Noises from outside his tent reach a crescendo.
Jim's gotta shit—or get off the pot.
Things might get worse.
Worse than three broken ribs, a possible punctured lung and a left eye he can't see out of.
A sad state of affairs, in Jim's book.
Fuck it. Jim grabs the pack and splices together the kit. He opens the two-piece vial. One captures his spit, simultaneously assessing both his unique DNA, and the extent of his energies.
He spits. And spits again.
Damn. These clan jerks haven't even given him water so he doesn't have much saliva, thank you very much.
He spits again. The spit level reaches the magic black line. Jim exhales in relief, plugging the receptacle vial on top and shaking the activator liquid with that of his own spit.
The two collide and change color. Slowly a pale orange covers the strip. He slips the reference strip into the slot integral to the vial and it shoots out a bunch of shit he already knows.
50% Asian descent.
Jim rolls his eyes impatiently.
25% Scandinavian, 25% British Isles.
Yeah, yeah, get on with it, he thinks impatiently.
The beat down catalog of his body takes longer. The machine's little pulse brain whirs.
Three broken ribs, one additional fractured. Hairline cheekbone fracture, perforated non-critical organ and minor lung puncture. Multiple abrasions and third degree contusions.
Nice.
Anything else?
More whirring.
Mild concussion.
End analysis.
Well that's fucking swell.
Jim suddenly smiles. He brought the whoopass. Too bad the Band self-heals. He gave it good to that asshole Vaughn. Righteous.
Jim takes ahold of the first aid kit, dumping the vial into what they call The Churner in his lab.
A blinking light winks its bleeding eye inside the tent.
The Churner works with the information based on Jim's saliva.
At the other end, he has the collection vial waiting.
A beep chimes. Liquid pours out into the vial. Perfectly matched to Jim's DNA and body's needs of healing.
He gets one shot. Jim gets his ass kicked again? All the bets are off.
He could die.
Noise infiltrates the tent from outside.
Dammit, hurry.
The last two drops fall into the glass collector.
Jim tosses his head back and chugs it.
It tastes like ass. Even high tech, heal-on-command medicine tastes like shit. With all the advances of his world, they still haven't been able to get that right.
Jim stays still for the healing to work.
Euphoria coats him from the inside out. His back arches and his breath hisses out.
The healing steps up and, as it's designed, knitting trace damage at the molecular level.
Jim's skin fills, plumping and appearing healthier—firmer, even younger than his mid-twenties.
His body gives a last shudder and Jim knows the circuit is finished.
He stretches where he stands and tosses the used med kit inside his pack, walking with fresh strength to the unmanned flap at the door.
The heal would have been even more successful if he'd consumed any food. But oh-no.
The healing is designed to stop at vital reversals, like birth defects and inherent genetic defects. It has been programmed to leave inherent DNA code alone.
Thank fuck. Because earlier interferences hadn't been so choosy.
Like the mess of the tree guys Jim had invited here by blood.
Jim steps outside, eyes adjusting readily to the light, and instantly sees three guys trying to tear down a bleeding Phil.
Jim grins, revitalized.
I'm coming, big guy.
Chapter 8
Adahy
Adahy is regretful that he took Elise to the clan by the sea. Alanna, mother to Calia, has let grief twist her heart. The hate inside runs like a river of blackness over her remaining daughter. Though Adahy does not think the behavior is intentional, it is no excuse for how her reuniting with her only child has unfolded.
Alanna's temper has saturated all who are around her.
Adahy already makes internal plans for him and Elise to leave in stealth. He would take his chances with just the two of them before he would stay here. He knows the more time she stays in the presence of a clan run by emotions, rather that principles, the greater danger Elise is in. He can only speculate, for there are too many possibilities to consider, but the likely one is as it always is: there are too few females and eventually, though Elise may or may not have blood of the Band, the clansmen of the Band might find an excuse to keep her. With or without her consent. A new life of finer imprisonment is still a life lived without freedom.
Adahy does not think he can abide another loss.
I will not.
His eyes slit, taking in the great dining hall, the wind from the sea makes great buckles and folds within the billowing tent that cuts the icy sea breeze. Spring is a promise, the days are reaching temperatures above freezing, yet the threat of late winter remains, breathing all around them as though it is a living thing.
As far as the Iroquois are concerned, everything in this world is connected.
That is partly why the Stone Giantsʼ presence is alarming. Their existence is proof that the Fragment are not nearly as large a threat as the smaller clan of males within the trees.
They feed on the blood of humans. They live in trees that were mere saplings in a post-apocalyptic world made by the Travelers almost a century and a half ago. As the trees grew, these distant relatives of the Band lived and flourished in their narrow environment of tree and leaf.
They did not survive the cruelness of the new world as the Band did with their throat slits to aid breathing air too thick with ash to survive without them. But with abilities to shift their form so they could harness the protection the forest offered.
And the blood of whatever lived below became their food, even as the sun gradually became their enemy.
Yet Ulric seems a bit removed from those constraints and it troubles Adahy. The other Stone Giants are contained by the night. But Ulric? He seems to use whatever darkness is available—day or night.
Adahy does not believe they've seen the last of them. He intends to leave this place, keeping to the broad swaths of land that bisect the corridors of trees. The Iroquois have heard legends of the Stone Giants. However—they had coexisted without incident. But through circumstance and need—the Stone Giants had revealed themselves.
Adahy would not wait for their next reveal. Ulric would follow. Adahy could feel it as sure as he was standing in this spot watching the clan people take food.
Vaughn approaches, and Adahy is hardly able to clamp down on his body's natural response to tense.
“The females?” he grates, and Vaughn shoots him a look of barely-contained tolerance.
Adahy allows the expression—the irritated silence. Pauses in conversation do not trouble him. On the contrary, silences are useful tools in a test of verbal dominance. Not all fighting must be with fists and blade.
“They take rest in the tent.”
Adahy grunts in reply, his posture relaxing somewhat.
There are strict rules of propriety enacted here that are unfamiliar to him. Adahy is sure those protocols come from Alanna. Adahy longs for Elise, holding her in his arms as they slumber. If the clan knew how innocent their relationship still is—they would feel the fools they are.
Sudden unease unfurls inside Adahy. He is not wont to ignore his instincts and his body stiffens.
Vaughn's throat slits flare in response to Adahy's sudden tension. “What is it?”
Adahy's thoughts touch on Jim and Philip ensconced in a prison of sorts after fighting with the Band. He reminds himself the women are under guard in a tent, getting much-needed rest.
Adahy does not answer Vaughn. Instead, he s
trides to the stiff flap of the tent and runs a finger at the seam, spreading the material like a parting mouth.
He takes in a half-moon, bathing the distant sand dunes in silver. They glitter, ice making them sparkle like the sugar the Iroquois trade with the midwestern clans. His gaze travels along the changing topography, landing on the cluster of erected tents. His sharp eyes locate the tent where a wisp of smoke exits a chimney of sorts at the top, and he knows that Elise is within, warm and fed. His shoulders relax slightly.
Unsatisfied with just a casual inspection, Adahy steps outside the tent.
He could not hear the noise with the clanking of eating utensils, soft talking and other noises of over forty people inside the temporary structure.
Now he does. Over the howling of the wind that scrapes over depthless waves, Adahy hears keening.
Gooseflesh rises in response to the piteous crying. He swings his head in the direction of Vaughn behind him.
And a dull crunch sounds as a blunt instrument plows between his eyes.
Adahy staggers back, his nose broken, blood beginning to slowly ooze in twin lines to wet his lips in the sick taste of copper.
With vertigo trying to claim him, Adahy releases the tether of his tomahawk and swings it upward in a reaction as automatic as the struggling breaths he takes from his mouth.
The ax blade meets flesh and the figure who bashed him falls into his arms.
Vaughn.
Their eyes meet.
“What evil is this?” Adahy asks in Iroquois.
Vaughn grapples, trying to tear the blade from wherever it has met his body.
He shoves powerfully at Adahy and they break apart, Adahy falling hard on his backside. His teeth come together with a snap and blood fills his mouth.
Vaughn comes for him, the tomahawk sticking out of the meatiest part of his thigh.
He will not take me silently, Adahy vows.
Adahy gives the banshee wail of the Iroquois warrior engaged with the enemy.
The shrill sound of alarm floats over the top of the talking inside the tent, the sea bashing the shore, and comes to ears that recognize it for what it is.
*
Elise
“No, no, no—noooo!” Elise moans. She rolls Calia off her body and lays her gently on her side.
“Do not, Calia!” she shakes her and Calia's head lulls to the side, her lips part as shallow breaths signal her life starting to ebb.
Elise is not at her best. Her Healer abilities work to their fullest when circumstances are ideal and she is fed, rested.
Elise cannot remember the last time in which she felt truly whole.
Her hands shake as she puts them on Calia's concave stomach.
Heat flows from her fingertips to Calia, warming her rapidly cooling flesh.
She's too near death, and Elise's head hangs in defeat.
Elise shoves everything she has, scooping from deep within her body and unleashes healing in a wave of heat.
Please, she whispers to no one. Please let her live.
*
Ulric
Ulric, Tab and Brom jog to sudden stillness at the sight before them.
The sea crashes against a shore they have never witnessed as Ulric's stomach churns with the scent of blood permeating the frosty air around them.
He can hardly think for the smell.
Brom licks his lips, fangs fully extended.
All three are blood-starved.
Ulric glances at Tab.
Fangs as long as his own gleam in the hesitant light of the moon.
“Shall we kill them?” Brom asks. “It will begin something. We are making history by striking out. Leaving the great forest to engage them.”
Ulric understands the exact potential of the decision they weigh in this moment. “I am tired of hiding. We are first species.”
“Yes,” Tab gives an emphatic hiss of agreement.
Ulric can't smile, his fangs disallow the gesture, but his heart is light as they make their presence known by stepping out into the open glade.
The wind from the sea bites at their flesh, slapping their bodies in seeming anger. The smell of saltwater is thin and heady all around them.
Two clansmen and a warrior of the Band snap their heads up as they unveil their presence, fists bloodied by the beating of the Band Brom and Ulric have already made the acquaintance of.
Philip looks up, his body broken and bleeding on the icy cushion of matted seagrass and bed of sand.
Horror fills his gaze.
Ulric smiles.
He sees true.
*
Jim
Jim jogs into the open glade where Phil's getting his clock cleaned.
Oops.
Maybe those clans guys got a little enthusiastic. Poor Phil is laid out like a slab of meat. Not cool.
Jim can't sneak up on these neanderthals, they'll see him a million miles away. But he can give the big guy a chance.
He sprints, the residual healing making him fly over the ice and sand.
They are slower that he thought they'd be. Or Jim's just faster after the med kit heal.
He shoots into the air, maybe two meters from that fuck of the Band, Zaid.
Jim hates Vaughn more, but this guy'll do fine.
His foot slams into a thick neck, his laces grinding into his breathing slits, and Jim rides the move all the way through, his Kung Fu skills as automatic as breathing.
Zaid grabs Jim's legs as they pass over him, and using Jim's own momentum, tosses him wide.
Jim sails through the air, tumbling to an abrupt stop at the feet of the new threat.
Jim's bowels freeze as Ulric comes to stand over him, surveying Jim from above.
“Fuck,” is all Jim can wheeze out.
“Fuck, indeed,” Ulric replies and reaches for him.
Jim chops Ulric's wrist and evasively rolls, jumping to stand and whirling as he does in a low semi-crouch.
Ulric advances.
He's even more huge and badass than Jim remembers.
Holy. Fucking. Crap.
Jim centers, hands going to loose fists. He knows he can't take freaky monkey dude, and Jim's guessing Ulric's holding a helluva a grudge from the Pathway.
“You die first,” Ulric says with deliberate nonchalance, his hands fisting and fangs gleaming like sharp pearls.
Yeah. Still holding the grudge.
Jim's eyes hold onto Ulric but his stomach sinks as two other tree guys who flank him split away in opposite directions.
Jim won't survive this.
But if it saves Philip or the chicks, it's worth it.
A scream paralyzes the air and all heads turn toward the shrill cry.
“Help!” Elise wails. “I can't save her!”
Ignoring Jim, Ulric hisses, sprinting toward Elise.
Her eyes widen as she sees him, recognizing all that his presence means, and lifting her skirts, she beats feet in the other direction.
Where in the blue hell is Adahy?
Then he's shoved from behind, nose planting into grass like knifing spears. Jim manages to raise his head as the tree guys leap over the two clansmen they killed.
Zaid lays on the grass, spattered with what looks like tar, Philip beside him—still breathing.
It's not tar, Jim realizes, getting to his feet as his vision swims.
It's blood. A whole shit ton of it, if he's any judge.
Jim lurches forward, making his way to the big guy.
There's no time for fucking around and lying down on the job. They've got some chicks to save.
Maybe getting the tree guys here wasn't such a hot plan.
Chapter 9
Elise
Oh no! Elise's palms immediately dampen and her stomach plunges at the sight of Ulric appearing like an evil mirage in the middle of the nightmare clan.
Elise scatters to the wind, her feet flying beneath her. She is too selfish to care about Calia, all she can think about is that Ulric has come to
take her from Adahy.
If Ulric saved her from the Yellow Death—and made her womb fertile once more through blood share—what good does it do if he meant to have her for his clan within the forest?
She hears his footfalls crushing the seagrass and snow behind her. The noise of it overrides that of her heartbeats pounding.
“Stop!” Ulric shouts and a defeated sob escapes as Elise slows.
She does not obey him because he commands it, but because there is no outrunning him. And when she turns, he looms directly behind her. Her breath is frozen in her throat like the air all around her.
Elise had forgotten how huge the tree clansman was.
She shudders, lifting her forearm above her face.
The self-defense is automatic. No female survives the brutality of the Fragment without some measure of compromise to their sense of safety and wellbeing, and Elise is no different.
Ulric grips her arm and she shouts in terror, trying to drop to the ground as he does.
“Do not, Elise—I mean you no harm and there is not sufficient time to convince you.” His brows drop. “What has happened?”
Elise stops cowering when the blows do not immediately rain down upon her.
Ulric's dark eyebrows lift in question. Elise gives a shaky nod.
“Ca—” she clears the thickness of her throat, “Calia has fallen ill.” Elise does not elaborate how the event occurred.
If she is even now—gone to them.
Ulric's gaze narrows upon her as two others run up beside Ulric. One tree man she recognizes. Brom. The other is a stranger.
“Do you trust me, Elise?”
No. Yes—she doesn't know. As he stands before all she feels is terror. And terribly conflicted. Ulric did save her and Calia, yet he and his tree clansmen had tried to keep the two of them. In essence, removing her from the only male who she had ever endeavored to trust.
A very similar recipe to the one the Fragment cooked with. However, in the case of the tree men, they tied it together more neatly. Elise still views it as a robbery of their choice to live their lives as they wish.
“I am not sure.” There. That is as truthful as she can be.
Elise straightens and moves toward Ulric—for Calia's sake.
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