Drowning in Fire

by Hanna Martine

  Bright sunlight now lit up the scraggly garden out back. She’d been channeling the Source all night without sleep or pause, yet she’d never felt more awake, more alive.

  Movement out in the garden, and she realized it was Griffin sitting on the crooked steps of the terrace. He leaned back on his hands, stretching his neck, then cracking his back. The small burn mark on his temple, the one she’d given him during Nem’s first attack, drew her attention. The sight of it made her heart twist. Such a tiny thing, but it was a reminder of all that he’d done for her and her people—and what he’d given up for his own. Like the handprints, he would wear her mark forever. The cuts and bruises from their cliffside brawl and the battle with Nem would fade, but that burn would remain.

  She exited the house, the sound of the door opening bringing Griffin to his feet. As she approached him, she marveled at how every time she thought she looked upon a beautiful god in human form, he managed to somehow look even better the next time she laid eyes on him. Even now, when he was as dirty and ragged as she.

  He held his breath as she went up to him.

  “Will you come with me?” she asked.

  He smiled. “Always.”

  She skirted around the morning meadow that was filling with Chimeran warriors preparing for their drills, a shouting Bane and a shirted Ikaika at the front.

  She brought Griffin to her hidden spot high up on the cliff, the one that had views of the valley and the ocean. The place where she’d incinerated his coat when she believed herself cured of his presence in her mind and heart. Who had she been kidding? Even back then?

  He climbed without complaint, though he must have been exhausted. There was no place else to take him, however, since she could not bring him to the Common House in broad daylight, and she had no other home. If she’d demanded Bane vacate her old house he would have done so, but that would draw unwanted attention.

  “Griffin.” She turned to him, a million things to say on her tongue, but the two words that mattered most came out. “Thank you.”

  Then he was on her. Pushing her against a rock.

  Touching her.

  She tried to scramble out of his grip, to save him. The Source . . . who knew what it would do to him?

  “It’s okay,” he whispered, his hands firmly wrapped around her arms, the hard length of his body pressing against hers. “I am water.”

  And when he kissed her, she sensed his smile. His joy. His pride.

  Inside she felt the Source reacting, trying to get out, flinging itself against her skin and coming up against a sparkling, formidable barrier in the man she never wanted to stop touching. Because she could touch him. Deep down she knew that she would never be able to touch another Chimeran man in this way again, but Griffin . . . he was water.

  Her opposite. Her complement.

  She kissed him back, eyes squeezed shut in near pain. Because they floated in a dream of a future she was sure they would never be able to have. He lead his people. They depended on him, and he would return to San Francisco with a slate wiped clean—all that he’d worked for, all that he’d promised the Ofarians, gone—thanks to what he’d done for her here. The amount of work ahead of him was astronomical. He could not be tethered to a Chimeran woman, not if he hoped to focus on strengthening future Ofarian generations.

  And the Chimerans needed her. This was still her home, still her culture, and she could not simply walk away. Maybe she could not allow herself to be Queen, but she was still a cure, and the disease might strike again. Maybe that’s what the Queen had intended for her original quest all along: to discover the illness’s origin and eradicate it forever. That was a noble purpose and one Keko could easily dedicate herself to in this day and age.

  She did not want to walk away from Griffin, but she just might have to.

  The realization ripped a sob from her throat. She had not cried before when she believed he’d double-crossed her, but she did right then with his mouth on hers, the tears pricking at the corners of her eyes. She cried for what she’d learned and discovered and unearthed inside herself. She cried because she chose to believe that he really did love her, even though he had not spoken it.

  This belief she grasped tightly and wrapped around her heart. She channeled it into a deeper, more frantic kiss, an almost frightening urgency to her motions. She let herself be ground into the rock at her back, not feeling any of her injuries, only feeling Griffin. Tasting him. Loving him.

  His spirit was his own Source. His selflessness gave him a purpose she’d always found foreign but now accepted with a profound understanding. His fair, considerate concern for the well-being of anyone other than himself was a bottomless well that would never run dry. It was counter to the Chimerans’ way of life and it humbled her greatly. But it also gave her something to strive for, and a gift she could slowly feed to her own people.

  Griffin pulled away, leaving her breathless not from the broken kiss, but from the depth of the emotion on his face. His hands slid up her arms and shoulders, and the Source fire traced his fingers’ path underneath her skin, making her shiver with awareness, kicking up the pleasure of his touch. Taking the flaps of her ripped T-shirt—his T-shirt—he parted them gently, exposing her chest but not her breasts.

  The Source glowed, a tranquil spot of light, until Griffin bent his head and kissed her skin. Right over the gift he’d given to her people.

  This time the Source did break free in a flash of blue-white. Keko gasped, but Griffin only smiled with his lips and hands on her as a cool sheen of Ofarian water trickled over her skin. Rising in equal challenge to the fire inside her. Claiming her.

  Deep inside her mind and body, fire and water magic clashed together. They tangled briefly, a sexy tussle, then they found a way to interlock. To accommodate one another without losing what made their element unique and powerful.

  When Griffin released her, his lips were moist with magic and his eyes were dark and filled with understanding, and she knew that he’d experienced exactly what she just had.

  He took her mouth again with a deep groan, eliciting from her a bone-deep shiver, heightened by the dual, opposing bits of magic. Heightened by him. Indeed, the whole world seemed to vibrate.

  And then the world actually did vibrate. Tiny stones somersaulted down on them from above. Nearby, the tree branches, covered with giant, waxy leaves, trembled. The ground shook under their feet.

  Griffin shoved away the same moment Keko felt the rock shift at her back. Instantly she knew what it was. Instantly she knew that the Child of Earth had returned.

  Keko knew no fear.

  She spun toward the rock as it folded and clinked and rolled back in ways that seemed to dissolve and eat itself and transform all at the same time. Shoving Griffin behind her, she called Source fire to her hand, more than she’d ever dared before, ready for Nem’s newest attack.

  But it was not Nem who appeared.

  Keko watched, wide-eyed, as Aya’s familiar, diminutive human body and pale, streaming hair gradually replaced the elements of earth. When her transformation was complete, she merely stood there, taking in Griffin and Keko with sad green eyes.

  Keko could feel Griffin behind her, his chest pressed to her back, the way his heart beat faster, the struggle of his lungs. He was afraid.

  “I’ve come to demand punishment,” said the Daughter of Earth, her attention shifting solely to Griffin.

  If Keko had held on to any doubt that Griffin had told her the absolute truth about his reasons for coming to Hawaii, she regretfully let it go now. Aya’s presence and demand confirmed everything.

  Griffin asked, “Were any Primaries hurt?”

  Aya briefly closed her eyes. “No.”

  He pressed on. “And did the eruption cause any other damage that might put Primaries in danger?”

  Aya’s glare hardened. “No. The new volcano, relatively
small as it is, is far enough away from civilization to not have a direct effect, though it’s caused a slight sea level rise. But no loss of life, no.” She lifted a graceful hand. “That was not our agreement, Griffin, and you know it. The terms were for you to make sure the Source remained untouched or Keko is ours. The Father is aware of what’s happened and he demands retribution.”

  “No. I won’t let you.” Griffin tried to push out from behind Keko, but she steeled her arms and legs and refused to let him pass on the narrow path. He took a breath as if to say something more, and Keko sensed he was about to tell Aya the true reason behind her quest. Then he went still, and she knew that he was holding true to his vow. Even though it killed him not to defend her.

  Aya stepped closer, having to lift her chin to look up at Keko. Before, during their talks outside the Senatus gatherings, Aya had always seemed somewhat childlike. Now she was decidedly adult. Eerily composed. And perhaps a little regretful.

  “Can I tell you a secret?” Aya said.

  “Yes,” Keko replied, blinking back surprise but not letting down her guard.

  “I don’t want you to be punished any more than Griffin does. I am trapped between my heart and my duty, but, in the end, my race and the Primaries we protect must come first.”

  That didn’t make much sense to Keko, but behind her Griffin gasped. “You protect them?”

  Aya nodded. “It’s why I wanted you to go after Keko. It’s why I wanted you on the Senatus. Because you and I, Griffin, we want more for the elementals and more for humanity than our races believe in, and I see in you many good things. I would’ve sided with you, and we could have made so many changes, but now you’ve destroyed your chance. And since Keko touched the Source, I have to take her Within.”

  “She didn’t—” Griffin began.

  Keko wouldn’t let him finish. She couldn’t allow him to sacrifice any more.

  “The volcano was my doing,” Keko blurted, because it truly was, when it came down to it.

  “There was a man,” Griffin growled, “a Son of Earth who attacked us twice and escaped through the earth both times. Did he tell you what happened on that island?”

  Aya looked disturbed and mournful. “No. Nem never returned. We don’t believe he got away from the island before the volcano destroyed it. Not even a Child can survive something like that. He was . . .” She shook her head, trying to compose herself. “He wasn’t supposed to go after you, but something about him isn’t—wasn’t—right.”

  “Am I being blamed for his death?” Keko asked.

  The tension in Aya’s expression told her yes. Keko looked to the sky.

  So the only two people alive who knew that Griffin had been the one to go down to the Source were standing right here. It was another secret she would make him carry. There was no way she would let him take the fall for her actions. There was no way she could allow herself to be more indebted to him than she already was.

  A calm settled through her. Maybe this was what she’d known was coming when he’d kissed her. Maybe her mind had already realized her punishment and their separation were imminent, and it had to convince her heart that it must happen to protect them both.

  This way, the Chimerans would never learn about the Queen’s treasure and the Source, and the afflicted’s secret would never get out. This was better, the only way.

  Keko raised her hand, the one still rippling with the Source flame. She used it to tug aside the T-shirt so Aya could see what she bore, and part of the black fabric burned away before she willed the white fire to die. She pulled away from Griffin, away from his touch.

  “A part of the Source is in me,” she told Aya. “I own the magic. And I will pay for it.”

  Keko cast a long gaze over the valley, seeing each and every face of the Chimerans she’d healed. They had fire again. They could smile, and that brought her a profound sense of peace.

  “I argued against death,” Aya said, “because you, Keko, changed me. Helped me to see the Aboveground world in a way I’d never imagined. I want you to know that you made me want to become human.”

  Keko could not say anything for the shock, unaware she’d affected Aya in such a way. Unaware that the Children even had such a choice.

  Griffin exhaled.

  “But you disturbed something you should not have,” Aya went on, her face darkening, “and caused offense to the Earth. My people will not kill you, but you will serve us Within. Your magic will not work down there and there is no sun. It was the will of the Father, who rules us. I am truly sorry.”

  Keko finally turned to face Griffin, and she was nearly knocked over by the fierce protest in his eyes and the terrible tension in the coil of his muscles. She saw everything on his face—their entire tumultuous history and the future that would never be. She saw it all, and couldn’t help but be grateful for ever having experienced and known him, for however brief a time.

  “No,” he said. The single word of defiance came out harshly, though the look in his eyes was tender and soft. Then he reached out and yanked her to him, enveloping her in his arms. She had to concentrate very hard on keeping her fire under her control. When she went Within, she wouldn’t have to worry about that struggle anymore.

  “Let me,” he whispered in her ear, low enough that Aya couldn’t hear. “Let me tell her the truth.”

  Keko merely shook her head, her face against his neck. “Before you,” she said, just as softly, just for him, “I thought love a weakness. Before you, I thought only fire and fists mattered. I was wrong.”

  She pushed away, and he reluctantly let her go. Though his hands were at his sides, she could still feel him reaching for her.

  “I love you,” he said between gritted teeth, his eyes filling. And then again, “I love you.”

  Those words—the ones she feared and longed to hear, finally spoken in his voice—painted themselves over her skin. She would never be able to wash them away, nor would she ever want to.

  She touched Griffin’s face with great sadness and aching loss and all the love she’d been gathering and storing her whole life, awaiting the appearance of this man. She could not look upon those three years apart from him as a waste. Instead she chose to look on the time they were given as a blessing.

  She kissed him, quick and chaste. “And I love your stars.”

  With the reminder of his vow, his head dropped forward on his neck, his chest heaving. One hand came up to dig his thumb and forefinger into his eyes.

  This was her time.

  Keko turned to Aya. “It’s done.”

  Without hesitation, Aya snatched her in arms made of skin and stone, and whipped Keko’s body around. The Source fire wanted to be let out, to fight, but Keko kept it in check. She would not oppose this.

  Griffin’s head snapped up, his face a mask of terror and despair, his arms reaching for Keko, his feet grinding up dirt as he lunged. Keko saw her name on his lips but could not hear him for the roar in her ears.

  Aya threw Keko against the rock, and she braced herself for impact, for pain. But there was none. There was only the vision of a hopeless Griffin charging after her, and a sickly, strange sensation of a hard world going spongy all around her.

  Then all went black and silent as Aya took them both deep into the earth.

  TWENTY-TWO

  The rock bit and ripped at Griffin’s fingertips as he futilely tried to scrape his way Within. The blood didn’t matter, the pain was inconsequential. Aya had taken Keko into the earth because of Griffin’s actions, and nothing he could physically do would ever dig her out.

  Something he could say might bring her back, might allow him to trade his life for hers, but she’d carefully reminded him of his vow and he was forced to hold true to his stars, as ever. Just as he would hold true to Keko, because in the end he believed wholeheartedly in what she’d done for her people, even though it felt like h
is soul had been buried along with her.

  Great stars, she was gone. Inside this wall before him. Hidden. Taken.

  She’d called him selfless. She’d told him she admired him, but she’d been the one to anonymously give such a gift to her people.

  Her disappearance would likely be explained—and her whole existence therefore diminished—by Chief telling everyone that she’d thrown herself into the ocean. Keko had told Griffin back in Utah that in the eyes of Chimerans, dying purposely by water was the ultimate cowardice. And yet it was one she was willing to live with if it meant peace for innocents.

  And he was the selfless one?

  With a great bellow of anguish wrenched from the bottom of his diaphragm, he smashed a final fist into the rock. The shock of agony rippled up his arm. His body collapsed right there on the path, his back against Keko’s invisible prison door. He’d dislocated two fingers on his right hand, and with a grim numbness he popped them back into place.

  He refused to do nothing. He refused to just allow this to happen. Once upon a time Griffin Aames had been the shadowy guy who lingered along the back wall and took orders. He’d had to either live with their consequences or watch, helpless, as the appalling results of his actions unfolded. No more.

  He was no longer peripheral. He was the goddamn Ofarian leader and he believed in action when a purpose called to him. For the past five years that action had come through politics, but this could not be fixed through the Senatus. Magic would bring no solution. Neither would brute force or a personal plea to the Children.

  Below, in the valley meadow, the Chimeran world came alive. A beautiful, intimidating chorus rose up. Hundreds of Chimerans chanted in sharp, harsh voices. Griffin got to his feet and peered over the tangle of lush, drooping greenery at what was laid out before him.

  Row upon row of Chimeran warriors filled the meadow in perfect lines. Bane stood alone, front and center, facing his fierce men and women, leading them in the synchronized movements that were half dance, half challenge. Their brown skin gleamed in the new sunlight, their faces chilling masks of open lips and bared tongues. Timed with some unheard tune, they stomped their feet and slapped their arms and legs. Their deep warrior rallying cries echoed throughout the valley.