Rootbound (The Elemental Series, Book 5)

by Shannon Mayer

  We stopped on the white beach, and Shazer went to one knee. Bella mounted and I leapt up behind her. “Be safe, Finley.”

  She raised her hand. “You have my word, Lark. I will not be fooled again.”

  Before I could answer, Shazer took off, galloping down the beach and gaining speed; right at the edge of the water he leapt. His hooves skimmed the surface and a dark torpedo-shaped body glimmered underneath us. I shuddered and looked away. We were done with the Deep.

  It was the next family I needed to focus on.

  Shazer glanced back at me. “Eyrie or Pit?”

  Neither choice left me with much hope, but at least with the Salamanders, I’d left on good terms. Not so much for the Eyrie, seeing as how I’d destroyed their home.

  “Pit. We leave the Eyrie for last and hope we have enough by then to take Samara down easily.”

  Shazer snorted. “The Sylphs never go down easily.”

  I thought about the two Enders who’d tried to kill Finley and me. “No, they don’t. Which means the more stones I can collect before I face her, the better. Not that the Pit is going to be an easy in and out.”

  Bella looked back at me. “But is that not true of Fiametta? You have two rings already. Could you not use them to take her down?”

  “The Pit is on an active volcano which Fiametta has direct control over. I’m not sure that going in swinging with all the power at our fingertips is a good idea.”

  “Then what’s the plan?” Shazer banked to one side, angling us west across the continent.

  “I’m hoping Peta can help me with that,” I said. Peta looked up at me from my lap.

  “What do you need?”

  “Your first charge, Talan. He was a Spirit Elemental. I need you to tell me all the things he could do.”

  Her tiny eyebrows shot up. “You think you can learn without training? I told you I would take you to him when you were ready.”

  She had, and I’d almost forgotten that. “Do you think I’m ready?”

  “No, you are not. You’re too stubborn to learn from him, and he is too stubborn to teach you.”

  Bella laughed. “Why don’t you tell her how you really feel, Peta?”

  Peta shrugged. “You aren’t ready. I can’t even describe how I know, only that I know.”

  The wind whipped around us, an errant current that tugged at our hair and pulled us to one side of Shazer’s back. He grunted and angled with the wind to correct it. I twisted in my seat to scan the sky around us. No Sylph waited behind or below us.

  “Sometimes an element is just an element, Lark,” Peta said.

  It was my turn to laugh. “But when it’s not, it’s damn deadly.”

  Peta smiled up at me. “True. Back to your question. I don’t think I can tell you all the things he did. They didn’t have names to me, he didn’t explain himself. He didn’t tell me anything, really.”

  “You’ve helped me before,” I pointed out.

  “And you would have my help now if I could do anything!” She curled against me. “It’s not that I don’t want to help, it’s that I don’t think I can.”

  Bella’s eyes met mine, and in them I saw the confusion I felt. Peta was not like this. I held a hand out to my familiar. “Give me your paw.”

  “No.”

  I grabbed her by the scruff before she could worm away from me and took one of her paws in my hand. Her tiny claws dug into me, but the skin of her pad brushed against mine.

  I felt the shattering of Spirit’s hold on her as our skin touched.

  She stared up at me, horror in her eyes. “I couldn’t help myself. I was told not to help you, to let you figure things out on your own.”

  I nodded, anger snapping through me. “Do you know who did it?”

  She shook her head. “No.”

  “I do.” I took a breath. “Talan met with me in the Deep. He was the one who left the bracelet, he was the reason I was acting strange. He . . . didn’t want you to know he’d been there.”

  Grief and pain sliced through the bond between Peta and me. She tucked her head against my belly as if to hide her shame. “Why would he do that?”

  I shook my head, placing a hand on her back. “I don’t know. It’s a game to him, I think, as it is to whoever is using the stones.”

  My words seemed to still the air and Bella’s eyes widened. “Could it be him doing all this? Could he be playing both sides?”

  Slowly, I nodded. “He controls Spirit, and he’s been around a long time.” The puzzle pieces cleared in front of me. Bella’s words were closer to the truth than I think even she realized.

  Peta shook her head. “No, I can’t believe he’d do this. That he’d try to kill you.”

  “Unless he wanted you back as a familiar, unless he wanted the stones for himself and thought to take them from me once I gathered them.” I recalled all too well the sadness in him when he spoke of Peta loving me better than him. I tightened my hold on her, as if by sheer will alone I’d be able to keep her with me.

  I told them everything he’d said about me being trained. I said nothing about the battle, or how he’d said I’d screwed up. Or how he’d said Peta loved me better. I wasn’t so sure, and I didn’t think I could bear to hear her lie to me. My heart couldn’t handle knowing she was never truly mine.

  *_*_*

  Two days of flying took us across the continent to the eastern side of the Pacific Ocean. We spoke mostly of inconsequential things. Things that would mean nothing to anyone else, and yet they allowed me to freely consider other thoughts and possibilities . . . other ideas that could explain how the rulers knew we were coming.

  Though I could easily blame the mother goddess, I doubted she would give me a charge, only to sabotage me. Not when it was clear that she truly believed the stones had to be gathered, and quickly before Blackbird gained hold of them. That left the creator of the stones, and Talan. And I was beginning to believe they were one and the same. The timing was too coincidental that he would appear in my life when the issue with the stones arose.

  So his game with me in the Deep was just that, a ruse to throw me off. But how in a bucket of goblin piss had Finley and Bella known I was there before I’d ever revealed myself? Talan found me; could he somehow be tracking me? There were no Trackers left in the world so I knew that was out. The knowing of my impending presence had the feel of stepping into a trap I had no idea was even there.

  We swept through the skies high above the Pit and I still had no answer as to how the rulers were being alerted to my presence.

  “You’ve got a plan?” Shazer asked.

  “Yes, though it will depend on my ability to control Spirit and Earth together.” I stared down at the mountain that held the Pit in its belly, smoke curling out of the top of it. About halfway down the mountain was an indent. Not a cave, but a section that had collapsed, leaving a lip of rock sticking out. “See that edge there; can you drop me off?”

  “I can do you one better and land there.” Shazer tipped his wings and angled us toward the mountain. With a swift backstroke, he slowed our descent and landed us on the edge with a soft bump.

  I slid from his back and went to my knees, pressing my hands to the dirt, knowing time was of the essence. “Everyone else stay on Shazer’s back. If this doesn’t work I want you out of here fast.”

  Peta leapt to my shoulder, in complete defiance of what I’d just said. I opened my mouth to argue with her, and then stopped. I reached a hand up. “Rebel cat.”

  “Loyal, not rebellious.” She tightened her hold on me.

  Carefully, I opened myself to my connection to the earth first. It hummed around me, filling me with power before I called on it. Teeth gritted, I reached for my connection with Spirit.

  The element writhed inside me, lashing to be let loose. “Damn it.”

  The mountain rumbled and the stones around us hopped with the vibration. I swallowed hard and focused all my energy on what I was doing. Whatever balance I’d had was gone and the
two elements within me seemed to know it.

  The mountain shimmied again despite my efforts to keep it still.

  Worm shit, this was going downhill faster than I’d thought possible. I only needed to find the Firewyrms. From there, I was sure they could help me find an entranceway that wasn’t guarded. At least not by Fiametta’s people. Spirit wove around Earth and my power sank into the mountain. I closed my eyes as a shudder rippled through me, not unlike the strange pleasure I’d felt in the graveyard when Talan had stared at me.

  But this time, it was my own connection to Spirit that caught the edges of the unwelcome sensation. Muscles clenched, I pushed past it. Through the mountain I sent my power, searching for the creatures that lived alongside the Salamanders. Finally, in the deepest depths of the Pit, I touched on a soul I knew.

  Scar. The first Firewyrm I’d ever met. Though he was older now, he lifted his head as my power rolled over him. I sent him a simple command.

  Come to me.

  In the depths, I felt him move toward us. I withdrew Spirit and Earth, bringing them back to heel easier than I’d thought was going to happen. Balance was what Talan said. What was it I’d done that was so different than before?

  The answer was there, just at the edge of my mind, only I couldn’t quite reach it. Damn.

  I stood and brushed my hands off. “Now we wait.”

  “Why not just tunnel your way in?” Shazer asked.

  “And end up inside the Pit because we took a wrong turn? I think not.” I folded my arms.

  Minutes ticked by. Bella made a move as if to slide off Shazer. “No, stay there. Please.”

  “I thought you were calling up a friend?” She frowned and I shrugged.

  “People change. He was a friend, but it has been a lot of years.”

  “Someone is coming.” Shazer snorted, and stamped a foot.

  The section of mountain next to us crumbled and stones fell in a trickle around my knees, but I didn’t move. A flash of white scales behind the tumbling dirt caught my eye, and then Scar poked his head out of a hole twelve feet high and wide. He’d made a perfect circular opening, big enough that even Shazer would be able to pass with his wings tucked back.

  “Larkspur?”

  “Hello, Scar.”

  His tongue flicked out and he looked past me to Shazer and Bella. “What are you doing here? And why aren’t you coming in through the front door?”

  “I need a different way in, one Fiametta doesn’t know about. She’s not happy with me right now.” I looked around him. “This would do nicely, I think.”

  He snorted and shook his head, the horns that curled back over his neck brushing against the top of the tunnel he’d made. “Then perhaps I should not let you in. The queen has been our champion since you left, keeping us safe. Allowing us to stay behind when you would call us to battle.”

  His tongue snaked out again, and his eyes narrowed. I took a step. “The world was in danger, and you turned away. Don’t think I feel sorry for your scaly ass.”

  So maybe that wasn’t the best way to deal with him when we needed his help, but when the Firewyrms had declined to stand with us in the battle against Orion and the demons, I’d been shocked. I’d saved them once, and as far as I was concerned, they owed me.

  A snarl rolled out of him. “You know nothing, Elemental. When you left, our people were healthy, and we had a future ahead of us. When the demons were loosed, the sickness they spread,” he shook his head, “it wiped our numbers down to only a few. If we went to battle, we might have been completely wiped out.”

  Shame flickered and died before it ever took root. I shook my head. “You mean like the rest of the supernaturals who fought when there were only a few left? There are species that are extinct now, and those who are on the cusp of it. Do not bemoan to me that you only had a few numbers. Everyone was in the same position, and yet they came. You did not.”

  He hunched his shoulders and I raised my hand. “It is the past already. No more. Will you allow me to use this entrance?”

  The pause was heavy and weighted with things unsaid.

  “Please don’t bring the mountain down on us.”

  “I would never—” I clamped my mouth shut, rephrased my words and tried again. “I will do my best.”

  He snorted softly, but retreated, allowing us access to the opening. “I will let you in for the good you did before. If not for that, I would never allow you to step foot in here.”

  I glanced at Bella and gave her a quick nod. She slid from Shazer’s back, and pointed a finger at me. “Do not even try to tell me to wait for you.”

  “Would never dream of it.” I stepped into the tunnel. I knew when I could win an argument with her, and when I would have my reasoning handed back to me in pieces. This was one of the latter times.

  Scar waited patiently, his scales lighting up the darkness like a giant firefly. I opened my mouth to ask him a question about the feel of the Pit and Fiametta’s current state of mind, and closed it just as swiftly. He was not the friend I remembered. I could almost see the change in him, as if it were imprinted on his scales.

  As Bella stepped in I looked back to Shazer, his body silhouetted by the bright blue sky.

  “Not a chance in hell will I step in there.” He flicked his head once. “I will be close by.”

  “Good enough. Keep an eye out for us.” I put a hand on Bella, stopping her. “Close the opening.”

  Her eyes widened. “Do you think that’s wise?”

  “I trust Scar enough to see us through this. And if anyone notices a giant hole in the side of the mountain, whatever surprise we might have will be lost.”

  The concern on her face was obvious, but she did as I asked. Peta whispered in my ear, her curiosity getting the better of her. “Why didn’t you do it?”

  The thoughts that had woven through my mind during the previous two days finally came to light, and at last I was able to grasp the idea firmly.

  “I don’t know if it’s possible, but what if the person who controls the stones can detect those who use elemental powers nearby? And if he can do that much, perhaps he can tell who those people are that use them.”

  “It isn’t Talan.” Peta tightened her hold on me. “I know you don’t trust him, and I don’t understand what he is doing, but I know he would not want to harm you.”

  I wanted to believe her, but the reality was that she hadn’t been with him as his familiar in a long, long time. People changed with time and the harsh realities of life.

  I was proof enough of that.

  “Unless I have to, I won’t use my connection to Earth or Spirit again. Already it may be too late. The thought didn’t come to me until now.”

  Bella finished closing the opening and the darkness tightened around us. She hurried to my side, and took hold of my hand. “Don’t let go.”

  I smiled at her. “Never.”

  Hand in hand, as though we were children afraid of the dark, we followed Scar through the tunnel.

  The Firewyrm was quiet, except for the sound of his long claws scraping along the floor. He led us in a looping spiral downward, the heat rising with each step until sweat ran down my cheeks, drying before it could drip off the edge of my jaw.

  Bella wasn’t doing much better. Her cheeks were flushed and her hair stuck to her skin wherever it touched her.

  It wasn’t long before we were deep within the mountain, the feeling of it all around us, pressing down.

  Reminding me all too closely of my time trapped.

  Buried and forgotten.

  I shivered, fighting the roll of nausea that whispered through me. I would not vomit, I would not. My guts heaved and I shook at the effort to keep my food where it belonged.

  Scar stopped in front of us, and his body rippled, as though he were suddenly inundated with ants, and the faintest lines of pink rolled over him.

  Worm shit and green sticks.

  Someone was using Spirit on the Firewyrm, instructing him.

/>   And the intention behind the command was anything but friendly.

  CHAPTER 14

  “ang on!” I tightened my hold on Bella and dove toward the wall on our right. Connecting with the mountain, I pulled the power of the earth around me and opened the stone face and shoved Bella in. “Stay there. I can’t protect us both.”

  “Wait!” She held a hand out, but stayed where I’d put her. “Lark, duck!”

  I spun and dropped to my belly as Scar’s tail flung over my head. His eyes were full of tears as he stared at me. “I cannot stop myself, Lark. I’m sorry.”

  He lunged again, his mouth wide, his fangs as big as my forearm. I rolled to the left, and one of his fangs nicked my right shoulder. A searing pain sliced through me, the same fire that had been the lava whip against my bare skin, the same burn that had nearly killed me. I grounded myself to the mountain and let the strength of the earth keep me on my feet though I swayed as though poisoned.

  I spun my spear off my side and pointed it at him. Though it was puny looking next to his mouth full of razor-sharp teeth, he paused.

  “Scar, fight it.” I didn’t lower the spear.

  “I can’t,” he said, his voice the same soft gentle voice I’d known before. He lunged so fast there would be no dodging him. His mouth was wide, tongue flicking the air.

  Peta leapt from my shoulder, shifting in mid-air.

  Taking my place.

  Protecting me with her own body.

  “NO!”

  Scar’s mouth snapped shut, reflexes kicking in the second Peta touched the inside of his mouth as though he were a crocodile. She disappeared, as he clamped down, as if she never was.

  Peta was gone and along with her went any coherent thought passing through my mind.

  Screaming, I ran at him, driving him back with each sweeping pass of my spear. He dodged me as if I were nothing. Over and over again I attacked, and he didn’t even blink at my attempts. My spear bounced off his thick hide, not because it wasn’t sharp, but because I wasn’t strong enough to actually make it pierce.

  Who cared if I saved the world, if I saved Ash even, if I lost Peta?