Boreal and John Grey Season 1

by Chrystalla Thoma

  “Bring them out,” Dave’s voice rang from outside. “Nobody shoots unless I say so, got it?”

  Reassuring, though not by much, considering Dave had been the one to put a bullet in Finn’s chest in the first place.

  Two attendants came around to pull the stretcher out and, to her relief, the young doctor from the clinic was with them. That hopefully meant Dave hadn’t brought them there — wherever that was — to have them killed or be left to die.

  A policeman stepped forward, offering her a hand down and she accepted it gratefully, not too certain of her balance.

  Then she stood next to Finn’s stretcher, surrounded by loaded guns, on the side of a deserted road. Rectangular, windowless buildings with heavy doors rose across the road. The light slanted, casting long shadows. Late afternoon. Just how many hours had the bumpy ride taken?

  And how far were they from the city? She eyed the buildings again. What on earth was this place? It smelled of military.

  “An abandoned base?” she hazarded.

  “The less you know the better,” Dave all but growled. He came to stand in front of her, hands shoved in his pockets. He hummed. The sound seemed to come from deep inside his chest. “This is an experiment, just so we’re clear about this. You have a week to fix his magic.” He glanced at Finn who glared right back, hands fisted by his sides where he lay on the stretcher. “We’ll be posted along the perimeter and also inside, close enough you can yell for help. Infrared sensors will tell us if anything passes through a Gate, and the moment an elf or machine crosses, the experiment is over. Understood?”

  Understood. No second chances. Ella swallowed hard. “But the doctor—”

  “Dr. Evans will check on you once a day. You can call him with the phone you’ll find inside if anything else is needed.”

  A policewoman approached and handed Dave a duffel bag. He glanced inside, then zipped it closed.

  “Here are changes of clothes and antibiotics, painkillers and bandages. Come along.”

  He led the way into the closest building. Barracks, she thought, abandoned and dusty. She walked next to the stretcher, making sure Finn could see her, as they crossed the huge space and came out on the other side. A training area, if the obstacle race circuit, shooting targets and uneven walls for rock climbing were anything to go by. They took a path around the area to a smaller building standing in the center of the compound.

  A rusty sign creaked in the chilly breeze as they approached. The cafeteria. Maybe they offered tea?

  She swallowed a snort. Oh dear, not good. Still balancing on the razor-sharp edge to insanity.

  “The place has been fixed so you can stay here for the allotted week,” Dave was saying as he opened the metal door and entered, switching on lights.

  The stretcher’s wheels made a racket on the path and the attendants had to lift stretcher and Finn to clear the step. Then the tread of heavy boots followed as the small force accompanying them followed inside.

  Ella stopped. Someone had shoved the long tables and benches aside and had placed two narrow beds against a wall. A small table with two chairs sat by the counter. Boxes of food and drinks lined the shelves she could see. A door marked ‘toilets’ stood to the right.

  Dave cleared his throat. “Showers are outside, by the officers barracks. You’ll find towels and soaps there.”

  The place was grey and dark, cold and dank, with all the charm of a prison cell.

  She’d take it. God, yes. The bed was calling her name. At this point, she’d sleep on the floor if she had to. “Looks like we’re set, then.”

  The attendants lifted Finn from the stretcher and lowered him on one of the beds.

  “Will you be all right?” Dave asked softly, and his familiar, concerned voice brought a lump to her throat. He’d always been kind to her — until he’d shot Finn and had proven to be a perfect, emotionless machine.

  “We’ll be fine,” she snapped, wishing she got angry enough to see the seam with the spirals and cogs inside Dave, to remember just what an alien being he was. “What choice do we have?”

  “You could let me finish what I started,” Dave said matter-of-factly, and yeah, that did the trick quite nicely.

  Fingers curling at her sides, she stepped up to him, his glittering seam teasing the edge of her vision. “Go to hell, Dave.” She turned away, because punching him wasn’t a good idea right now. “By the way, you might want to free Sarah from the clinic. She made the same offer. I declined.”

  Chapter Eight

  Not real

  The doctor checked Finn’s drip and examined him one last time before he left the building with the three attendants. Dave shot her a dark look before he followed them, barking at his police to move out.

  Yeah, maybe pissing Dave off hadn’t been her brightest idea. But, hell, she was beat, and her brain wasn’t big on rational thought on the best of days.

  The door of the old cafeteria banged shut, leaving them at long last alone and relatively safe. Lots of iron around. Even the beds were iron. Hopefully it’d give the Shades pause.

  And now to dream and fight to save John Grey. Who would’ve thought such a day would come — or that sleep would be so much work?

  She dragged the second bed right next to Finn’s, wincing at the screeching of the legs on the cement floor. Her hand hurt so bad tears leaked from her eyes. Rummaging in the duffel bag Dave had left, she found painkillers and bottles of water. She chugged two pills down, and sat to unlace her boots. That done, she turned and — finally — lay down, fully dressed, reeking of blood and sweat and not caring one bit.

  Finn stirred and rolled his head toward her. He stretched out one arm and she shifted closer to lay her head on his shoulder, belatedly checking it wasn’t on his wounded side.

  “You did it,” he whispered, wonder in his voice.

  “We’re not done yet,” she said.

  He stroked a fingertip on her cheek and frowned. “You’re crying?”

  She wiped a hand over her face. “It’s all the dust,” she muttered and rested her bandaged hand on his chest.

  He grunted, still frowning, clearly not believing her. “You’re in pain.”

  “I took painkillers. Should kick in soon.” She sighed, listening to his heartbeat. She could stay like that forever. Her eyes were closing, her lids heavy. “And you? Are you in pain?”

  “I’m...” He breathed out, and she looked up, wondering what he wanted to say. He shifted her hand so it rested over his heart. “I’m fine now.”

  Her eyes smarted again, and dammit that was quite enough of tears. “Good, because it’s time to dream, and, Finn?”

  He harrumphed, his eyes already closed.

  “If I don’t start talking in your dream, talk to me, okay? I know you don’t talk much, but this is important, and we need...”

  A wave of darkness rolled over her, and she let it come.

  ***

  Ella stood on the frozen plateau among the mountains. A rainbow arched over a girl of six or seven, dressed in a red suit of trousers and tunic. Colorful spheres revolved and danced as the girl waved her small fingers. The spheres rose like soap bubbles, reflecting the light in changing hues that bled into each other, expanding and contracting as they bobbed up and down.

  A few steps away, a boy juggled wind currents. They whistled around him, whipping his long, pale hair, ripping the snow, raising it in swirling mini tornadoes.

  But it wasn’t Finn.

  Ella walked among the tiny magic-wielders, glance darting over pointed ears, cute faces and slender bodies clad in thick fabrics embroidered with the crests of the royal houses. Power sparkled around her, energy bent and twisted — hot and cold, bright or invisible, loud or quiet, touching her or skirting her.

  Where was Finn?

  She waded through the quiet, focused elven children, until she saw the boy standing to one side, leaning against a huge boulder, arms crossed, glaring.

  So familiar.

  Finn, she t
ried to call, but no sound emerged. His eyes flicked her way, though, acknowledging her, before shifting back to the magical display.

  Suddenly, his eyes widened and he jerked. A ball of light flew at him, hitting him in the chest. He yelped and dropped to his knees.

  Laughter rang all around. The colorful displays dimmed, and many heads turned their way, and hands pointed.

  “Not real!” they called and Finn bowed his head, letting his long hair hide his face. “You’re not real.”

  Sorrow swamped her. She tried to turn, make the kids shut up, but her feet had taken root in the brittle snow.

  Then the landscape was changing, disorienting her, making her dizzy. Passing from dream to dream, from nightmare to nightmare, as the darkness turned to grey and she found herself standing on a huge, white plain, below a cliff.

  Something about it was familiar. She thought she saw faces up above, on the ledge, looking down. Staring at something.

  She turned, dreading to see.

  The boy lay in the snow, blood seeping from his broken leg on the snow around, the white of bone glimmering through the gory mess below his knee. Grey eyes stared right at her, clouded with pain.

  She gritted her teeth, twisting this way and that to move her legs, but nothing happened. Walking to him was impossible. Calling him wasn’t working. She dropped to her knees, defeated.

  And came awake, her face wet. Glancing around in the faint light of an overhead lamp, she saw nothing out of the ordinary. If something had crossed over, it had to be outside the building.

  Falling back against the pillow, she stared at Finn’s grimacing face. Still caught in the dream. She reached out to shake him.

  Outside, a howl rang, raising gooseflesh on her arms. Finn’s body jerked and his eyes opened. She clamped a hand on his shoulder to keep him from moving and listened.

  Shouts, heavy footsteps, a gunshot. Low voices. Finn was watching her from hooded eyes, his breathing harsh and shallow.

  “They got it, whatever it was,” she said.

  He slumped back on the pillow and turned his face away.

  Ella clenched her jaw. Goddammit, it wasn’t working. Finn was sinking into nightmares and she could only watch as he ripped open the Veil between the worlds over and over again.

  ***

  “There’s ham,” she said, examining the tins on the shelves. “Canned fruit, tuna, and saltine crackers. Would you like some?”

  Finn grunted, neither affirmative nor negative, hunched over on the bed. His eyes looked bruised, and the vomit green of his hospital pajamas lent a sickly hue to his skin.

  Man, he’d looked quite bad when she’d first taken him in and when he’d been shot, but now his eyes were sunken in their sockets and his cheeks were hollow. Worst of all, the relentless energy that had kept him going, the glint of curiosity and interest in his gaze, had dimmed.

  He was staring at the needle inserted in his hand.

  “You need to eat,” she said quietly. Not that she felt like eating, herself. She was still woozy and her brain felt as if padded with cotton. She’d munched on a cracker earlier and taken her antibiotics, though, and Finn didn’t seem inclined to eat even that much.

  Depression clung to her like a poisonous web. On the counter sat the book that had saved Finn’s life — the saga of John Grey, a neat hole in its center, the cover encrusted with dried blood.

  Finn’s blood, dammit.

  She unscrewed the lid off a water bottle and went to sit next to him. He didn’t look up.

  “Are you in pain?” she asked.

  He shook his head, tugged half-heartedly on the needle, then pressed a hand to the bandage on his ribs.

  “Something’s wrong, isn’t it?” she muttered. “Should I call the doctor?”

  “No.” The word was sharp and he ground his jaw, as if angry at himself for speaking.

  “Finn, that was a lot of damage. It’s okay to ask for stronger painkillers or anything else you need.”

  “I’m opening Gates.” Each word forced between gritted teeth. “These animals... they’ve killed people.” He ripped the needle from his hand and blood spattered the white sheets. Before Ella could move, he surged up and shoved away the drip, sent it clattering to the floor. His fists shook at his sides. “Nothing can help.”

  Killing people. A wolf had killed Simon. She remembered corpses in a park with scaly wolves stalking over them. She watched Finn standing there, breathing hard; shaking.

  “Listen.” She got up, her bad leg throbbing. “It’s not your fault. I’m not blaming you.”

  He said nothing.

  She reached for him, didn’t touch him. Like in the dream. “We’ll find a solution. You can do this.”

  “Can’t.” Spoken so quietly she barely heard it. “I was never good enough.”

  Looked like she wasn’t the only one depressed. With those dreams, who could blame him for hitting rock bottom?

  “I promise I’ll fix this.” She’d make goat sacrifices and dance naked in the moonlight, if that was what it took. “Finn, you can do this. You’re strong.”

  He still didn’t look up. “Not real,” he whispered.

  “Hey.” She grabbed his hand. “Snap out of it. What those kids said, what everyone thought was wrong.” She put a hand under his chin and lifted his face, gently. When their eyes finally met, she winked. “You’ve got magic, baby.”

  He pressed his lips together and she let him go.

  “Lame, huh?” she whispered. “You rock my world?” She snorted. “If I can’t even make you smile, then what good am I?”

  He snorted softly, too, and the sound lifted her heart. She had to get through to him and she wasn’t above cheating; not when it came to helping Finn. “Come and eat something. I need your help to do this. I’m tired and the fever won’t let me think. Please.”

  It warmed her heart when this time he nodded and let her drag him to the table. Cheating or not, he was doing it for her.

  ***

  The room was shaped like the inside of a bell, the curved walls sheer white. They sparkled in the light of lamps set on tall tables made of dragon bones.

  Kneeling on a colorful rug in a corner, the boy played with his toys, pale hair hiding his face, slender-tipped ears poking out. He had a beaked wolf made of stone in his small hand, and the figurine of a man in the other. He made low growling noises as he had the two fight and tumble about.

  She dropped to her knees at the edge of the rug. He glanced over and smiled, his grey eyes lighting up. He pushed the stone wolf toy toward her, but she couldn’t lift her hand to take it.

  He didn’t seem to mind. He had it attack the man figurine with a low howl that sounded eerily like the sound a real wolf would produce. The fine hairs on her arms stood on end.

  She must have made a face, because the boy laughed, a beautiful crystal sound that echoed in the room.

  Grinning, she watched as the stone wolf stomped around the figurine, then attacked it making snarling sounds.

  So cute. She wanted to grab the boy in her arms, tickle him and hear that happy laughter again. Why wouldn’t her arms move from her sides?

  The boy muttered something and wiped at his nose with the back of his hand. He shot her a quick look, then pushed the man figurine toward her. He gave a tentative smile that wobbled at the edges, as if saying, come, play with me.

  Oh god, she wanted to join in, but it was as if a force field surrounded the boy, not letting her approach.

  His face fell and he pulled back the figurine, eyes downcast.

  It made her want to cry. Finn, she tried to say, but no sound came from her lips. Finn, can you hear me?

  The boy set the wolf on the figurine, but his heart didn’t seem to be in it anymore. As he turned to set his toys aside, a dark patch on his arm caught Ella’s eye. A bruise? The boy stretched to grab another toy, a sort of plane made from a light, brown material, and she thought she saw the imprint of fingers marked in blue and black around his biceps.

/>   Who did this to you? she wanted to ask. Those weren’t the fingerprints of a child. The urge to gather him close made her hands tingle, but she still couldn’t move them. It was maddening.

  The boy whimpered, a tiny sound caught in his throat, and turned his head as if listening. She glanced at the open door. What had frightened him so much?

  Then she heard the steps, too.

  She couldn’t approach the boy, but she could move away from him, so she got up and stepped toward the door.

  The boy scrambled to his feet.

  A male elf entered, his wide shoulders barely fitting through. His long pale hair was clasped at the back of his neck and he wore a peculiar metal crown on his head — glittering vines twisting and knotting on his forehead, vanishing in his hairline.

  She knew that face from the dreams, and hated it. It always heralded pain.

  “Fadhir,” the boy whispered, his face white, and backed into the corner.

  Without a word, the elf marched to the boy and grabbed him by the hair. The boy whimpered again as Ella spun after the elf, a shout clogging her throat.

  Leave him be! she tried to shout, but couldn’t, and when she threw herself at the elf, to pull him away, she found she couldn’t even touch him.

  Why? Why’s this happening?

  A thump and the boy’s head was slammed against the wall, the man’s hand holding him there by the hair, his other hand coming to grip the boy’s jaw.

  “Where’s your magic, mogr?” he hissed. “You’re no son of mine, are you? You’re an embarrassment, making me look bad to the other lydr.”

  Her knees shook with fear. The elf was huge and she barely reached his waist. Stop hurting him! her lips formed the words without a sound.

  So useless.

  The elf shook the boy and slammed him again into the wall. Another thump sounded, sending her heart banging.

  Red misted her eyes. Heat rushed up her neck to her face. How dare he harm Finn? Finn was hers to protect.

  “Finn!” she shouted, the sound ripping from her throat, “no!”

  ***