by Kate Kelley
The lizard man smirked through all of his attacks but the last one, the fire spear shattering the sphere with a loud crack, and tunneling through to hit his bicep with a thick thud.
Wolfram took advantage of the distraction and shot another spear into his chest, inches from his heart. The lizard man looked up, surprise in his eyes. He stared at Wolfram for a long moment, blood staining slowly through his white shirt, before he shifted his attention to me, his stare piercing mine directly. There was something odd about the way he looked at me, as if he knew me.
He tensed, and for a moment I thought he might lunge for me. Baal gripped me tighter and growled. Then the lizard man turned and took off without a backwards glance, the faint tinge of smoke trailing behind him.
Wolfram whipped around to retrieve me, but Baal held me tighter. I had a moment of panic. A strange man’s--possibly demon’s--arms were clamped tight around me like chains, and he was bigger than Wolfram.
Wolfram’s flame bright eyes seared through Baal for only a second before Baal chuckled darkly and handed me over. “She’s a sexy little thing. If she survives, bring her back to me. She’ll need a place to stay, after all.” Like hell I’d stay with you, demon boy.
I groaned as an invisible hammer wracked my skull and my neck gave out, my head falling back helplessly. Why couldn’t I move my muscles? Wolfram cradled it against his shoulder and said something unintelligible as he strode from the room.
“Alfie still needs to see her! You’re being unreasonable! August! If you walk out of here, her death will be on your hands!” The Queen’s voice was shrill, her voice stabbing me behind my eyes.
My vision went black, but noises were still loud--too loud. Thud, thud, thud of Wolfram’s boots as he ran. More shrill screaming.
I was sleeping, wasn’t I? Dreaming?
No, I was blind.
Blind! Oh my God, I’m blind.
I thrashed as pain stabbed me all over my ribs. My breath went out. I couldn’t breathe.
I felt myself spiraling down, deeper, deeper, deeper into black.
I was dying, wasn’t I? What a shit ending to a shit life.
Wolfram’s breath was oddly comforting on my cheek, even though it was warm. “Stay with me, Rai.”
◆◆◆
“Leave or I break every single bone in your body with a gesture of my hand.”
A growl. “I have papers.”
“I warned you--”
“Please. Just look at her. She’s Air. She's dying.”
I opened my eyes for a moment but couldn’t see, and frail hands grasped me. I felt my gown being lifted off of me, soft, old hands touching me all over, smoothing my skin.
Then someone stabbed me in the chest. I felt blood spurt like a fountain from my heart, and I smiled. The pain was fading. With each spurt of blood, each warm gush, the heat was going away. The blood enveloped me, and I bathed in it. My skin was cool, finally. Blessed peace washed over me as I melted away.
◆◆◆
I woke up with a gasp, my eyes darting all over the place.
“Where am I? Where’s August?” I yelled.
My vision, like a kaleidoscope, moved in front of my eyes, until all of the images overlapped into one and I was able to see again. I stared into a soft, lined face with straight, white hair and crystal blue eyes. She wore a simple, white dress that reminded me of something I’d seen on a roman statue.
“How do you feel?” she asked, leaning back.
I looked down at myself. I was sitting in a tub--outside. Wait, no, a pond? Except steam rose up from it.
“You’re in one our healing hot springs. The Water Elementals aren’t the only ones who own water, you know.”
I found my voice, but I scanned the area for Wolfram. “So this is the Air Kingdom?”
“Yes. And you are fully restored. You’re magic might be shaky at first, but we can teach you to control that.”
“Was it you, that…”
I looked down at my chest. No puncture wounds met my eyes.
The old lady smiled. “I brought out your Souta, your magic, yes. It felt like I’d stabbed you? It was a magical wound inflicted to drain the magic and heal you. Now you can use it freely, with some practice. This is usually done at birth and then again at puberty. Frankly, I’m surprised you survived as long as you did.”
I swallowed, amazed to be feeling normal--healthy again. “Thank you. I thought I was going to die.”
She nodded. “Oh you very nearly did. You were this close.” She held up a finger and thumb to show how close I’d been to death. A shiver worked its way up my spine. “Now. Tell me why you were with a Fire Elemental.”
I flinched at her suddenly hard turn of words. “I--I didn’t know what I was. I worked for Wolfram, back...back on Earth.” It was hard to talk about Earth as if I wasn’t on it at that moment. “Wolfram helped me when my sickness started. He brought me here, to his Kingdom, to look up my parents. Find out what Kingdom I belonged to.”
The old lady smoothed a delicate hand over her cheek. “Nothing adds up. We have no missing babies from the year you were born. We have no one who gave up their babies--you see, Air Elementals have a hard time producing. We live very long lives, but are not particularly fertile women. So we would have known if a baby was missing from our Kingdom. I assure you.”
“Well, what is your explanation? I wasn’t given up, I wasn’t kidnapped, so what? I just appeared out of nowhere?”
She licked her lips, staring at the water that bubbled around me. “I don’t have an answer, except that perhaps--perhaps the Fire, and Wolfram, have something to do with it.”
I frowned. Everything always came back to blame the other elemental Kingdom.
She held up a hand to silence me before I could speak. “The coincidence of you working for him and staying in his apartment building is too much. It’s too convenient. He was likely trapping you, keeping tabs.”
I shook my head, shaking off her words. “Where is he?”
She scoffed at me, looking impatient. “He’s gone, child. He left.”
I opened my mouth, breath leaving my lungs. He helped me, I survived, and he left. Why would I have thought he would do any differently?
But I couldn’t stay here. Now that I was well, I needed to leave.
I stood up, the water sloshing off of my naked body in rivulets. “I need to go home.”
The old lady quirked her head. “And where is that, child? Earthlings aren’t going to accept you, and the Fire Kingdom is the last place you’ll be accepted.”
I hauled myself out of the water and onto the grass and spotted a mansion several yards away across a vast field spotted with old trees. “I need to talk to my dad. I need a phone. Can someone take me back to Earth, please?”
I hugged my chest, beginning to realize I was nude and in a strange place. “And...can I maybe...have clothes?”
The lady hesitated before inclining her head and ushered me toward her, then she grabbed onto my waist with one arm and lifted off of the ground in a great rush of wind.
“Whoa, what the hell!” I grabbed onto the old lady’s body which, contrary to appearances, was not frail by any means.
We flew, the ground rushing past us in a blur of green, and rose above the trees before lowering in front of the mansion. I gaped at the lady, who had not a hair out of place. “I’m Zephyrine, by the way, Queen of the Air Elementals.”
Chapter Twelve
I pushed a chopped sweet potato to the rim of my plate, nibbling the little bit that came off on the tips of the prongs of my fork. I should be ravenous, should be devouring this food. And yet, it tasted bland in my mouth, was hard to get down my throat, and fell into a sour stomach. I just kept thinking of Wolfram, and why he would leave. A part of me--the rational side--was fine with it. That part of me understood why he would leave. He did his part, he helped me even when it was frowned upon in his kingdom. I was where I belonged, wasn’t I? Wolfram had no reason to stay with me.
And yet...I kept going over the way he had pleaded with me to stay with him, when I was blacking out in the Fire Kingdom. His voice rang in my head. ‘Stay with me, Rai.’ He’d used my first name.
I shivered.
Zephyrine eyed me over her goblet. “Not hungry?”
I put my fork down carefully. The dining hall was empty except for her and I, and it was unnerving. I was dressed, safe. The woman had saved my life. So why was I so weary of her? Probably had to do with that calculating look she always had trained on me, as if she was trying not to show that she was watching my every move.
“Is there a phone here? I would like to call my father.”
Zephyrine eyebrows came together. “Those devices don’t work across worlds.”
Defeat weighed heavy on my shoulders but I fought against it. I didn’t intend to be crushed today. I leveled my gaze at the Air Queen and sat up straight. “I need to get back to Earth.” I said it as clearly as I could, as direct as I could.
Zephyrine watched me a moment and smiling and setting down her goblet. “Of course. I’ll have someone fly you over.”
I let go of a pent-up breath I didn’t know I was holding. Thank God.
Zephyrine whistled and a small man came around the corner, out of the shadows. He was dressed in a robe of black, his features and gaze drawn down as he approached the Queen.
“Take the girl to the stone and see that she passes to Earth safely.” She crooked her finger and the servant man bowed lower as Zephyrine whispered something into his ear. He nodded solemnly, his expression giving nothing away as to the nature of the secret.
Rude.
We readied to leave, and Zephyrine looked down at me, a gleam in her eyes. I couldn’t gauge her feelings. “When you make it back, and the humans shun you, come back through the cave, to the stone, and make this sign.” She made a loop and a strike with her hand, and the wind picked up incredibly in the room, pushing my hair back from my face.
“Do it,” she said.
I repeated the action, and a hum tingled my fingertips. A gust of wind pushed against her face then, and I felt the power surge through my hands.
Holy shit. I had Air powers.
I stared at my hands a long moment before looking back to Zephyrine, but she was already gone.
◆◆◆
Apparently the Air people had super strength, because that skinny servant boy held me like I weighed no more than a sack of potatoes as he carried me during the flight.
Surprisingly, the height didn’t bother me. Heights didn’t ever really bother me, but I would have thought being unharnessed, in the air, carried by a man that probably weighed as much as I did, would scare me. But it didn’t.
“When will I learn to fly?” I asked.
The servant man pinned me with a stare as if he hadn’t understood what I had said. His eyes turned smoky for a moment, and then back to clear.
Uhh, alright then.
He lowered us down to the ground next to the transport stone, much like the one by the cave. I wondered how many there were. My bare feet touched soggy ground and a light mist settled on my skin as it began to fall softly from the white sky.
I walked up to the stone and attempted to scramble up it by myself, and was surprised when my bare toes gripped slight grooves in the stone and I was able to lift myself up onto my tummy. I felt stronger--much stronger, than I had in a long time, even more than before the sickness.
My brain was lanced with a searing pain hot on my skull, and I blacked out.
◆◆◆
I woke up in a dark room and reared up from a wall, the metallic jangle of chains echoing in my ears. My wrists burned against sharp metal bands.
Where the hell am I? What’s the last thing you remember, Rai?
Zephyrine. Wolfram left. Servant boy. Flying. Stone--I climbed it myself...my head suddenly pounded as if on cue. Someone had hit me over the head and taken me prisoner.
My heart skipped a beat as panic set in and I pulled against the chains again. I was able to stand up completely, but the chains only allowed me to walk two feet in front of me. Wildfire. I bet it was that Wildfire lizard prick.
I sat back down to clear my head and my eyes adjusted in the dark. I lifted my head to look up--at the top of the wall, a tiny cube of light with bars across it. I could see bars in front of me, too, the sliver of moonlight glinting off of them. My cell was probably three by three feet. There were bars next to me as well.
I felt the tantalizing whisper of the breeze over my skin. It hushed my nerves slightly. Maybe someone else was down here. Maybe they’d hear me.
“H-help!” I shouted, my voice echoing hoarsely in the dark.
“Rai?”
The voice was clear as day to the left of me and I jumped toward it. “Wolfram?”
I peered into the darkness and the moonlight shone blue over a standing figure near the bars. I scooted as close to them as I could get, which was still about two feet away. “What are we doing here? What does Wildfire want with us?”
Wolfram’s gaze hardened on me and his eyes swept my body. I was wearing a black robe-like dress from Zephyrine’s closet, and it was tighter on me than on her. At least it covered my legs. “We are still in Air Kingdom. I didn’t think they’d imprison their own. I’m sorry.”
I choked on my swallow. “Zephyrine put us in here?”
“She caught me unawares right after she brought out your magic. My defenses were down.”He sniffed, obviously angry. But the copper light didn’t spark in his eyes.
“Why don’t you use your fire now?”
“I would if I could. They did something to me. These chains act like coolants. Some blocking magic. Besides, no one has been down here since they brought you. I couldn’t see, and didn’t think it was you, but I didn’t want to try anything in case I burned the prisoner in the attempt.”
My mind reeled and I tried to pull a wrist from the clamp again. It scraped my wrist and began cutting into my thumb joint.
“Stop, Peterson. If you are injured and it gets infected, you could die.”
“Fuck,” I spat, dropping my arms. Had he just called me Peterson?
“The question is what do they want?” I said as I paced. Suddenly I remembered I had magic. I did the sign in the air that Zephyrine taught me and waited for the gust of wind. When it came, I gasped. I turned sharply toward Wolfram. “Did you see that? My powers work!”
Wolfram stared at me. “Which would be nice if you knew how to use them at all.”
My heart sank. “I forgot about that,” I mumbled.
“I suspect,” Wolfram drawled, “they think we are part of Wildfire. Obviously they don’t trust me, but why don’t they trust you? You’re Air.”
“Because I came out of nowhere and they can’t explain it.”
My stomach growled loudly and I suddenly wished I had eaten more during the meal in the mansion.
A loud creak had me jumping out of my skin. I backed up to the wall and Wolfram slowly did the same. I squinted to see a shadow approaching. Her face shown in the moonlight as she pulled down her hood.
Zephyrine unlocked the cell door, looking unaffected by the sight of me in chains. She leveled a stare at me. “Admit to being involved with the terrorist group, Wildfire, and I’ll let you avoid the death penalty.”
I gaped at her. Was this lady serious?
I laid a hand on my chest. “I am not involved in Wildfire, and neither is Wolfram. And I don’t see how you can accuse us and chain us up when we have done nothing wrong!”
Zephyrine remained calm. “Very well, you’ll be sentenced to three months in the cell, after which we will commence your training and place you in a home for troubled women until you prove yourself to be a valuable asset to society.”
I sputtered. “What the hell? I just want to go home! I never asked for any of this!”
Zephyrine pinched her lips together, the lines creasing around them. “Silly, stupid girl. You were born into the best elemental K
ingdom there is, the descendants of the One True God, I just spared your life, and you have the nerve to complain. Wolfram,” she turned to him. I noticed how she kept her distance and decided to address him from my cell rather than enter his. “Do you deny being a part of Wildfire?”
Wolfram was quiet a moment. “Of course I do. They are my enemy.”
Zephyrine snorted. “Fascinating. To be clear, can you deny ever having been involved with the terrorist group, Wildfire?”
Wolfram hesitated. “No, I cannot deny that I was a part of the group a several years ago.”
I glanced sharply at him, trying to see his face in the dark.
Zephryine grimaced. “All Fire elementals are the same sinful, vile creatures as they’ve always been. Your execution will take place tomorrow, whatever time my schedule opens up.”
“Bitch!” I lunged at her, and got a sense of satisfaction as the chain’s noise seemed to startle her. “I saw him fight and almost kill a member of Wildfire right in front of me! He’s telling the truth!”
Zephyrine squinted at me. “You’re brainwashed. That will be righted. Goodnight. Don’t let the rats bite!”
“You can’t do this to people! You can’t just imprison and kill people without a trial!” My scream fell on deaf ears and the heavy thud of a closing door ended my tirade.
I pulled on the chains again until I thought my wrists would break. “Wolfram? Listen. There’s a window up there. If we get our arms out of these damned clamps, we can get to it and use the bar to crack around it and widen the opening, then slip through. You have super strength, right?”
My breath heaved as I waited for a reply. Finally he spoke. “You do realize we are in the tallest tower of the castle?”
“How far up? I’m not afraid of heights. In fact, I’m supposed to be able to fly.”
“Two thousand feet? And that won’t help you if you are in chains.”
I nodded, gathering my breath. “Right. So how do we get out of these chains? You don’t have any magic right now whatsoever?”
