The Complete Harvesters Series

by Luke R. Mitchell

  Whatever he saw on her still body made him go pale and shaky at the knees.

  Gada watched, fangs bared in what looked to be a sneer.

  Rachel had to get his attention, had to give Haldin time to get Elise to safety.

  “Hey!” she shouted.

  She pelted the side of Gada’s face with a hefty fireball and tried again telepathically.

  “Hey, asshole!”

  She gave him a firm telekinetic uppercut on the snout, moving closer.

  Gada rocked back, but didn’t seem to particularly care.

  Haldin didn’t appear to be noticing much of anything around him. His jaw was clenched, his eyes filling with tears as he reached down to touch Elise’s head. Alton was crawling toward them, his severed legs dragging behind.

  Alton reached Elise, and Haldin stood, rigid with a fury like Rachel had never seen before. It radiated off him in waves, the air crackling around him as he prepared to unleash untold hell on Gada.

  And Gada simply watched all the while, looking, if anything, excited about what was coming. The sick son of a bitch.

  A shrill screech pierced the air from where Krogoth had attacked the tentacular monstrosity.

  Then, Krogoth’s thought, tinged with urgency. “Rachel Cross!”

  She tore her eyes away from Haldin and Gada in time to see the creature hurl Krogoth straight for the farther of the flaming pits.

  She reached out, not taking the time to think about it.

  He was far, farther than she was used to working any serious channeling, but she found him in her senses and gave him a hard telekinetic shove, enough to carry him over the pit rather than into it.

  It took more out of her than it would have at a reasonable distance, but she turned back for Haldin, refusing to fail him again for something as surmountable as channeling fatigue.

  Too late.

  It wasn’t hard to imagine how Haldin hadn’t seen it coming. He was out of his mind with grief-stricken rage. And the wriggling bastard had moved so fast—one second tossing Krogoth to the fire, the next, ensnaring Haldin from behind with half a dozen tentacles at once.

  Haldin cried out, thrashing against the creature as it pulled him smoothly away from Elise. It was no good. The tentacles gave no more than if they’d been solid bands of iron.

  “Brother,” Gada hissed.

  The voice that answered from within the swirling mass of tentacles was like sheets of rusted metal scraping together.

  “Brother…”

  Rachel wanted to cry out for help—for Jarek, for Krogoth. For anyone.

  But there wasn’t time.

  So Rachel reached for the energy her exhausted body wanted nothing to do with as Haldin snarled a helpless curse and Gada, baring his fangs in a wide smile, started toward Elise.

  26

  Rachel was pointing her staff at Kul’Gada and preparing to throw every ounce of force she could muster to get the bastard away from Elise when a flicker of movement to the left caught her eye, and a large, dark figure came blurring in toward the Kul with impossible speed.

  She almost cried out in relief as she realized it was Jarek.

  Jarek planted his feet several yards out from Gada and drew his sword as his considerable momentum carried him the rest of the way in a muddy slide.

  Gada began to turn, no doubt hearing him coming.

  Jarek was quicker.

  In one smooth motion, he slid to a halt and brought the sword down full power on the Kul’s heavy tail.

  A flash of blue light and a hiss of steam.

  Gada let loose a gut-wrenching shriek and spun on Jarek with a savage, bladed backhand, but Jarek had already leapt back and out of reach.

  Rachel saw with grim satisfaction that the rear third of Gada’s tail now lay on the muddy ground, completely severed.

  “C’mon you ugly bastard,” Jarek called as Drogan and Lietha caught up and joined him on either side. “I’ve got a tale for you.” He tilted his helmeted head. “No, wait—I can do better.”

  Rachel didn’t have time to process the exasperation and relief before the tidal wave of energy building behind Gada drew her attention.

  Haldin.

  A cry that barely sounded human rang out, followed by a sound like a dozen shotgun blasts in a small room, and the tentacled thing holding Haldin stumbled backward with a scream like a discordant chorus of fiddles from hell.

  Haldin’s knees buckled as he hit the ground, clearly exhausted after whatever channeling he’d just worked. That didn’t stop him from crawling toward Elise the instant he was free, a few amputated tentacles still dangling loosely from his arms.

  Rachel started for them at a run.

  Alton looked up from whatever he was doing to Elise’s wounds and growled something at Haldin, which the Enochian seemed to ignore. Alton pointed emphatically toward the tentacular monstrosity, which Rachel realized now could only be another Kul—and a Kul that appeared to have recovered from its shock, at that.

  It was starting to glide forward when Johnny and Phineas pushed in through the surrounding chaos, planted themselves in front of their fellow Enochians, and opened fire.

  The Enochian artillery filled the rainy air with rapid, rhythmic pulsing sounds, quickly joined by a furious scream from the creature. It lashed out, simultaneously smacking the rifle from Johnny’s hands and Phineas from his burly feet.

  Rachel drew up beside them, leveled her staff at the swirling mess of tentacles, and fed the thing a heavy column of force right at center mass.

  The creature didn’t fly so much as roll back a dozen yards, tumbling through something like a perpetual cartwheel, its tentacles working quickly to roll it smoothly through the motion. It came to rest back on its thickest tentacles, utterly uninjured and ready to attack again.

  Before it could, Krogoth landed beside her with a deep thud, followed shortly by one of his raknoth.

  “What the fuck is that thing?” Rachel asked him quietly.

  “Kul’Armin,” Krogoth said, tilting his head to the Kul in acknowledgment and flexing his clawed fingers in anticipation.

  “Right…”

  So they’d scored two Kuls for the price of one. Fucking fantastic.

  With her reinforcements stalking forward to confront Armin, Rachel risked a glance over her shoulder, to where Jarek, Drogan, and Lietha were doing their best to corral Gada.

  Her heart leapt as Jarek raised his sword to parry a series of Gada’s swipes, her mind flashing back to the sight of the Kul tearing through his previous blade, but her enchantments did their job. On each strike, Gada’s enormous claws slowed considerably before they impacted the blade, almost as if they’d encountered an invisible body of super viscous goo along the last foot of their path.

  Kul’Armin must not have had much to say to Krogoth, because, when Rachel turned back, the tentacular Kul was surging forward, tentacles working in bizarre synchrony to propel him as smoothly over the ground as if he were hovering.

  Krogoth sidestepped the rush and landed a hard claw rake that removed a few smaller tentacles from the Kul’s back.

  Krogoth’s underling wasn’t as fast. The raknoth roared as the Kul caught onto one of his arms. He thrashed wildly, scoring a few hits but doing little to prevent the inevitable as the Kul reeled him closer, wrapping him more tightly.

  Rachel tried telekinetically prying the tentacles off and yanking the raknoth free, but Kul’Armin’s grasp was too strong, too pervasive.

  She focused down to one of the smaller tentacles, no wider than a finger, and, with a surprising amount of effort, pulled until it tore free from Armin.

  Rewarded with a small yelp, Rachel moved on to the next one.

  At the same time, Krogoth harried the Kul from all sides, light on his feet despite the long fight and foot-sucking mud. Another raknoth joined him from the fray, desperately seeking to free his shrieking kin from Armin’s grasp.

  It wasn’t enough. For every tentacle they removed, another took its place until,
finally, the ensnared raknoth’s head came free with a sickening tearing sound.

  Armin tossed the lifeless body into the adjacent burning pit and the severed head at Krogoth’s feet.

  Rachel expected Krogoth to roar and charge, but, instead, he and his underling only circled Armin, dividing the Kul’s attention and watching for any opening with smoldering red eyes.

  A furious roar to the left demanded Rachel’s attention.

  She traced it to Drogan, who faced Gada side-by-side with Jarek, eyes burning brighter crimson than she’d ever seen. Behind them, Lietha lay torn open in the rain and the mud, either dead or too wounded to move.

  Phineas was carrying Elise away from the fight now, Alton crawling leglessly after them. Haldin watched them go, paralyzed, oblivious to Johnny’s words as the Enochian held him firmly across the chest and spoke something in his ear.

  Every way Rachel looked, they were losing, and if she didn’t do something and do it fast, they were all going to be dead—likely within the next minute or two.

  A streak of lightning licked at the dark sky, momentarily illuminating every single glob of rain and all the other bloody details around her. With it struck a solution, and as the accompanying thunderclap filled the air, Rachel found herself grinning a mirthless grin.

  Jarek apparently had a similar thought in the wake of the lightning. “We sure could use some Lady Zeus action right now, Rache,” he called as he dodged clear of a charging Gada.

  “I’ve got some Lady Zeus for you,” Rachel muttered, a fresh surge of adrenaline buzzing through her head as she prepared for what would surely be an exhausting last ditch effort.

  But maybe she didn’t have to do it alone.

  “Hal,” she cried.

  No response.

  She beamed the thought at him like a battering ram.

  “HAL!”

  He might as well have been catatonic.

  Johnny, coming to a similar conclusion, released Haldin with a loud curse and turned his weapon on Gada.

  Rachel saved her curses, gripped her staff for support, and closed her eyes, casting out her senses.

  It was there all around them, a veritable ocean of ions, dancing and swirling on the stormy winds, casting tentative but persistent tendrils down from the clouds, seeking a ground, a path of least resistance.

  So Rachel focused on Gada’s position in her senses and gave it to them.

  A brilliant blue-white bolt of lightning flashed through her eyelids, searing through Gada’s back and lancing into the clouds above, the rushing crack of thunder instantaneous and nearly deafening in such close proximity.

  Charred flesh and ozone wafted to her senses as Gada dropped to a knee with a deep roar.

  Behind her, Armin gave an angry shriek of his own.

  Rachel did her best to ignore it and reach through the channeling fatigue to prepare another strike.

  Had she somehow been manipulating this amount of charge within a range of a few yards, it would have been an effort, but a manageable one. As it was, exerting her will over so far a distance and so wide an area, the first strike had left her head spinning. The second one wasn’t going to be any easier, but she gritted her teeth and forced it down anyway.

  Another tremendous boom. Another roar, this one clearly pained.

  Darkness.

  Cool wetness on her knees, her chest, the side of her face.

  “Rache!”

  Jarek’s distant cry, strained as if he were still fighting.

  “Hey! Get your shit together, Haldin!”

  Jarek again.

  She opened her eyes to find she’d collapsed in the mud.

  Had she been out? Or simply fallen over from exhaustion? She couldn’t tell.

  A little ways off, Gada fought on against Jarek and Drogan, his back and right flank thoroughly charred black. His fighting was still ferocious, though he moved as if he’d seen better days. Then again, so did Jarek and Drogan.

  Johnny had circled around and was dragging Lietha’s body back from the fight, and—

  “Rachel.”

  Haldin’s voice.

  She looked up and found him standing over her, but he wasn’t looking at her as she’d expected. His attention was fixed on Kul’Gada, cold rage plastered across his face.

  “The lightning,” Rachel sent, her head still whirling. “It was working. Can you…?”

  He dropped unceremoniously to the mud next to her and reached out his hand, his eyes never leaving Gada.

  “Together?”

  She reached out and grabbed his hand. Their fingers intertwined, and Haldin’s presence washed over her, strong and resolute and brimming with barely-contained fury.

  “Together,” she sent, taking strength in his resolve.

  She’d touched his mind once before, when the Enochians had first arrived on Earth and she’d needed to verify the truth of their story, but that had been different. Intimate, yes, but still a one-way arrangement, with Rachel in control.

  Now, though, she was pretty sure that wasn’t going to cut it. For them to do this together, to share in each other’s strength… She’d never deliberately opened herself to anyone that completely. It wasn’t a welcome thought.

  But the sight of Jarek narrowly dodging Gada’s blades reminded her that that didn’t matter one damn bit right now.

  So she dropped the wall between her mind and Haldin’s, and he did the same.

  Sights, sounds, feelings, even thoughts—everything doubled, pouring through her in an overwhelming rush. Most overwhelming of all, though, was the guilty rage coursing through Haldin’s veins.

  At first, the heat of it made her flinch, but as their separate beings swirled together into a singular stream, that rage became hers as well.

  Calm, she thought as best as she could. Focus. Gada.

  The rage didn’t dim, but it did focus.

  She—no, they—closed their eyes and bled into their extended senses, fixing on Gada, taking in the swirling dance of charged particles, beginning to draw energy from their surroundings.

  It seemed to Rachel that she was guiding the process more so than Haldin, but the fact that she could feel his agreement as if it were her own confused the question of who was doing what.

  It didn’t matter.

  Together, they massaged the tendrils of charge down toward Gada’s spiky back. Together, they waited until Drogan had kicked out one of the Kul’s legs and hopped back to safety.

  And, together, they touched the charge down on Gada’s hide and rained white-hot fury on the giant bastard.

  The ground kicked beneath them, the sonorous boom of thunder buffeting their rain-soaked hair.

  For the first time, Gada’s shriek was tinged with a desperate edge.

  They felt him in their extended senses, whirling to face them, starting forward to put an end to what he seemed to have just realized was a serious threat.

  Jarek darted in and hacked a deep, searing cut to Gada’s injured right flank. It didn’t stop the Kul, but it slowed him enough for them to build another charge and fry him a second time.

  Gada dropped to his knees, nearly pitching flat over.

  They built another charge and hit him again. Then again.

  Clammy perspiration mixed with the rain streaming down their brow, sickly waves of channeling fatigue roiling in their gut. She couldn’t have distinguished whose brow and whose gut. Probably both of theirs.

  It doesn’t matter, she thought. Or was that Haldin?

  Unimportant.

  They had the bastard on his knees.

  They drove Gada flat to the ground with telekinesis, their combined consciousness wavering with the enormous amount of energy they were slinging, and hit him with yet another bolt of lightning.

  The Kul stopped struggling.

  They drifted awash in a sea of channeling fatigue, leaning on one another for support.

  Nearby, someone was yelling.

  Jarek.

  But why?

  She t
ried to focus on his voice through the mental haze and realized it was her he was yelling at, bolting toward them all the while.

  “I said look out!” he cried, leaping over her and Haldin.

  He came down on the other side and planted his armored boot into Kul’Armin, who’d slithered his way up behind them while they’d been raining fury down on Gada.

  The Kul gave an aggravated roar, but even as he recoiled from the kick, several tentacles shot out and wrapped themselves around Jarek’s leg. The tentacles held firmly as the rest of Jarek’s body fell victim to gravity and toppled downward. His back slammed into the muddy earth, and Armin wasted no time in wrapping him up more tightly.

  Jarek managed an awkward one-handed sword swing that took off a few smaller tentacles, then he tried a few kicks with his free leg, but Armin continued to bind him and reel him in.

  Then Krogoth slammed into Armin’s side with a lowered shoulder, and Drogan landed on the Kul’s opposite side and began ripping at the tentacles holding Jarek.

  Rachel and Haldin gathered their combined focus and capitalized on the distraction to telekinetically yank Jarek and Armin in separate directions.

  One of Jarek’s legs came free, and, with one last kick, he parted from the Kul’s deadly embrace with a wet ripping sound.

  Jarek hit the ground with several tentacles still dangling off his legs. He pulled himself to his feet, shaking them off, and readied his sword for another round.

  Behind them, Gada’s smoking form remained thankfully still in the mud, face down.

  None of them were in much better shape.

  Exhaustion pressed in on Rachel and Haldin, heavy and insistent. Jarek was panting and moving as if every part of his body hurt, and Drogan and Krogoth both appeared to be literally missing pieces.

  But it was just them and Armin now.

  So, taking solace from that fact, they pushed aside their fatigue, gathered their will, and prepared to call the storm down once more.

  Before they could, Armin surged toward them on a wave of tentacles.

  Jarek planted himself between them and the Kul and met his tentacled rush with a blazing sweep of his sword. The attack seared through the Kul’s flesh, but Armin pushed on.