Ethereal Underground

by Briana Gaitan

  “Then why did you drag her on this quest with you. Why did you make Finlay and Arie come along? Do you not care for the redhead and your friend?” Leon’s voice grew louder, but not loud enough to cover the singing in the background that called to him.

  “Annalise is not that weak and feeble seraph anymore. She is stronger, we make each other stronger. This bond helps her become something you seraphs will never understand. My friends came along because they stand by my side no matter the cost. We want to help Annalise clear her name and prove her loyalty to her kind. I don’t sit back and let monsters kill the people I love.” He forced the last sentence out and had to keep from punching the wall behind him. He hoped that Annalise couldn’t feel how angry he was right now. Leon was right. The longer he stayed away from the hulmiens, the less affected his mind became. Leon bent down to look Ash in the eyes. Ash felt a shiver run down his spine.

  “I underestimated you. When this is all done, Annalise will return home and pretty soon this bond between the two of you will disappear. The seraphs do not associate with your kind for this very reason; you mortals cause nothing but violence and destruction. You leave death and despair everywhere you go.”

  Ash wanted to protest, but he kept his mouth shut. Arguing with him would be pointless. Leon had no idea what it was like to be bonded. He had no idea how much they complemented each other.

  “Where is she?” Ash asked.

  “Resting. These human emotions have exhausted her. I promised Finlay I would keep you safe while he is enjoying what may be his last night with Arie.”

  This would not be Finlay’s last night anywhere. Ash didn’t like it when Leon spoke so negatively about their journey to the fallen, but he knew Leon was trying to guilt him into turning around.

  “Finlay knew exactly what he was agreeing to when he joined us,” Ash said. It was true.

  “Only because he felt guilty for putting you in this situation in the first place; Finlay has spent too much time with you humans.”

  “You’re wrong, Finlay has no reason to feel guilty. Why would he feel guilty?” Ash whispered. He meant to say more, but he felt himself start to drift into a deep sleep. He struggled to keep his eyes open. What kind of spell was Leon putting him under? Why was he so tired? He wanted to get up and find Annalise and make sure that she was safe, but the heaviness drifted over his entire body until he had been coaxed into a slumber. In the back of his mind, he figured it must be Annalise. Somehow her feelings of how tired she was were affecting him. Yet, maybe it was the hulmiens’ poison. Were they ready to devour their food now?

  A short time later, Ash awoke to the faint sounds of laughing. He groggily sat up and looked around. He was sitting against a rock wall. The light from the bonfire flickered off of the walls. He looked across the way at all of the hulmiens who were gathered around the fire. They seemed to be enjoying the company of the outsiders. Annalise sat smiling and talking with Arie. Finlay looked like he was talking strategy with Leon. Ash took a moment to take in the relaxed sight of his friends. It was so different from the chaotic week they had shared. Ash winced as he remembered his actions from earlier. Something about the hulmiens had impaired his judgment. He wasn’t sure if it was the singing or maybe it was just being close to them that seemed to alter his mood, but he decided he couldn’t take that chance again.

  He watched Annalise talking; it was so nice to see her relaxed and getting along with Arie. Annalise ran her hands through Arie’s curls. They seemed to be having some sort of girl talk. The shadows bounced off of her face, making her skin look a bit darker. He hadn’t been able to take the time so sit back and watch her beauty. The way her face lit up. She had a genuine way of making him feel like he could be cared for. A deep longing inside him stirred. It was a feeling that he had repressed over the journey. As a keeper, he was always taught to keep all distractions to a minimum. Annalise was the biggest distraction of them all. His mind needed to be clear in order to fight the fallen. As if she knew what he was thinking, Annalise looked over to where Ash was sitting. She whispered something to Arie, who nodded in agreement. Annalise stood up slowly and made her way over to Ash’s side of the cave. Ash sat up straighter and smiled as she came closer. He thought about looking Leon’s way, but decided against it. He didn’t want anything to ruin the happiness that jumped inside him when she was near.

  “Hey,” he told her.

  Annalise sighed and turned to sit next to him. “They say that you cannot get too close to the creatures.” Ash felt his face darken in embarrassment. It was a feeling he never had. Yet the thought of her seeing him act so stupid with the hulmiens made him feel even worse.

  He hastily tried to change the subject. “I can take care of myself, but you seemed to be having fun with Arie.”

  She looked at the ground and pretended to straighten her clothes. “Yes, well Finlay told us that it is a mortal custom to have one last...what did he call it? Bravo before a battle.” Ash wasn’t sure what type of custom Finlay was referring to, but he was pretty sure he was making it up to get Annalise and Leon to loosen up. They both sat in silence for a long time. Neither of them having to talk. Ash still felt comfortable. He could sense how nervous she was about the jump into the tenth layer. He was also nervous, but because he was about to enter a layer that no one else could get to. The tenth layer had been closed off to citizens since the ecosphere was created. He still couldn’t believe that he was about to enter it to fight the legendary fallen.

  “There is no turning back,” she whispered. She bravely grabbed his hand and squeezed it. Her hand felt warm and soft against his rough skin.

  “You can still go home with Leon,” he told her. He wanted to give her one last chance to turn around.

  She shook her head. “If I go home, they will cast me out. If I go home with the blood of a fallen on my hands they may forgive me.” Everything she said made perfect sense, but Leon’s words were still stuck in his mind. Was he pushing her to be reckless like himself? He didn’t want to feel responsible for someone else’s death.

  “And when it is over, what will become of us? How about our bond?” Ash wasn’t sure what type of answer he was expecting. She didn’t have any plans to stay, and he had too much pride to ask her to.

  “Natara said it will fade with time.” Her words stung him. How could she pretend that this past week had meant nothing to her? Ash coldly pulled his hand from her grip. The sudden thought of losing the bond terrified him. He enjoyed feeling the power of water around him. With the bond, the need to sleep and eat came considerably less. The connection with another living being made him feel less alone. Until she talked about it fading, he hadn’t thought much about how much he loved it.

  “This bond makes us unique. If you could give it a chance; maybe we can learn to control it. We can learn to do great things with it.” He wasn’t even sure why he was saying this. He knew all along the end of their story. Perhaps it was the hulmiens’ poison that made him speak before thinking. The only thing on his mind at that moment was the fact that he did not want Annalise to leave, or their bond to fade.

  She shook her head and slowly stood up. “This bond does not make us unique. It makes us an outcast. It is a curse for breaking the rules.”

  “That is Leon speaking.”

  “This is me speaking.” She took her hands and put them to her heart.

  Ash disagreed. He stood up beside her. He towered over her small form. Looking her in the eyes, he tried not to sound so harsh. “Once again, that is only your fear.” She didn’t answer, so he decided to drop the subject.

  He looked at everyone at the bonfire. They needed to run. His cloudy mind had started to clear out. The hulmiens were preparing that large pot for something and he had a sneaky suspicion they had never eaten a seraph. Today would not be the day they would get to. Ash grabbed Annalise’s hand and pulled her close.

  “I know Finlay thinks we will be okay, but I really think we need to get out of here. Those friendly feelings the
hulmiens share with Fin will eventually fade and we will end up like the piles of bones we saw back along the way,” he told her. Annalise appeared to understand. He talked quietly in case someone was listening. He watched as Finlay started to dance with a hulmien and Leon started to twirl Arie around the fire. He thought that the hulmiens weren’t supposed to have an effect on anyone but mortal men, but everyone was acting far too relaxed.

  “What will we do?”

  “If we put out the fire, it may distract them. They are preparing that big pot for something.”

  Annalise held out her hand. “I can make the water if you can get close enough to throw it on the fire. While the hulmiens are distracted by the water, we can all make a run for it. Leon told me the entrance is a little farther down the cavern, a hole in the ground. They won’t follow us down there. They said that no one ever goes down there.”

  Ash looked at her; they didn’t even need to talk. He would do what he needed to distract the hulmiens and she would get everyone out. It sounded so easy, but he knew nothing ever was. Ash walked closer to the dancing hulmiens and tried to keep his mind focused. He didn’t want to slip back under their spell. He decided to try and touch them as little as possible in case their poison was spread by contact. He walked up to Leon with his head held high.

  “May I steal Arie away for a minute?” Ash asked Leon. Arie spun around grinning and held her arms out to wrap them around Ash’s neck. Leon took a step back and let his eyes wander over to Annalise, who stood back away from the dancers. The girls noticed that Ash was back and ran over to him. They each put their hands all over Ash’s body and tried to pull Arie off of him. Ash tightened his grip and pulled Arie closer. He gave them a loopy smile and pretended to still be affected by them. “I’m sorry girls but you will each have to make a line and wait your turn.”

  They each started to pout and complain.

  “But we have missed you.”

  “We are so lonely.”

  A short green haired hulmien hissed and tried to pull Arie back by her hair. Ash watched as her bright eyes started to glow; the sound that came from her throat was like no other. Arie gasped as she lost her grip around his neck. The hulmien bent down and bit Arie in her shoulder.

  “My turn!” Her hiss was so loud it echoed off of the walls.

  Arie cried out; more in shock than anything else. She regained her balance and looked at the shorter hulmien. “You bit me!”

  She was answered with a proud fanged smile. The hulmien held her hands up to show five razor sharp claws that gradually grew from her fingertips. Ash got in his fighting stance, ready to protect his friends.

  Finlay ran over from the other side where he was dancing with some other hulmiens. “Whoa, ladies, hulmiens, why all the hissing?”

  The green haired girl pointed a claw at Arie. “Fin- this red-haired girl means to take my food.” Ash forced down a large gulp as the word food came from the creature’s mouth. Food? In all his keeper battles he had come across many things but never had he been someone’s meal. He knew that the hulmiens’ intentions were not friendly, and she had just confirmed this.

  Finlay stepped in front of Arie to protect her. “You will not harm my friends, with your claws or your fangs.”

  Ash looked around and noticed that the hulmiens were all starting to circle around the three of them. Annalise and Leon were nowhere to be found, Ash only hoped Annalise was filling Leon in on the plan, and quickly. Ash pulled his blade out ready to slash anyone who made a move.

  “Are you hurt?” Finlay asked Arie. He pulled her head to the side to examine her shoulder.

  Arie laughed in response. “It barely broke the skin. I am going to kill these…these things.”

  The hissing continued around them as the creatures cried out.

  “I’m so hungry.”

  “We have waited so long.”

  The creatures stepped in closer; there was nothing beautiful about them now.

  The sound of Annalise’s sweet voice from behind him made Ash turn around. In a split second a rain storm started to fall from above. The rain soaked only the hulmiens. It startled them, since they had never been to the surface to see rain. Ash decided that the bonfire was useless now- he needed to use the water as a weapon against them. Ash tried to use the water to push the hulmiens back from around them, but he wasn’t strong enough. It hit them; it just wasn’t strong enough to harm them. One of the girls jumped toward Ash, but he sidestepped the attack and let her hit the ground. He tried again to make the water into a weapon, but again he failed. He could manipulate it, but there was nothing harmful about the water he threw at them. The water only appeared to agitate and confuse them.

  “What are you doing?” Finlay cried out, pushing a hulmien back with a wall of vines. The vines sprouted from the ground and twisted around the creatures. They responded by slashing the vines with their claws in one swift motion. Arie swiped at a few girls with her knife. He didn’t understand why it was so hard to control the water. He had no problem controlling it before, but he didn’t have much experience with it in battle. He felt the tingle grow in his hands. He took a deep breath and cried out as he used his hands to throw a wave of water at another hulmien. She flew back against a rock, Ash smiled in response. He was getting a bit better. From the corner of his eye he watched each one of the creatures go up in flames. They each hissed and fell to the ground in pain. Their cries didn’t affect him nearly as much as their singing did.

  “About time,” Finlay said.

  Ash looked over at Leon who stood emotionless; he stared at the flaming bodies. If it was so easy for Leon to kill the creatures, why didn’t he just do it in the first place? Unless, Leon’s plan had been to make Ash look weak all along. The only male affected by the creatures, and the only male without an affinity. Ash let the burning hatred rise in his chest as he glared at Leon. The seraph was putting in his claim for Anna.

  Chapter Eleven

  Annalise

  Her hands went to her mouth in shock of Leon’s blatant display of power and caused the rain to stop. Before she could open her mouth to speak, he grabbed her hands and pulled her behind him.

  “Come on, we need to get out of here,” he called to the others.

  She followed behind him quickly, eyes looking back to make sure Ash was in tow. He was, and he did not look very happy about what had transpired. They had tried to use their bond, share the affinity for water, and it had failed them. She knew that it was disappointment that flowed from him and over to her.

  After they were once again to safety, Annalise found herself walking behind Ash, Arie, and Finlay. Leon had allowed them to walk in front so he could keep up the rear and make sure none of the hulmiens followed behind them. Really, Annalise was glad to have a few moments from Ash due to the harsh things he had said to her before they tried to fight their way out of the lair, as well as his interaction with those dreadful creatures. She knew that the flirtations with the hulmiens were due to their poisons and song, but it had reminded her that he had been more like that when they had met. He had been one not to settle down or spend serious one on one time with a woman, and so she had reminded herself that she needed to go home. It would never work between them, even if part of her wished it would. Their bond was not even strong enough to battle with.

  Leon cleared his throat and she looked over to him to see what he needed. “What’s on your mind, Anna?”

  “I do not wish to talk about it.”

  “You haven’t spoken since we left those hulmiens, and I thought you had some sort of fun there before things became dangerous.”

  Annalise let out a sigh and shrugged, “I did enjoy myself, more so than I have in a long time it seems. It is just that…I spoke with Ash about the bond. He wants to give it a chance, so to speak. I think maybe he wants me to stay but he would not say it.”

  She could see Leon’s change in posture at the mention of the bond. He stood up straighter as he spoke, “I told you that mingling with the m
ortals would bring you down, but you did not listen to me. We used to bond with the mortals, and then it did not turn out in our favor.”

  “Do you remember those days?” she asked curiously.

  “Yes. I was a young seraph back then. I still had warrior training, but the females were the majority of healers. We lived in harmony with the humans for the most part.”

  “Natara says that lots of seraphs were bound with mortals. Did you ever make a…bond?” She drew her words out slowly, not sure if she wanted the answer or not. If he had, perhaps she could get him to understand. If not, she feared that he would not.

  “No,” he said simply.

  “Did you know of anyone with one? Did Finlay have one?”

  “I did know of bonded pairs, and no this was before he was created.”

  Annalise tried to imagine a time without Finlay around. “The seraph world must have been a dull place.”

  Leon looked over at her with an amused smile on his face, one that she had missed getting from him through all of these serious conversations they had recently, “Is that a joke?”

  “Perhaps.”

  “I never imagined you making a joke on purpose,” Leon said with a laugh. He reached over to put an arm around her waist and pull her over to him. “I’m just glad to see that you are okay. I feared that the fallen would get to you in order to try and get to me. They know that you are my counterpart and with you wandering around the mortal world…” He let his words trail off, but she could tell what he meant by that.

  “I am glad you are safe also. You have always been by my side and I do not want that to change. But Leon, I am not so sure that I want to leave here. This experience with Ash has opened my eyes to all of those things I wanted to see. I have seen the stars. I have gone on adventures. I have-”

  She stopped herself from saying those words that she had not even gotten to tell Ash and cast her eyes to the ground, just how much she cared for him. “Anyway, it does not matter. If he wanted me to stay, he would have asked me. Do you not think?”