Umara sprinted down the shoulder of the road—rainbow sparkles cascading about her—making her way to the trailer that—through the wreckage—had flung open its rear doors. Stephanie and I made our way to the cabin, switching forms and tearing off the driver’s side door that stared up at the sky.
The driver dangled limply from his seatbelt. I decanted to a gorilla to hold him up while Stephanie unhooked his seatbelt so we could lay him on the ground.
We had a matter of minutes to get some answers out of him before the emergency vehicles swarmed the scene, and already I could hear them making their way in our direction. Decanting back to myself, I kneeled down beside the driver whose elbow bent in an unnatural angle. Blood leaked from his nose, soaking his beard, and from what I could tell, a few of his teeth were missing.
His eyes looked faint, and I knew we were losing him fast. Two slaps on the cheek didn’t bring him to attention. Neither did the following two.
“Let me try.” Stephanie took his head in her hands, blue lights glistening from her tattoos, and since her Semblance was active, displaying a tight yellow shirt and jeans, her bare skin was touching the earth.
Power pumped into her and she delivered healing energy into the driver whose body began to come alive, even though Stephanie held back some of her power, not wanting to rejuvenate him fully. I eyed her, wondering what she was doing, but then I realized that she probably had no intention of letting this man live. I didn’t protest.
“Tell us what’s in the trailer,” she demanded.
The driver spat out a blood clot, a smile slipping into his eyes.
Stephanie shook him. “Tell us!”
“You’re too late,” he managed. “It’s here. It’s already here.”
“Tell. Us.” Stephanie’s eyes snapped with lightning, sparks skipping down her arms and into her fingers.
The man’s body began to seize as she channeled energy into him. He was out of breath and panting when she eased off, demanding again that he reveal what he’d planned to deliver.
The driver just laughed, tongue deep red. “You’ll find out. Soon enough, you’ll find out.”
Just as Stephanie went to shock him again, the driver bit down hard on something. Foam bubbled from his lips, and instantly he was gone.
Stephanie shouted at him, shaking him violently. “Tell us what you did! Tell us, I said!”
I put my hand on her shoulder. She let the man’s body go, standing up and wiping her nose with the back of her wrist.
“Might want to check this out,” Umara called from behind the truck.
The emergency vehicles closed in on us, and I wasn’t sure how much time we had. Either way, Stephanie and I hurried over to Umara who stared at a metal enclosure that had been crated and shrink-wrapped to perfection, ensuring that no damage would befall the unit. The enclosure nearly filled up the entire trailer, and there was no way that either of us could have pulled it out without a forklift. As large as it was, I wondered if Carter could have even picked it up.
“What do you think it is?” I asked.
Umara looked at me. “I have no idea.”
CHAPTER
NINETEEN
Evidence and investigations were better left up to the police. We did our part by getting the truck off the road, but I wasn’t settled about all of the wrecks our plan had caused. That said, I could only imagine how many lives we’d saved just because we hadn’t let that truck driver deliver the unit.
Still, just off on the far hill away from the wreckage as emergency vehicles whined to the scene, I didn’t feel like we’d accomplished what we’d set out to do. The driver had warned us that “it” was already here now. But what was “it.” Surely the “it” he was referring to had to do with whatever was in that trailer down there, but I knew there had to be more to it.
Arms folded, staring at the cluttered interstate as helicopters grumbled overhead, I looked over when Umara called my name.
She’d sat on the hill next to me and was rummaging around in her the pockets of her black leather biker’s jacket. “Lyle, you okay?”
I nodded.
Stephanie was in the grass to the left of me, elbows on her knees. “We might have stopped him from delivering whatever that thing was, but we really need to figure out what to do with Zakhar.”
Umara thumbed her nose, brushing dirt off her helmet and setting it back on the ground. “Carter’s not back yet?”
“Haven’t seen him,” I said. “You said your goblins are going to make sure that the item in that trailer gets taken to the police, right?”
Umara nodded. “Once it gets there, I have a fairy friend on the inside who can seal it away and run some tests on it.”
That at least brought me some satisfaction, because I wasn’t completely sold on the idea of having the unit arrive at the police station without any paranormal support. “As long as it’s out of the Zakhar’s hands.”
Umara’s Samsung phone dinged. An incoming text message. She pulled it from one of her pants pockets and unlocked it.
Quickly, she beckoned us over. “Come look at this.”
Stephanie and I leapt off the grass and huddled over Umara’s shoulder. “Good-ness,” I said.
Evidently, one of Umara’s goblins had caught footage of the police motorcade that had been organized to escort the trailer. The motorcade was in shambles, police cars smoldering, officers screaming, vehicle parts strewn about the street like a junkyard. Even some of Umara’s goblins lay lifeless in the road.
“Where’s that at?” I asked.
“The message says downtown Raleigh,” Umara answered.
“Gods,” Stephanie said. “Zakhar must have known they were coming.”
I hunkered over her shoulder even more. “Text him back and ask him how long ago that happened.”
Umara’s fingers clicked on the screen. She waited. “Twenty minutes. Maybe less.”
I said, “So right about when the truck capsized.”
“Get up.” The voice was stern and it came from behind. Instinctively I recognized the accent.
My hands shot up in the air when I felt the cold barrel of a weapon on the back of my head, which I thought was odd. Why would a Shaman use a gun? When he stepped in front of the three of us and the barrel was still aimed at the back of my head, I realized why.
Guns cocked into place behind Stephanie and Umara also, as the three of us sat on the hill off in the woods with our hands surrendered.
“Goblins,” Zakhar said, “they are always looking for work. I assured them, that if they worked for me, they would always have a job to do.”
I turned slowly to Umara. I’d warned her that the goblins might have been the ones who’d released Zakhar from the apartment, but she had assured me that the goblins had been out on errands.
Zakhar must have understood the look I gave her. “Oh, do not worry. These are not the goblins from your apartment. They were happily fulfilled with their current assignments.”
“Then how did you get out?” I asked him.
“Yeah,” Umara said. “That place was Shaman-proof.”
Zakhar smiled wide. “That is a story for another time. As for now, we came for Lyle. There are three of you, and in order for Lyle to believe that I am serious, I have discovered that three is the perfect number for…persuasions.”
I eyed him, confused.
He nodded to the goblin behind Umara.
A gun exploded by my head, making my ears ring. Smoke from the shot puffed into the air along with the lingering odor of gunpowder. Next to me, Umara lay still in the grass. She wasn’t moving. She wasn’t blinking. She wasn’t breathing.
When what had happened came to me, rage bubbled up inside of me. “You…” I sprang to my feet, going for his throat, not caring about the gun trained on me, not caring that I was next. What he’d done to Umara was wrong, it was foul, it was inhumane.
With unnatural speed and awareness, Zakhar’s knee found my gut, and his hand chopped me in the
back of the neck. The next thing I knew, I was on my side and out of breath, fighting for air. Each breath I tried to take was halted by wind that I couldn’t catch. And then there was the lingering throb on the nape of my neck from where he’d struck me.
“I swear on my life…” I sputtered out.
Zakhar kneeled down before me, wrenching me up by my hair. “Do not swear on what no longer belongs to you.”
He stood me up, a fist of hair still tight in his grip. Strands snapped from my scalp, he was holding me so tight.
“You see that?” he said, pointing to the wreckage. “You are going to go down there, and you are going to do exactly as I ask. Got that?”
Dangling from his grip almost like a puppet, I glared at him. “I’m not doing…a thing you say.”
Though he smiled, he still refused to let go of my hair. “Mr. Lyle, do you see now why three is such a persuasive number?” He tugged me over to stare down at Umara’s body. “You now believe that what I did to her, I will also do to her.” He showed me Stephanie who was trembling with a gun to her head.
The goblin behind her wore a red felt hat. Stalactite tusks curled down to his chin, and he didn’t so much as look at me.
“Lyle…don’t listen to him.” Stephanie was almost in tears.
But with her crying like she was, how could I not listen to him? Still, I wasn’t about to let him get the upper hand. I knew that the Wraith form was dangerous, but I had to try it. My body decanted slightly, but Zakhar gave me a shameful look.
“Decant to a Wraith, and you will burn for it,” he said. “You will burn for it, and your friend will die. Try to summon, and the same will happen.”
Then to show me that he was in complete control and to remind me that his ankh gave him unnatural powers to make connections, he said, “Your vampire friend is on his way. He should be here in three, two…” Zakhar dodged out of the way, bringing down a fist like a hammer on Carter’s back as the vampire passed.
Carter’s face crashed into the dirt, strewing up patches of grass as his body toppled over. He grunted, then shook it off. When he saw Umara’s corpse, he hopped to his feet, nostrils flared.
Calmly, Zakhar said to him, “Make one false move and the Druid dies.”
Carter eyed Stephanie who trembled uncontrollably. His shoulders rose and fell with each exasperated breath, though he never took his eyes off the Shaman.
“Just relax, Carter,” I said, patting the air, afraid that he would strike and Zakhar would set a fire to him. “Okay. I’ll go, I’ll go. Just…leave them alone, okay?”
“I can assure you of this,” Zakhar said, “if you cooperate, both of them will live.”
I knew that was a lie, but as long as they were still alive, I had time to stall Zakhar for just a little while longer.
Zakhar gestured to a goblin with a flamethrower who stood next to Carter. “If he so much as bats an eye, give him everything you’ve got.”
Shoving me from behind, he mushed me down the hill, out of the woods, and onto the chaos of the road where police tape was already going up around the wreckage.
Distraught onlookers stood by their cars, hands on their heads, peering out at the damage.
An officer called out to us as Zakhar forced me under the police tape. “Hey, hey! Hey, buddy, you can’t go in there!”
Zakhar pretended not to notice.
Just go away, was all I could think, wishing that the officer would leave us alone for his sake.
Unfortunately, he didn’t.
“Hey, buddy.” He grabbed Zakhar’s arm. “You can’t go—”
Zakhar’s eyes snapped bright blue. His hand axed sideways and a bolt of electricity channeled through the officer’s body. The officer jittered in place then collapsed, still. Guns cocked into place. Orders barked out over megaphones as officers shielded themselves behind their car doors.
Unfazed, Zakhar kept on towards the capsized trailer.
“Hey,” I whispered back to him. “Hey, you better listen to them before they open fire.”
“Keep walking.”
My gut stiffened from the threat of dozens of bullets bursting straight for me. But if I tried to escape, Carter and Stephanie would be dead for sure.
“Let go of the hostage!” the officers demanded. “Get on your knees and put your hands behind your head!”
When Zakhar finally arrived at the open doors of the trailer where the crated enclosure lay, he turned to face the officers, announcing, “Officers of the law, I will give each of you one opportunity to flee. Go home to your families, to your friends, to your loved ones.”
None of them moved. “We can do this the easy way or the hard way!” they called back.
I could almost sense Zakhar swelling up. “Just listen to him!” I shouted to the police. “Just go home and leave this man alone. He’s crazy!”
I heard Zakhar sigh from behind me, and it was all I could do to just dive out of the way. Humidity crystallized into millions of tiny orbs all around him, crinkling together with a sound like snow on a tin roof. Water droplets leaked to the ground as dozens of ice shards formed in midair.
It all happened so fast that none of the officers had time to shoot before shards lanced out, slamming into chests, hearts, legs, arms, whatever. More shards formed, ripping through the doors of the squad cars.
Those who’d survived the first two volleys opened fire. On the ground, I covered my head, shimmying into the trailer on my knees just to keep from getting hit by gunshots or ricochets or shrapnel. Ice volley after ice volley sent civilians into screams and officers to their graves until only the crackling of fires and the annoying squeal of car alarms were all I could hear from within the trailer, amplified by the metal din of the trailer walls.
Zakhar ducked his head inside, wrenching me by the collar. “Get out.”
I staggered out with my hands in the air. “You’re going to need a forklift to get that enclosure out.”
“I have something better.” He stepped beside me. “A summoner.”
The mention of it made me examine him to see how serious he was. “You want me to flip the trailer?”
“Were it not for you, Mr. Lyle, the trailer would still be upright. Now, if you do not mind, would you please quit stalling and proceed?”
My jaw tightened. Everything in me wanted to refuse, but a look back to the hills where Carter and Stephanie were being held hostage forced me to move forward.
“Where are Carter and Stephanie?” I asked him. “I can’t see them from here.”
“I assure you, your friends are safe.”
Slowly, I decanted into summoner form, which didn’t alter how I looked, but altered my abilities. With my feet on the concrete, the obelisk warmed my chest. Power surged through me as Rebekah linked up with the asphalt.
The pavement split and cracked, then came together in clunks piece by piece until a twelve-foot summon of sheer concrete stood next to me. Its eyes burned deep yellow, and it turned either way, waiting to be commanded.
Zakhar smiled. “I know you would like to use this summon against me, but I would like you once again to consider your friends.”
“Just tell me what you want me to do,” I shrugged.
“Pick up the trailer, pull out the enclosure, and drag it into the middle of the street. Simple.”
With a rocky grunt, the summon hefted the trailer. Metal screeched as it sat upright, and once the bottom was flat on the ground, the enclosure rattled on the inside.
The trailer was just a few inches shorter than the summon, so the creature only had to duck its head a little to drag out the enclosure. Once it was in the middle of the interstate, Zakhar began to strip away the shrink-wrap, tossing it aside until the only the crates remained at the top of the unit and the bottom.
“Remove the crates,” he said.
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The creature took off the top crate, then lifted the enclosure off the bottom crate. I held my head, feeling nauseous.
“Is something wrong, Mr. Lyle?”
I just rolled my eyes. “The Pith.”
“It will pass.”
He opened the enclosure, unlocking several latches along the sides, gesturing for the summon to flip the latches at the unreachable top corners. Once they were done, the side panels clanged to the ground, revealing what was inside.
I didn’t recognize the device at all. It was made completely of metal, completely flat on the bottom. Two steel cones—almost as tall as the summon—slanted up from either edge of the base. Metal rails encompassed the entire device, and in the center closest to me was something like a four-foot podium with about a four-inch hemisphere carved in the top.
“What is that thing?” I asked.
“The end of your city and others like it.” Zakhar said.
“That’s rather vague, don’t you think?”
“That will change very soon. Very, very soon. Dismiss the summon.”
I obeyed. The creature dissipated to swirling gray specks of light that vanished in an instant.
“Now here comes the interesting part.” Zakhar leaned against the podium on the device, folding his arms and peering at me. “I need you to decant to Dr. Ubala.”
“Why?”
His eyes went wide. “Because I do not want your friends to die, that is why.”
“Thanks for caring.” I rolled my eyes, and with a few alterations, I spilled into Dr. Belin Ubala’s form. My hips widened, and my skin darkened and aged. My bones grew brittle, and my eyesight lessened. “Okay.” My voice had changed again.
“Now stand by this bowl.” He pointed to the four-inch hemisphere that had been carved into the podium, and when I neared it, I saw that a tiny pinhole was in the center.
Forcefully, he grabbed my wrist, and when I tried to pull away, I didn’t have the strength, since my current form was so fragile, so frail. Zakhar must have noticed it too, because he didn’t even make any threats. He just shuffled me over to the bowled carving and held my wrist over it.
Elemental Damage: Confessions of a Summoner Book 2 Page 18
