by D. R. Rosier
Katie was still smoking hot, but it was what she did, and apparently with political bullshit and assholes in her way at every turn, which was already deepening that originally shallow and romanticized childhood attraction. She was far from the perfect woman he’d imagined as a teen, but dealing with those fears, assholes, and pressures despite that anxiety, well that just made her stronger in his eyes. Also more three dimensional, a profoundly complicated woman instead of a shallow ideal, and in the end more attractive. It’d only been a few hours, but honestly he already knew her pretty well, as he was starting to see their long past through adult eyes.
Not to mention their shared interest and passion in magic and enchantments, knowledge, and helping others if in different ways. Katie was all about the balance, and maintaining neutrality, where he was somewhat of a crusader, making small differences, or large differences for small communities. In the end though, the impetus was the same, they both wanted to make the world a better place.
He wondered how he’d feel about her tomorrow, when Katie and Bria walked out of the cave entrance.
Katie smiled, “We’re ready.”
Bria grinned, “For what?”
Katie laughed, “Bad dragon, no cow.”
Bria snorted, “I do feel better actually. I’m also thankful you two are here with us, otherwise it’d take us twice as long.”
He nodded, “You’re welcome. The first group moving south has a front and rear guard of ten males. The other twenty are flanking the females on either side, even if they look just as fierce, if not more aggressive. They’re also looting houses as they go. Several are wielding sports equipment. Metal bats, wood bats, hockey or Lacrosse sticks. A few have iron crowbars and there’s even a couple with demolition hammers, the really big iron mallets. Not to mention long kitchen knives. How do you want to play it? I can drop us behind or in front, or on their flanks? Inside one of the houses to lie in ambush…” he trailed off.
Katie tilted her head, “Any flat roofs ahead of them?”
He smirked, good call. He had his hawk check ahead.
“Yeah, they’ll hit a main road with a Walgreens on the corner, if they keep going straight south. I can put us on that roof.”
Katie nodded, “Let’s go.”
He cast the teleport spell. Teleport was a slightly longer spell, it not only included the destination visual and magical signature of the location, but also several other concepts including momentum bleed off from latitude changes and the like. The earth was spinning a lot slower as far as miles per hour up by Colorado Springs, than it was down in Dallas closer to the equator. There was also the focus of bringing all four with them, and checks that the target area was clear so that they didn’t merge with a wall or another solid object.
They all disappeared and reappeared on the roof of the Walgreens a moment later. They immediately ducked down behind the three-foot-high wall on the edge of the roof. They didn’t have to peek or anything, since both him and Katie could feel them and even target them with their magic.
Katie said, “Let’s attack the main group after the front guard passes. I’d say it’s almost a sure thing the front and rear guard will rush us at that point and try to get up on the building. The main group is close enough together that we can get a lot of them with a powerful area of effect spell. You get the front. I’ll get the back. Bria, the middle.”
He nodded in easy agreement, and while they waited he pieced together a spell. He didn’t get too creative with it, or change it up too much, since he didn’t want to waste the magic if he made a mistake. He just slightly modified the ball lightning spell. It would cost him a third of his magic in the bracers he thought, instead of an eighth, but it’d be worth it if it worked.
Katie whispered, “Three, two, go!”
They stood up, and he assumed part of the plan was to get seen, or they could’ve just stayed down and used their magical senses for targeting. But, if the aliens didn’t see them, their only choice would be to run.
He said, “Ball lightning, quad cage, collapse,” as he went through the three concepts. A large ball lightning the size of a medicine ball launched from his hand and arced over the aliens in the street. As soon as it was above them, it split into four lightning balls and shot to four corners, forming a square around the front eighty or so women and flanking men. The ball lightning formed a thick rope of lightning between them, and then collapsed toward each other at the center of the formation. Basically, the four balls making the corner of the square, shrunk the square until they met in the middle and exploded and fizzled out.
Those ropes of lightning connecting them of course, had electrocuted all the aliens between the balls as they moved together, essentially killing all eighty of them. It cost a third of his magic, but it would’ve taken four ball lightnings the other way to kill eighty, which would’ve been half his magic. So it really worked out.
Bria, just sent a big old exploding fireball that plumed out and filled the street, encompassing at least sixty of them, including some that he’d killed. Katie cast the same fire spell as last time, or so it seemed at first. The large fireball above them exploded into twenty, but then those twenty exploded into eighty, and she absolutely annihilated the back half with melting heads, overlapping into Bria’s destructive fireball.
Bria chuckled, “Damn, we’re scary.”
He couldn’t argue, though he’d have rather used more subtle magics, but the aliens being resistant that wasn’t really an option.
Katie smiled, “The electricity square trap was kind of neat.”
He grinned.
All that was left was the front and rear guard, who seemed to lose it at that point and scream as they raced for the Walgreens. He launched one of the smaller ball lightning spells at the front group, that only killed ten and cost him a sixteenth of his bracer’s magic potential. That meant he still had over half left to take on the second group. Even after another teleport.
The rear half was taken out by another explosive rain of fireballs from above, just a much smaller sunburst to save on mana. Katie still had at least three quarters of her magic left.
He checked the second group still on the move, as far as southbound, the rest of the groups had either stopped to take stock, or they were moving more east or north. He grimaced.
“Looks like the second group is coming up on a community. They’re in a similar formation, and they have improvised weapons. They umm, they just killed some farmers, and they’re getting close to the town center.”
Katie’s face darkened.
He said, “My fault, we should’ve gone after that one first. The community wasn’t in view of my bird yet though. Fuckers move fast.”
Katie snorted, “It’s their fault. The aliens I mean, and we’re doing the best we can.”
He nodded, “Good advice, you should take it.”
She gaped at him a second, and Bria chuckled.
“He’s right, Katie.”
Katie ignored that, and ordered, “Put us on the edge of the community. Bria, take out the front guard. I’ll arch over to the middle-back, and Ryan’s got the front again. Then we’ll cleanup whatever’s left. Let’s go, before they start a slaughter.”
He nodded, and he started to cast the teleport spell. They’d be pretty close to the aliens when they landed, but their initial spells should take out most of them.
As soon as they appeared the ten in front, who were no more than fifty feet away, screamed and charged while brandishing weapons.
He ignored that, despite his tight sphincter and slamming heart telling him that was insane, and he trusted in Bria to take them out. He used the same spell a second time, arching the medicine sized ball of coruscating lightning over those ten and above the main group. It split into four balls, lit up ropes of lightning between them, then closed in electrocuting anyone inside the box.
He felt close to sixty die, instead of eighty, because they hadn’t been tightly packed, but partially spread out and a little rando
m as they raced toward the community to cause a little death and destruction.
The ten in front of them were destroyed in roiling fire sent from Bria’s hand.
Katie did her sunburst attack, taking out a good eighty of them. He really needed to learn her spell and start using it instead, it had a much better range away from the starburst point of origin.
The problem was the spread-out ones, about ten each on the left and right flank were rushing in, there was also the ten rearguard who was rushing their front.
Katie barked, “Bria front, Ryan right.”
He nodded and cast the smaller version of his ball lightning, which razed all ten of the ones on the right. Katie did another small sunburst which took care of the left. Bria sent out a plume of fire that demolished the last ten in front.
The problem was they’d all had weapons, been pissed, and knew they were dead. Even as the aliens fell to the ground dead, he felt a heavy impact on his chest that sent him flying back. It’d been a simple hammer, but one thrown hard enough to impart a lot of momentum. It stung like a son of a bitch too, but his enchanted armor had prevented any of his ribs from breaking, and quite possibly his sternum. He had the breath knocked out of him as well and desperately tried to gasp in a breath.
Sadie seemed to blur, and she knocked two more of the thrown weapons to the side.
Bria similarly defended herself from the weapon that was about to hit her, and her magic sword cut a crowbar in half which flew in different directions.
There was also a loud crack sound, and he turned his head as he slammed into the ground and flipped over backwards onto his stomach and face. He groaned as he got up, trying to catch his breath as his heart hammered in his chest, and that’s when he saw Katie knocked out cold and bleeding from the head.
He still couldn’t get a good breath, and he tripped when he moved that way. He wound up crawling desperately the rest of the way to her side, even while trying to regain his breath and steady his spinning head. Her head was partially caved in and there was a bloody aluminum bat lying next to her on the ground.
He felt like he was going to throw up, and finally managed to gasp in a breath as he put his hand on hers and sent his life magic into her body. Her skull was cracked, almost completely split open, and his life magic rushed to heal the damage. Her silver armor was almost invulnerable, but it didn’t protect her head.
His head was throbbing, so was his chest as his heart pounded and the sore sting burned. He’d be okay in a few minutes though. His own life magic was healing his injury at a fantastical rate as well.
But… his focus was a little sloppy as a result of his fuzzy head, perhaps for the first time in years. Nothing went wrong with the healing, it’s just his magic did more than he’d intended it to do, and his body stiffened as Katie’s life flashed before his eyes.
Every, single, second of it.
From birth, to grade school, to college, to aliens, to emergence and her becoming the bearer of the mantel, and the last twenty years of fighting for respect and for the entire world’s safety.
Damn. Even in his swimming head he knew he’d just fucked up really bad.
In that moment of egregious trespass, accident or not, he knew her better than he knew himself. Saw all her foibles, all her dreams, all her knowledge, her past lovers, her failures, her highs and lows, her doubts, her incredible moral compass and deep abiding strength of purpose and stubborn refusal to ever give up.
His chest overfilled with a powerful protectiveness, and with a deep possessiveness he had no right to feel. She was every bit as amazing as he’d always believed her to be. More so, the flaws and doubts in her just made her iron will, determination, and bravery that much more impressive to him.
He was also surprised to find out, just how much she wanted him, and just how much he’d been pushing all the right buttons in both her desires and needs from a man all day long. What she wanted did fit him, and it seemed obvious to him. It was who he was and what he believed. A woman that wanted to be possessed and cherished, challenged and claimed, but not controlled, browbeaten, or belittled and demeaned in her professional life, or calling.
That was just obvious though, wasn’t it? Knowing of her past relationships and why they failed, he guessed he was being naïve again. That most men wouldn’t see that obvious truth he did. But that didn’t change the way he felt about life, or the kind of woman he wanted in his life.
He also tried not to get a big head, when he found out she found him as physically attractive as he found her. Which was saying a hell of a lot, because in his opinion she was one of the most beautiful and sexy women that he’d ever met. He knew a few others that could match her that way, but none that really exceeded her in his opinion, though he knew tastes abounded.
He also felt horribly guilty, for invading her privacy yet again because of his lack of focus. Never mind he’d been knocked for a loop, and his head was throbbing, there was no excuse for him reading her life force like he’d accidentally done.
Even with that dizziness, it wouldn’t have happened unless he held the subconscious desire to do so. And he did, he’d wanted to become friends, allies, and to learn everything he possibly could about her. That quite natural desire had informed his magic, because of his reduced mental control in the moment.
He was also pretty sure he was in love with her, the crush had been… crushed. He knew every part of her, and he was in awe of her beauty, grace, and strength as a woman of power, intelligence, and principles.
As her head closed up, and her body healed, he let go of her as he tried to work through the guilt of what he’d just done. Accident or not, he had to take responsibility for it. He was okay enough to stand up by then, and he did so as he held out his hand to pull Katie up to her feet as she opened her eyes.
Katie asked, “What happened,” as he pulled her to her feet.
Bria said in a monotone, “I failed. You’d have died, if it wasn’t for him just healing a mortal wound, like it was no trouble at all.”
He grimaced.
Katie said, “Thanks, Ryan. Shit happens, Bria. My plan was rather desperate, and a bit foolish, but better these people live. It wasn’t your fault.”
Bria didn’t argue, but she didn’t look happy with herself either.
Katie shook her head, “I’ve got half a staff, but Ryan’s almost out, we should call it a day. We can take five more groups tomorrow.”
Sadie said, “Sounds like a plan. I let one get by too, it was just luck that it hit his armored chest.”
Bria grumbled.
He said, “I can tap life force, if you want to take one more?”
Katie seemed to think about it, then shook her head, “You should leave your reserves for an emergency. How about you keep an eye on the twenty-five groups left. If they approach a community, they can notify you, and we’ll act. But it seems like the rest of them are either stationary or in the wild, right?”
He nodded, “Yes, the birds can do that much. I’ll tell them to fly higher too, so they can see a community when it’s farther off.”
She smiled, and looked over the community behind them all, and he knew she felt pride they were safe, and that the risks had been worth it.
That was just who she was.
She activated her emergency teleport to avoid using the staff’s power, and she took them back to the caves.
Katie said, “You two need a room.”
Sadie cleared her throat, “Actually, two rooms. We aren’t together in that way.”
Katie looked surprised, but just nodded, “This way. We’ll have an early dinner tonight and get started early in the morning.”
He knew he had to tell her what happened, but he wanted to do so in private. It’d be hard enough telling her what he’d done, accidentally, but would she believe that?
It wouldn’t be the first time she’d been betrayed by a man she thought might be the one for her, and perfect for her. She might not believe him. He wasn’t even sure if he
believed himself. He’d desperately wanted to get to know her. The lack of focus was a part of it, and that had caused that desire to pop in his mind at the wrong time which guided his magic, but that didn’t change the fact a part of him wanted to do it. Had wanted to know everything about her. Otherwise it wouldn’t have happened.
Either way, it was the right thing for him to do, and he’d have to live with the consequences.
Chapter Six – Interlude
The bedroom seemed a bit warm as Katie got out of the bath. Her detection field and sense of magic told her the enchantment keeping the place temperate was working just fine, so it was probably just her. She’d almost died today. It hadn’t been her first time seriously wounded, but it had been her first head injury and where she’d been knocked out. Unable to apply her own magic to the problem.
She hadn’t even remembered being hit yet. She felt grateful toward Ryan, though he’d seemed a bit preoccupied during dinner and not his normal self. She liked him a lot, but he seemed a little too perfect for her, which probably meant she wasn’t seeing all of him yet. Every action and word he spoke today, not to mention being her type with blonde hair and gorgeous warm blue eyes, had drawn her in. Despite the day’s events, she felt… thoroughly seduced.
Of course, there was that one problem, that might not be a problem. She laughed at herself. After getting her guests settled her and Bria had chatted a bit. Bria could be incredibly blunt and inhuman at times in her opinions and observations, but at the same time they’d helped.
She’d told Bria she liked him, which was no surprise to the silver dragon of course, who must’ve gotten a load of her out of control pheromones up her nose. That’s when Bria had given her something to think about. The dragon had verified her perceptions that Ryan wanted her too, but Bria had also warned she better be ready to share like she said she might be, in the past.
Which, had been a bit of a surprise, considering her guests were in separate rooms. The pleasant surprise at that information hadn’t lasted all that long. Bria had told her Sadie loved Ryan, but that Ryan was in denial of his own feelings for the moment, but that surely wouldn’t last.
