by Beth Cato
“Live out your life . . . with Cy?” Blum shook her head, as if talking to a small child. “I’m afraid not.” She motioned to her soldiers. Their gun barrels shifted to aim at Cy.
Ingrid squeezed Cy’s hand to reassure him. His heartbeat quivered through his sweaty palm. She could protect him with an energy bubble, but she would rather not give up that secret to Blum. How could they slip out of this trap?
“You don’t need to kill him,” she said.
“What, are you going to offer to come with me willingly if I leave him alive? You’re both willing to sacrifice for the other. How nauseatingly sweet.” Blum laughed. “No, Ingrid. You must understand that hope is a kind of gangrene. A less smelly type, most assuredly, but a form of fatal rot nevertheless. You shouldn’t waste your conscious hours on something as finite as love. Besides, if Cy’s not in our employ, he shouldn’t work for anyone else either.” Blum shrugged and flicked her hand.
Five guns fired simultaneously, and Ingrid was ready. The bullets impacted on the bubble and formed brief, glass-like ripples in midair before ricocheting away. One pinged back at the tank with a metallic ding.
Blum lifted a hand. The soldiers froze. “Oh my. Ingrid, now this is a surprise.”
Ingrid gritted her teeth. “We’re going to have to run for it,” she quickly whispered, as low as she could, though her legs wobbled as she stood still.
“Can’t outrun the tank,” Cy muttered quickly.
“I’ve shattered a few walls tonight. I could run at the tank.”
“It’s made of enchanted orichalcum.”
She glanced at him. “We have to try something.” She couldn’t afford to dwell on doubt.
“What other tricks can you do?” mused Blum. “Can you really tear through orichalcum? That could come in handy. Oh yes, whisper away over there. I may be in human form but my hearing is—”
Through her heightened senses, Ingrid heard the soft, subtle click of a gun off to her right.
Unfortunately, Blum noticed it as well. “Take cover!” she shouted, waving to her soldiers as she ducked below the tank’s gun barrel. Pops erupted around them. Ingrid hunkered down with Cy as another bullet bounced off their shield.
Chinese men and women screamed as they jumped from the rubble and flung themselves at soldiers. The refugees’ arsenal ranged from rakes to planks to metal pipes to bricks. Only a few had guns.
“Banzai!” yelled a soldier, the word punctuated with a gurgle. Screamed Chinese words melded into a cacophony of rage and desperation and pain.
“This is our chance!” Cy said.
A soldier lunged toward them, but a Chinese woman tackled him by the legs. His face impacted on the street with a harsh crack. Behind them, a soldier turned, gun barrel aimed at the woman. Ingrid gasped and slashed her arm through the air. The soldier flew back five feet to crash into the metal plating of the Durendal with a sickening crunch.
Fire erupted in Ingrid’s thigh. She screamed as she collapsed forward and rolled to her side, hands pressed to her right leg. Heat burbled through her veins, a different heat than what poured over her fingers. She lifted a hand toward her face. Blood painted her palm dark.
Pain roared through her thigh, her blood pumping and gushing against her hands. The bullet had struck or passed through near her femoral artery—where Papa had been stabbed, the wound that would have killed him if the massive snake hadn’t gotten him first.
Like father, like daughter.
Cy clutched her shoulders. “Ingrid. Oh Lord.”
The earth shivered as it awoke. Blue mist crept across the muddy street to where Ingrid lay prone on her side.
Chapter 23
Ingrid soaked in earth energy with a ragged gasp. It felt good, even as she bled out. A pleasant distraction. Was this how Papa felt at the end, as his blood sizzled and boiled? He was powerful, even then—he’d almost succeeded in suffocating her, even at a distance. Ingrid was still powerful, too.
She willed her senses to dull the pain. It worked. In the absence of agony, she suddenly became aware of how hard she was breathing, how her heartbeat rampaged. She formed a shield around Cy and her again as a precaution and rolled to rest on her knees with a groan. Her injured thigh almost scooted out from under her. The miasma continued to thicken.
“You need to stay down, keep the leg elevated—” Cy said.
“No. It won’t save me,” she gently said as she held up a bloody palm. Energy coiled up her arm to form a writhing blue fireball within her cupped hand. She shook her head, dazed at her own magic—such power and powerlessness all at once. Her gaze was pulled south to where Mount Rainier stood. The earth still knew her pain, even if it was dulled in her brain. “And I’ll be damned if I show weakness before Blum.”
“You shouldn’t be hurt, not here!” snapped Blum. She crouched in front of the Durendal about ten feet away. “I’ll—”
Ingrid struck the air with her fist as she dropped the bubble for a scant second. Blum took the blue fireball like an uppercut. With a distinctively animal yelp, she flew back and landed just short of the Durendal.
The melee around them had already reached a quick end. Soldiers and refugees sprawled in the street and rubble, some dead, some whimpering, some escaping into broken buildings nearby.
“Your ring can’t protect you from everything, can it?” Ingrid called to Blum. “You’re not immortal, after all.” Through the pulse of her blood, the pulse of the earth, she knew the weakness of the made ground beneath her. “A thixotropic reaction,” she whispered to herself.
The textbook definition from her auxiliary flashed through her mind: When viscous ground is shaken and liquefies. She pushed power into the earth.
A crack spread outward from her palm and zigzagged toward Blum and past her, expanding as it went. Ingrid shoved harder. Metal twisted and wrenched as dirt gave way. The Durendal sank into the ground, back end first, then suddenly angled forward. The heavy barrel tipped down. A few injured soldiers yelled and dragged themselves away.
Blum tried to scamper away, too. Ingrid felt the compressions of her feet through the earth. Dirt crumbled beneath Blum and one of her legs sank to midcalf. Ingrid clenched her fist, and the earth clamped down as if with teeth. Blum screeched and twisted, but Ingrid willed the dirt to compress as hard as marble.
“Bring down the bubble for a second,” Cy snapped. She did.
He fired his gun. Blum snarled and jerked back, a hand to her shoulder. Ingrid brought the shield up around them again.
“I aimed for her head,” said Cy. His voice carried a coldness Ingrid had never heard before. “That ambassadorial ring distorts the shots. We can’t kill her. You could bury her, and she’d dig her way out again.”
“I could bury her so deep it’d take her centuries to claw her way free,” Ingrid whispered, but knew without question that such a feat would be fatal to her. Nor would it conclusively eliminate Blum.
Oh God. What had become of them? Cy, the avowed pacifist, the man who hadn’t even wanted to touch a gun. Ingrid, who would find moths indoors and try to cage them in her fingers to free them outside. She felt detached sadness as she realized how they had changed over the past week.
Why are you hurting me, cousin? The words were a whisper, but rang through Ingrid like a bell.
“Cousin?” she said aloud.
“Ingrid?” asked Cy. She limply waved him to silence and pivoted to look toward Rainier. Was this, really . . . ? There was no visible plume from an eruption and no earthquake, but the blue fog continued to thicken. Who else could this be?
Tacoma? Ingrid said within her thoughts. An overwhelmingly positive emotion surged in reply. Oh God, she was talking with a spirit bound with a fourteen-thousand-foot volcano. My name is Ingrid.
I’m trying to slumber, cousin-from-over-the-water-Ingrid. I promised my people I would stay asleep as long as possible.
The voice was neither male nor female. It simply was. Ingrid wondered if the people it spoke of were the native
tribes now scattered to the winds, so many dead to disease or doomed to lives on remote reservations or coastal canneries, or people who lived here in a much more distant time. Rainier had experienced minor stirrings in the past few centuries, but geologists speculated that it had been thousands of years since there’d been a cataclysmic eruption.
Ingrid didn’t want such an event to be her dying legacy. The fast-moving mud and debris flow of a lahar shouldn’t reach Seattle, under normal circumstances, but she knew what Papa had caused in San Francisco. He had attracted more damage to his location. If she drew in lahars and lava, if seisms caused a tsunami, thousands upon thousands would die. The repercussions could be felt as far away as Baranov or even Japan.
She formed a bloody fist against her seeping wound. Pain undulated from her thigh as agony tried to erode the barrier she had made.
I’m sorry, she thought. I’m happy to meet you, but I don’t want your mountain to awaken either. I’m hurt, and I’m so sorry that you feel my pain, too.
You should return to your mountain. It’s bad to be far from home. The voice was sleepy.
A mountain? Where would her mountain be? Her first thought was Mount Diablo near San Francisco, where she used to go on picnics with Mama. A sob choked out, with another spike of god-awful pain. Gritting her teeth, she forced the feeling to dwindle down, but she wouldn’t be able to squelch the full sensation for much longer. She was weakening fast. The shield would fall soon, too.
The earth quivered in response. Rubble shifted.
“Cy,” she gasped. “Cy?”
“I’m here.”
“Tacoma’s . . . waking up. Talking to me. Can’t let that happen . . . volcano. Stop this.”
“Oh, Ingrid.”
Cy was hunched over her, his shoulders shaking, the pistol against his thigh. “I love you, Ingrid. I can’t, I can’t—”
“I’ll die anyway,” she whispered.
He closed his eyes, his lips moving as if he prayed.
Pain rolled through her like magma. Her concentration shattered as agony dappled her vision in red. The shield dropped, and smoke wafted over them.
“Finally!” growled Blum.
Ingrid’s pain stopped. Not simply dulled, but stopped. She looked at her hand, her darkened skirt. “Cy?” she whispered.
The normal tone of her voice made him sit up straight. He looked at Blum then back at her. “Ingrid? She . . . healed you?”
“Of course I healed her. I am not about to drown in boiling mud or water or be brained by floating debris. I have plans, and they do not include death. Not tonight.” Blum bared her teeth. “Ingrid, I was worried that you wouldn’t drop that fool blockade until you were actually dead.” The kitsune had stretched out to grasp the leg of one of the downed soldiers. “I much prefer to heal while in my Masako body. She was the gifted Reiki doctor, after all. It’s taxing to draw on that power while adorned in this.” She motioned to her skin with a grimace. “But even if I was wearing Masako, it’s always difficult to heal someone at a distance—and a near-fatal wound at that. I had to use three soldiers! Three! You should be grateful that the bullet passed straight through your leg. If it had struck your torso or head . . . well.” She shrugged. “We wouldn’t be having this conversation.”
Three men had just died in order for Ingrid to be saved. She could see the bodies around Blum now. Young men, sprawled and still. Ingrid had been so deep in her pain, so overwhelmed by Blum’s ever-present magical musk, that she hadn’t even felt their ki tugged away.
Cousin-from-over-the-water-Ingrid, thank you. Tacoma’s appreciation felt warm and fuzzy in Ingrid’s mind. I will sleep more.
Sleep deeply and for many years, Ingrid replied in her thoughts. Peace to you, Tacoma.
Peace. With that, the heightened presence dwindled to nothing.
Ingrid didn’t feel peace as she looked on the kitsune, still snared in the street. What if Blum changed to a fox now? Her leg wouldn’t be trapped anymore. What would they do then? “You killed them to heal me.” Rage shook her voice.
“It was that, or Rainier awakens, or your lover boy shoots you in the head, though he didn’t seem quite up to that. That’s romance for you.” Blum looked at the bodies around her. “I’ll be blunt. These men were already injured, one of them quite badly, so it’s not as though I gave you their full measure.”
Fueled by anger, Ingrid pushed herself to stand. She was wobbly as a newborn foal standing upright for the first time. Her knees knocked together and her injured leg gave out; Cy caught her and guided her down again.
“Good catch, Cy.” Blum gave an approving nod. “Ingrid, do take it easy. Your artery is patched and the pain is frozen for now, but you still have anterior and posterior flesh wounds that could become infected, and you lost a dangerous amount of blood. You also have substantial muscle atrophy and nerve damage—it’s a wonder you can walk around at all! My magic will help attend to your most urgent needs, but it needs time. You’ll need considerable rest and hearty meals with lots of meat.”
The sound of ripping cloth caused Ingrid to look over at Cy. He’d grabbed a shirt from a fallen man. “I need to bandage your thigh. It’ll keep more filth off your wounds.”
Heavy tapping sounds rang from the stuck Durendal. Soldiers were trapped inside. God, how had Ingrid done that? She shivered, cold despite her lingering fever. She brought up a shield around Cy and herself again.
“Speaking of wounds,” said Blum. “It’s curious how you are unable to bear children.”
Ingrid gawked at her. “You can see that?”
“She’s trying to needle you,” Cy muttered. “And delay us while more soldiers come.”
“Of course I am, Cy. And yes, Ingrid, I can read your body in intimate detail during a healing.” She gave them a knowing smirk. “You haven’t been spayed, as your ovaries are still present, but your body has been purposely altered in a way that prevents pregnancy. Judging by the scar tissue, I’m guessing it was done around puberty, most likely by a floral Reiki doctor working alongside a surgeon.” Blum sniffed in disdain. “I suppose such an operation was necessary, considering the repercussions of your pain. A shame, though. I wonder what sort of children you could have produced?”
What kind of children could she have had? She’d never considered this before; since her teen years, she had known it was impossible. Her mind conjured an image of a brown-skinned little girl with spectacles perched on her nub of a nose, airship schematics clutched in a pudgy fist.
“Shut up,” snapped Ingrid; even her mind was racing. Mr. Sakaguchi and Mama—they’d had her . . . fixed? She thought of when she was twelve, when she was told her appendix had to be removed, though she’d had no pain beforehand. Had this other surgery occurred instead?
Cy used his pocketknife to slice down the length of her skirt. Blood made her bloomers adhere to her skin. “Ingrid, don’t let Blum get to you.” Even so, she could see the anger in his eyes.
“I suppose it’s a good thing I can’t talk to Ojisan right now,” she whispered.
“Yes.” He wrapped her thigh and she gasped as he tugged the cloth tight, though she still didn’t feel any pain. The thin blue sheen that remained on the ground was pulled toward her. “You have a legitimate reason to rage at him, but remember, she wants you to think these thoughts.”
Ingrid nodded, and hated Blum all the more.
“I don’t suppose you’d be willing to free my leg?” asked Blum. She sounded blasé. “I can summon medical aid for you. That gunshot wound isn’t your only concern. These power fluctuations aren’t good for you. If only you could see what you’re doing to yourself, child.”
Child. It set Ingrid’s teeth on edge. “Can’t foxes chew through their own legs to free themselves from traps?”
Blum made a face. “Certainly, but I’ve become well adapted to my human forms and the Western way of cooking red meat. I haven’t worn my original body in ages.”
Cy tied off the bandage. He’d wrapped her thigh so
tightly that she barely had feeling down through her leg, but that was likely for the best. Blum might have saved her life—damn the yokai—but Ingrid’s physical well-being still dangled from a precipice.
“While proper doctoring would be a fine thing, I don’t think Ingrid wants the chains that come along with your offer, Ambassador,” said Cy. He stood, bringing Ingrid up with him. She wobbled but had the focus now to weave more power into her muscles.
If only you could see what you’re doing to yourself, child. Ingrid didn’t want to know, but she had a horrible feeling she’d find out soon enough.
Blum shrugged. “It was worth asking.”
A man screamed close by. Ingrid turned to see a Chinese woman smashing a brick against a downed soldier. The soldier’s skull crunched like a melon. Other Chinese people crept from the rubble. They eyed Cy and Ingrid with caution.
Ingrid looked between them and Blum. “I don’t want to be cruel like my father,” she whispered with a glance toward heaven. But she and Cy needed to survive. They needed to get away from this place.
These Chinese people had even more reason to hate Blum than Ingrid did.
“We’re not a threat to you,” Ingrid said as she looked at the refugees. She pointed at Blum as she and Cy started hobbling north. “That’s an ambassador of the Unified Pacific. She’s nigh impossible to kill, but for now, she’s trapped in the street. Don’t get too near her. She has very powerful lingqi.”
“An ambassador?” a Chinese man asked. The words bubbled through a mouth of blood and broken teeth. The others stooped to pick up bricks. Ingrid pushed herself to walk faster.
“Good-bye for now, Ingrid Carmichael!” called Blum. “I’ll remember this. Cy, I hope you make it to Atlanta soon so you can see your sister.”
“She’s buried in Wedowee, Alabama, not over in Atlanta!” he snapped. He kept his gaze forward.
“The only thing she’s buried in is work, in her laboratory, as she completes my Gaia Project. Her genius will end this war at long last.”
Cy’s hold on Ingrid grew tighter. He practically carried her as he walked faster, his strides longer. Ingrid felt dizzy. Maggie was alive?
