by Jaymin Eve
I dodged that first swing, and then the second as he followed back around in a smooth motion. I didn’t waste time or words on him, pivoting as he came at me and sliding myself slightly to the right so he grazed along the side of me. As I moved I sliced the blade around and up.
The tip entered his side, between the ribcage, and exited from his chest. He let out a single gasp of air, and then as I wrenched my weapon back out, his knees hit the deck and he pitched forward.
A quick glance was all I needed to see that Brace and Colton had taken out the vast majority of the males on the dock. Lucy was with them, and I had no doubt more than one victim was from her.
There were still a dozen of the smugglers and gangers left. Including that initial well-dressed dickbag.
The females remained huddled in their little area. None of them had stood and none of them had tried to escape. They had to be drugged. It would explain their lethargy. All except for Chrissie and Golden Girl – those two were alert and prowling within their barrier. Although they remained relatively close to the girls on the ground, sticking around to protect them.
It was time to finish this.
Of course, as I had that thought, the remaining males realized that they were in an ass-ton of trouble, and took off. They didn’t even waste any bullets on us, so they were either going for backup, or had another plan to be put into motion. There was only one way for them to run – to the water; they ended up squished into a medium-sized speed boat.
The moment its engine gunned to life, they were gone in a splash of water and whitewash. At a guess, there were more of the gangers and buyers out on all of those fancy yachts and vessels.
They’d be back soon. We had to get the females to safety.
I returned the sword to its home. Then, with Brace on one side and Lucy on the other, we crossed to the females. I wasn’t really looking forward to speaking with Chrissie. I wanted to make amends, but I knew it wasn’t going to be as easy as throwing out an “I’m sorry”. Those two words didn’t bring Chandra back. And that was all Chrissie really wanted.
Large dark eyes flashed at me as I closed the distance between us. I still hoped she might have let go of some of her anger, but it didn’t look like it.
The area she was being held in with Golden Girl had a barrier which stood around mid-chest in height. I halted opposite her, about to extend a hand to help her jump over. She didn’t take my offered palm, instead taking three steps back and running forward to vault over the fenced area.
I held my ground as she stalked up to me, a darkening of anger cresting across her features like the wash of a violent storm. I prepared myself for the abuse. But instead of opening her mouth, Chrissie swung her arm – closed fist – right into my face.
Truth be told, I probably could have avoided the hit. My reflexes were much faster than hers and I had enough time to see it coming, but I decided to let her have this one. As her knuckles crashed into my left cheek, a dull thud echoed across the space. This was followed by a flare of heat and jagged spikes of pain. The force knocked me back. I stumbled but managed to keep my footing.
Shit. The girl could punch. She’d definitely had training since we were in the compound together. I didn’t remember her hits feeling like sledgehammers in our old sparring days.
A low, thunderous growl filtered through the area, and I knew it was Brace. I could feel his simmering anger, and right then Chrissie was lucky that she was both human – well, possibly – and also female. Shaking my head and trying to ignore the blaze of pain which still spiked along my cheek, I crossed over and placed both hands on my mate’s chest.
“It’s okay, I’m fine,” I said, before raising my voice. “Chrissie gets one freebie, but if she decides to use violence again, I’ll return the favor.”
Brace’s breathing was deep and rhythmic. He was reeling his fury in, regaining control. His right hand cupped my face as he gently brushed against the bruise which I was sure had already formed on my cheek. I’d heal slower here, but Walker genetics would take care of the injury soon enough.
“People need to stop hurting you. Otherwise I’m going to fu –”
“Brace!” I interrupted him, snorts of laughter erupting.
I loved how protective he was. Even the smallest injury was abhorrent to him. He truly held my well-being above all else in existence. Every single being should be able to experience such a pure, perfect love. I couldn’t believe I was the dumbass that had almost screwed it all up. Thankfully, the fates didn’t completely hate me yet and the melding bond had been returned to us.
Chrissie was less hostile now. “What are you doing here? What are the marks you wear?” The punch must have gotten some of her aggression out. She was now capable of conversation. “I haven’t seen you in New York for years.”
I shrugged, facing her directly again. Over my shoulder I had no doubt that Brace was leveling a warning glare on the female.
Chrissie shrank back, which must have been enough for Brace to decide it was okay to leave me with her. He crossed to Colton, the pair of them moving around the docks, checking on the other girls. Golden Girl was also crouching down with the others.
As Brace moved closer, I had to say she definitely spent a few too many moments checking him out. A very mild flare of jealousy jagged through me. It wasn’t strong because I was secure in my bond, but still, I was always going to be territorial about Brace.
I pulled my focus from them and back to Chrissie.
“It’s a big city,” I said, giving a half-answer to her previous question. “Plus, there’ve been other things going on. And my marks … well, they’re a long story. One which I’ll share with you later – but I’m not in a gang.” There was no doubt she’d wondered that. “What’s going on here, Chrissie?”
Footsteps sounded behind us, and I realized that Golden Girl was approaching. She no longer held her lethal red blade, although I could see the hilt of it over her shoulder. She must wear a sheath along her spine. That was pretty advanced weaponry she had.
“Her name is not Chrissie … it’s Kata,” she said, sounding a combination of wary and monotonous.
Golden Girl had a strong, husky voice, the lilt of it sending tingles down my spine. Much more interesting and varied than the high-pitched princess voice I’d expected.
“Kata …” I trailed off, tipping my head to the side to meet Chrissie’s gaze.
She ran a hand over her face, before pushing it through the brown curls. “After that night in the warehouse, I … I changed myself.” She straightened, strength infusing her spine. “I took back the power which had been stolen from me and … my friend.” Her voice broke; she recovered quickly.
Golden Girl spoke again. “Kata is the leader of an all-female vigilante group which keeps the streets of New York ganger-free.”
Now I understood why Chrissie was surprised that she had never run into me. She’d apparently been running the streets a lot.
A smile creased my face. “That’s wicked, Chris … something to be proud of,” I said. “I know … she would be proud of you.”
She didn’t want to hear Chandra’s name, and I wasn’t going to cause her more pain if I could help it. The sound of moans drew the attention of Chrissie and her side-kick. Both of them moved away from me and strode over to check on their friends. With a bit of help – and probably a boost of power from Brace and Colton – most of the girls were standing now. I followed across and stepped in close to Brace’s side.
“We need to move them,” Chrissie said, turning to me. “Can you help us?”
I hadn’t seen her look in Lucy’s direction yet. I wondered if she had a beef with the pixie too. They’d never been great friends, but my recollection was that they got along pretty well. Although, as I caught sight of my best friend, with her waist-length green-blond curls, and that glitter dusting her skin, I realized Chrissie probably didn’t even recognize her any longer.
“I’ll scout around for a vehicle,” Brace said. “The
y’re not going to be able to walk far; they’re too weak.”
He took off then, moving fast enough to blur in the darkness. The silence after he had left was pretty uncomfortable. No one knew what to say. Most of us were occupied holding up the battered females. I had one under each arm, their frail bodies dangerously malnourished.
Brace appeared again in the darkness. He was so swift and silent that I didn’t see him until he was right beside me.
“This entire area is deserted and I couldn’t even find an exit. It’s cut off on all sides by a large electrified fence. And there’s no gate.”
“So the only way in and out is via the water?” I confirmed.
“We arrived by boat,” Chrissie said as she hefted one of the weaker females over her shoulder. “A car first, then boat.”
All of our eyes were drawn out into the blackness, to where the gangers had vanished.
“Looks like we need a boat.” Colton grinned and jogged off into the night.
I was sure that he was going to use his instant transmission power, and was moving out of sight so as not to freak out a bunch of humans. I hoped his ability worked the same on Earth.
The roar of an engine cut across the silence, and all of us stepped closer to the edge of the docks. Cautiously at first, in case it was the gangers returning.
It was Colton. White-blond hair flashed as he directed a reasonably large Boston Whaler-style vessel toward us. I’d studied these in our marine ecology classes; they used to be a very popular fishing boat in the early 21st century. It was a center console, half-cab style. White with black lettering up and down the deep side.
The wolf-Walker’s grin was huge as he cruised into the side of the dock and threw a rope across to Brace. Then the two of them made quick work of loading the dozen or so females on board. Lucy, Chrissie, Golden Girl – whose name I’d just learned was Eva – and I followed across last. I needed to stick with the group until I determined which was my half. Chrissie or Eva.
As soon as the opportunity presented itself, I’d use my moonstale. Brace took over from Colton, and somehow knew exactly how to maneuver the fishing boat. He settled into the white leather captain’s chair, and those of us still able to sit scattered around the built-in leather benches. The battered females pretty much collapsed wherever they could fit. They were squished, but at least they were safe.
“What happened to all of you?” I asked Chrissie.
She was sitting on my right side, Eva on the other side of her.
I’ll have to go the long route to avoid running into any ganger vessels. This was why Brace had taken over. His advanced senses would keep us from trouble.
“Smugglers.” Chrissie leaned forward and rested her hands on her knees. “We were in Manhattan. I had intel that there was a convoy of smuggled females due to cross downtown, and we were planning on interrupting the gangers. But before we could take them out, they knocked us down with some sort of electronic pulse. Eva knows a little of the technology; it disconnects the synapses in your brain for a short period. We were knocked unconscious long enough for them to drug us.”
Eva picked up the conversation. “When we finally came to we were on a boat, and then we ended up in that room. The one with all the mirrors. There were about two dozen of us, a lot from the vigiladies group, but also others.”
Vigiladies – I liked that. It was great to see females taking back their power. Alone we were vulnerable, but together women could do anything. I hadn’t been kidding when I said Chandra would be proud of Chrissie. Instead of rolling over and dying from her emotional wounds, she’d embraced her destiny and saved others from the same fate.
Eva continued her story, her voice starting to shake for the first time. “There was a voice, over a loud speaker. He called our numbers.” She held out her arm, and I noticed that there was a large black ‘12’ inked on her palm. “We had to step into the center of the room, and then we were … bid on.”
Lucy, who was next to Colton a few seats down from me, leaned forward. “Why were there so many dead females?”
Chrissie made a low, angry noise from the back of her throat. “Any that weren’t purchased were disposed of, the rest of us were forced to drink from this cup … it tasted like cherries and poison. Then we were dragged out onto the docks.”
This was pretty much as I had figured, but I still wasn’t sure of my theory about why Chrissie and Eva had been in that fenced area. I asked them, rather than guess any longer.
“They wanted us to fight each other. The two men who had purchased us, they were trying to use the other girls as leverage.” Eva’s voice was hard and low, that huskiness fading out under the memories. “You arrived just in time.”
They’d been using the females as a form of entertainment. Turning friend against friend. Knowing that to save yourself from rape and torture, most women would do anything. Even hurt someone they cared about. It was this type of power which gangers and rich evil men thrived on.
I had really hoped I’d been wrong about what they were doing. Dammit! I wanted to go back and kill all of those males we had missed. There was no reason for them to exist any longer. No reason at all.
Chapter 7
We’d been traveling for an hour and I was totally ready to get off this stupid boat. Chrissie believed we’d been on docks somewhere in the Brooklyn area; although that was only a guess, since there weren’t many landmarks for them to determine.
Brace decided to head south, and the Whaler moved swiftly on the water. So far there was no pursuit, and thankfully most of the females were moving past their drug-induced stupor. They still lay around and were very quiet, but many of their faces had finally relaxed. Losing the wide-eyed look of fear.
I’d never been out of downtown New York; no one on the boat had been. We asked around. I knew I should be opening my necklace, figuring out which was my girl and getting all of us back to First World. But I needed to know that these women were going to end up somewhere safe. It felt like a job I had to finish.
Chrissie, who had been dozing, sat up straighter and rubbed at her eyes. “Why are you here, Abby?” She went from asleep to awake in an instant. I’d bet she had learned to sleep very lightly in the last few years. “Can you tell me now about those marks you wear and how you found us on the docks?”
I took a deep breath. It was getting to be quite the long story, but right then we had the time. More than one set of eyes locked in on me as I began my tale.
I already knew humans were going to be the most difficult race to convince of the existence of Walkers. For all of their religion, faith and superstition, they’d still been conditioned to believe aliens, gods and magic were the stuff of legend. Only existing in fairytales. I was prepared for that, though. On top of telling my story, I’d also give them proof.
I hadn’t spoken of our journey from start to finish for a long time, but I did it for Chrissie. She needed to understand what she and Chandra had been in the middle of. She needed to know of the evil which threatened every single world. For her to move on, to let some of the grief go, she needed to understand the enormity of it all. Maybe Chandra’s death wouldn’t seem so senseless to her then. Probably it still would.
I talked of Quarn, stepping through the doorway and discovering First World and Walkers. I spoke of the seven worlds, the prophecy, the Seventine, and all of the battles we had fought already. My voice softened as I briefly described each of the half-Walker females. My heart swelled as I thought about my friends, my family, and our sacred animals. Finally I finished with the ancient energy the half-Walkers possessed, the power and burden which rested on our shoulders. By the time I had finished speaking we were nearing the end of the vessel’s fuel capacity, and Brace had decided to turn her toward the land.
During my long explanation, I’d mostly stared out into the ocean. Watching the splash of color through the waves, the beauty of the sea finally visible in the light of the rising sun. Now I turned back to the silent humans. Strangely enough, b
y the time I was done, most of them didn’t seem to require any demonstration of power.
Sure, there were a myriad of expressions blasting at me; most were disbelieving, but some actually held this gleam of more. Like a desperate hope that there was a better life out there than their wretched existence. Some of the girls looked toward Brace and Colton with new interest. Especially my mate, as his marks were both dangerous and striking in appearance. He was the more alien looking of the two males.
Chrissie leaned forward, hands pressed firmly into her thighs. “So you’re saying that one of us is this final Walker you need?”
I nodded. “You or Eva. It’s easy enough to determine; I just need to open my necklace.” I lifted it up from where it rested between my breasts. “The moonstale inside will reveal your Walker marks.”
The girls exchanged looks; I couldn’t tell what they were thinking. Before I could actually open my locket Brace’s deep tones cut the silence.
“Red.”
Just one word. That was all it took for my body to come to life and the blood to hum in my veins. I knew something was up. His tone would not have revealed anything to the others, but I knew him better than that.
Eyes followed me as I rose. It took some effort to keep my footing in the rocking vessel and step around the prone bodies, but I eventually reached his side in the center console.
What’s up?
I assumed he’d prefer to discuss whatever it was privately, or he’d have said something out loud when he called my name. Although, I wondered why he’d said anything out loud at all.
I like to say your name, Red. It conjures up all sorts of interesting thoughts.
I refused to blush. Blood better not pool in my cheeks, or else.
But there’s something going on here. I know we’re in the middle of the ocean, but I get the distinct feeling that we’ve passed this spot already, more than once.
