Elemental Awakening Book Bundle

by Nicola Claire

  But the shoving and shouting at the entrance to a grocers. The threat of violence that hung on the air around the petrol station across the road. The car horns blasting and sirens wailing and alarms going off set a tone of heightened danger and brought sickening reality to everyone's lives.

  I should have been stronger than this. I'd been through so much, survived so much. And yet as I watched that group of five teenagers get ever closer with their bats I knew nothing had prepared me for this.

  I'd been able to explain so much away because "they" had not been human. Athanatos are dangerous beings. Ancient and knowledgable in every cruel and vicious act there has ever been. Able to survive centuries by hardening their minds and hearts. Not human. Not even close.

  And yet here were the monsters. Standing next to the saints. Two sides of humanity that had probably always existed but I'd only just noticed today. Not everyone is good. There is right and wrong in every society. Virtue and dishonesty. Love and hate. Kindness and meanness. Respect and dishonour.

  "They are not who you think they are, sweetheart. There are good Athanatos and bad, like humans." My grandfather's words, reflected in humanity.

  I flicked my eyes back to the shop entrance. How long had it been? Five minutes? Ten already? I'd forgotten to check my watch when Theo and Mark had left. The bat wielding thugs were closer now. Almost to the store frontage that had been boarded up by the enterprising owner, but which would be useless against a baseball bat.

  My heart picked up speed, the malaise of shock was lifting, my fingers already curled around the door handle on the car door. Theo had said remain locked inside, but those bats could kill. Hadn't there been enough death already?

  Aether. Oh, my Aether.

  Yeah, we were all feeling the pain. This was wrong. The world was out of whack. Our immediate survival was imperative, but no less important than sorting out this mess and making the world healthy and safe again.

  An old lady got caught up in the middle of the group of thugs. One pushed her out of his personal space as though he had the rights to that little segment of the pavement. Another thrust her back when she lost her balance and landed against his side. A shoving match began and I found myself standing outside the vehicle, my feet in amongst stones and debris, my nose filled with the acrid stench of a city infrastructure on the brink of collapse.

  I reached for Air instinctively, ready to blast the hell out of the arseholes who picked on a defenceless pensioner. I had no way of knowing if I could wield my new Stoicheio with enough finesse to avoid hurting the old woman, but I had to try. Anything was better than the terror on her wrinkled face, the shock and confusion that accompanied it, the realisation that she could die.

  No! I clenched my fists, closed my eyes and tried to imagine a mini tornado twisting through their midst, picking off broken bits of building and flinging them out at each boy in that group, selectively hitting my targets and avoiding the lady who was still being buffeted from side to side.

  But when I called Aeras all I heard was a mournful cry, the wind whistling through the shattered windows of nearby structures, a mournful howl sounding out inside my suddenly splitting head.

  "Oh," I gasped, doubling over, clutching my temples and thinking regurgitated ouzo was about to be spilled.

  I blinked through tears of pain and watched two middle aged men tear into the group, throwing a punch here, a kick there, and basically fighting back against the bullies. Another woman rushed out from her hiding spot, to grip the arm of the old pensioner and pull her to safety, while yet another person shouted on the corner for the police, who must have been within hearing distance, because in seconds two uniformed cops came tearing around the corner batons raised, tasers out, intent in their eyes.

  I sunk down onto the road, back to the SUV and watched humanity come back from the edge of an abyss. Watched those beings without supernatural powers take control and right the wrong. Despite their lack of weapons, despite their lack of skills, despite their fear.

  There were good and bad souls in every race on earth. I had to believe the good would win over the evil. I had to believe that what I'd witnessed today was not an anomaly but the norm. I had to.

  But as my head stopped throbbing and the nausea from the pain subsided I felt a different kind of unease. A type of despondency that even hope witnessed could not completely wipe away. A type of panic the weight of responsibility did little to alleviate.

  This was our world now. Treacherous not only for me, but for every person in it. Human, Athanatos, even Alchemist. I realised, as I sat there panting through the after effects of what felt like a brain haemorrhage, that a war had begun. A race to balance the world, right the Elements, and save everyone. Every...one. Not just my group of friends. Not just the Pyrkagia, or the Aeras, or the Nero, or the Gi. Not just humans or Alchemists or Athanatos. Everyone.

  A type of calmness replaced the despondency and panic. A sort of conviction without a rudder, but still a goal to achieve. I didn't know how we'd do it, but I did know we had no choice. The alternative was too bleak.

  "Cassandra!" Theo yelled as he ran across the road pushing a shopping trolley before him and making me smile from the surreal and, I admit, slightly humorous sight. "What are you doing out of the car? Are you hurt?" he demanded, the trolley rolling to a stop against the car, landing a decent dent in the side panel which he didn't seem to care much about, as he crouched down in front of me and pushed wet hair from my eyes.

  Oh, it was still raining. I hadn't even noticed.

  "Are you ill?" he asked, concern marring his handsome, but equally wet face.

  I wasn't ill. I was just waking up to reality.

  "Did you get everything we need?" I asked.

  He grunted, an unamused sound, as Mark slipped out of the store before a large group of military looking men rounded the corner and started ordering everyone back from the shop frontage, taking over control of the street from the civilians. Who, in the end, hadn't done that bad a job.

  "We have to fix this," I added, when he didn't answer my question.

  "What, Oraia? Where do you need fixing?"

  I tried to laugh. It didn't work.

  "This," I said instead. "Everything."

  "Is she all right?" Mark asked, pulling his overflowing trolley up against the side of the car as well.

  "I'm not sure," Theo answered, proceeding to check me over physically with his hands. "Load the car, before anyone decides it'd be easy to take ours than battle inside that store," Theo ordered, his eyes on my face, my body, wherever his hands currently were.

  "I'm fine," I murmured.

  "You don't look fine. What happened?"

  "Humanity fought back."

  "Excuse me?" he asked, eyebrows raised.

  "This is our world now," I added, looking over his shoulder and watching the men in fatigues line up the thugs with bats while holding big looking guns. The guns won. "We need to fix it."

  "Casey," he said softly. "We'll fix it."

  "Do you know how?" I asked, hopefully, my eyes coming back to his.

  "Oraia, you need to rest." Not an answer I had expected nor wanted. Not an answer at all.

  But he'd missed the point anyway. I wasn't tired. I wasn't suffering from shock. My eyes were wide open. My heart beating steady within my chest. The ache I felt a backdrop to the need to fix this.

  "I'm fine," I said with conviction, pushing up from the ground and forcing him to move back or be knocked over.

  "You are?" he asked sceptically.

  "I've got no idea how to, but I do know we have to fix this."

  "So you keep saying," he said slowly and softly, looking at me as though he thought I might have lost the plot.

  And as I watched the scene of forced order assert itself across the street and the looks on the faces of the survivors of this first round of Genesis - and yes, I was sure this was only the first - change from fear and loss and confusion, to a hope laced still with shock, I realised it would be a
n easy assumption to make. That I might have lost the plot.

  But with that change in atmosphere on the streets of a Wellington inner city suburb, in the rubble left by the destructive force of an Elemental world gone out of whack, I also knew that hope was a powerful force. Offering direction, absorbing misery, reinforcing the need to survive.

  And most of all, bringing out a strength that some would not have known they possessed, but found the will to dig deep enough to find it inside.

  Just like I did, sitting in the dirt and muck of a broken road, leaning against an SUV in the rain.

  "In the car," Theo instructed softly. His attention on my face leading me to believe he still didn't think I had recovered yet.

  And maybe recovered was too complete a word to use for how I felt. I certainly couldn't stop the images of that young weeping child or the frightened impotent pensioner from flashing through my mind. But I did feel a shift within me. A monumental type of change within my soul.

  As Theo slipped into the rear of the car taking me with him, letting Mark drive the vehicle back to the house, I looked into his hazel eyes and realised that there were levels of immediacy. I'd already acknowledged that this Theo was, in a way, my Theo too. That to have one, I could survive without the other. In addition, I was aware that reconnecting with our Elements was more important than even that. Than me and Theo. Than having my Thisavros back.

  And finally, I acknowledged that nothing was more significant, more paramount than fixing what was wrong in this world. For me. For Theo. For Athanatos, Humans and yes, even the Alchemists. Because we all had a right to survive, and we all had a right to exist in a healthy world.

  Can you hear me? I asked all my Stoicheio, even those I hadn't yet come to possess, whilst making sure I didn't actually reach for them.

  I hadn't expected an answer, nor did I get one. I just had to believe that they could hear.

  I'm coming, I whispered in my mind. You are not alone, I added, remembering Theo's same words to me last night. I will find a way to fix this, I vowed.

  Silence.

  And as the rain fell harder and the winds picked up and a fire, burning in a pile of rubble we passed, flared towards the sky in a move the precipitation should have arrested.

  And as the ground rumbled beneath our tyres.

  I knew that they had heard.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Haven't You Heard A Freaking Word I've Said?

  "I've managed to salvage three rooms, as well as the utility and this one, for our use," Aktor advised, once we'd returned to our ramshackle base. "The cellar is also a possibility, but will require further investigation as a fallback position, should we need it."

  We were standing in what had been the library, at the rear of the building, behind the stairs. Aktor and Sonya had turned it into a makeshift living area, with couches and a table and benches and a stove over an open fire in the hearth. A kettle was whistling merrily as though the world hadn't come to an abrupt end.

  "The utility room is through the destroyed kitchen but is ideally suited as a wash house," the butler was saying, as he wrapped a tea towel around the heated handle of the kettle. It occurred to me that had he had access to his Element he wouldn't have needed to take such precautions.

  I glanced at the fire burning brightly in the hearth.

  "Did you use Pyrkagia to start that?" I asked.

  Aktor shook his head. "Sonya found matches."

  She smiled brightly from where she was slicing bread with a sharp knife on a side table, set up with utensils and crockery clearly dug out from the ruins of the kitchen. They'd done a remarkable job making a home for us in amongst the destruction the earthquake had caused. My gaze, though, kept looking up at the ceiling expecting it to come tumbling down on our heads at any second.

  "It's quite safe, Miss Eden," the butler said, pouring the boiled water into several waiting mugs. "I have been aloft and removed any unnecessary weight, testing the structure quite thoroughly. There are parts of the house which are precarious, but this room, as well as those already set up, are sound, I assure you."

  "I trust you, Aktor," I said, from my position on an overstuffed couch with surprisingly minor wear and tear. Theo had forced me to put my feet up despite the copious amounts of trips they were making with supplies. He still didn't believe I was not in shock.

  "I have also set up a rain collection system outside to help with ablutions and such," the old man was adding, each bit of information offered when Theo and Mark were back in the room to hear. Isadora and Nico hadn't returned yet, and the concern for their lengthy absence was felt by all.

  "You've done a remarkable job," Theo offered, finishing up stacking our provisions against a far wall Aktor had set aside. "But I'm famished," he announced. "Pilfering makes you hungry."

  "You pilfered?" I asked, astounded.

  He cocked his head at me and said, "Disaster?" and nothing else.

  "That's no excuse at all," I countered.

  "Here we go," Mark advised, sinking into the couch opposite me. "Take it like a man, Your High-and-mighty. She'll only keep prodding and poking until you relent in any case."

  "I do not prod and poke," I argued. "Anyway," hands crossed over chest, "this is exactly the point I was trying to make in the car."

  They hadn't listened to me then either, still thinking I wasn't of sound mind.

  "We have a choice to make at a time like this, and by we," I said, looking at each person in that room, Athanatos, Human and Alchemist, "I mean everyone on this planet. Pull together, rise above it and make things right, or succumb to fear and panic and animalistic behaviour in order to just survive. We need to be better than that," I concluded.

  "See?" Mark said, leaning his head back and closing his eyes. Then starting to hum under his breath.

  I threw a cushion at him.

  "It's an altruistic view, Cassandra," Theo advised, moving to sit beside me on the couch. "But those who are not prepared to fight for their survival will not prevail. History has proven this."

  "Those who are not prepared to fight for the good of all right now will die with the rest of the population when Genesis finishes," I said softly.

  Theo looked at me for a long, long moment and then whispered, "What do you suggest, Oraia?" As though I had the answers to all of this.

  I let out a breath of air. OK. Right. Time to put my money where my mouth is. Which was ironic, because Theo clearly hadn't put his money where the pilfering occurred. And no, nothing was actually funny about any of this, I was just procrastinating.

  "OK," I said. "It's going to get worse."

  "Probably," Theo agreed.

  "And we need to fix it," I added.

  "But how?" he queried. I don't think he was being obstinate on purpose, I actually think he was trying to push me to work this out myself. Kind of like a self taught lesson. But he didn't know me, like he used to know me. Like my Theo had known me.

  And now was not the time to be reminded of that.

  "We need to reach our Elements first," I declared.

  Theo tilted his head slightly in a move that was meant to encourage me to go on.

  "We can't fix this without re-establishing that connection," I said.

  "But how?" Mark asked, clearly listening in on the conversation despite looking asleep right now.

  I didn't have a definitive answer. The only thing I could think of was trying.

  Hardly world saving material.

  "We attempt to reach them in short burst, limiting the fallout," I offered.

  "What if that doesn't work?" Mark helpfully asked.

  I narrowed my eyes at his still tipped back head.

  "We keep trying. We believe we'll get through eventually. We don't give up."

  "Hardly scientific," Mark supplied.

  "Do you have a better idea, Alchemist?" I asked, and saw Theo's lips twitch out of the corner of my eye.

  "No," Mark replied on a sigh, tilting his head back down and looking towards
me. "And you're right. Without Fire we can't communicate with Pyrkagia and see what's happening there. Without Air we can't move through lightning where we need to go. Without Water we can't battle the next Genesis threat which could well be flooding. Without Earth we can't be certain the earthquakes have stopped."

  "Not to mention the role in balance those Elements play," Theo added. "Without being able to manipulate them, things could well just keep getting worse."

  "But it won't be easy," Aktor advised from the table, where he was setting out bowls and spoons and what smelled like a delicious chicken soup in a large pot. "I've tried to establish communications through Fire and it almost laid me flat."

  "I had to slap him to bring him around once," Sonya offered, her lip retreating between her teeth at the fraught memory that evoked.

  "I tried to use Air out on that street," I admitted and Theo stilled. "Some thugs were terrorising an old lady and I thought I might be able to help."

  "Did it work?" Theo ask, voice strained.

  "No. I thought I blew a blood vessel in my head." Perhaps not the wisest thing to say to a man like Theo who had decided despite not feeling like he was my Thisavros that he'd act like one anyway; possessive, protective, over the top.

  "Yeah, Water was a bust too," Mark offered, trying to get Theo's intense attention off me. Once a big brother, always a big brother. "Getting rain to miss me is second nature, but when I automatically tried outside earlier I felt like I was drowning instead."

  "So doing this won't be easy," I admitted. "But it has to be done."

  Theo let out a pained sigh and closed his eyes, pinching the bridge of his nose as though he had a tension headache.

  "We do it in pairs," he announced. "One person attempting to re-establish contact. The other making sure they don't do it for too long and compromise themselves."