“Gladly,” she said, and began to walk away, then stopped. Conn was still standing just where she’d left him. “Thank you, Conn.”
“You’re welcome, Adaira.”
“I won’t fall into a quickfall patch?”
Conn peered past her. She watched his eyes squint as he stared ahead far along the cloudbank.
“You’ll want to walk straight toward that low, abandoned building. See it, maybe a hundred yards out?”
“I see it.”
“Once you reach it, head in the direction where Maggie is standing. Keep walking in a straight line and you’ll be fine. Use your rackstaff.”
They stood there a moment longer, gazing intently at one another.
“Well, bye for now,” she said.
He stepped closer, holding out the paw of his rackstaff to her. “Tap it.”
“Why?” she asked.
“Just tap it with the paw of your rackstaff.”
They tapped paws.
“Then you say, step wisely.”
Misty smiled. “Step wisely, Cloudwalker.”
Parting ways, she thought of little else but the sensation she still felt on her lips from their kiss. She sighed, remembering the touch of his hand cradling her neck when he’d pressed against her. She soon reached the small building, which wasn’t much of a building. She’d never noticed it before since it barely crested above the cloudbank. There were no visible widows, at least not on the near side of the structure. Now standing within the cool shade, she looked across the cloudbank to where Maggie still stood on a wooden crate. Walk in a straight line, Conn said. She let out a long breath, prepared to head out.
In an instant, Misty’s head was wrenched backward. Someone behind had grabbed a fistful of her hair. Then came another painful yank, and she found herself falling backwards, pulled closer into someone. A tall man, her back was now pressed hard against his chest. His mouth was close to her ear and she could feel the scruff of his chin.
“Scream out and I’ll snap your neck like a twig.” His clenched fist tugged harder on her hair, pulling her head back even more. Her neck extended, exposed and vulnerable.
“What do you want of me?” she asked.
“It took a bit of time. It was bothering me. Driving me crazy—I knew I’d seen you somewhere. Recently, too.” His breath was foul and she could see the oily strands of his long black hair.
“You’re that Grounder girl. The one on the stairs.”
“Stairs?”
“In the damn Drake Building. Don’t play dumb!” He yanked down hard again on her hair, enough to force her down to her knees. Her hand slid down to the midpoint of her rackstaff.
“I’m Adaira Drummond. You’ll . . . you’ll be punished for this.” She tried to sound insolent but couldn’t hide the fear in her quavering voice.
Releasing ahold of her hair, the man stepped around until he was standing before her. It was Bryant Peirce of the Dorcha Poileas. Standing tall before her, his broad, fluttering cape blocked her view of the world beyond them.
“Do you know what happens up here to Grounders caught trespassing?”
“I’m not—”
The slap came fast and hard to her left cheek. Hard enough Misty momentarily saw stars and tasted blood in her mouth. She wanted to scream and cry out, or melt into the cloudbank and beg for his mercy.
Chapter 51
“Grounder scum like you don’t deserve to see our sunshine. You don’t deserve to breathe our fresh air,” Bryant said.
Misty stared up at him, watching the twisted smirk on his face. “I’m . . . not . . . a Grounder!” she spat, with far more force than she thought she was capable of.
He slapped her again, then kicked her in the stomach with the tip of his boot. She doubled over and began to retch. He took a step backward.
“How dare you wear the clothes of a Cloudwalker. You think of yourself as having noble blood, do you? But I watched you. You possess no more of the Sight than I do.”
Misty shook her head, glowering at him but unable to speak.
“There are two things I hate more than anything else: foreigners and Grounders. They disgust me. Literally make me sick. And you want to know something else?”
“No!” she croaked.
“Whenever possible, I don’t waste valuable Dorcha Poileas resources on such scum. No trial; no elaborate Fall From Grace ceremony. That’s all so tedious, and time-consuming. I do everyone a favor by simply dragging people like you, usually kicking and screaming, to the nearest quickfall patch. I know where most of them are. Then I toss them into the void. Goodbye. I like to stand still and just listen. They usually fall silent after a brief moment. Perhaps they’re praying. Or perhaps they’ve prematurely died of fright.” He shrugged, a sick smile growing on his face. “Then I hear it, ever so faintly. The sound of a body thudding down onto the pavement far below. It’s a glorious sound. It excites me! You know what I mean? Excites me?”
“You’re disgusting.”
Bryant smiled. His eyes, lowering to her chest, lingered there.
Suddenly something else occurred to her. “You’re the one who pushed that Folais boy. Janis Folais. You killed him. Shoved him into a quickfall patch, didn’t you?”
“I told you, I hate foreigners. I caught him skulking about Midtown after hours. When questioned, he became mouthy.”
“You started a war!”
“The war would have started with or without his death—that Jersey City scum has been looking for an excuse for years. Anyway, it was worth it to hear his body hit the ground.”
Eyeing her again, he said, “You should not be wearing the colors of a true noble. You bring dishonor to the Drummond Clan. Strip.”
“What? No!”
“Take . . . them . . . off! The shirt first, then the kilt.” His hand grabbed the handle of the knife worn on his belt. “I can cut them off your body, if you’d prefer. Makes little difference to me.”
Misty tried to see around him. She could still hear Maggie, yelling orders in the distance. This can’t be happening. Am I really going to die like this? “I need to stand up. To get undressed.”
Taking Bryant’s silence as a sign of compliance, she used her rackstaff to help propel her body up onto her feet, and then wavered. Although the pain in her stomach was still there, it was tolerable. She just needed time to think.
At some point, Bryant, she realized, had freed his knife from its sheath when sunlight glinted off its reflective blade. It looked sharp and incredibly lethal. She nodded, “Okay . . . first the shirt.”
“Move it along. I’m inclined to just cut your throat and be done with you.”
She found the shirt’s top button but her hand shook too much to unbutton it. “I’m sorry, I’m just . . . so scared.” Her eyes lowered to the cloudbank, mainly cast in shadow near the ugly little building. Except for one area, she noticed, over there; also, another area, right over there. Curious. She glanced to her right—toward the sunny cloudbank beyond. Why wasn’t it white all over? Like it was before, a bit earlier? Tears filled her eyes and a smile formed on her lips as she came to a realization.
Misty looked down to find the sharp tip of his blade upon her chest. Pricking her skin near her heart, she felt blood trickling down between her breasts. A red stain blossomed there, spreading outward like a scarlet flower upon her shirt. No, not Adaira’s shirt, she thought.
She remembered Adaira, so frail and vulnerable, and the promise she’d given her only last night, and then Misty became angry. Angry she was being forced to break her promise. Angry her new life was being stripped away. Angry that for the first time in her life she really wanted to live. Now, because of this horrible man, everything was being taken from her.
In a flash, Bryant’s knife began slicing upwards. One, two, three buttons catapulted up into the air, leaving her cleavage exposed. She looked up into his eyes and he saw her hatred. She was gripping the vertical length of her rackstaff so tightly, her knuckles were turning w
hite. Without any cognitive thought, she jumped backwards. She then took a further step back, followed by another. Bryant looked at her with mild curiosity. “You cannot escape the inevitable.”
She raised the tip of her rackstaff, pointing it at him.
Now he was smiling. He made an attempt to slap it away, but she moved back before he could make contact.
“Move. That way, into the sun,” Misty ordered, gesturing with a quick jerk of her head toward the right.
“Like hell I will! I’m going to enjoy tossing your Grounder ass into the—” he stopped speaking as he noticed the new expression on her face.
Misty was doing something she didn’t know she could do; something she didn’t know anyone could do. Somehow she was bringing forth an inner strength. No. Not strength from the inner, but strength from below, from the very cloudbank itself. She felt the energy coursing up through her legs, causing her entire body to vibrate. And the pent-in anger she felt now joined that same energy, becoming an incredible well of heat that filled her to the very core. Suddenly a blast shot forth from the tip of her rackstaff, the recoil so jarring she almost lost her grip. She stared at her rackstaff.
Bryant’s desperate screams pulled her back to the present situation. The Dorcha Poileas captain was nowhere in sight. Oh my God. Did I somehow vaporize him?
When he screamed again, Misty saw the top of his head and both arms above the lip of a quickfall patch. His hands were frantically reaching outward for something, anything, to grasp onto. Misty pictured his lower torso, deep within the cloudbank and weighing him down, his legs bicycling all about. “Help me!” he cried, his cruel voice pathetic from fear. “Don’t just stand there, you stupid bitch, help me! I can’t hold on much longer!”
Misty walked toward him, carefully avoiding areas where the solid cloudbank met a quickfall patch. Bryant was a good seven or eight feet away from her, and she’d put him there. Somehow.
“I don’t know, Bryant. You’re pretty far out there. Would be dangerous for me to come much closer.”
“Use your staff. Reach it out to me so I can grab it. Hurry!”
Pursing her lips, Misty thought about his request. “You were going to kill me. Or have you forgotten that already?”
“I was wrong to suggest that . . . I’m sorry. Truly sorry!” His eyes went wide as he slipped deeper into the patch, the tops of his shoulders now barely visible. Panting, he was afraid to talk, make the slightest movement.
“You still think I’m a Grounder? Don’t deserve to wear the colors of my clan?”
His eyes, wide in their sockets, answered for him.
She stared down at her ruined shirt. “I could let you fall. Maybe I could hear that same sound, you know, the thud you mentioned?”
“So what are you going to do?” Maggie queried from behind her. Misty jumped in surprise. Her friend was no longer barking orders from the wooden crate in front of her company. Now, she stood only ten feet away, near the ugly brown building. Misty wondered how long she’d been there. How much did she see? Maggie’s lips were parted, clear astonishment on her face. She looked as though she were staring at a stranger.
“I guess I should help him,” said Misty after a moment.
Maggie nodded.
Misty turned back to Bryant, still doing his best not to move, hardly breathing. Lowering into a crouch, she swung the rackstaff out horizontally. The tip fell a foot shy of his closest hand. “You need to reach out for it.”
“No. I’ll slip through. I can’t.”
“So you want me to risk my life for you, is that what you’re saying?”
Bryant nodded, almost imperceptibly.
“You’ll be in my debt then. Forever.”
“Yes. I promise.”
Misty studied the nearby cloudbank and found an area free of quickfall. Crawling over to it, she again stooped into a crouching position. She swung her rackstaff around, then across, close enough for him to reach. “I can’t grab the staff for you. You either need to reach out for it, or die. Your choice.”
Bryant, reaching out, got a solid, one-handed, grip on the rackstaff. Hauling his body somewhat farther up, higher from the void below, was enough for his other hand to grasp onto the staff.
“Don’t let go,” Misty ordered, as she began to pull. Whatever she’d done before, it had drained her; she was exhausted. The man was so heavy she didn’t know if she had the strength to pull him free. Then Maggie appeared by her side. Putting all her weight into it, she too began hauling in the rackstaff. Once they freed Bryant’s body from the quickfall zone, they dragged him further atop the cloudbank. Letting go of the rackstaff, he lay there for several moments. Misty, who had nothing more to say to him, instead looked at Maggie, and asked, “Can I borrow a clean shirt?”
Maggie nodded, “Aye. Maybe you can do some explaining along the way?”
“Not sure I can,” Misty said. “But I’ll try.”
Maggie stood and helped Misty to her feet. “You’re not a Grounder at all, are you?”
Misty shrugged. “I don’t know what to think.”
The two young women set off across the cloudbank, Misty clutching her ruined shirt to her chest.
“You know you’ve made an enemy with that one,” Maggie said, turning back to see Bryant still lying on the cloudbank. “He’ll never forget what you did to him.”
“I know.”
Chapter 52
Bruised and sore from today’s relentless battle training, Conn inwardly debated whether he wanted to head on down to Ginny’s Trap tonight. He’d promised his company he’d make an appearance, if only for one whiskey—maybe two. Then again, he was curious, too, to find out how Misty’s first day participating as a Cloudwalker-in-training had ensued. Fortunately, he knew he had Maggie to keep a close eye on her as she learned their ways.
Now close to nine o’clock, the Empire State’s narrow stairwell was far more crowded than usual. Conn stood to one side as a family of seven, all talking at once, clattered noisily upward, oblivious to his presence. It then occurred to him that Maggie and Misty might not even be there. They were probably still back in the Pavicon building, each nursing her own assortment of injuries.
On reaching the Empire State’s lobby level, he was surprised how many Skylanders were out and about this night. Don’t they realize a war was coming? That any free time would be best shared among family, or even spent alone, to gain some deep meaningful insight by reflecting on life itself? Wake up! We are on the brink of war, people!
Conn entered through the double doors of Ginny’s Trap and found a throng of people too dense to see past. He stood on his tiptoes to better look about. His senses were accosted by music playing far too loudly, too many bow bags yelling at one another, and a layer of dense smoke that seemed to linger most around head level. He debated whether he should just turn around and go back home.
“Conn! Conn! Over here!”
Conn saw a hand waving at him over a group of heads to his right. When he caught a glimpse of dreadlocks he knew Toag was hailing him. He made his way through the inebriated crowd, receiving more than a few painful pats on the back and shoulders from friends, and from others in his company. By the time he wedged himself into a spot at the bar, he was feeling even more irritated and drained than he had before.
Smiling, Toad gave Conn an affectionate pat, which felt more like a smack, on his tender back. “Glad you made it!”
Conn winced and attempted a half-smile back, as a glass of whiskey appeared on the bar before him.
“That’s on me. Looks like you need it,” Toag offered, draining the last remnants in his own glass.
Conn gulped down the whiskey then signaled the barkeep for another. “Seen Maggie?”
“Sure, she’s around. Along with my bonnie green-eyed fiancée,” he said, giving Conn a smart-ass grin.
Conn waited for the strong temptation to punch him in the mouth to pass before asking. “Whereabouts?”
Toag said, “They’re making their
rounds in here. Maggie’s introducing Misty—Adaira—to her friends. Hey, did Maggie mention to you anything about what happened today?”
“Happened? What happened?”
“To Misty. Something about your old friend accosting her.”
“What old friend? What are you talking about?” Conn’s head throbbed. Toag was beyond irritating.
“Peirce! I didnae get the whole story; it was too loud in here. But she’s fine. Better than fine,” he added, giving another toothy crocodile-like smile. “We’ll get the whole story when we find them.”
But Conn was already fuming. The mere mention of Peirce and Misty’s names in the same sentence was enough to raise his blood level to the boiling point. He tried to reason out when that Dorcha Poileas sociopath found time alone to accost her. Conn replayed the moment he left Misty on the cloudbank earlier that day, telling her how to carefully traverse the cloudbank in order to safely reach Maggie, and her company. He thought of the nearby squat, ugly little building, which cast just enough of a shadow for someone to hide, lurking or lying in wait. That someone, it seemed, was Bryant Peirce. Conn glanced over his shoulder toward the entrance. He’d go find Peirce and set things right. Once and for all.
“I’m telling you, she’s fine,” Toag said, no longer grinning. “Look, the place is beginning to clear out a bit. I’ll get us a couple more drinks then meet you over by the fire, aye? I think that’s where the girls were headed.”
Conn, exhaling a pent-in breath, gave Toag a halfhearted smile, then turned and headed toward the seating area at the back of the pub. A fire burned brightly there beneath an iron hood. An overstuffed chair, not occupied, was situated next to the circular, stacked-stone surround. The chair had been Dob’s favorite place to sit, where he’d rest his weary bones at the end of a long day, usually accompanied by several strong drinks. In that moment, Conn had no problem picturing him still sitting there.
He found it difficult to swallow. He pictured the professor leaning over to tap-out old remnants of tobacco from his long-stemmed pipe. He’d be glad to see me, Conn imagined. He’d say, Sit down, my boy . . . get warm by the fire.
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