“Sentient?”
“Can it think on its own?”
“Can your hand think on its own? It’s part of the body.”
“What you killed was the brain?”
“The heart.” Finn touched his chest.
“And what is the heart made of?”
He glanced at her. “It’s a controller’s heart.”
“I don’t understand.”
“The controllers...” Finn stretched his hand out. “They project their heart.”
“Their mind?”
“Their magic. Into the machine.”
“These are aelfar?”
“Boreals.” Finn let his hand drop.
“And when you killed the machine?”
“I killed the controller.” Said matter-of-factly. A little strained.
Holy shit.
They walked in silence, reaching the car. The crowd surged behind them, shouts and yelling erupting from time to time, the police trying to be heard over them, trying to restore order.
“Why was Dave limping?” Finn muttered. “You said the magic affects his machinery?”
“It gives him pain. Well deserved, too.” Ella unlocked and opened her door, looked over at Finn who was rubbing the back of his head, his gaze distant. Lost in thought. “Hey, get in. Let’s grab some dinner.”
Finn blinked, nodded as the hubbub rose behind them. Went to open his door and froze.
Dave was approaching, his face a thundercloud.
Ella frowned. “Did something else happen?”
“We haven’t finished our discussion,” Dave bit out, crowding in on Finn, pushing him against the car. “Not only was a Gate open, a dangerous machine crossed and this will be all over the news. How the hell did you miss something this big?”
“The threads are different now,” Finn said through gritted teeth.
“I know the goddamn threads are different!” Dave growled and fisted his hand in Finn’s t-shirt. “I feel it inside me, but how could you not know a Gate opened?”
Okay, enough was enough. Ella rounded the car and got into Dave’s face. She lifted her chin. “If you’re doing this because the fucking Organization is watching you, don’t expect my sympathy. You’ve got something to say, Guardian, you say it to me.”
Dave ignored her; didn’t even look at her.
“I didn’t know something crossed,” Finn said. “I thought I closed the Gate in time.”
“So more Gates could open and anything might cross without you feeling it?”
Finn said nothing. When Dave let go, he turned aside, face twisting in pain.
Ella wrapped an arm around his back, feeling the jackhammering of his heart. “Are you okay?”
“You said you had it under control,” Dave said. “You need to try harder if you want our agreement to hold.”
Finn nodded, his lips white.
“I’ll ask one more time,” Dave said. “Is there something you’re not telling me? This isn’t the time for secrets. Maybe I can help, though I can’t think of a better helper than a Stabilizer. Your magic should be growing together.”
Finn grunted. He tried to step aside but his knee folded and if it hadn’t been for Ella’s hold, he’d have collapsed.
Jesus. “I think you made your point, Dave,” she grated. “Don’t let us keep you.”
“Yeah, well, I have to go and cover up the mess, as always.” Dave scratched at the stubble on his cheek. He looked sickly and tired. “Will pass it off as an alien invasion hoax. Keep your fingers crossed.”
“I’ll give you my finger,” Ella muttered, and she did, although Dave was right: Finn needed to keep the Gates closed, and for that he needed her help.
And she still didn’t know how to deliver.
Chapter Eight
Clear
“How’s your leg?” Ella glanced at Finn’s still profile as she started the car and waited for the engine to warm up. “Did you hit it?”
That got no response. Finn glared ahead as if trying to memorize the building numbers lining the avenue.
Okay, Ella, different tack. “You know, I think I’ve seen living tech before, and I don’t mean Dave. I recall another living vehicle. In your memories, there was this huge armored car in the woods, like a giant white armadillo.”
“A Hestr,” Finn muttered.
“Yeah, that one.” Aha, a reaction! A Hestr, then. He’d called it that, she remembered. “What was it?”
“Patrol car.”
“So why were you so scared of it?” She recalled Finn crouching in the snow, blending in, hiding.
“It shouldn’t be there. It was...” He frowned, pressing a hand to his shoulder. “Rebel.”
“Rogue?”
He nodded.
Christ, rogue machines. “You get that a lot?”
He shrugged, then winced and paled.
“What is it? Finn, hey, you—”
He bent over, sweat beading on his face, and gripped his bad leg in both hands as if it would fall apart.
“Finn?”
He grunted, his teeth grinding together.
Fuck. Okay, why couldn’t she have been a girl scout and always be ready for any emergency? She rummaged inside her backpack for painkillers and cursed when she found nothing. She could’ve sworn she had some Vicodin with her.
Finn didn’t even seem to notice, his face ashen. He’d leaned back, his throat arched, his body so tense every muscle stood out in his arms and chest.
“Hey.” She cupped his face. “Did you hit your leg in the fight?” He’d been banged around by the damn tentacles and then by the explosion. “Are you hurt elsewhere? Are you bleeding?” She was flashing right back to the first times she’d seen him, wounded; half-dead. It scared the hell out of her.
“The threads,” he whispered. “The frenzy.”
And the images hit her — the plain, the corpses, the tower, and the blinding pain.
“No, Finn, stop. Come back.” She still held his face and he strained against the seat, his breathing coming in short gasps. “No dreaming, not now. Stay with me.”
A long face, gleaming amber eyes, something lashing the air like a reptile’s tail, water trickling...
“No, Finn. You’re safe. You’re here with me.”
“Can’t do it,” he rasped. “Can’t keep the Gates closed. He’ll kill me. He should.”
Her blood ran cold. “No, he goddamn shouldn’t. I’ll kill him if he tries, do you hear me?”
He jerked backward and her hands fell on his shoulders.
He cried out in pain, his back arching. He twisted, shrugging her off, clasping his shoulder protectively. Not his shoulder: his mark, she belatedly realized.
“This isn’t from your fight with the machine,” she whispered, holding herself back with an effort. “The Veil’s changing again, isn’t it?”
His struggling slowed. God, he was so pale blue veins showed in his cheeks. He looked like shit.
Fuck it. She needed help.
Keeping an eye on Finn, she dialed Mike’s number. It rang and rang, and in the end it was Scott who answered it.
“Ella?”
Cold squeezed her gut. “Hey. Is Mike all right?”
“Yeah, just one of his headaches.” Scott let out a sigh. “What’s up?”
More evidence something was going down behind the Veil. Shit. “I think we’ll need help going up to the apartment. Are you guys up to it? We should be home in fifteen minutes.”
“Sure,” Scott said, his voice dropping lower. “Shit, Ella, what happened?”
“Nothing. Finn’s leg’s acting up. We might just need a hand up.”
Fingers crossed that’d be enough.
She buckled Finn in and pulled out into the street, driving away from the crash site, fumbling one-handed with her cell, trying to find Darla’s number in the list.
Darla answered on the third ring, out of breath, as if she’d been running. “Darla Ramirez, Physiotherapy Center.”
“It’s
Ella Benson. Finn’s in pain. What can I give him?”
“Bad pain?” She sighed. “Of course it is. Vicodin works most of the time, but you’ll need a prescription. Or a Voltaren gel. Depends. Is his stomach good?”
“I guess.” Ella stole a glance at Finn whose face had gone even paler. Dammit, she hadn’t thought it possible. “Where the hell can I get a prescription now?”
“Are you at a drugstore? Let me talk to someone there.”
“On my way. Will call you in a minute.”
God, her head pounded. A vicious little hammer beat behind her eyes, in her temples, on top of her skull.
She drove, keeping an eye on Finn and one on the street. She parked outside the first pharmacy she saw and debated leaving Finn alone. His eyes had fallen shut but he wasn’t asleep; his jaw was clenched so hard a muscle leaped at his temple and he had a white-knuckled hold on his mark.
“I’ll only be a minute,” she said, unbuckling herself. “Stay here. I’m getting you some painkillers.”
He made a soft sound in the back of his throat. “It’s here. Cut it out.”
“Cut what out?”
He groaned softly. “Give me your knife.”
“No, Finn.” She bit her lip. “Just wait. I’ll be right back.”
Hoping he’d heard her, Ella zipped up her jacket and rushed through the cold wind into the pharmacy. She pushed the door shut behind her, sighing at the blast of warmth, and headed toward the counter.
A line had formed behind a tiny woman with flaming red hair who waved her hands about and declared at ear-splitting levels that staff these days knew nothing about service and that her credit card worked just fine, thank you very much.
Wincing at the decibels, Ella glanced about. What should she do? Her head throbbed in time to her heart and the damn woman kept shouting, until Ella’s hands inched toward her gun.
Don’t shoot her. Gunshots are really loud. They’ll make your headache that much worse.
Well, she could flash her badge and get to the front of the line, say it was an emergency. The way Finn looked, it wasn’t far off the mark.
She fished for her badge, her vision going a little blurry at the edges, and wasn’t that odd.
Her cell rang.
“Darla, hey,” she said, hoping she’d pressed the right button. She felt loopy, her hold on the phone precarious. The room tilted sharply. “I was about to call—”
“Ella, can you hear me? It’s Dave.”
Dave? Ella blinked and, crap, the room shifted again, making her stumble. She bumped into a tall, thin man with black-rimmed glasses. “’Xcuse me.”
“Ella, listen to me. Another seal has broken and magic’s leaking through. Where’s Finn?”
“He’s in the car.” She staggered into a table with a lipstick display, knocking the products off. They crashed to the ground. Someone was shouting at the back of the pharmacy.
“Get him out. Make him lie on the sidewalk.”
“Why?”
“Convulsions,” Dave said. “Where are you?”
She frowned, her boots crunching on lipstick tubes. “How would you know about the convulsions? Admit it, Dave, you’ve planted a bug on Finn.”
“Stop being paranoid and get him out of the car,” Dave snapped. “Tell me where you are.”
“Neil’s Pharmacy, on the corner of Cam and Bronson.”
“I’ll be right there.”
Ella lowered the cell, wondering if the headache could make her head explode. “Finn.”
“Excuse me,” a pot-bellied man said, sweating as he made his way through the wide-eyed customers. “You’ve damaged products you’ll need to pay for.”
She finally got hold of her badge and flashed it vaguely in his direction. She could barely catch her breath. “Police business,” she wheezed.
“How’s my pharmacy your business?” the man demanded. “My lipsticks?”
He was right, but it was kinda funny, too. Would’ve been, if she didn’t have to get out because...
Finn. Oh god. That cleared the fog from her head. She turned on her heel, wheeling only slightly, and marched out.
The cold hit her in the face, helped to clear the fuzziness. She squinted against the faint sunlight and headed toward her car. Maybe Dave was wrong. How would he know a seal broke? He hadn’t known the first time, not before Sarah told him, or so he’d claimed.
Of course, now Dave felt the changes in the Veil in his machinery, something that obviously didn’t happen before.
According to Dave. If he was to be trusted. A big if.
Dammit, she should have stayed and bought the medicine. Hell, she’d need it, the way her head ached.
Then the air rippled with lines of gold. They flickered on the crystal-sharp air, appearing and vanishing again.
Holy shit. She ran. No movement inside the car as she circled it and opened Finn’s door. She drew a sharp breath.
Blood dribbled from his nose, coating his mouth and chin in crimson, and bloody tears had fallen from his eyes, tracking down his cheeks.
Hell.
“Finn.” She tugged on his arm. “You need to get out. Finn!”
His head lolled on the backrest. His pale brows draw together and his body tensed. He made an effort to move and his teeth clenched. He started to shake, his limbs twitching.
“Dammit, Finn, come on!” She dragged him out of the car and he fell to his knees on the sidewalk.
People stopped and stared. They couldn’t help so she ignored them. She knelt and pulled Finn’s head onto her lap.
Just in time, too. He convulsed, his back arching, his legs kicking on the concrete. His eyes rolled up. She draped an arm over his chest, held the other on his brow, basic training kicking in.
Keep the person from hurting himself. Keep Finn from smashing his head on the sidewalk as he thrashed. Blood trickled from his mouth.
Dave had said Finn may not survive another such event. She hadn’t believed he might be right.
“It’s all right, Finn. I’ve got you.” She bent over him. Moisture spilled down her cheeks. Dammit all, she was crying. “You’ll be okay.”
People had convulsions and survived them just fine, she told herself. No reason why Finn shouldn’t.
Only the seizure went on and on, Finn’s arms and legs slamming into the concrete. Why wasn’t it stopping?
Her breath had caught somewhere in her chest. She couldn’t quite see, her eyes blurry. Her phone was ringing; she didn’t even know where it was.
“Turn him on his side,” someone said in her ear, although the voice sounded distant. “He’ll drown on his vomit.”
Vomit.
Two women crouched by her side. They were already grabbing Finn’s limbs and turning him, pressing him down as he thrashed. Shaking off her numbness, Ella helped, holding him as he retched.
“It’s important to make sure he doesn’t choke,” the woman explained, a pretty thirty-something with clear hazel eyes and short curls. “I’ve seen it happen.”
Her hands trembled. “Thanks.”
“He’s throwing up blood,” the other woman said, her voice hushed. “This is bad.”
Okay, now Ella was past scared, working on terrified. She held on to Finn as if he might slip away.
But the convulsions finally tapered off. Finn’s body relaxed, sagging against her as if his strings had been cut.
The younger of the women produced a pack of tissues. She used one to wipe his mouth as he lay limp; he was unconscious.
“You have to get him to ER,” she said grimly. “He’s been bleeding from his eyes and nose. Did he knock his head?”
Ella stroked back the sweaty hair from his face. “No, I don’t think so. I’ll get him to a doctor.”
The woman offered her a tissue, her eyes grave. “You have a nosebleed, too.”
Did she? Ella wiped her nose and stared at the blood. Her head spun.
“I’ll take it from here,” a familiar male voice rumbled behind her. “
Thank you for your help, ladies.”
The women scrambled up, their faces pale with shock.
Ella wondered if she was in shock, too. “Dave, I got him out of the car. I think...” What did she think? Her brain hurt.
“Let me.” Dave pulled Finn from her arms, lifting him easily, as if Finn were a child, the blond head resting on Dave’s shoulder. “Time to go.”
***
Dave drove her car, heading toward home. They’d buckled Finn in the seat and pushed the backrest down, so he lay more or less flat. Ella sat behind him, her hands on either side of his head.
“Are you all right?” Dave glanced at her in the rearview mirror.
“What do you think?”
“Your nose is bleeding.”
She shrugged; refused to think about that. “Do you think Finn will be okay?”
“Elves are damn tough bastards.”
“You said he might not make it.” Dammit, more tears spilled down her cheeks, and she wouldn’t take her hands off Finn to wipe them. And she didn’t care.
“He’s still breathing, isn’t he?”
Yeah, he was. She had to focus on that.
“I won’t lie to you, Ella. More spells and seals might break, and his power hasn’t become stronger. If anything, it’s weakening. The Veil has ripped, Gates have opened. He was lucky this time. Next time he might not be.”
“Damn you.” She gritted her teeth. “What do you want?”
“I want you to let me help. To tell me what’s going on. Why there’s no growth. I’ve been patient. I’ve been helpful. Don’t think you can make this work without me, Ella.”
Shit.
“How can I trust you?” She was so tired, and her eyes burned. “You planted a transmitter on Finn to listen in on everything. How can I—?”
Dave banged his hand on the wheel and his eyes flashed in the mirror. “Enough. I’ve told you I never planted any transmitter. I’ve done all I can to aid you. Show some faith.”
Ella swallowed hard, struggling to rally against the concept. But she was teetering on the verge of a breakdown, a long fall, and she could use a helping hand. She’d trusted Dave before. His reasons for shooting Finn were rational, if nothing else, and he’d been by her side ever since. Hell, he’d just saved Finn’s life, probably, by telling her to get him out of the car where he wouldn’t hurt himself.
Boreal and John Grey Season 2 Page 23
