They walked down one of the cobblestone streets that led off from the central dome of the island. The roads were all laid out like the spokes of a wheel, converging at the rounded building. The dome towered over the nearby structures, reaching four stories into the air at its pinnacle. It was large enough to house the city hall building of White Halls but it was inhabited by only a single man: his uncle Robert.
Xander had only seen Robert once before. The man had a destitute appearance; his long hair and unkempt beard accentuated his pasty complexion. He was cared for by the other aunts and uncles, since he was unable to leave the cushioned seat on which he rested.
Robert controlled the waterspout that surrounded the island. His unconscious mind kept it aloft even during his sleeping hours. Likewise, he kept the island floating hundreds of feet above the surface of the ocean below. His task was repetitive but necessary. Keeping the island so high in the air ensured any Fire Warriors that sailed nearby couldn’t detect his outpouring of elemental power, since the elemental wielders could only detect the individual, not the result of their power.
Xander and Sammy turned before they reached the dome and walked to one of the more squat outlying buildings. A thin tarp had been pulled across the entryway, keeping out the misting rain and glaring sun but letting through the day’s cool breeze.
Alicia stood in front of the thin veil, smiling at the approaching young lovers. Deep wrinkles carved across the surface of her face and deepened considerably as she smiled. Her back was slightly stooped from age and her silver hair was pinned up into a loose bun on the top of her head. She looked grandmotherly, though Xander knew her looks were very deceptive. As one of the last Wind Warriors, she wielded considerable abilities.
“How is he?” Xander asked matter-of-factly.
“He’s as good as can be expected,” Alicia replied. “He’s still sleeping.”
Xander frowned. Though she called it sleeping, he knew his grandfather was actually unconscious, as he’d been ever since being attacked by General Abraxas.
“Should we come back another time, then?” he asked. “I don’t want to wake him up.”
Alicia shook her head. “You don’t need to worry about waking him up. It’s better that you come to see him.”
She pulled the cloth tarp aside, revealing the cool darkness of the one-room building. Xander looked to Sammy, who only shook her head and gestured for him to go inside. She knew as well as Xander did that this was something he needed to do without her.
Xander stepped past Alicia and was swallowed by the deep shadows in the room. His eyes strained to adjust to the dim light; a single lantern was the only light source in the room. As his eyes came into focus, he saw his grandfather lying on the room’s sole bed.
The elder man’s chest rose and fell unevenly as he clearly struggled for breath. The left side of his face and part of his exposed left arm were heavily bandaged in white linen but Xander could see spots of red and yellow, as the fresh burns oozed through the wrapping.
Xander fought the urge to throw up. The emotional turmoil within him reached an apex as he stared at the man he had loved his entire life. His grandfather had lived with him and his parents since he was a child. Though Xander had never known the Wind Warrior secret his grandfather had harbored, he had always shared a special kinship with the old man. To see him injured and—though Xander was loathed to admit it—dying on the bed left an unending ache in his chest.
Alicia closed the tarp behind her as she followed him into the room. She moved wordlessly past Xander and retrieved a bowl of water from a nearby table. Dipping a rag into the cool water, she patted his grandfather’s forehead.
“How… how is he?” Xander stammered.
Alicia looked up at him and smiled meekly. “He’s dying, Xander. He’s a strong man, one of the strongest among us, but he’s old just like the rest of us, too. His body just can’t take abuse like this.”
Looking around, Xander found a chair nearby. He pulled it over to the bedside and sat down heavily. Reaching out, he took his grandfather’s uninjured hand and squeezed it tightly.
“There has to be something we can do,” he whispered, without looking up at his aunt. “Take him to a hospital or something. There’s a really good burn hospital in Texas, I think.”
Alicia shook her head sadly. “If it were an option, we would have done it. He’s just too weak. He’d never survive the flight. To be honest, I’m surprised he made it all the way here. He’s obviously holding on for something important. I’m assuming that something is you.”
Xander leaned his head forward and rested it on his grandfather’s arm. He squeezed his eyes shut tightly as a tear rolled off his eyelashes and fell to the floor.
“You guys keep saying that,” he muttered. “I’m not special. I’m just a kid trying not to lose the only family member he has left.”
He didn’t hear Alicia move from the far side of the bed but she placed a compassionate hand on his back.
“You are special, Xander. There’s a reason you were chosen to be a Wind Warrior when it seemed like our time was done. Even if you don’t believe in yourself, you’ve ignited something in the rest of us that we all thought had died. You’ve given us hope for the future, not just our own but all of humanity’s.”
Xander lifted his head and turned it toward his aunt. “You may believe that but the rest of them are still ready to lie down and die.”
“Give them time,” she replied. “They’ll come around.”
“We don’t have time. The Fire Warriors are coming for us.”
Alicia sighed and retrieved a second chair. She placed it next to his and sat down so they were eye level with one another.
“Xander, dear, you have to remember that we’re old and stubborn. We’ve been Wind Warriors for decades now. We became warriors back in a time where there were literally hundreds of us living on this island alone, and we were only one clan of many throughout the world. Over the years, we’ve watched our loved ones, our friends, and our fellow warriors die of old age. We’ve seen so many of our kind simply fly back to their homes to live out their days alone. And all because we knew our time was coming to an end. We spent so much time being Wind Warriors that we never stopped to consider starting families. And those of us who did start families never had our children activate.”
Xander was surprised to see her reach up and wipe away a tear. He’d been so saddened by his own loss that he had trouble remembering how painful this must be for everyone else.
“We all knew the signs,” she continued. “Our time was coming to an end. That was probably the most painful thing of all. We knew what it meant when we were gone. It meant that nature had decided humanity wasn’t a good fit for the Earth any longer. It meant that… that it was time to wipe the slate clean and start again.”
Xander sat in silence, letting the weight of that realization sink in. He remembered how surprised he had been when he found out what would happen when the Fire Warriors rose to power. He couldn’t imagine what it must have been like to have that realization while actively a Wind Warrior; to realize that the world had suddenly decided you were obsolete.
“Then why didn’t you fight back?” he asked. “Why didn’t you do everything you could to stop the Fire Warriors?”
Alicia laughed softly. “Oh child, you sound so much like your grandfather. That’s exactly why he became our leader.”
Xander frowned at the implication. “So you did fight back? But it didn’t work, did it?”
“Humanity had progressed too far beyond our help. We were its spiritual guides but humanity no longer had a need for spirituality. The world prayed to technology and cared less and less about its impact on the world around it.”
She stood and moved her chair back against the wall. “You have to appreciate that we’ve had years to realize that we were going to die and no Wind Warriors would take our place. I guess, eventually, we just gave up trying. That’s why you’re getting so much resistance from
the others. They were content thinking that this was the end for them. They were resolved in the thought that they were going to die and there wasn’t anything they could do to change the world for the better.
“And then you came along. You’re giving them hope, but that hope has to break through some pretty resistant barriers.”
She slipped her hand under his arm and helped him to his feet. “Just don’t stop trying, okay? Give us a chance and we won’t let you down. It’s what he would have wanted, out of you and out of us.”
Xander looked over at his grandfather before turning back to Alicia. He wrapped his arms around the elderly woman and pulled her into a tight embrace.
“Thank you,” he whispered.
“My pleasure, dear,” she replied as he released her.
Xander looked back at his grandfather once again, taking in the sorrowful image of the wounded man. He hated to see the older Wind Warrior that way and just wished there was something he could do to make him better.
“Promise me you’ll let me know as soon as he wakes up,” he told his aunt.
Alicia nodded. “On my honor.”
Xander nodded and walked back out through the draped tarp. He had to squint momentarily as he was assaulted by the glaring sunlight. As his eyes cleared, he saw Sammy watching him intently from beside the doorway.
“How did it go?” she asked pensively.
Xander managed a faint smile. “It went well.”
“So where do we go from here?”
“I’m going to fight back,” he said sternly, finding a strength in his voice he hadn’t heard in a while. “I’m going to train and I’m going to convince the other aunts and uncles to help me.”
Sammy stepped up beside him, a beaming smile on her face. “I’m so glad to hear it. There’s something I didn’t tell you before but I think you need to hear it now. You’re something special—”
“Don’t you start with that, too,” he interrupted.
Sammy shook her head. “I’m serious. You told me before that you didn’t see the point in fighting since one Fire Warrior did so much damage. But that Fire Warrior was one of the strongest and deadliest I’d ever seen. And you’re fighting at a disadvantage since your caste was created only to bolster our abilities. But when you and General Abraxas faced off, he threw some of the most powerful fire attacks I’d ever seen and you stood your ground. You were able to tap some reserve of power, even without any real training.”
Xander felt a hollowness inside of him that wasn’t related to his depression. He remembered the fight with Abraxas and the power that flowed through him, how it seemed to pull from his very soul as it poured from his body. Could Sammy be right about him? Could they all be right?
“Great,” he said, “now I just need to convince all the others.”
Sammy cringed as she looked over his shoulder. “Looks like you’re about to have your chance.”
Xander looked over his shoulder and sighed heavily. Of all the people to approach, Thea was probably his last choice. The stern Wind Warrior looked set to walk past him when he stepped into her path.
Thea arched an eyebrow, expressing her displeasure. “Yes?”
Xander took a deep breath. “I want you to train me.”
“We tried that already,” she replied curtly. “You’re not very good. And frankly, I don’t have the time right now.”
She pushed her way past him, glowering at Sammy as she went.
“Please,” Xander called after her.
Thea stopped. She turned sharply on her heel and stared at the young man. “Why should I?”
He swallowed the hard lump in his throat. He looked at Sammy from the corner of his eye but she was staring off into the distance, either oblivious to the conversation or not eager to get involved.
“Because I want to make a difference.”
“Like you did with Bart?” she retorted.
Her words stung far worse than if she had struck him. He took a step back but kept his gaze locked on Thea.
“No, not like Bart,” he replied softly. “But because of him. And because of my grandfather. And… and because of my parents. And because of the billions of other people on this planet who are all in danger right now. Because if I don’t do something—if we don’t do something—they’re all going to die. The Fire Warriors are going to cleanse the world so it can start again. And I don’t know about you, but I’m not ready to lie down and die just yet.”
Thea stood tall but he could see her resolve faltering in her gaze.
“Did you ever have children?” he asked.
Thea’s hard gaze quickly returned before she shook her head. “No.”
“But you did have family, right?” He didn’t wait for her response. “Parents, of course, and maybe some siblings. Maybe even some nieces and nephews?”
He could see his words cutting through her rough exterior.
“I know you don’t like me and you don’t want to help me, if you can avoid it. And I know you don’t like Sammy. If you won’t do it for me, though, then do it for all the family of yours that probably still exist out there, all your family that’s still in danger.”
He took a step forward and was surprised when she didn’t back away. “I don’t know if we can actually stop the Fire Warriors but I’m sure not going to give up without a fight. Will you help me?”
Xander could see her jaw muscles clenching and unclenching as she considered her options. Finally, she nodded sharply.
“Meet me in the courtyard in fifteen minutes,” she said before turning away.
As she walked away, she called over her shoulder, “And Xander, you won’t enjoy this.”
Xander didn’t care about her thinly veiled threat. He smiled broadly as he turned back to Sammy.
Sammy didn’t meet his gaze. She stared past him in the direction of the retreating Thea. He glanced over his shoulder quickly to make sure Thea wasn’t giving Sammy a sour look but only saw the back of her as the older Wind Warrior walked away.
He turned back to the Fire Warrior. “Sammy? Earth to Sammy.”
Sammy blinked hard as her eyes came back into focus. Reaching up, she wiped away a thin sheen of sweat from her forehead.
“Sorry,” she said before coughing politely. “I was off in my own little world.”
Xander couldn’t blame her for wanting to avoid any confrontation with Thea. Only Patrick would have been a more unpleasant encounter.
“Thea’s going to train me again. Do you want to come with me?”
Sammy smiled weakly. “I’ll be there in a little bit. You go on ahead.”
Xander nodded and stepped forward. Pulling her close, he kissed her gently on the forehead, feeling the heat that radiated from her skin.
“I’ll see you soon,” he said before hurrying away.
Sammy watched Xander disappear around a building before turning her gaze back to the wall of water that surrounded the island. She knew Xander assumed Thea distracted her. She only wished it were that simple.
Hovering behind the curtain of water, a giant reptilian eye looked down on the island and stared intently at the wayward Fire Warrior. Sammy shrunk from its gaze and felt her temperature rising, as though her skin would burst into flames at any moment.
She had seen that eye in a hidden chamber behind her father’s throne room. It had frightened her so badly then that she had fled, never looking back. Despite knowing the threat it posed, she hadn’t seen it again outside of her dreams since. To see it hovering behind the water left her heart pounding in her chest.
Sammy was so intent on watching the eye that she didn’t hear the tarp being pulled aside behind her.
Alicia stepped into the bright light and stared at Sammy. The elderly woman followed her gaze toward the wall of water and furrowed her brow in confusion.
“Is everything alright, dear?” she asked, turning back to Sammy.
Sammy jumped and let out a slight scream of surprise. She looked to Alicia just as the grandmoth
erly Wind Warrior looked back at the waterspout. Despite looking directly at the spot where Sammy had seen the eye, she clearly didn’t see anything out of the ordinary.
Sammy nodded and looked back to Alicia with what she hoped was a disarming smile. “I’m fine. It’s just been a really long day, you know? I probably just need to go rest for a little while.”
Alicia smiled. “It’s been a hard day on all of us, love. Why don’t you go lie down for a while? Let me know if you need anything at all.”
“Thanks, Alicia.”
The older woman disappeared back inside and Sammy exhaled a breath she didn’t realize she’d been holding.
Turning back toward the waterspout, the eye was gone.
Wind Warrior Page 22