“Okay,” Ridley said softly. “You know, I like this side of you. When you open up and share personal things that remind me you’re not always the super confident, invulnerable person you appear to be.”
A silent moment passed in which Archer’s lips lifted in a slow smile. Then his hands tightened around her waist, and he flipped her over onto her back. He pressed kisses against her neck and whispered, “I like all sides of you.”
She laughed and tried to squirm away from him. “You idiot, I was trying to say something serious.”
“I know. It made me want to kiss you.”
For a few moments, she let herself drown in his dark, depthless gaze. Then she placed her fingers over his lips. “No more kissing, or I won’t be able to control myself.”
“I don’t mind the sound of that.”
“Yeah, until my dad hears something and walks in. Then I would die of complete mortification, and this whole escape-into-the-wastelands adventure would be over for me.”
“Yeah, okay, that’s no fun.”
“Exactly.” She snuggled closer and rested her head just below his shoulder and her palm on his chest. His arms tightened around her. “My face isn’t glowing again, is it?” she asked. He shifted his head, probably to look down at her.
“Nope, don’t worry, you’re all good. The magic glow is under control.”
“Okay. Good. It’s just … Now I wonder how close I’ve come before to giving my secret away. As far as I know, it’s never happened with any other guy, but what if it had? I could have landed myself in prison. Got the death penalty just for kissing someone.”
“I don’t know. Maybe it’s a subconscious thing.”
“Meaning?”
“You feel safe with me because I already know your secret, so it’s completely okay if you don’t pay attention to keeping your magic hidden.”
Ridley chewed on her lip while she thought about that. “Maybe. But still. I doubt I’ll ever relax again while kissing someone who isn’t supposed to know about my super secret elemental heritage.”
“Or you could just not kiss anyone else except me, and you’ll be totally fine.”
She smiled. “That could work.” She was quiet for another few moments before something occurred to her. “Hey, I didn’t get a headache earlier. I mean, I felt super crappy from the arxium, but after that wore off, and after I became air so I could find you and then bring you back, I don’t remember noticing anything.”
“Fantastic. Clearly it helps to let go properly.”
“Yes. I guess you and Grandpa really did know what you were talking about.”
Archer trailed his hand up and down her arm. She could hear the smile in his voice when he said, “I’ll try not to say ‘I told you so.’”
She shook her head against his chest, then let out a sigh. “It’s okay. I’m happy for you to be right about that.”
They lay in silence for a long time, and Ridley’s eyes grew heavier as the storm rumbled outside and Archer’s heart beat steadily beneath her ear. Eventually, he said, “I should go. Your dad would probably use some horribly painful conjuration on me if he discovered me in bed with you.”
“Mmm, maybe,” Ridley said sleepily. “He doesn’t usually come into my room during the night though, so you’re probably safe. You can stay if you want.”
“He may not come into your room, but he’ll be going into mine about halfway through the night to wake me so I can keep watch.”
“Oh.” She peeled her eyes open and shifted her head to look at him. “I didn’t know the two of you were doing that.”
“Probably not necessary, but it’s best to be careful.”
“Then we should all take turns instead of just the two of you staying awake.”
Archer shook his head. “We figured we’d let you elementals get some rest. It can’t have been good for you, breathing in all that arxium today. Plus whatever arxium they drugged you with last night.”
“But—”
“Don’t feel bad.” He kissed the top of her head. “You’ll be doing all your elemental tricks tomorrow to get us back into the city, so your dad and I may as well do our part tonight.”
“Okay.” She tucked her head down again and let her eyes slide shut.
“But I can stay here until you fall asleep,” he said quietly, brushing his fingers through her hair.
“Mmm, okay.”
Another minute or two passed before Archer’s voice reached through her drowsy haze again. “I want to tell you everything. Why I left in the first place, and all about my complicated family, and all the things that changed me while I was away.”
Ridley smiled. “Okay,” she murmured, though she was almost too sleepy now to form words. “I want to hear … everything … soon.”
20
An odd noise woke Ridley. By the time her eyes were open and she’d figured out where she was—not at home, and not in the bunker—she wondered if she’d simply dreamed the sound. She rolled onto her side and pushed herself up, listening carefully. The storm was gone, dull light filtered through the cracked window, and whatever she thought she’d heard—a thump? Callie moving around in the room next door?—didn’t repeat itself.
Her mind replayed everything from the night before in a quick rush, and her body filled with a surge of warmth. But the strangeness of the sound she may or may not have dreamed nudged at the back of her mind, and she climbed out of bed to investigate. Her bare feet made no noise against the carpet as she padded to the half-open door, her awareness going to her magic. She might have to use it at a second’s notice. She slowly pulled the door open and peeked around it. There was nothing suspicious in the passageway directly outside her door. She stepped out—
And there was Dad. On the floor. His eyes closed. A woman leaning over him.
“Christa?” Ridley said. For a moment, she was too shocked to move. It was a moment too long.
Christa grabbed a cylinder-shaped something and sprayed the contents directly into Ridley’s face. Ridley backed up against the wall, coughing and gasping as her throat began to close. The passage tilted and slid away at the edge of her vision. “You should have hidden yourselves better,” Christa said, spraying the arxium at Ridley’s face again. “I’m sorry,” she added as the edges of everything began to darken. “I really ammm sssorrreee …”
Ridley rode an endless wave of dizziness from the depths of a dark dream all the way to consciousness. Memories of the past few days seeped into her brain one at a time, ending with the most recent horrible truth: Christa. She was the one who’d betrayed them.
Ridley finally managed to force her eyes open. She was lying on a hard surface, with a plain gray ceiling above, plain gray walls, and a single light. It was so similar to the room she and Archer had been locked in when she first visited the bunker that she wondered if that’s where they were now. Back in the bunker.
She sat up, realizing she was barefoot and still in her pajamas. But someone—Christa, presumably—had decided to put her jacket on over her pajama top. How kind, Ridley thought, her internal voice laden with sarcasm. Christa’s happy to let me die at the hands of the Shadow Society, but she doesn’t want me to be cold while it happens.
She twisted around and saw Malachi and Callie stirring on the floor behind her. No Dad. No Archer. Fear twisted her insides as Malachi asked, “You guys okay?”
“I’m tired of waking up confused and dizzy and nauseous,” Callie moaned as she sat up.
“I think this is only the second time,” Malachi reminded her, “but yeah. That’s two times too many, in my opinion.”
“Can either of you use your own magic?” Ridley asked. She tried to let hers go, and though she could do it without winding up unconscious, the crazy spinning of the room made her stop before she was ill. “I can force it out,” she said breathlessly, “but it’s not pleasant.”
“Yeah, same,” Malachi said. “But I doubt there’s any point. I assume every surface in here is reinforced with arxi
um, so we’d never get out, even if we could transform into one of the elements. Well, except perhaps for that.” He pointed past Ridley. She turned and saw what she hadn’t noticed while lying down: one of the walls was partially covered by a large mirror. Probably one-way glass. No doubt someone was watching them right now.
Sure enough, the reflective quality of the mirror vanished as light appeared on the other side, revealing a small observation room. A lamp stood on a desk, and a young man with wavy blond hair and a tan that couldn’t possibly be natural waved at them. Scooting forward on what must have been a wheeled chair, he grinned. “Hey there.”
Ridley raised an eyebrow while Malachi muttered, “Creep.”
Climbing to her feet, Ridley asked, “Do you feel safe on the other side of that mirror?” She ignored her shaky legs, walked right up to the mirror, and pressed her palms against the glass. “You might have made it difficult for us to use our own magic, but we’ll recover soon. And until then, we can still pull magic from the air in here. I’m sure we could easily smash right through this thing.”
The man’s grin stretched wider. “Go ahead and try,” he told her, his tinny voice reaching her from a speaker somewhere in the ceiling. “I’d love to see what happens when the magic rebounds and slams into you.”
Great, so now people had figured out how to mix arxium into glass as well. She supposed that made sense. They would never put a gigantic mirror in here if it wasn’t elemental-proof. She pushed away from the mirror and turned her back to the guy sitting on the other side.
“So, who wants to talk first?” he asked.
“About what?” Malachi grunted.
“Where you’re headed, how many other elementals you know, the locations of other communities around the world, that sort of thing. Obviously. What else would we want to know from you?”
Ridley forced out a laugh and turned to face him again. “Too bad we don’t know anything useful.”
“Well, unless you want to die a slow and painful death, I’d come up with something useful quickly. The chairman will be here soon, and whoever volunteers to go and talk to him first can choose a swift and painless death instead of the alternative.”
“What chairman?” Malachi asked.
Blond Guy sighed. “Why does that make a difference?”
“It’s part of the Shadow Society structure,” Ridley said, remembering what Grandpa had told her. “Each chapter has its own chairperson. A director oversees the whole society.”
“Correct,” Blond Guy said. “Though how that helps you decide to share your useful information or not, I have no idea.”
Ridley folded her arms. “Where are the other two men who were traveling with us?”
Blond Guy’s eyebrows inched up. “Two? You mean there was a fifth person?”
Crap. She should have kept her stupid mouth shut.
“Who’s the fifth person?” he pushed, but Ridley refused to answer. She’d seen her father unconscious on the floor, so it must have been Archer who got away. He was supposed to be keeping watch, wasn’t he? Why hadn’t he warned them? Or had Christa got into the hotel without him knowing?
“If you hurt him—the other man you took—I will not tell you or your chairman a single thing,” Ridley said. “And unlike these two—” she nodded to Callie and Malachi “—I actually know a few things.” Hopefully that came across as believable, especially since it was actually the truth. She knew a few other elemental names. She wasn’t planning to share any of them, but that didn’t change the fact that she did know them.
“Why did Christa give us up?” Callie asked. “Is she part of the Shadow Society?”
“Christa?” Blond Guy asked.
“The woman who caught us in the hotel.”
“Oh, her. Sorry, I don’t know anything about her,” Blond Guy said with a shrug. “I was told where to pick you guys up. I got to the hotel with a few other society members, and she was there, making sure you were all still unconscious. I don’t know her name. I don’t think she’s in the society; I’ve never seen her at any of the meetings. All I know is that she has some kind of agreement with the director. She delivers elementals when she discovers them. As for why?” He shrugged again. “No clue.”
“Hey, Eric!” An older man shoved open the door into the observation room and poked his head inside. “What are you doing? Shut the hell up.”
“What’s the problem?” Eric shouted back as the newcomer pulled his head back out and slammed the door. “Who cares what they know?” he shouted at the closed door. “They’ll be dead in a few hours.”
A twinge of panic tightened Ridley’s chest, but she refused to entertain it. There had to be a way out of here. Someone would eventually have to come into the room to give them more arxium, if nothing else. They could fight back then. Or, if they could keep themselves alive long enough … She turned to the Callie and Malachi. “Remember what Archer told us,” she said in a low tone. “The voice message he sent when he came looking for us.”
“Yes.” Malachi paused, and Ridley could see his mind working. “But we have no idea how long it could be until … you know.”
“If you’re talking about someone coming to rescue you,” Eric said loudly, “don’t get too excited. We’re outside Lumina City. Far outside. Even if someone’s already coming for you, there’s no way they’ll find this place.”
Ridley looked at him. “I think you’re lying.”
He laughed. “You can believe whatever you want. But it makes sense, don’t you think? It’s easier for us to get certain things done out here where we don’t have to worry about any laws or police or government red tape. We can experiment with arxium … experiment with elementals … It’s fun, you know?”
Hot fury burned through Ridley’s veins, seeming to clear some of the effects of the arxium. Experiment with elementals? Was he serious?
The door swung open again, slower this time. “Ah, looks like your time is up,” Eric said, rising from the chair. “Good morning, sir.”
The chairman stood in the doorway, just beyond the circle of light cast by the lamp. Ridley saw a suit jacket over a shirt, and the upper half of a pair of tailored black suit pants. Finally, he stepped forward into the lamplight.
Ridley heard a sharp intake of breath from both Callie and Malachi, but she wasn’t exactly surprised to see Mayor Madson. She had guessed he was part of the Shadow Society, and she knew he liked to be in charge. It made sense that he was the chairman of the Lumina City chapter. With pale skin and blond hair, he was a slightly more rotund version of his son Lawrence. Though she hated him and whatever he’d done to try to eliminate her kind, there was a part of her that felt sorry for him. He’d just lost his son, after all. The past week must have been rough for him.
“Thank you for waiting for me,” he said, moving toward the mirror. His voice was cold as he stared straight at Ridley and said, “I want to be able to look into her eyes as the life fades from them.”
Ridley swallowed as a chill crept over her skin. Clearly Mayor Madson knew that she was the girl someone had reported seeing at the scene of his son’s death. Apparently he didn’t need to know whether she’d actually pulled the trigger. She was guilty by virtue of being present.
“Um … what?” Eric asked. Ridley tore her gaze from the mayor’s, and her eyes landed on Eric’s confused face. “I thought you were coming to question these people.”
“Then you were misinformed,” the mayor said. “I don’t have time to question people who don’t know anything. My contact overheard them when they were making plans to leave. They don’t know where they’re going. One of them didn’t even want to join any other elementals. No, the only thing we’re doing with these people is killing them, and that one—” he pointed at Ridley “—is the one I most want to see die.”
“Wait, hang on,” Eric protested. “That one said she knows something.”
“Well then she was lying.” He folded his arms across his chest. “Turn the gas on, and make sur
e it’s the strongest we’ve got.”
The gas? Ridley looked up and noticed two air vents in the ceiling, one on either side of the mirror. She couldn’t see any other way to pump gas into the room, so that must be where it came from. “I think we’re actually about to die,” Callie said faintly. Without answering, Ridley reached for Callie’s hand and held onto it tightly. Her eyes continued to dart back and forth from one side of the ceiling to the other. Two silly air vents. Was that really how she was going to die?
“Well, what are you waiting for?” the mayor asked Eric. “I gave you an instruction.”
“Um …”
“Maybe we can keep it out,” Ridley said in a low voice. “Like we did with the hole in the door at the shoe shop.” She was already tugging her jacket off. “I think I’m almost able to use my magic. Or we can just pull from the air.”
“Good idea,” Malachi said, reaching over his head for the back of his T-shirt. “A simple conjuration should do it.”
“Yes.” Before the Cataclysm, people had used magic to move objects around all the time. It wouldn’t be too complicated to send their clothing up to the ceiling and press it against the vents.
“Then you’ll have to come in here to stop us,” Malachi said, and Ridley saw he was speaking directly to the mayor now, his eyes narrowed as he balled the T-shirt in his hands. “No more hiding on that side of the—”
“Do it now!” the mayor said sharply to Eric. “Or are you planning to just stand there and let them hatch their own plans?”
Elemental Power Page 23
