by D. N. Leo
“I repeat, I don’t want to throw fire at you. Leave us!”
“I’m afraid we cannot leave you after knowing you have the One. We’ll leave with him. Or we’ll fight to the death.”
“You can leave in peace. But you’ve apparently chosen the hard way,” Lyla muttered and took a quick glance at the two men lying helpless on the ground. Damn her if she couldn’t protect them.
She fixed her stance again and prepared to throw more fire.
Then all the witches, including Jaxper, dropped to the ground and said, “My god.”
Lyla rolled her eyes and turned around. In front of her stood the god of the witches, a very tall and formidable man with long white hair and fair skin. He stood looking down at Michael and Gale.
“Get away from them!” Lyla said.
The man looked at Lyla and smiled. She relaxed her fists but knew she could ball them up quickly if she needed to fire.
The man looked back down at Michael.
“Get away from my men,” she said.
The man nodded, chuckled, and stepped back.
Lyla rushed over and stood in front of Michael and Gale.
The man raised his hand and gave her a dismissive gesture. In front of an astonished Lyla, the witches, including Jaxper, bowed and withdrew in order.
The man returned to Lyla. “I know who you are, young lady.”
“I’m a fire summoner. I can burn paranormal creatures.”
The man smiled. “That’s only a myth.”
Lyla threw a fireball at a nearby tree. It burst into flames.
The man nodded. “Impressive. But true ability to control fire comes only with virtuous action.”
“Virtue is the last thing I need to think about right now.”
“Is that because you might have been exiled from Eudaiz, the place you call home?”
“I don’t know you, and I don’t care to be judged by something that wasn’t my fault.”
“I’m not judging. I can help you fix your friends here, overcome the exile verdict, and go home safely.”
“Who are you?”
“Someone who can help you … for a fair exchange.”
“Name your price.”
“I wouldn’t call it a price. It’s a fair exchange.”
“All right. What is it you want, god of the witches? As long as it isn’t any of my friends, I’ll consider.”
“I can see you’re trying to guard your guards. But even if you give me both of them, it won’t match what I’m going to give you.”
She approached, looked the man in the eye. She couldn’t tell his make. He was supernatural now—she could tell that much. But he used to be human. There was something in his eyes that made her believe him. She felt she could trust him—a stranger in a strange world compared to hers.
“You said you know me. How?”
He smiled. “You’re Lyla J. LeBlanc. Daughter of the current king of Eudaiz. That piece of information, if it were to fall into the wrong hands, could put your life, your family, and Eudaiz at stake. As you can tell, I have no intention of causing you harm.”
“What’s your name?”
“People call me Cole.”
“Just Cole?”
He nodded. “That’s my preference.”
“You used to be human. So how did you become god of the witches in this forest?”
“That’s the kind of information I will reveal after you agree to a fair exchange with me.”
“You called out my true identity. You outlined the danger I’m in. I figure whatever you want me to do to help at your end won’t be a small thing.”
Cole smiled. “Do you agree to a fair exchange so we can begin the negotiation?”
“Yes, I agree. But at any point, if I feel the exchange is unfair, I reserve the right to withdraw.”
Cole nodded. “Let’s begin.”
Chapter Thirty-Four
Michael opened his eyes and saw a large patch of blue sky. He squinted. It wasn’t a small patch of sky like he would see from the middle of a thick forest. It was a magnificent sky … out in the open. He sat right up and saw Lyla sitting nearby, working on Gale’s equipment.
“There you are. How are you feeling?” she smiled.
He looked around. They were on top of the hill, on a flat surface. The grass he was lying on was soft, green, and neat as if in a manicured garden. He was sure the trees around them were part of a garden, too, and not a wild jungle as before.
On their left was the mouth of a cave, covered in vines and wildflowers that released a pleasantly calming aroma. Square blocks of farmland were carved into the hills, curving around the contours of the rocks and the landscape. He could see patches of the highland villages. They looked to be a long distance away. That meant they were very high up and even more remote than the remote Vietnam civilizations.
“Where are we?”
“Land of the witches.” Lyla smiled. “That’s what Jaxper told me.”
“So she’s okay? Where’s Gale?”
“Recovering. I haven’t turned him back on yet.”
Michael approached and sat down on the stone bench next to Lyla. “Did he know he was a robot?”
Lyla looked up at him. He wished she wouldn’t blink those striking gray eyes framed by impossibly long thick lashes at him, but she did. “He didn’t know. And it’s my plan not to let him know.”
“How is this possible?”
“We were teenagers. Gale, my brother, and I sneaked into Xiilok as part of a hologame we were playing. Then we penetrated Black Rock. We thought we were in the hologame environment and were safe. It was just a game.”
“It didn’t go well, I guess.”
“No—we were attacked by mercenaries and creatures from both Xiilok and Black Rock. My father rescued us in time, but Gale was injured badly. Only a very small part of his brain survived. We had to reconstruct him. My father negotiated a lot to get what we needed. I don’t know the deals he made or with whom. But I helped with the program, so I know it was designed so that Gale lives and thinks like any other human.”
“But it’s a lie.”
“No, that was how he was before the incident. A large part of his memory was lost. But he was human, and he deserves to continue like one.”
“I can see that he turned now. Are you sure the program will still work the same way when you turn him back on?”
She shook her head. “I’m working on it.”
“Everything happened after I was out. Where are all the witches?”
Lyla stopped working on the computer and smiled at him again. “Nothing much to say, really. You killed the wolves. So the witches in blue went away.”
“So did you piggyback me all the way up here?”
“I didn’t think you were keen on details,” she said. “Jaxper arranged some help with her people, and they brought you and Gale up here. She said it’s safe here.”
He nodded. “So when Gale is back up, he’ll connect the gateway for us, and we’ll go back to the Daimon Gate. Is that still the plan?”
“Mm-hmmm.”
“Lyla?”
“We’ll go home.”
“Did you make a deal with someone … or something?”
“I didn’t make any deal.”
“You’re not good at lying, Lyla. There’s no chance the paranormals here are going to leave us alone so that we can take our time and find our way home. Who did you make a deal with, and what did he ask from you?”
She stood and looked into the distance toward the highland village. “It wasn’t a deal. It was a fair exchange, Michael. And as a result, we can’t go home just yet.”
“Who did you make a deal with?”
She turned around and looked at him. She touched his face and looked into his eyes. “I’ve made an agreement with your father, Michael. You have a lot of him in you.”
This is the end of Fire Summoner, but not the end of the trilogy. Turn to the next page for the exclusive bonus short story about
Michael and information about the trilogy.
The Stolen - Bonus Short Story
The muffled scream of a child cut through the darkness.
His silhouette shook as he tried to wriggle free of the hands wrapped around his neck belonging to a large man looming over him.
One twist of the hands and the fragile bone of the child’s neck would be savaged.
In a second, everything would end for the boy.
* * *
Flash.
His fury had wings. It moved as fast as light and it killed without mercy, without discrimination.
All he had to do was free it.
Today was the day he was born thirty years ago. Tonight was the night he had to kill a man to save a child.
All he had to do was to free it; his Daimon.
* * *
His father was philosophical about the Daimon. It was a spirit that was supposed to keep one righteous. But his was violent. There was nothing philosophical about violence, righteous or not.
A kill was a kill.
It was beyond reason. At least that was his father’s ideology.
* * *
His father was no longer with him. Even if his father looked down from Heaven, if there was such a place, and didn’t approve of his action; there was nothing his father could do about it. More importantly, he was not to live for anyone’s approval. He was his own self and he was the most independent child his father had ever trained.
Independence was the first lesson his father gave him. Since he was two, his father had home-schooled and trained him to make the most of his potential. At five, his physics and his intellect excelled. And at the same time, his father discovered that his talent came with a package: violence.
The talent and the violence made the whole of him. Together, they formed his Daimon.
* * *
To his father’s expectations, he had learned to utilize his intellect and had suppressed his fury. But he had never promised not to try his fury, to see what it offered. His father had said, too many times, that he was a normal human being. Well, if he was to believe that, he could just be a normal child for once; naughty and curious.
He tested his talent. And he saw what his fury did.
When he sent out a flash of his fury, he chopped down ten old trees to the root in one swift hit. The trees Father had been talking about calling in bulldozers to clear the path to the hill, but never found time to do so.
The morning his father told him that a weird storm during the night had conveniently cleared the little bush in their backyard, he’d said nothing. What could a four year old child do with such ‘catastrophe’?
* * *
He never let his fury out since then. For the most part, when he feared it was getting out of control, he took it out physically on inanimate objects. His furniture hated him.
He got better over the years and had learned how to control, mostly. One thing had become clear, his fury was not psychological nor was it philosophical; it was primal. It was a beast and it lived in his blood.
* * *
He inched closer into the tunnel, and the silhouettes had become more prominent, printing against the background of a fast-moving train. The noise of the train covered the scream of the child. But his mind heard the desperate scream. One second and it would be all over. He could send out his fury right now and save the child.
But, his fury would decapitate the man in front of the child.
Which was worse, dead or witness a decapitation and have blood and gore rain on him? He couldn’t speak for the child.
* * *
He took over his father’s corporate world when he was a teenager; and he was a predator in the business. His intellect was his lethal weapon; and he had not run into any opponents he couldn’t defeat. At the same time, although he hadn’t spent a day on the street struggling to make a living, nothing about human behavior surprised him. That was his basic training.
Artificial intelligence, computer science, biology, psychology, chemistry, astrology and the like. They were his toys when he was a kid.
His father swore to him that he was normal!
But now, in front of him was an extraordinary situation of two ordinary human beings. Beneath the obvious size differences of the people in conflict, the silhouettes gave him no additional information. Who was in danger here? The child? The man? Or himself? What if this was a trap to lure him into the tunnel and expose himself?
* * *
He thought he found his soul mate. She understood him and his Daimon. She understood him and his ambition to change life and the landscape of science. She understood his pain. She thrived to make him happy and it had cost her precious life. She died making him a present for this thirtieth birthday.
Today.
Before he ran himself to the ground with guilt, he found evidence for all the objections to their marriage. He wouldn’t label it the way people did, betrayal. It couldn’t be a betrayal if she didn’t promise him her loyalty first. They loved each other, of that, he was sure. He was even surer that he loved her.
* * *
He had run on empty for a few weeks as the world blurred by. He had a responsibility. He had people who depended on him. He had to keep going.
Today, the meeting in freezing winter in New York was a good break from his London office – a place full of painful memories. But as soon as the meeting finished, he circled back to his empty self. He didn’t know where his Daimon was, but he was sure a large part of his soul was missing.
His assistant all but begged him not to go for a walk in the snow.
And here he was, standing in front of a tunnel. At the other end were the silhouettes of two people, one of whom he should kill to save the other.
All he had to do was to let his Daimon free.
One second. That was enough time to send out his fury and kill the man. It wasn’t the killing decision he was hesitant about; it was who actually needed his help. He stepped further into the tunnel and yelled, “Stop!”
It wasn’t the authority or the meaning of the word that stopped the man. It was the intention behind it. The intention to follow suit if the command was not obeyed. The intention to cause harm if necessary.
The man dropped the kid down to his feet.
He had walked halfway through the dark tunnel. Dim light flickered from the other end. He recalled the horror in his assistant’s eyes when he said he wanted to go for a walk by himself at this hour in an unsavory part of New York.
“Who the fuck do you think you are?” The man grunted out the words.
He was only a few feet away. It wasn’t the man he wanted to see, he needed to see the child. He needed to look into the child’s eyes and be certain he had made the right decision.
“This ain’t your fucking business. Hear me?”
He kept walking toward the child and the man. The child let out a little moan as the man lifted him up a few inches from the ground, still holding the collar of his shirt. The moan earned the child a slap in the head.
“Stop! Don’t make me hurt you,” he warned.
He was close enough and he could see the child’s eyes now; frightened.
The man kept hitting the boy. “He’s mine. I can do whatever I want to him.”
There was no need to send his fury out now. He was close enough to break the man’s neck with his hands.
“Let the kid go,” he said.
“You’re a fucking idiot. He had to earn his keep. I can’t feed him forever.” The man grabbed the kid and dragged him away.
“Leave the kid,” he said.
The man stopped, turned around, dropped the child, mumbled some profanity and charged at him. In the dim light, he saw the reflection of a knife. He sidestepped the approach. In one swift move, the man landed on his back, still gripping the knife. The man jumped up to his feet and lunged at him again.
The man didn’t give him a choice.
Years of combat training weren’t wasted on him. He actua
lly liked it for the most part. The power of body and mind control and what the human body could achieve with the appropriate manipulation of movement always fascinated him. He blocked the second attack, and before the man could thrust the knife at him for the third time, the man’s knife had pierced his own throat.
Blood spurted, splattered on him and the child. The man slumped to the ground.
Dead.
He turned and looked at the child. The big brown eyes filled with tears, his small shoulders shook with fear as he stared down at the body of the man on the ground. But he didn’t run.
“What’s your name?”
The child blinked. “Little Mike.”
“That’s not your real name.”
“Michael Fraser.”
He smiled. “That’s a lot better. Who’s this man, Michael?”
“My stepfather.” Michael frowned and played with the hem of his jumper.
“Why did he try to hurt you?”
“He didn’t try. He just hurt me.” Michael was still examining the hem of his jumper.
He lifted Michael’s chin up and looked into his eyes. “Where are your parents?”
“I’ve never met my father. Mom died last year.”
“How old are you?”
“Eight. I don’t go to school, if that’s your next question.” Michael stared straight up at him and didn’t go back to the hem of his jumper.
“Do you understand what I just did to your stepfather and why?”
Michael nodded. “He hurt me. You told him to stop but he didn’t. He tried to do you with the knife, but he copped that knife in the end. He deserves it.”
A cold breeze blasted his face. It wasn’t the chill of New York’s winter, but the tenacious tone and meaning of what Michael had said that stunned him.
He looked at Michael. “Nobody deserves to die, and no one has the right to murder.”
“If you didn’t kill him, he’d have killed you. Then he’d have killed me. Who would say he doesn’t have the right to murder if we had both died?”
