healed Simon, didn’t you?”
Her mind raced as if he’d yelled at her.
Memories of the men torturing her to learn about her powers surfaced in her mind.
The same ones that had taken her after she’d healed Fotios’s legs.
If only she’d weighed the risks instead of letting emotions reign, she wouldn’t have that trauma.
And she wasn’t sure she wanted to trust Daxton with that information yet. “How do you know I healed him?”
He grimaced. “The link. I felt your need to help him, and then you did. How is that possible? You may have transported a laptop, but healing someone is something else.”
She clenched her jaw and took her arm from his. “I need to get back to my research. Keep me updated about Simon and the news on the Archfiends.”
Turning before he could protest, she headed back inside.