A mix of fire and lightning shot out from either side of me, and I dodged, throwing up two black orbs to absorb the energy. Flame spiraled into one, the red competing with the darkness, while blue sparks spasmed around the edge of the other. Light fighting darkness, and bent space fighting gravity.
I clenched my teeth as the Mimics circled, unable to move as they refused to let up, sneers forming on their mouths as they knew they had me trapped. For a second, I dropped my fight over gravity to try to launch an offense and immediately started floating upwards—and trying to drop my other defenses brought the flames and electricity dangerously close. While they were not winning, we had reached a stalemate.
But that was all they needed.
Only twenty yards away, Lacit approached, turning the ring on his finger as his smile trumped their sneers.
“I have to thank you,” he said, pausing outside of my reach. The light spilled over onto his face—a band of red and blue, separated by a vertical line of darkness that ran directly down his nose, as if it were ripping him in two. “This place is far deeper than I imagined. It was your smell that brought us here—perhaps, without it, we never would have reached the city at all.”
“Last I checked, you still hadn’t reached it,” I said through gritted teeth.
“Ah, but that is a simple matter of time. Meanwhile, I have you.” He laughed, then took another step forward. “Containing the mighty has always been a problem; it’s so much easier to bend their minds than their powers, just like the others who join our army. Each day, we grow in number, each day, we grow stronger. But now, with the help of four others, your power is contained. You have bowed. And your mind—well, we have the best for that. Siri won’t be locked away forever, and what relish she will take in showing you the light. ”
“Oh, is that what you call it?” I retorted back, my voice strained. “I’d rather keep my eyes shut.”
His hand went to the ring on his finger once more, and he tapped it as he spoke.
“There was a time when I was like you. I resisted as well, back when things were murky in my own mind. But sometimes, you have to be cut before you can heal. Surgeries require incisions.” His fingers then reached upwards, tracing the scar that wound along his face to his throat. “When I met Siri, long ago, she gave me this with my own fingernail. So I could remember what she cut out of me, she said. And she stopped me just before I reached the artery, just before I took my life. It was she who kept me alive, and it was love back then, young love, the type that never truly leaves your memory. ”
His eyes drifted as his fingers reached the end of the scar, and he spoke almost absent-mindedly.
“And with the singing, you forget everything else that used to matter.”
Chapter 98
My breath caught as I took in his words, and as I stared as his face, I caught a reflection of myself in the steel grey of his eyes. Without my friends at the academy, that could have been me. I shuddered, realizing that if he had his way, I would be competing against Blake to become the next Lacit, the next perfect citizen.
Now, pinned down beneath the combination of powers that could hold me even without Lacit’s leering gaze, I faced that fear head on.
“Now, here’s what is going to happen,” said Lacit, his voice low, deadly. “I came to the jungle expecting to leave with one weapon, using troops loaned to me by those above. And now they will be so pleased that I have two. You’re going to be retrained, rebuilt, stronger than you can imagine. With you, we’ll do more than change the world—we’ll raze it, so we can create it anew.”
My eyes widened as I thrashed, but the movement allowed the fire and electricity closer, and destabilized the balance of gravity holding me in place, only locking me tighter under the Mimic’s control. I turned my head, searching for others to help, but they were far away, guarding the wall—by rushing the enemy, I’d effectively created a void between us. And the enemy had filled that void like a wave, leaving me as an island stranded among violent waters.
Lacit reached a hand, and the earth that was already under low gravity buckled, a trapezoidal chunk of it the size of a car lifting upwards and carrying me with it. Around me, the four Mimics started walking with him, keeping me tethered as he departed the battle, heading to somewhere he could keep me contained. Perhaps there was a Special waiting to put me to sleep, or to paralyze me, or nullify my powers in another way until the battle was over. Or maybe he would rely on the four Mimics keeping me pinned—in which case, I had a chance.
“What you see here is only a fraction of our strength,” said Lacit as his forces clashed again with the mastodons that tore through their lines. But this time, his forces anticipated the attack, and one of the great beasts crashed to the earth, one of its legs breaking with a crunch from a Special swinging a tree trunk like a club. Atop its back, the Transient leapt into the awaiting army, attacking twice before disappearing into the other side, her enraged screams ripping through the battle. And where she had fallen, the army advanced.
“You see, these are the new recruits, those from the academies across the world, cultivated at a rate slow enough that their disappearances are acceptable by society. A child here, a child there—with no parents, who is to notice? And the others, those that the police force so eagerly accepted among their ranks as easy labor, they lie dormant. But not just them—there are those existing in the government. In the universities. Everywhere from the lowly sewer worker to the investment banker. All waiting for our call, all prepared to act. Highest esteemed are those who came to us by their own intuition—those who I hoped you could be, the ones who saw the light of their own accord. Who did not have to be retaught, reconditioned.”
We had reached the back of his army, two Healers parting to allow us to pass, their fingers trailing along one of the Mimics that held me to instantly stitch together scrapes I had inflicted along his temple.
“What is it that you want here, then?” I asked, flaring one of the dark orbs on my left to drag a passing thorn bush across the freshly healed mimic, his lips pursing in annoyance as the cuts reopened. “Why travel all this way for a tribe separated from the rest of humanity?”
“Those that control the powers control the world. It’s that simple, and a theme that has dominated history. We play the long, slow game—we take the young Specials in who have nowhere else to go. But so long as there are the powerful to oppose us, that’s not enough. We must capture the locations too, we must monopolize the strongest abilities until only we hold them. What makes this location unique is only a starting point—and with it, our next wave of Specials twenty years from now will be unstoppable.”
“Hah! Your best plan is going to take twenty years? No wonder you’ve gotten nothing done!” I snapped back, but my voice was thin. If they were prepared to fight twenty years, then they were dedicated indeed.
“After we’re finished burning, someone has to sweep up the ashes. We’ll need the reinforcements,” he said, his voice too calm, staring back at me. And I realized what he meant. One year to destroy. Nineteen to rebuild.
“Here, this area shall work!” he declared just as we reached the far edge of the troops, near a rocky boulder outcrop that jagged from the forest floor at the base of a hill. He set my mound down, then stretched a hand towards the boulders, dropping six around me with only fine gaps between them, slivers of light peeking through the cracks. Above them, he settled the largest boulder, far outsized compared to the others, the entire structure groaning and rocking as it settled.
“This is a house of cards, build from boulders,” he said to me, stepping back to admire his work. “Move any of these six pillars, weaken them at all, and the top comes crashing down before you can move. For now, it is perfectly balanced—but so much as trying to drill into the boulder above you is enough to destabilize the entire structure. And if you try to dig, well…” He turned to the two Mimics with the fire and electric powers. “If he digs, I want there to be no difference between him and the dirt be
fore I come back.”
They nodded, and my heart fell as I examined my cage, feeling the rock shift again under a slight poke from him to illustrate his point. Trapped, I could either try to escape at the risk of killing myself or I could wait until the end of the battle to make a stand. Or maybe, with luck, I could create a hole large enough for me to pass through above me, assuming that moving the orbs holding the electricity and fire at bay did not kill me instantly.
But there was one other option. I could make a final stand—I could take out the Mimics he was using to enter the other side with one final strike, one that certainly meant my death. If they were his only Mimics, that would foil his plans, and maybe I could even take him with me with enough surprise.
I gathered my power, preparing to strike the moment that he turned his back, and tears flooded to my eyes as I thought about what I was leaving behind. Arial, somewhere high above me, whose hand my closed fist had memorized. Darian, trapped high above, and in peril no matter the outcome of the battle. Lucio, who would have to return the news to my mother. And Lola, who if my plan failed, would fail her entire tribe.
I funneled the doubt and anger as the dark orbs swelled in size, drawing in wind, the structure shaking. As my thoughts turned to violence, Larissa’s face floated in front of me, and at that moment, I no longer felt the guilt at having taken her arm—rather, I felt a vague sense of regret that I had let it hold me back. That perhaps if I had put that event behind me quicker, I would have grown stronger. That I could have been strong enough to match Lacit in an outright battle.
I screamed as I prepared to fling my orbs outwards, then froze, realizing that I was not the only voice that screamed. That there was another approaching, one filled with even more rage than mine, with not the energy of a trapped rat but an attacking predator.
And as a ripple of orange and white stripes rushed past the cracks in the stone, I understood the words, just as Ennia collided with Lacit.
“For Lilac!”
Chapter 99
“Nobody hurts my creations! That wing is going to take weeks to heal!” she screeched as he was thrown backwards, and the Mimics’ attention were torn from me, their stunned faces tracking her as Lacit swiftly recovered. With a flick of his finger, dozens rock shards leapt towards her like arrowheads, but she threw her hands downwards, her tiger roaring as the air itself morphed to porous bone that absorbed the impact.
With the Mimics’ attention diverted, I threw my orbs upwards in a single motion, crashing them together as I stretched space itself, my thoughts turning to the same sheet of blackness I had produced when Lacit tried to shoot us out of the air. With a ripple, it crackled into existence, pulverizing the rock into dust as it rushed upwards, then exploded in a reverberation that shook the earth. A negative wave of force hit me with the flash, dragging me upwards nearly six feet before I could stabilize it, but the nearby Mimics were not nearly so lucky.
The shifting gravitational field launched them upwards like a trampoline, their limbs flailing as they crashed into the branches high above, clinging to the greenery with white knuckles while their legs dangled below, their feet searching for purchase on nothing but air. Even with my power, they would not be coming back to the earth easily.
True to Lacit’s word, the stone prison crumbled around me, and I leapt left to avoid a rolling boulder that careened past, rocking into a divot it created in the soil. Above, three jagged rocks slammed together to form a tripod, while a final monolith clipped me in the shoulder, sending me reeling as I jumped away from the wreckage. I landed on my side on the forest floor, my teeth clacking together with the impact, my face turned to see Ennia as she strode forwards against Lacit.
With a laugh, he swiped downwards, and two trees cracked, slashing towards Ennia in a mighty cross with her at the center. Her tiger darted backwards, but it was not quick enough—the shadows of the trees had already found their mark, and the rest was sure to follow. From behind Ennia, another figure stepped forwards, one I didn’t recognize but wore the same Blender robes as her, his hands catching the descending trunks. The instant of contact, the wood jellified into water, sloshing down over Ennia with no impact as she turned to the offensive once more, and I climbed back to my feet.
On the other side of her, another robed figure darted forwards, raising his hands to the branches high above, where the leaves turned to emeralds, their weight parting them from the branches in a rain of razor gemstones. Before Lacit noticed the transformation, a single leaf slashed down his forearm, leaving a crimson line of blood on his skin. A mar more on pride than body.
His fingers curled as the remaining gems froze in midair, orienting themselves towards Ennia shooting like possessed arrowheads. In an instant, I stepped forwards, launching two fresh dark orbs into the onslaught, absorbing the projectiles before ripping them towards Lacit. He caught them, and with a flash, they exploded, but this time, he was ready, his strength overpowering the shockwave and sending it reverberating back towards us.
Then he drew himself to his full height, throwing his hands downwards as he pulled in a sharp breath. Trees around us shattered, erupting into splinters as long as my forearm, spinning as they were whipped around us. Like a tornado they whirled, cutting the three of us off from the outside world, moving too quickly to blend and too much matter for me to destroy. Just barely visible through the whistling wreckage, Lacit leered, his face contorted in rage, his scar a bright purple.
As the shards raced about us, the internal cone shrank tighter, and the debris formed the image of Lacit’s own face in front of us, laughing with molars of bark and eyes of pulp, the teeth gnashing as we huddled towards the center, ready to be impaled.
But just as the first bits of debris started to catch on my sleeve, tearing through the fabric like a rotary saw, another person lunged out of the forest. Unlike the blenders, or myself, or any other special I had seen, he used no projectile to attack Lacit.
Rather, he punched him square across the temple.
The tornado disbanded, arcs slamming into the trees to embed the splinters, mulching the ground in a fifty-foot radius. Lacit turned to ace his new attacker, his eye already starting to swell as the man’s fists raised once more to prepare for a second assault. He bounced on the balls of his feet, challenging Lacit, his face turned away from us. Streaks of paint covered him as he lunged again, aiming a second blow at Lacit’s stomach, but Lacit only sneered, reaching leftwards with his power to pull a flat piece of stone in front of him in protection.
But the stone, a mere ten feet away, did not leap at his call. Rather, it quivered, as if deliberating, considering staying right where it was. Then it moved a single inch before settling back down, like a defiant dog straining at the end of its leash, as the man’s fist sank deep into Lacit’s gut.
Chapter 100
Lacit’s mouth fell open—though from the defiant stone or from the blow that drove the shocked breath from his lips, I could not tell. In a panic, he reached upwards again, this time to tear another tree down upon his attacker, but the tall trunk barely bent, the tip turning to stare down in defiance before straightening up again. His eyes went wide as his attacker stiffened for the third punch, the man’s weight shifting in a fluid motion that spoke of someone with years of fighting experience.
Before the blow could land, a crackle sounded from the branches far above as one of the Mimics launched a lightning strike, the bolt arcing down towards the newcomer with enough force to kill. By instinct, he hurled himself to the side, crashing through the bushes in a roll that left the plants behind him charred. In that instant, Lacit recovered, his face still drawn, staring at his hands. With a quick glance, he evaluated the four of us standing there, then back the rustling bushes, before turning on his heel to flee.
“Vegetarian tigers will still eat people!” shouted Ennia after him as I looked around the clearing for the man whose face I had not seen, before she turned to me. “And don’t think you’re off the hook either! When she found
her way home, she was half dead!”
Barely two trees stood where there had once been a dozen, and the ground was a mixture of scorch marks, fresh mulch, and broken boulders. I had time only for a few moments of staring before Zeke arrived from where Ennia had come, holding a machete with several suspiciously deep nocks from use along the blade.
“Where the hell have you been?” I demanded as he careened past us. “And who the hell was that?”
“That? That was nobody,” he said, his voice low enough to be a growl and in a tone that asserted there was nothing left to be said. “And I was getting you help. Ennia here did not take the news of her tiger’s injury lightly and nearly came to kill you instead. Besides, you should know by now, boy, that I don’t like to be killed. Inside the tree fort? Good chance of getting killed. Battling that insanity? Greater chance of getting killed. And now? Now it’s our best chance at getting killed.”
“Best chance? Don’t you mean worst chance?” I asked, staring at the bushes where the intruder had disappeared but never returned.
“I mean best, as in take out a life insurance policy, but this is unavoidable. Now, you know the drill—in my footsteps! The four of you, don’t stray off. We’re going to need to be quick.” He started forwards, and Ennia paused atop her tiger, which I now realized was Lilac, and had orange gauze strapped across the wounded wing.
“You heard him!” I snapped at her as she glared, her hand still on the wounded beast’s side. “Let’s go, keep up!”
I darted after him, feeling the tiger’s hot breath on my heels, and hearing the footsteps of the two other Blenders. Zeke quickly turned at a right angle, directly back towards Lola’s tribe and through the frenzy of battle. Before us, over a hundred Specials stood, their powers activated, each advancing on the wall.
Their attention was focused on their attack, not expecting an intrusion from behind.
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