by S. A. Moss
Thankfully, the large room remained empty.
Well, except for Will, who dashed in haphazard circles around the pillars spaced throughout middle of the room.
Alex let out what could’ve been a grunt or a chuckle, I wasn’t sure. When I looked over at him, something warm and soft glinted in his eyes.
“He’s almost as much trouble as you,” he murmured in a teasing voice.
As we headed up the large stone steps toward the rest of the castle, I drew abreast of Maron.
“This place seems mostly deserted,” I muttered. “A skeleton crew of Fallen guards at best. I’ve seen a few, but not many. I’m hoping they lost a lot in the last fight.”
He nodded grimly, never stopping his constant sweep of our surroundings.
As we stepped off the stairs onto the main level, a pig-demon rounded a corner on the opposite side of the large hall. Adrenaline buzzed through me at the sight of him. Before he could shout, I unleashed a concentrated blast at his head.
I’d been hoping for a repeat of my lucky hit earlier, but this time the demon’s neck didn’t break. It did stun him for a second, and I used that chance to set up a filter and throw another blast through it. The aether spear impaled him through the chest and he staggered back into a wall, leaving a smear of dark blood as he slid down to the floor.
Maron looked at me with surprised respect. “You’re very good at handling aether.”
If I could’ve blushed, I would have. “Thanks. I’ve had lots of chances to practice.”
Not bothering to deal with the body, we crossed the large room at a quick clip. We made it down another hallway undetected and finally reached a door that opened onto the small clearing in front of the castle.
Maron hesitated. “No cover. We’ll be easy targets out there.”
He was right about that. And although the castle wasn’t to be fully occupied, it would only take one Fallen goon attacking from the battlements to stop us. Not to mention the fact that Sirius and Akaron were still here somewhere.
But Alex most definitely couldn’t climb across a cliff face right now. We’d be lucky if he could manage more than a slow stumble across flat ground.
I glanced back in the direction we’d come from, an idea slowly forming in my mind.
“Wait here. I’ll be right back. Keep him safe.” I gave Maron a hard look with my last words. I didn’t know him and barely trusted him. If he hurt Alex, or allowed him to be hurt, there’d be hell to pay.
He nodded slowly, his features hardening with determination.
Leaving the two of them at the door, I raced back down the hall. Will had been scampering behind us but leapt on my shoulder as I ran by.
Retracing our path, I headed back down to the large underground room above the dungeon, stopping at the base of the stairs.
Please let these pillars be structural, not just ornamental.
Shaking out my hands, I raised them toward the middle of the farthest pillar. Then I unleashed the strongest blast of aether I could muster. It was so strong it pushed me back a step as it exploded from my fingertips, and I stumbled on the step behind me.
The blast slammed into the pillar with a sharp bang. Small chunks of rock crumbled off, rattling to the floor.
Damn, this isn’t going to be easy. Or quiet.
Shaking off my doubts, I braced myself and sent another blast at the same pillar. This time, the pillar actually cracked down the middle.
Yes! Progress.
Remembering my lessons with Owen in that parking lot—it seemed like years ago now—I imagined myself as a firehose, a conduit for the energy of the universe. Then I turned up the pressure, allowing more and more aether to flow through me.
My body almost felt like it was expanding from the rush of energy pouring through it as I used my hands like the spigot of the hose, directing them at each of the pillars in the room. I unleashed blast after blast, until the sounds of the cracks were so close together they sounded like the grand finale of a fireworks display on the Fourth of July.
A wolf-demon appeared at the top of the stairs, howling as he charged toward me. I redirected my hands toward him, sending my next blast in his direction. It hit him so hard he flew back up the stairs and out of sight.
I swung around, every muscle in my body burning, and unleashed one final blast at the pillar closest to me. Finally, it split entirely. As it did, the pillar next to it bowed and split too. Large chunks of rock began to rain from the ceiling as more pillars gave way.
They had been holding the ceiling up, and without their support, it was coming down.
Turning, I raced up the stairs. Will clung to my ear for dear life as I sprinted across the crumbling floor of the next level, the sharp sting from his little claws heightening my senses. A deep rumbling sound thundered up from bowels of the castle, the noise both terrifying and thrilling. Rock chunks began to fall from the ceiling.
Holy crap, it worked. The whole place is going to come down.
Rounding the corner, I careened down the hall toward Alex and Maron.
“Run! Go! Go!” I screamed, and without question Maron threw open the door and pulled Alex through. I was behind them a moment later, sprinting away from the castle.
We sprinted across the clearing, our backs completely exposed. But no attack came.
I chanced a look over my shoulder as the rumbling grew louder. The entire castle folded in on itself, as if dragged by a magnetic pull deep at its center.
With a last loud crash and a puff of dust and debris, the castle was no more.
7
We stopped at the tree line and turned back to face the pile of rubble at the base of the mountain.
I would’ve loved to keep running, but Alex’s face was pale and drawn from the exertion already. I didn’t want to push him too hard, and besides, the collapse of the castle would buy us a little time. Everyone inside should’ve been buried by the falling stone, and hopefully it would take them at least a few hours to recover from their injuries and blast their way out.
“Holy mother…” Maron breathed. He turned to me. “You did that?”
“Yeah.”
“You’re—” He hoisted up a sagging Alex, eyes wide. “I’ve never seen power like that.”
I couldn’t tell if that was a compliment or not, especially since Maron seemed almost afraid of me.
“Well, it wasn’t like I just threw a single blast and brought the place down. I hit it a bunch of times in structurally weak points.”
He nodded, his brows still pinched together.
Deciding to ignore his distrust, I slipped my arm around Alex’s waist. He let go of Maron and transferred his weight to me, squeezing my shoulder. I was technically the one providing him support, but his touch comforted me immediately.
Will, dislodged from his perch, ran across Alex’s arm to take up residence on his shoulder instead.
“We need to get moving,” I said. “I doubt a destroyed stronghold will keep them occupied for long. We can’t waste our head start.”
The four of us set off deeper into the woods. I’d been surprised to discover during my time in the Wild that I actually had a decent sense of direction, which made my retracing my path relatively easy. When we arrived at the portal I’d come through—my trusty green bra strap confirmed it was the right one—I turned to face Maron.
“How well do you know the Wild?”
He shook his head, glancing up at the tall trees around us. “Not well at all.”
“How well do you know Earth?”
Maron’s gray eyes glinted in the dim light as he looked down at me. “Very well.”
“Okay. I’m going take Alex and follow the portals I took to get here. I need to get him back home as quick as possible, but if we fade back over now, I have no idea where we’ll end up. I don’t have ID or anything, so we won’t be able to fly home.”
Maron ran a hand over his jaw. “All right. Would you like me to accompany you?”
“No. I want yo
u to get back to the Haven. Pearl told me there are portals leading to it in pretty much every major city worldwide, right?”
“Yes, that’s right.”
“Good. I need you to alert the Council that I found Alex. Tell them to have someone meet us at his apartment. I doubt a regular hospital will know how to treat whatever the Shroud has done to him. I don’t know if the Council knows a—a healer or anything, but if they do, tell them we need that person too.”
Maron nodded sharply, his hands clasped behind his back. He had definitely been a soldier in his previous life. The ease with which he took orders made that obvious. What was more shocking to me was the ease with which I gave them. Then again, this was my rescue mission and my show to run; with Alex’s life at stake, I wasn’t going to let anybody else take the reins.
“I will deliver the message as quickly as I can. Good luck to you both.” Maron faded out quickly, returning to the earthly plane.
I leaned down to tug the piece of green fabric from the branch, then tightened my grip on Alex. “You ready? I’ll get you out of here as quick as I can, but we’ll need to go through a few portals first.”
He muttered something that sounded like a confirmation, and we stepped into the portal. As we passed through it, he sucked in a sharp breath. Was it just the act of moving that hurt? Or did the portals cause him additional pain? I winced, my stomach tightening with worry.
We walked in silence for several hours. I had so much I wanted to say to Alex, so many questions for him, but he needed to reserve all his strength for the simple act of putting one foot in front of the other. We passed through portal after portal, stopping at each one so I could remove my little marker—I wasn’t going to leave Akaron and Sirius a trail of breadcrumbs to track us.
At every portal, Alex’s body shuddered as we stepped through. The landscape around us changed from muggy and lush to dry and barren and back again.
Will was draped over Alex’s shoulder, legs dangling, as he watched the scenery pass by slowly.
Too slowly.
Our pace lagged every hour, despite the fact that I was now bearing so much of Alex’s weight I was practically carrying him. I would’ve insisted on picking him up entirely, his male pride be damned, but he was so much broader and taller than me that I would’ve probably tipped over if I tried.
My nerves were frayed from being in a state of high alert for so long, and every sound or rustle from the underbrush made me jump.
The only positive was that, although it’d taken me almost two weeks to reach Alex, a lot of that time had been spent exploring and rejecting what turned out to be dead ends. Taking a straight path on the way back meant we could cut that time down considerably.
When Alex’s footsteps began to stumble badly, we stopped for a while in a rocky, craggy landscape. I found a small nook between two large boulders and leaned against the junction where they met, cradling Alex in my arms. He fell into a deep sleep immediately, and I kept a keen eye on our surroundings for any threat. Will scrambled onto one of the boulders and did the same, scanning the horizon and muttering to himself in his squirrel-creature language.
I felt like jerk when I roused Alex several hours later, but he rose without complaint, and we stumbled on.
When we finally reached the first portal I’d come through, I almost wept with relief as I tugged the green strip of fabric from the stalk of a nearby plant. It wouldn’t deliver us right to Alex’s door, but it was close enough.
We stepped though—I winced as Alex winced—and as soon as we reached the other side, I shooed Will from his spot on Alex’s shoulder.
“Okay, buddy. Last stop. Thanks for all your help.”
The small squirrel-creature leapt to the ground then turned around and regarded me, cocking his head to one side. I still wasn’t exactly sure why he’d attached to me so strongly, but I could admit I was going to miss the little guy.
Wrapping both arms around Alex, I faded quickly back over to the earthly plane. I didn’t care if we appeared in the middle of a crowded shopping mall, I just wanted to get him out of this place.
But what came into view around us wasn’t a mall at all, just a large field.
Alex blinked in the sudden sunlight, a shock to the system after weeks in the dim atmosphere of the Shroud. A two lane road cut across the landscape a short distance away, and I tugged Alex in that direction. We walked along the shoulder until we reached a small, run down gas station.
No cars were fueling up. The place looked almost deserted.
Shit, maybe it was.
I leaned Alex up against the side of the building and pulled the door open. A middle aged woman with curly red hair lifted her head off the counter and blinked several times as I approached. She rubbed a hand over the spot where her head had rested, cleaning up a small puddle of drool.
“Can I help you?”
“Do you have a phone I could borrow? My, uh, car broke down a ways up the road, and I need to call for a lift. My phone’s dead.” That last part wasn’t a lie. I hadn’t bothered trying to use Alex’s cell to call for help since I knew from experience that a trip to the Shroud turned even the fanciest of phones into bricks.
“Sure, hon. Here you go.” She slipped her phone out of her pocket, typed in her password, and handed it to me.
As I took it, I hesitated. There was really only one person’s number I knew by heart, but I hated to drag her into another one of my messes. Then I peered out the window at Alex’s bowed head and shook off the thought. Now wasn’t the time to let my pride stop me from asking for help.
I punched in the number. A few rings later, Sarah’s soft Southern accent filtered into my ear. “Hello?”
“Hey, Sarah.”
“Cam! Is that you? What’s going on? This isn’t Alex’s number! I keep seeing you on the news. I thought you said you were in witness protection?”
Her barrage of questions was loud enough for the clerk to overhear, and the woman did a double take at the words “witness protection.”
Ah, crap.
I took a few steps back, pretending to examine the minimal snack offerings the gas station had on display.
“It’s not quite like that,” I murmured in a low voice. “I can explain it all, and I will, I promise. But I need another favor, if you’re still willing to help.”
“Anything.”
The word came with no hesitation, and I bit my lip against the wave of emotion that surged through me. I didn’t deserve a friend like Sarah, but I was so lucky to have her.
“Thank you.” That phrase was paltry compared to what I wanted to say, compared to the debt I owed her. “Can you come pick me and Alex up? We got stranded…” Trailing off, I put my hand over the speaker and turned toward the clerk, who was organizing the change in the “take a penny, leave a penny” dish. “Excuse me, where are we exactly? What road is that?” I gestured outside.
“Oh, that’s Thatcher Road.”
She rattled off the address, and I repeated the information to Sarah.
The sound fingers flying across a keyboard filtered through the phone, then Sarah said, “Got it. I can leave now. It should take me about an hour to get to you unless traffic gets bad. Will you be okay that long?”
“Yeah, we’ll be fine. Thanks, Sarah.”
“See you soon.”
The line went dead. I handed the phone back to the clerk, thanking her too. I could feel her eyes on me as I made a beeline for the door and pushed it open. I didn’t want to loiter outside the gas station for an hour, so I looped an arm around Alex’s waist and walked him a short distance down the road—just far enough to be out of sight of the gas station’s large front windows.
A wooden crate that looked like it’d once held vegetables sat in the grass by the side of the road. I flipped it upside down and slowly lowered Alex onto it. He slumped, elbows braced on his knees and head hanging low. Worry twisted my stomach. He was still conscious, but he was so quiet and dazed. He was almost unrecognizable as t
he strong, witty, capable man I knew.
The sun beat down on us from the cloudless sky as we waited. I kept my gaze fixed on the road, hope rising every time a car appeared on the horizon, even though I knew it was too soon for Sarah to be here.
Then something else appeared on the horizon.
A tiny furry body.
I squinted. Is that…?
Yup. Will had darted out of the field a ways down the road, and now he scampered along the shoulder past the gas station. He picked up speed as he drew closer, and by the time he was five feet away, I braced for what I knew was coming. Without breaking stride, he leapt into the air, landing with a splat on my chest.
At least he hadn’t starfished my face.
He scrambled up to my shoulder, chittering angrily. Probably chewing me out for leaving him behind.
“Sorry, little guy. I didn’t think you’d want to come. Don’t you want to stay in your home?” I thought back to the threatening landscapes of the Wild as I scratched his furry head. “Well, I guess I can see why you wouldn’t.”
Will must’ve forgiven me because he didn’t chomp my ear or my finger. Instead, he scrambled down the side of my body and sniffed around the edge of the shallow field.
I knelt in front of Alex, my stomach twisting as I took in his wan face. “Are you doing okay? Sarah should be here soon.”
“Yeah, I’ll make it.”
His eyes were still tired but didn’t look quite as glazed over as they had earlier. He reached for my hand, bringing it to his lips to kiss my open palm. I rested it against his cheek for a second, taking comfort in the rough feel of his stubble against my skin.
He was alive.
That was all that mattered. Everything else, we could figure out.
Because Alex was alive.
8
I had no way to measure time, so I wasn’t sure if it took Sarah more than an hour to reach us. But when her car appeared on the horizon, it took all my self-control not to leap into the air, shouting with glee. I waved my arms over my head, but she’d already spotted us. The car slowed, rolling to a stop on the shoulder across from us.
