Reckless

by Selene Charles

  All eyes turned to the ringmaster.

  “She’s right, Cain. Grace told me the same thing. This is supposed to happen before the final transformation. Now if you’ll excuse me, I need to call Grace and let her know what’s happened.”

  It was crickets after he left, and everyone turned to him, obviously aware that he knew much more about this situation than they did.

  “Cain,” Rhiannon said slowly, “what exactly is Flint, for real?”

  “You mean Grace didn’t tell you?” He shoved his fingers through his hair, staring at the mound of dirt Flint was now entombed under.

  “No, and excuse my saying so, but you and I both know this isn’t hive.” Rhiannon shook her head vehemently.

  Sighing and feeling ten times wearier than before, Cain said, “All of you saw something Flint probably wouldn’t have wanted you to see.”

  “What exactly did we see?” asked Eli. He was also staring at the mound in confusion.

  Cain didn’t want to tell them what she was, what she was turning into, not because he was scared or ashamed, or even embarrassed to be with her, but because he’d sensed from the beginning that she’d need time to come to grips with it before the others discovered the truth.

  But the cat was out of the bag now. Except even he didn’t have a clue what’d just happened to Flint.

  “So when Grace told you this was an awakening, did she tell you what that meant?”

  Rhiannon touched the mound with a tip of her finger, then ran a hand down her face, leaving a smudge of dirt behind on her cheek. “No. Just if she vomited gold to let things happen as they should.”

  It would have been nice if Grace had thought to warn Flint about it too. The terror in her eyes before she’d been sucked under had been painful to see. But maybe she’d not told Flint because knowing would have only made the fear of it happening worse.

  He hated feeling so helpless.

  “This is a secret that can’t leave this tent, do you guys hear me? This is Flint’s life, and we all need to respect that.”

  “So, you planning to tell us or what?” Seth snapped, pointing a hand at the mound that was now covered in wildflowers and rolling green vines.

  “She’s fae,” Cain finally said.

  “Fae?” Rhi laughed, but once she realized that no one else had joined in, she clamped her lips shut. “What kind? Is she going to kill us?” Her eyes grew wide and a flicker of fire winked through her pupils.

  “Kill y—” Cain shook his head. “What? This is Flint we’re talking about. She’s not going to kill anyone.”

  “The fae eat shadow demons,” Rhiannon hissed, crossing herself quickly as she gazed at the mound.

  “Oh come on!” Cain snarled. “There is way too much superstition going around about the fae. Grace gave me a book before she left, about the history of her kind. As of today, I’ve now read five pages of it. Mostly to do with the fact that fairies are attuned to nature in some way. But she’s Flint. Our Flint. And that hasn’t changed.”

  He eyed Rhiannon sternly, who glanced off to her right.

  “She’s not going to be eating anybody.” As sure of that as he was, he wish he could say he was as equally sure of her returning to them.

  Kneeing, he blew out a heavy breath and searched the disturbed earth for any sign of her. She’d return. She had to return. She’d done it once before.

  She would come back to him.

  She would.

  “What kind of fae is she?” Eli asked, leaning over as he continued to study the mound with the clinical eye of a scientist.

  “I’m not sure. From what I’ve read, there are different species of fairy. Not all groups have shown up in the book yet, but judging by the fact that she’s taken at least two dirt baths that we know of, at a guess I’d say somewhere in her family tree is a Green Man. It’s a nature spirit more highly attuned than most to the earth.”

  “So why get sucked into the dirt again?” Rhiannon asked exactly what he’d been thinking.

  Eli was the one to speak up this time. “Okay, so the last time this happened was after the bomb, right?”

  “Yeah, but what does that have to do with anything?” Seth shook his head.

  “Well, think about it.”

  Cain couldn’t understand where Eli was going, but he kept his thoughts to himself.

  “There was blood everywhere, but when we found Flint, apart from the weeklong coma, she was fine. Her vitals. Her body. Nothing broken. She was perfect.”

  “Still not following.” Rhi frowned.

  Eli rolled his eyes at them as though they were too dumb for words. “She was in here with Bruce and went total She-Hulk on—”

  “She did what?”

  Eli opened his mouth.

  Rhiannon powered on. “Wait, back up.” She held up her hand. “First explain what exactly you mean by She-Hulk?”

  There wasn’t a monster in this carnival as strong as the berserkers—but only when in a rage. Bruce, being Abaasy, was almost the equivalent of them with the exception that he never turned it off. He didn’t need to be triggered to feed the beast; it was simply in his nature to be violent.

  “How come no one told me she was going to be meeting up with Bruce?” Cain’s voice could have chipped marble.

  Everyone took a visible breath before releasing it slowly, no doubt imagining how that had gone.

  “Bruce is dangerous. She shouldn’t have been here without a guard.” Cain glowered at Eli.

  Eli dipped his head. “I did stay. That’s how I saw this.”

  “Saw what?” Cain breathed deeply through his nose, reminding himself for the millionth time that she was fine. This was all part of the plan.

  Hopefully.

  “Not a lot. Bruce drilled her in the gut, but she was fine at first.”

  Cain clenched his back molars, pissed at Adam. It was one thing to help her test out her reflexes; it was another to send in a punisher like Bruce. Even though he was the “strong man” in the circus and had his own tent, Bruce always had eyes on him to make certain the demon kept himself in check.

  “That shouldn’t have happened,” Cain bit out.

  “Nah, man.” Eli shook his head, his silver eyes glinting like cut steel. “She gave it back to him good. In fact, I think she could have taken him if she hadn’t made him cry mercy.”

  “She did what?” Rhi squeaked, hugging her arms to her chest.

  It wasn’t often that anything could get under the skin of a kanlungan, but the fae were the great unknown. What they could do. Couldn’t do. Just how powerful they were. It was like going for a swim in the deep ocean, knowing a great white lay hidden somewhere in its depths and praying it would choose not to attack.

  “How did she get to this point then?” Seth asked the obvious.

  “She got sick. Said her stomach hurt. I mean, Bruce did get her good. Next thing I know, she’s puking up gold and now she’s gone. So what do the two scenarios have in common?”

  When no one answered, he said in a huff, “She’s healing herself, man. That blast at the school, it got everyone else but not her? No way.” He answered his own question. “She was probably badly hurt.”

  “Which would account for all the blood in the forest and the way she’s been sucked under now.”

  Cain wanted to punch Bruce in his thick Abaasy head.

  Rhiannon glanced down at her feet.

  Cain looked at the rest of them. These were his friends, his team—he’d lay down his life for them, and he knew they’d do the same for him. But he knew them, and knew that in their world superstitions sometimes held more sway than science and facts.

  “She’s Flint, guys. And she’s worth protecting. She helped you pick out your gown, Rhiannon,” Cain reminded the now-trembling blonde. “She watched those stupid movies with you guys, and when she found out who you really were, she never told.”

  Rhiannon’s s face transformed, the anxiety in her brows and the tightness around her mouth easing up.
/>   “She does kind of need us, doesn’t she?” Rhi asked quietly.

  “Yeah.” He nodded. “She does. And she didn’t want you guys to know too much about this because she was scared what you all would think, I’m sure.”

  She hadn’t out-and-out told him that, but he knew her well enough to know that’d been her reason for keeping it so hush-hush.

  Seth, who’d been standing back a few paces, glanced up. “What about Abel? I understand Flint needs us, but we need him back. The focus can’t shift—”

  “And it won’t.” Adam, who’d been gone a few minutes ago, traced beside them. “We’re only staying here long enough to give us time to feed and store our energy for whatever lies ahead.”

  “What if he’s dead already?” Rhiannon mumbled. “After all this lost time, the trail is so cold, what if—”

  “He’s not. So long as Janet lives, so does he.” A muscle in Adam’s jaw twitched as he clamped down on his back teeth. “Find a drone. That’s what we need to focus on now.”

  “And Flint?” Cain ran his fingers through the petal-soft leaves of the vines. “She can’t be left alone in here.”

  “She won’t be.” Adam took a seat. “Grace is coming back to pick her up. We felt it best that Flint get away from here during her final transition. She’s going to change a lot, guys, and in very short time. If she comes away looking less than human, she’ll need to go into hiding for her own good.”

  “I’m not leaving her.”

  “I’m not asking you to, Cain. But for now, I’m sure you can understand if I tell you that you have bigger priorities than babysitting your girlfriend.”

  It was all he could do not to steamroll Adam for his flippant attitude. It wasn’t easy, what Layla had done. To any of them.

  But neither was what Flint and Cain were going through. He wanted to focus his mind exclusively on Abel, bring his brother home. The fact that his traitorous mind wouldn’t allow it ate him up with guilt.

  Adam flicked his wrist. “Our day goes on as planned. Finish your performances, then suit up.”

  “For?” Eli drawled.

  “Layla’s not a fool. She’s still gathering intel on us. That means someone’s here. They’re hidden, but they’re here. And we’re gonna tear the town apart to find them.”

  ~*~

  It’d been almost four days since Flint had gone underground. The moment she’d crawled out of the pit though, which had only taken a few hours, Adam had whisked her off, along with Frank. Cain had just a moment to glimpse the taillights of Frank’s run-down Ford truck turning down the road to meet up with Grace.

  When he’d asked Adam about the change, all he’d said was that there’d been one and left it at that.

  Cain wished he understood just how much there’d been. And each day that passed only made his thoughts run more and more rampant.

  No matter what she looked like, he would stick by her. But it would have been easier to learn now if she’d developed antlers or elf ears, something to prepare himself for her return.

  Carlito had been the first of the carnies to ask how she was doing, but no one said anything. If her change was really radical, it was only a matter of time before everyone was in the know.

  “Hey.” Rhiannon snapped her fingers. “Did you hear me?”

  “What?” He frowned, leaning forward to relieve some of the pressure in his ankles. They’d been in the same crouching position for over an hour at this point.

  Seth had gotten a bead on a supposed drone hiding out in plain sight. The intel wasn’t all that great—it’d come from out of the mouth of a meth head so lost in his dementia that more than likely this was yet another dead end, but they were desperate.

  “I said”—she rolled her eyes—“that I just saw something move by that door.” She pointed straight ahead to a small cottage tucked away by itself in the middle of the woods.

  The house had an almost Hansel and Gretel feel to it with its gingerbread-style roof and brightly painted blue wood paneling. A white wraparound porch and rocking chairs sat in front of large utilitarian windows, replete with white shutters, garden boxes bursting with flowers hanging off them. It couldn’t have screamed tranquil domesticity more, even if it’d tried.

  This was definitely not a place typical for a drone to hide out in.

  A white curtain fluttered in the stiff breeze. Somebody was definitely watching.

  He rolled his neck from side to side.

  “She’s fine, you know,” Rhiannon said softly.

  “I haven’t seen her in three days. What if she’s not? Is that why they’re hiding her? I have no clue. Because nobody tells me anything.” He breathed heavily, his words coming out with a hint of a growl to them.

  Rhiannon wasn’t his kanlungan, Janet was. It was better to fight with a shadow demon that actually belonged to you, but that wasn’t an option right now.

  He’d visited Janet last night and wished he could delete the memory from his brain. She’d been pale, washed out, and had foam curling from between the edges of her lips. He knew what that meant.

  Everyone in the circus knew what that meant.

  They were running out of time to find his brother. It pained him to see Janet that way, but it killed him to think that Abel wouldn’t come back to them. Pain and terror were tied to a berserker’s first turning. His own change hadn’t come easily. Not all berserkers survived the turning—that was just a fact. But Abel would have. Cain knew it in his soul. He couldn’t even begin to imagine what Layla had to be doing to Abel to get him to this dangerous point.

  Rhi shrugged. “I don’t know. What I do know is that for the past week you’ve been so freaking distracted by anything that doesn’t involve her that you’re becoming really, seriously useless to us.”

  Her eyes glowed. And for a split second he’d seen her flesh waver, become hazy and black.

  Cain drew in a deep breath, his insides revolting, his blood singing a call to battle. But deep down, he knew she was right.

  “I’m...”

  “Don’t say you’re sorry.” She rolled her eyes. “Because just saying it doesn’t mean anything. I’m your friend, Cain.” She gripped his knee. “Always will be. I know you’re suffering right now with your brother gone and Flint nearly dying, but you know, we’re all suffering, okay? And right now Flint’s okay. Abel is the one who needs your one hundred percent focus. So focus.”

  His nostrils flared as his heart warred with his mind. “You know, you’re going to be a great kanlungan for Abel.”

  Her smile was sad. “Yeah, well, I guess this means we need to bring him back first.”

  Giving her a side hug, he groused, “I’m a jackass.”

  “Yeah. You are. But I still mostly like you.”

  Their shared moment of revelation was quickly cut short when the front door opened.

  The shadowy figure stood on the front porch, not moving, standing as still as a statue.

  He and Rhiannon had remained hidden several yards away from the house, far enough that even a stiff breeze wouldn’t pick up their scent and expose them. And yet, like any successful hunter good at what it did, the drone knew it’d gone from being the hunter to the hunted.

  Rhi slipped the necklace off, setting it safely within a bed of twigs inside a hollowed-out log beside her feet. In moments her body shifted to one of pure, obsidian shadow.

  Only the glow of her red eyes let Cain know she still rested beside him.

  “I’m taking it down, you sweep the house and the perimeter, make sure there are no more of them,” he ordered.

  The shadow bobbed once and then was gone in a blur.

  Cain had waited what felt like an eternity to catch sight of a drone. To see one now had his veins throbbing with a rush of blood. He needed answers, which meant no killing.

  But there were other ways of torture.

  With a grin, he stood, cracked his knuckles, and thundered, “Hey, bastard. Looking for me?”

  The drone snapped ramrod str
aight, and though there was a fair bit of distance between them, Cain had no problem making it out even in the weak moonlight.

  Slender, it came to about his chest in height. Maybe an inch taller. Dark black hair hung long and thin down its slim shoulders. Hard to tell if it’d once been male or female.

  With a snarl, the drone jumped off the porch, moving ten times faster than its thin frame should have allowed.

  Muscles swelling, hairs ripping as thick as hypodermic needles through his arms, Cain roared, giving in to the fury and raw anger he’d felt for the past few days. The creature was fast, slipping between Cain’s arms and landing a solid slice to his face with its razor-sharp claws.

  But his rage was too powerful. Laughing, Cain spit out blood, dropped to one knee, and tossed out his arm, catching the drone behind its kneecaps. The blow knocked it flat on its back.

  Double-lidded eyes blinked rapidly. The face was peeling all over; the lips were dried, almost shriveled-looking worms on its face. The teal shirt lifted just slightly on the concave stomach, exposing rows of ribs. The thing didn’t just look emaciated; it was a walking skeleton.

  “Where is she!” he roared, squeezing the thing’s trachea until it wheezed and slapped at his wrists, trying desperately to get air.

  Its withered lips turned a deep shade of blue as stopped fighting, but Cain’s fire only burned hotter. Grip tightening infinitesimally, he snarled, “Answer me, or so help me you’ll be maggot food before the night’s through.”

  Adrenaline pumped violently through his chest, his nerves sang, his blood roared.

  Abel had been taken.

  Flint had been violated.

  And Layla had betrayed them all...

  “I’ll kill you.” His words were calm but all the more chilling because of it. Cain’s was a cold, killing fury.

  Cain’s lips curled to expose the fanged canines his teeth had now become. With a sound that was part laugh, part snarl, he began to turn its head. The creature latched onto his wrists, ineffective in its attempts to get him off.

  “Cain.” Rhiannon’s soft voice cut through his madness, making him flinch. “You don’t want to do this.”

  “Yes. I do,” he said with a voice grown ten times deeper than normal, the madness and the man converging so ferociously he felt his sanity slipping away.