by Jenna Kernan
“They’re possessed,” he said, pointing toward the mob now halfway across the field.
Neither the Ghostlings nor the Skinwalkers engaged them, letting them walk right by, like toddlers wandering on a battlefield. But these toddlers carried clubs and guns.
“There’s so many,” he said, as he and his mother rushed to the end of the earthen wall.
“Call the Memory Walkers and Peacemakers. They will need to revise the memories of the humans after we remove the ghosts.”
“I’m not sending them down there until the fighting is done.”
His mother nodded, her lips pressed into a grim line. “Very well.”
She handed over one of the two medicine wheels that helped channel their Seer gifts. She had had hers since before his birth and had used it successfully the last time she faced Nagi’s ghosts. That day there had been no Ghostling army, for the third Halfling race had not yet come into being.
His wheel was also made of cottonwood, bent into a circle. Two strips of wood bisected the center and crossed each other at right angles. Her wheel held one eagle feather at the center with her medicine bundle tied beneath. His bundle was likewise tied in the center, but he had also wrapped one feather on the bisection of each of the four directions using red trade cloth.
Together they ran toward the puppet army of humans.
“Wait until they are on the hill. Then we’ll work together. Remember, just keep breathing and focus on the middle of their bodies, right above the navel.”
His mother raised the medicine wheel to the sky. Blake lifted his as well and together they began to chant their prayers. His mother’s high voice rang clear above the chaos, while his boomed in a deep bass. In unison the people halted, clamping their hands to their ears as if the Calling Prayer was some heinous wail. The entire mob dropped to their knees, still clutching their heads, and together collapsed on the ground.
All the humans lay in the same direction, heads pointed north, motionless, except for their breathing. Blake gave a shout of triumph. They had removed the ghost invaders. All of them and without harming a single human.
He hugged his mother and she patted his back.
“You did well,” she said.
His elation died when he looked across the battlefield to see Nagi, billowing black and menacing at the tree line. He seemed to be looking directly at them.
Blake acted on instinct, dragging his mother to the ground as the killing blast ripped into the earthen embankment and shot above them into the sky.
“He’s seen us,” said Blake.
His mother lifted her head to peer across the battlefield. “He’s coming.”
* * *
Nagi billowed in delight. He had found two of the three Seers. Had the stupid Niyanoka actually brought them to the battlefield? The Seers were all that prevented him from enslaving the entire human race, so he would kill them first.
Where was the third? Nagi’s gaze swept the hilltop, looking for the telltale aura of violet that was unique to those three Halflings.
His search kept him from noticing when the tide of the battle shifted until the nearest of his forces charged past him. Had he not made it clear that any retreating would die?
He zapped the first half-dozen deserters with one blast. They stood seized in the grip of his killing force. He let the energy course through them as they began to smoke, their flesh cooking from the inside out. When they burst into flames, those retreating behind them reversed direction to make another stand as the souls of those he had killed slipped quietly away.
“Very smart,” he muttered. His children were fast, strong and deadly. But they lacked intellect. “Must get that from their mothers.”
His gaze swept from the hilltop to the mayhem in the valley. The Skinwalkers again, he realized, shocked to see that they were defeating his children. His offspring were stronger. So was it cowardice?
And then he understood what was actually happening. Some of his own children were fighting with the Skinwalkers. Impossible. Yet there they were, shoulder to shoulder with bear and buffalo, engaging the dwindling numbers of his vanguard.
“Traitors!” he bellowed.
Nagi searched the field for the leader of these traitors and found the huge Ghost Child fighting beside a Skinwalker grizzly. That one, he decided. Then, he did a double-take, blinking away the film of smoke and grime in his eyes. This world was very dirty, he thought. His second look confirmed the impossible, a violet aura glowing all about the bear that stood beside the biggest of his offspring.
The third Seer!
“Get her!” he screamed. “Kill that bear!”
The horde turned toward the Skinwalker grizzly. He did not need to win this battle. He only needed to kill the Seers to ensure victory.
Soon he recognized two things: his numbers were inadequate because of the traitors, and he would not reach any of the Seers. Nagi billowed with fury, unwilling to accept what he saw.
He had hoped to avoid this step. But really, how could he? The Seers were all within his sight. All he need do was remove their souls and, poof, problem solved. And while he was at it, why not take the souls of the traitors and of the rest of the fighters, alive and dying? Simple, clean, foolproof.
Such a blast would mean that his loyal children would also perish, but who had time to sort them out?
Nagi summoned all his powers to tear the living souls from their living bodies. He had never reaped so large a harvest, and he was not strictly allowed to take souls from the living, but once done, he’d control the Living World. Then he’d make his own rules.
* * *
Alon’s fighters turned the battle. He sensed the malicious ghosts still hovering over the battlefield. The Seers had expelled them, but they waited for their hosts to recover to repossess them. His kind and the Seers still needed to send them to face their judgment.
But that must wait until after the last of Nagi’s forces fell. Alon gave them opportunity to run, keeping his forces from pursuit, but it did not matter. Nagi forced them back into the fighting. They would die at the hands of their siblings or die at the hands of their father. The entire battle made Alon sick.
It would not be long now. The wolves and bears chased the last of the Ghostlings.
Beside him, Samantha, bloody and weary, engaged a female of his kind as two of his own leaped in unison at him.
His claws ripped into the torso of one, finding the soft cartilage between the ribs. His attacker crumbled. Alon turned, lifting his spines, and heard the scream as the second’s soft underbelly contacted with Alon’s hundreds of knifelike quills.
Alon found Samantha had defeated another challenger and now bled from a wound on her shoulder that was terrifyingly close to her jugular. Alon felt fear lance him once more. Samantha’s injuries and the danger she faced overshadowed his own peril. He would give his life to save hers, even to get her to run. But she wouldn’t. He was admiring and furious in equal measures.
“What’s that?” asked Owen, one of his compatriots, a Beta twin just six years younger than himself.
Owen’s twin, Ophelia, turned with him to look in the direction Owen indicated. Samantha reared up to look.
Before them, the Skinwalkers were falling, rolling backward, crumpling to the ground and cascading facedown.
Samantha bellowed and fell sideways. Alon caught her as she toppled, feeling the blast of invisible energy that passed through him an instant later. It took his wind, leaving him unable to draw breath for a moment. Samantha, unconscious, shifted into her human form, her upper body draped in the great bearskin cape.
Owen recovered first. “They’re all changing back.”
Alon scanned the field. The Skinwalkers dropped in human form. The wolf pack toppled, naked in their hunting formation, still as death, and the pride of lions crumpled in the grass, their lion skins spread out about them like tawny wings. Even the great herd of buffalo now lay naked, their pale limbs poking out in every direction from beneath the curl
y-haired buffalo robes. The Owl, Raven, Eagle and Hawk Skinwalkers began changing and falling from the sky.
“Catch them!” Alon cried.
His men rushed to snatch them from the sky. Alon spotted a woman falling. His mother. He changed to his ghost form and flew as fast as he ever had along the ground, reaching her in time to change back and catch her in his arms. He lay her beside the fallen buffalo shifters and ran back to Samantha, leaping over the prone bodies.
“The Spirit Children!” shouted Ophelia.
Alon retrieved Samantha, clasping her to his chest and holding her.
“They’re dropping, too,” cried Owen.
Alon patted Samantha’s pale cheek. “Wake up, Sam. Please, wake up.”
Instead he watched her soul seep from her body, like mist rising from a meadow.
“No!” he howled. Alon was on his feet in an instant. He knew now what had happened. Nagi had done this. He had broken every law in both worlds and harvested the souls of the living.
Nagi had gone too far. And he would pay for this outrage. But how to defeat one who is invulnerable? Now, there was the crux of it all.
“Look,” said Ophelia. “Their souls are all escaping.”
Before them a mist of souls slipped from the bodies of the fallen.
“Why aren’t we dead?” asked Owen, patting his chest to assure himself that he was still corporeal.
“It doesn’t work on us,” growled Alon.
“Why not?” asked Owen.
“Don’t know. Don’t care. I’m going to kill him and then I’m going to retrieve their souls.”
The twins spoke at once.
“All of them?” squeaked Ophelia.
“He’s immortal,” reminded Owen.
“He’s already tried to kill us and failed. Maybe we don’t die, either.”
“We die,” said Owen. “I witnessed our enemies kill Gail and Gregory. And I saw Nagi murder the deserters among his ranks. We die, Alon.”
“How do we kill him?” asked Ophelia, ready to join Alon.
Alon was already flying across the distance that separated them. He summoned all his remaining energy, determined to take his father’s soul—if he had one.
In the valley, Nagi’s troops turned to watch him. The silence of the battlefield added to Alon’s fury. Nagi would win. He knew it. Still he raced over the uneven ground, straight at the billowing rain cloud that was his sire.
So this was the great Nagi, Ruler of the Realm of Ghosts, stealer of innocent souls. This was the creature that had forced his essence on innocent humans and created him. This monster.
Alon struck at his sire with all the self-loathing in his heart. The energy that shot from Alon’s fingers was strong enough to steal a mortal’s soul. The power collided with Nagi’s vaporous body.
He writhed and then turned his yellow eyes on Alon.
“You dare attack me?”
In answer, Alon hit him again.
This time Alon saw a small wisp, a trace of Nagi’s essence, leave his body and evaporate into the air. The mark, the tiny nick that was no bigger than the bite of a field mouse, quickly disappeared in the rolling smoke that was his father’s earthly body. The similarity between Nagi’s shape and Alon’s flying form sickened Alon. He hit him again.
“Stop that!” said Nagi.
Had Alon actually caused this Spirit some discomfort? Had he caused harm? Alon felt a surging of hope. He hit him again.
Nagi flinched and then recovered.
“Does it hurt you, Father?”
“No more than a bee sting to a bear. You cannot harm me. Stop or I shall end you.”
He didn’t. Alon struck again. As his energy wave struck Nagi, one more hit landed from a different direction. He turned to see Aldara shocking Nagi from his right. Then more stings hit and more. His army had followed and all of the Ghost Children struck with their soul-harvesting force, the gift inherited from their sire, using his power against him.
“Stop!” Nagi bellowed. But he writhed now, billowing and contracting as the stings hit him, sending tiny traces of smoke hissing from him.
He was right. A single bee cannot stop a bear. But a nest of hornets will send any creature fleeing. Alon struck again. Beside him, Aldara attacked.
“You killed Blake! I hate you!”
“Kill them,” cried Nagi to his dwindling troops.
But they did not move to stop Alon’s army. Instead several rose cloudlike into the air and joined the attack.
“Traitors!” Nagi turned to retreat.
Alon pursued. The others followed.
“Run, Father! Run back to the Realm of Ghosts and know that if you come again your children will be waiting to send you home. This is the harvest you reap.”
Nagi turned to face them once more. “You fools. We could have ruled them all. You are their masters. Instead you act as their slaves.”
Alon hit him again. “This world is for the living.”
Nagi writhed. “Who will harvest the evil ghosts without me?”
Alon spoke. “We will. We need you no longer.”
The others roared their assent.
“Enough!” Nagi bellowed. “I go! But none of you will ever cross the Ghost Road. When you leave this world you come to me.”
Alon knew it was true, and it only enraged him more. He struck again but Nagi was already gone.
“Hurry,” cried Aldara. “Before their souls leave the Living World.”
The Ghost Children raced back the way they had come. Upon reaching the battlefield they stopped in unison. Their spiny quills drooped in dismay at the multitude of drifting souls.
Below the souls the Skinwalkers lay strewn across the grass. Upon the hill the Spirit Children had crumpled. Nothing stirred but the souls of the dead, glowing brightly, hovering near their mortal forms, confused by the sudden severance between the body and spirit.
“There are so many,” whispered Owen.
Alon felt a desperation creeping in to drown him. How could they return them all?
Chapter 18
Alon turned to his sister. “Aldara, take Nagi’s forces to the Niyanoka. Return the souls to the Seers first, then the Dream Walkers, because they can heal the injured. Then see to the rest. Hurry.”
Aldara pointed across the field. “Mom and Dad first. Promise.”
“Samantha, then Mom and Dad.”
“Yes. Hurry.” Aldara shouted. “Nagi’s forces to me. We will take the Spirit Children.” She turned to smoke and shot off to the hilltop with Nagi’s followers hurdling along behind her. An instant later they transformed to their human appearance on the hilltop, fanning out over the fallen.
“Owen, Ophelia. Take the older ones to the Buffalo Skinwalkers. Callie, to Mom near the largest buffalo. Cody, find Dad and then you have the bears. Restore the healers first, understand? Then work on the others.”
“Nick and Norma, you two work on the ravens. If they are not injured, tell them to fly to the Spirit Road and turn the souls back so we can restore them. Daniel, Darya, you have the buffalo. Quick now.”
Alon divided the others into quadrants. Then he returned to Samantha’s body. Still in his fighting form, he lay her gently down upon the grass. Her naked shoulder showed ragged tears in her flesh, and blood matted her dark hair. Where was her soul?
He glanced about, finding her hovering above the head of her body, staring down at him. Samantha’s soul sparkled as bright as a welder’s torch and with the same brilliant white glow. This was a holy soul, one who walked the Red Road. She would find instant welcome into the Spirit World, while he was doomed to the Circle of Ghosts. They could not be soul mates, for they would never spend eternity together.
Alon seized her soul in his fist and plunged it deep into her injured body, sorry for the pain she endured but unwilling to let her find the peace and joy she had already earned.
Selfish, he knew, for if he really loved her, he would let her go.
He pressed his ear to her chest and lis
tened. An instant later her heart began to beat, strong and steady.
Aldara knelt beside him in her fighting form, her claws digging into her fur as she pressed them to her knees and rocked.
He peered up at her, his vision blurry from the tears. “I sent you to the Niyanoka. The Seers, Michaela and Blake?”
“Done,” she answered. “And Mom and Dad. Callie and Cody found them.”
Alon stroked Samantha’s hair with his big, hairy paw, praying for her return, but her eyes remained closed.
He turned to Aldara to ask her why Samantha would not wake and caught her removing her ghostly hands from Samantha’s body.
“What are you doing?”
“Helping her.”
He drew Samantha into his arms, holding her to his chest with a desperation that choked him. “Did I do something wrong?”
“No. Look. She’s waking.”
He glanced down to find Samantha’s eyes fluttering.
“She’s bleeding again,” said his sister. “Get her to Blake. I’ve restored him and he’s already organizing the healers.”
Alon bounded up the hill to the headquarters of the Spirit Children, desperate to find Samantha’s brother and see her restored. When he arrived, Blake was on his feet. Having suffered no injuries, he recovered quickly from the separation, as Aldara had said. Several Niyanoka were coming around, retrieving weapons, pointing them at him. Alon turned so they would not hit Samantha. He had to get her to Blake before she bled to death.
“Hold fire!” shouted Blake. “Hold!”
The Spirit Children did as their War Chief ordered, lowering their weapons but still clutching them in preparation for new orders. All about them Ghost Children, in both fighting form and in the buff, were striding from corpse to corpse and thrusting ghostly hands into each. Fallen Spirit Children convulsed and roused, waking from the dead.
“Where shall I put her?” asked Alon.
“Is she...”
“No. Restored. She’s hurt.” He flipped back her cloak to reveal the gashes on her shoulder and upper arm. The one on her neck was obvious.
Blake led him to a healing circle, set up, he suspected, prior to the conflict in preparation for the inevitable injuries. Alon laid her on a buffalo robe and stepped back.
