10. Chapter Ten
The dragon laid his body flat on the ground so Linorra could climb onto his back. Linorra’s words had moved him, and he now believed, as she did, that he was meant to fly with her to the far reaches of the universe. He could feel her excitement, and she could feel his. They were connected, now, by a force that neither could understand.
Aaron decided we’d missed our window to cross the oardoo fields during the day because one of us had short legs that moved like a silken goat. I wasn’t sure what that was, but he assured me they were beautiful creatures, if a bit lazy.
“Oh, how kind of you,” I said. “Please, Aaron, don’t be afraid to say what’s on your mind.”
Aaron chuckled. “Let’s go,” he said, slipping on his pack.
Before we could take two steps out on the trail, however, he stopped short, motioning me to stay hidden. I crouched like a frog between two evergreens.
I didn’t know if he’d seen a person or a predator, but if he said hide, then I would hide. Rogue, ever observant, slinked over to stand just behind me, pressing his body against mine. It was comforting, but I didn’t know how helpful that would be if I needed to get up and run but instead tripped over his big body.
Aaron silently pulled two knives from his vest, one of which was longer than my forearm, then he crouched down in front of me, listening. The air around him heated up, and I leaned away from him and into Rogue. My heart pounded loudly in my ears as I watched him for signs that I needed to run. After a moment, his knives glowed a reddish orange, as if they had been pulled from a forge. He glanced at my surprised expression and gave me a little smirk.
I shook my head, looking down at the ground. It was covered in soft pine needles that smelled faintly of citrus, and I rolled one of them between my fingers to calm myself down, accidentally crushing it. When I touched the ground to pick up a new one, I got a flash of something like what I’d felt from Aaron, but fainter. I poked my fingers into the ground to touch the soil beneath the pine needles, and the feeling strengthened, revealing wary excitement and bloodlust.
Carefully, I touched the back of Aaron’s arm. He turned to look at my face, questioning, but then saw what I was doing. I searched for the emotion again, found it, then passed it through Connection to Aaron, similar to what I had done with my Protection fragment. His eyes widened, then darted left to right and back again, trying to make sense of the feeling.
I broke contact with him, then pointed out beyond our hiding spot. He nodded, then shook his head in awe. Through Connection, I had sensed not only what that person or creature felt, but also where they were while feeling it. I could sense their movement. Don’t I have to be touching skin directly to feel that? Perhaps the thing was barefoot. An animal then?
There was no way to know what was out there, but it wasn’t friendly. I reached for the emotion again. It grew more distant, passing us. Then, it stopped. I could feel surprise and a growing excitement. Whatever it was had sensed me.
Oh, crap. Lina, get ready to throw up a shield!
A shield?It was that weird, insistent voice again, and so loud that it was as if I shared mental space with Aaron. Was that even me thinking that?
I had no time to figure it out. My Connection fragment shoved back against me so hard that I physically fell backward, but Rogue pressed against my back, keeping me from falling to the ground. I grabbed Aaron’s arm again, both to steady myself and to jump into that shared mental space. Aaron sensed my fear and let me connect deep enough to allow telepathy.
It knows we’re here, I thought. It sensed me. I’m sorry.
He looked at me, eyes wide, then thought, Seleca.
Aaron was terrified, much more so than he had been during the dragon attack. I don’t know if I can protect you, Lina. You have to run. I’ll hold her off. Go!
I stared at him, uncertain. I couldn’t just leave him there. He wanted to be noble, but it felt wrong.
Go, Lina!
I’m not going anywhere, I thought to him. Tell me how to shield. There’s no time to argue, Aaron.
I. . . he closed his eyes, racking his brain. I think it’s the same as healing but directed inward. Seleca can invade your mind by force, even with Protection. She could turn me against you. Please, just run. I couldn’t live with myself if I hurt you.
I saw his memory then, buried as deep as a corpse and haunting him every day. I experienced the whole thing at once, as if time didn’t exist. It shot through me like a lightning bolt, only more painful.
He was in the school dormitory with his roommate, Ellis, who practiced Transformation by twisting metal ingots into rings and crossbow bolts. Ellis was only moderately talented but aimed to join the Metalworkers Guild. His future was bright.
Aaron lounged on his cot, reading a book. Sixteen years old now, he’d been hiding his Evocation for about a year and never practiced in front of others, especially not inside.
His roommate’s little brother, Ward, came in to watch Ellis practice. Ward was a brand-new underling and had only been there for a few weeks, so he was still in the honeymoon phase and eager to learn. His Transformation reservoir had manifested earlier than anyone had ever seen. He would be a powerful fragmentor, but right now he was just a cute kid with auburn hair, skinny as a sapling.
He looked like a miniature version of his brother, who was also a redhead, except Ward was energetic and friendly where Ellis was quiet and reserved. Aaron was fond of the boy and spent a few nights tutoring him in beginning fragment theory. He couldn’t do more than that because, as far as anyone knew, Aaron had no greater reservoir and would soon be forced to leave the school.
Aaron just wanted to finish his general studies so he could apply for a scribing apprenticeship with the Caravan Traders. He had always been among the best in reading and writing. No one cared, since he had no greater reservoir, but he would need an income while he waited for the supposed “dog girl,” if that ever happened.
A few minutes later, the door to the dormitory opened and Seleca slinked in without knocking. The three boys stopped what they were doing, shocked, then knelt before her, eyes lowered, as was required.
This was the Holy Daughter, the offspring of the goddess Eve, pure and perfect in every way, and more beautiful than the stars in the sky. Though he knew it was wrong, Aaron had fantasized about her more than once, about what her blue-green eyes would look like underneath him as he took her. Never mind that she was the most powerful fragmentor alive and could kill him with a flick of her wrist. She would kill him if she knew his thoughts and he would deserve it.
Seleca didn’t say anything at first, just walked around the boys as if selecting an animal to slaughter for dinner. She wore her usual yellow pants and blue shirt, not that anyone looked up to notice. Her boots scuffed the ground, making a soft noise. Ward, only eleven years old, giggled. He didn’t understand the danger they were in.
Seleca stopped to look at the boy, then glided over to stand next to Aaron. Without a word, she placed her hand on his shoulder, sliding it up to his neck to poke her fingers inside the collar of his shirt. Aaron jumped at the sudden touch, fighting to remain still. His skin tingled, and he felt himself becoming aroused but remained frozen, hoping to conceal it.
She tried to force her way into him using Connection, but he was protected, and she couldn’t get in deeper than superficial feelings. She could feel his arousal, though, and she made a sighing sound that only amplified the feeling. She laughed, then said in a husky voice, “Knock, knock. Let me in and maybe later I’ll return the favor.”
Though he sweated and his hands shook, Aaron didn’t open the door because he knew what Seleca would find in there. A moment of weakness and he’d undoubtedly end up as her next Absorption victim.
She let out a disappointed whine. “Oh. I guess I’ll just have to huff and puff and blow the door down.” He felt a sharp pinprick at the corners of his mind. He thought to himself, How bad could it be? Just let her in. It will be fine. She likes me. The image of Seleca pushing him down on his back and mounting him right there in his room flooded his mind. He imagined her pulling up his tunic and pressing her red lips into his stomach while he ran his fingers through her silky black hair, gently pressing her to go lower. He didn’t know if the fantasy was his or hers, but his resolve wavered.
Then she was inside him, digging aggressively into his mind. He lost his balance and fell to the ground. Seleca’s invasive manner always sucked the vitality out of people she connected with, Protection or none, and her Projection trance kept him from fighting back. She knelt over him, smiling, her hand now wrapped around his neck.
She spent several minutes looking at his life, searching for his secrets, and then she found it: his Evocationreservoir. He felt her shock for the briefest moment, and the interruption in the flow of Projection was enough to allow him to slam the door closed. She strained against his wall, but it took a tremendous amount of energy to push past someone’s defenses, and she couldn’t get back in using the same trick.
She squeezed his neck so hard that he thought his windpipe would be crushed. Then she whispered in his ear, “You have something I want, boy. How lucky for you that you will get to please me so thoroughly when you give it to me. I have been looking for that reservoir for a very long time.”
She released him, and he coughed harshly.
“Ward, come,” Seleca said, standing up. The boy looked up at her, likely surprised that she knew his name. He popped up from the ground, scooted toward her, knelt back down, and bowed his head. “What a good boy,” she said. “You may go, Ellis.”
Ellis hesitated, looking at his brother with wide eyes, then rose and left the room.
“Now, Aaron, I want you to sit up.” Aaron was groggy but did as he was told. He had already defied Seleca by not letting her back in. He had seen her strangle a girl nearly to death who had done almost the same thing. The girl was twelve. He shook just thinking about it, and, to his amazement, imagined escaping. He had seen people cry and beg for forgiveness, but they never tried to escape. That would be wrong. The goddess would never forgive that.
“Put your hand on Ward’s face,” she said. The boy looked up in alarm. Aaron didn’t move. Seleca, growing impatient, grabbed Ward roughly by the scruff of his neck. His eyes widened, then they rolled back in his head and closed, his body going limp. Seleca held him up like a rag doll, his face turned toward Aaron.
“Put your hand on his face,” she hissed, “or I’m going to crush his tiny little skull.”
Aaron did it, but a dark and disillusioned loathing blossomed in his mind, and his fantasy turned from sexual to violent. The Holy Daughter, flawless and beyond reproach, had a body that would burn brighter than his father’s barn if he wished it.
No. That would be wrong. I’m wrong. I should just run.He couldn’t believe his own thoughts. What was wrong with him? He shook his head, trying to clear it.
Seleca laid her hand on top of Aaron’s, smiling, and said, “Now, let’s see what you can do.”
The only thing Aaron remembered beyond that was the sound of Ward’s screams.
I looked into Aaron’s eyes, seeing the exposed pain and hatred he had for this monster. She made you burn him, I thought. It wasn’t your fault.
The knives he held glowed so brightly I feared they were in danger of melting. He looked at me, incensed but pleading.
I gave up on trying to hide from Seleca. “Aaron,” I said, “whatever happens, I will heal. I will not leave you. We’ll face her together. That’s how we win. It’s the only way we win.”
He squeezed his eyes closed, and I heard the handle of one of his knives crack. He opened his eyes again, took a deep breath, and stood up. I stood beside him.
Somewhere beyond the bushes, I heard that creepy ghost voice. “Avelina,” Psycho Snow White said. “I can feel you in there. I see you’ve learned how to use your reservoir. That’s good. There’s no need to be frightened. You did what you were supposed to do. You drew the dragon out of his lair. Now it’s time to come with me. You have been chosen for a greater purpose. Come with me now.”
Aaron looked at me, his eyes wide. I could see the wheels turning. I shook my head fiercely. “I’m with you, Aaron,” I whispered. “With you.” He relaxed a little, but I could feel the distrust radiating from him again.
Shit. This is not the time for that, I thought. I could hear Seleca getting closer and it would be worse to be attacked while backed into a corner. I touched Aaron’s arm. You can trust me, Aaron. If you trust in your mother’s predictions, then trust me. Can you do that? He hesitated, then nodded. Good, then we should just step out to face her. It’s still two against one.
No,he thought. There’s a dragon out there too. I can feel him.
I gazed at him, letting him make the decision. We stood motionless for a moment, and then Aaron nodded his head. I released Connection, and we set our packs down behind the trees and walked out to face her.
“There you are,” said Seleca. She smiled her crooked little smile but shifted her weight back and forth restlessly between her bare feet.
Bare feet. She was reaching out to feel us through the ground.
Behind her, silently perched on another fallen log, was a dragon, this one nearly twice as big as the last. Its glowing orange eyes fixed on Aaron, perhaps sensing him the way Aaron could.
“How lovely to see you again, Aaron. You know, my previous offer is still open to you. We don’t have to be enemies. My bed comes from Earth. It feels like sleeping on a cloud. Come to me, and all will be forgiven. I didn’t even like that man you murdered on your way out. You showed me that you could be one of us, Aaron. Come with me.” Seleca held out her hand to Aaron, beckoning him as if she spoke to a treasured lover.
Aaron growled low in his chest like an animal, then the handle of his knife creaked again. I wondered where Rogue was. Hiding under a tree? I hoped so.
Lina, she doesn’t know about your Protection reservoir. Listen to me, you have to start forming a shield.
“What?” I asked aloud. I wasn’t touching Aaron anymore, so the words hadn’t come from him. Was this a real voice in my head? Maybe the use of Connection had caused me to start hallucinating. This was not the best time to be going crazy. I needed to concentrate on the enemy.
Seleca must have thought my question was directed at her. “I’ve got five of the six Nobles,” she said, “and thanks to your lovely friend, Spirit, I’ve got all but two of the Unspeakables. You and your new lover have the only ones I still need. Come, there’s no reason for this to turn into a war. Why don’t you just let me take it, and I’ll let you steal away with your latest conquest.”
No, Lina! It’s me, Spirit. Please, I’m real. You have to listen.
“Spirit?”
Seleca smiled, still thinking I spoke to her. “Yes, she was understandably exhausted. It’s too bad about the twins, though. They were lovely.”
My heart dropped into my stomach. “You killed them,” I whispered. “You killed Spirit.”
Now, Lina! The shield!
For an endless moment, shock and grief paralyzed me. Spirit was dead? I couldn”t wrap my head around it.
Spirit, I thought. It can’t be. My eyes welled with tears.
Lina! a stern voice barked. Shield now. Cry later. Or join me over here. Your choice!
I didn’t know if I was losing my mind or if the voice was real. What I did know was that Spirit had always had an eerie way of predicting the future, and she’d changed her own name to Spirit. I had never thought much of that choice, but it made an insane kind of sense now. Spirit must have had Precognition, like Aaron’s mother. Seleca had discovered this on our walk through the woods and killed her to steal it. Somehow, Spirit had predicted her own death, and now her ghost shouted instructions into my mind like a pissed-off drill sergeant.
I feared that this was some kind of stress-induced psychiatric episode, but in my crazed state, I had to assume Seleca told the truth about murdering my friends. Based on that assumption, I made the sanest choice I could think of. I listened to the voice in my head.
“What do I do?” I asked.
Place your hand on your heart, and push Protection into yourself, thought Spirit.
I pushed my grief aside and did as I was told just as Seleca turned to her dragon and placed a hand on its wing. The dragon made a strange warbling noise and launched itself into the air, kicking up a gust of wind that whipped up Seleca’s hair and clothes. Then, the dragon disappeared, blinking out of existence as if it had been a hologram.
I closed my eyes to concentrate, directing my intention into my own body. My chest vibrated, tightening painfully. Then a sharp pain exploded in my rib cage. I grunted, pushing the fragment out like a mother giving birth. The sensation ceased when the force expanded beyond my body, and I opened my eyes to discover a sphere of aqua-blue light growing around me, much like the entrance to the bridge had that first night. The difference now was that I was both the source and the destination. I glowed with that same soft, calming blue, and little firefly specks of multicolored lights sparked out of different parts of my body and were captured in a stream that swirled within the sphere.
The colors were a strange combination of green, magenta, blood-red, and aqua, and they all had a different texture and consistency. The green streaked around the sphere in squiggly lines, as if it were a vine sending out new shoots into the air around us, then disappearing like the tail of a green comet. The magenta lights looked like a tight swarm of flies, trailing smoke as they flew around. The red lights resembled a roiling sea of blood caught in a whirlpool.
The aqua lights were more solid than the rest, like they were actually aquamarine crystals appearing and disappearing in the air, reflecting a bright blue-green light that created a halo around all the other colors. I only controlled the aqua-blue lights, however. The others were pulled forward as if sucked into an energetic circulatory system.
Other than the bridge, this was my first time seeing fragments directly and, despite my terror and anguish, I gasped in wonder at the beauty of their power. Previously, my own reservoirs had been no more than an idea, but now I had visual evidence. I had glowed, sure, but this was far beyond that. I could no longer deny what I saw or banish it to the back of my mind to deal with later. Fragments were real. I was powerful, and here was proof.
As quick as lightning, exhilaration struck down my terror and I nearly laughed out loud.
Encouraged, I pushed the Protection fragment out of my chest, observing that the task of maintaining the sphere was easy. Whereas healing Aaron had felt like blowing up a balloon, this was more like blowing a bubble through a bubble wand. It barely required any force, but rather a delicate touch that could burst if I was too aggressive.
The sphere expanded out from me and bumped into Aaron, who stared up at the sky, holding his knife ready. He hadn’t noticed my Protection sphere, though I didn’t see how he could have missed the bright swirl of colors. The shield pushed him away from me, and he would be trapped outside of it. I couldn’t have that.
I stretched out experimentally and found that I could reach my hand through the shield, so I grabbed his wrist and pulled him into the sphere with me. His eyes widened and darted all around, apparently now able to see what I saw from inside the shield.
“No!” Seleca screamed, her eyes widening as she caught on to what was happening. Spirit was right. Seleca hadn’t known I was protected. She’d known about my Connectionreservoir but not this.
The sphere wrapped around Aaron’s chest as Seleca pulled a weapon out of a deep pocket in her voluminous yellow pants. It was a gun. In fact, if I wasn’t mistaken, it was my father’s navy Glock 17, the gun he taught me to shoot with. That weapon was the real threat. The dragon had just been a distraction.
I concentrated on bringing up the shield faster to expand around our entire bodies, praying it could stop bullets, but it wouldn’t be fast enough. A manic grin spread over Seleca’s face as she aimed her weapon at my head. Apparently, I was the juicier target, or maybe she still had other plans for Aaron.
Just as I had that thought, Rogue scrambled out from under the tree, directly behind Seleca. He lunged at her as she pulled the trigger, biting her right in the ass. Her arm jerked to the side as Rogue barreled into her, causing her to miss her shot. He weighed more than her and knocked her off-balance, but she was strong. She shook him off and kicked him in the face, shoving him back. Then she pointed the gun and fired three shots.
Rogue fell and did not get up again.
I screamed, just as I had the first time I thought she’d killed my dog by throwing him onto the bridge to Monash, and the emotion almost burst the delicate shield.
Aaron sheathed his knives and wrapped his arms around me.
“Steady,” he said. The heat radiating from his body should have been intense enough to burn me. Instead, it sank into me, feeding the shield. I watched as a new color joined the spectral lights. It was a brilliant vermilion and looked less like points of light than it did a streak of orange and red flame, surging around the sphere and engulfing us.
Seleca turned back toward us and fired, but it was too late. Rogue had bought us the time we needed, and the shield expanded around us, locking us into a protective bubble. The impact of the bullets on my shield sounded like a metal bat banging on something an inch from my head. The vibrations were so painfully strong that I almost lost my hold on the shield, but Aaron tightened his grip around me, and we held.
The bullets must have ricocheted off the shield and hit the dragon because a split second later its corpse crashed into us from above. The weight and momentum were too great, and Aaron and I were both knocked viciously to the ground. Aaron’s protective embrace never wavered, and together we withstood the impact, maintaining the shield.
The silence that stretched after the attack lay over us like a woolen blanket. My heart still galloped in my chest, and my ears rang. I panted hard, trying not to weep and failing miserably. She had killed Spirit. She had killed Rogue. She had my father’s Glock, which meant she might have killed everyone else at the house, too. It was all too much.
Aaron held me for a moment, and then he whispered, “Lina, we have to get up. Come on.”
The dragon’s body had fallen on top of us but then slid off the shield like it was an oil slick. I looked around but didn’t see Seleca. Fury bubbled up from my heart and out into the shield, and rage tears surged down my face as a fire exploded inside me. I needed to see Seleca’s face dented and covered in blood.
Aaron got his feet under him and pulled me up. I didn’t feel tired at all from holding the shield, but Aaron looked like the effort of getting up had drained him. He was unsteady and leaned on me a little. I didn’t want to risk him collapsing and accidentally falling outside of the protective sphere, so I held onto him, focusing my intention on separating his fragment from mine. I imagined myself flicking off a light switch, closing the link between our two fragment reservoirs.
His energy contribution dwindled, and the fiery vermilion lights in the shield flickered and went out, leaving the original swirl of green, aqua, magenta, and that strange blood-red. Aaron regained some strength, and some of my rage drained away along with the Evocation fragment, though it didn’t stop entirely.
Aaron peered down at me and nodded, then we looked in every direction. Seleca was nowhere to be seen. I squatted down, touching the soil with my fingers in an attempt to locate her. My own shield blocked the attempt. I looked back in the direction that Seleca had stood and saw Rogue sprawled on the ground.
“Let’s go to him,” I said.
Aaron nodded. We walked toward my friend, holding hands. I looked down at Rogue, tears dripping down my cheeks. It was hard to tell where the bullets had landed because his body was a mass of blood and fur. His eyes were closed. I wondered how long it had taken him to die. Did he suffer? Did Spirit suffer? A sob broke from my chest.
“Rogue, I’m sorry,” I said, my voice breaking.
Rogue cracked his eyes open a sliver at my voice, lifted his head to look at me, then slumped back down. Aaron and I both jerked in surprise.
“Rogue!” I yelled. “Aaron, I can heal him.” I prepared to release the shield so I could grab him.
“Wait,” barked Aaron, searching over one shoulder, then the other. “She could be hiding under a Reflectionveil, like the dragon, waiting for you to bring the shield down so she can shoot us with her crossbow.”
I had no time to correct him. “The shield is too big now. I can’t reach him. Can you reach through the shield and pull him in?”
“I don’t know,” he said. Aaron reached his hand out, but it pressed against the shield from the inside and couldn’t penetrate through.
“We can move without ripping up the ground. Maybe we could just walk over him.” We tried, and again, the shield bumped up against Rogue. Sweat dripped down my forehead, and I wiped it away with a shaky hand. “I have to bring the shield down before it’s too late,” I said, my voice rising almost to a squeak.
“Bring my reservoir back into the shield,” he said and pulled me close, hugging me. His heat radiated out again, but it was much more subdued, as if the fragment itself was depleted. I hugged him back, tightly, concentrating my intention on bringing the heat into my body. His scent filled my nose, and I breathed him in greedily. He bent his head over mine, doing the same. We stood there together for several seconds before I accepted that it wasn’t working.
“Look at me,” he said. His hand came to my jaw, and he angled my face up toward his. His dark brown beard was a little longer and scruffier than yesterday. His hair had come loose from the tie and was now tangled and matted with sweat. I pushed it away from his eyes. They were a nearly translucent blue and reflected the light more than they should. I looked into those eyes and he into mine, feeling heat stirring beneath his skin.
I didn’t think, I just wanted to pull that heat inside me. The heat wanted to be inside me, so it came. The swirl of colors shifted to add Aaron’s bright vermilion. He exhaled slowly, then released all but my hand, bending down to grab Rogue by the scruff of his neck and pulling him into the sphere.
I closed my eyes briefly, relief washing over me. Aaron had guessed that if we connected in that way that brought his Evocation into my shield, he would be able to permeate the barrier. Aaron’s ability to stay calm in an emergency would save Rogue, provided I could heal him.
“Can I even do this while holding a shield?” I asked.
“No,” said Seleca from behind us, “you can’t.” I whipped my head around to see her holding the gun on us. “And you also can’t hold that shield forever. Eventually, your reservoir will run out of fragment, and the shield will fall. It’s too late. Your dog is dead, and you’re about to join him.”