She frowned as she realized how close he must have come to death today. Even though she knew that it should bother her that she was being held tenderly by hands which had just ripped the life out of dozens of furious Sirens, all she could think about was how easily they could have done the same to him.
She raised her head and met his eyes, plagued by the shadows which the day had yielded. “Are you alright?” she asked.
He gazed down at her for a long moment, drinking her in, before he answered. “I wasn’t,” he admitted, and then rested his chin atop her head. “But I am now.”
Chapter Twenty Eight
Winged Warriors
The shouts grew louder as Callie and Alex neared the beach, rising up around them as though being born of the trees themselves. Callie felt her palms begin to slicken as they flew the final few feet, somehow realizing before they even arrived that the scene she was about to witness would be terrible.
The trees parted, and Callie felt her blood run icy. This was not like the battle she had seen on top of the waterfall; this was the kind of war that she had only read about in history books, or seen on the news. Everywhere, for miles around, the stretch of sandy shoreline was decorated with vengeful soldiers fighting boldly and without restraint. The sound of intermingling cries was deafening, the sight of the living falling dead in either direction stunning. Callie couldn’t make sense of it. This was utter chaos.
All of the Guardians were fighting, not only those who had been trained in war. She recognized glimpses of faces from the waterfall, and understood that these white-winged warriors had either been recently liberated or had joined the fight willingly. In any case, there were hundreds of them now, and each was determined to fight until death claimed him or his foe. The Sirens bore the same mentality, from the looks of their expressions. Callie was relieved to note that the numbers had evened out.
“There’s Serena,” Callie said, shouting to be heard above the noise, as she pointed to the blonde battler below.
But Alex didn’t fly immediately towards his friend. Instead, he veered off, returning to the near outskirts of the forest. He landed on a thick branch a few meters off the ground, and set Callie on her feet.
“Stay here,” he ordered, his wings remaining extended as he prepared to fly away.
“Wait,” she said, grabbing hold of his wrist. He turned back to her. “You can’t just leave me up here. I have to help.”
“You have to do no such thing,” he said, his voice firm. “You will stay up here where you will be safe, and when this is over I will return for you.”
“Alex!” Callie protested.
“I demand it, Callie,” he growled. She raised an eyebrow at him in challenge, detesting the insinuation. He let loose a weary sigh, his features softening in exhaustion. “Please, Cal?” he asked. “Don’t make me lose you twice in one day.”
She rolled her eyes, but he understood that she was complying. He held up the wrist that she had captured, and quickly kissed her fingers, before peeling them off with his free hand. She sat down on the broad branch as she watched him fly away, disappearing into the crowds.
Callie watched the battle unfold. The silver-winged Sirens seemed to be falling alongside the white-winged Guardians in equal measure; no side was yet winning. Every time someone was about to die, she looked away, still unable to stomach the sight. A part of her was glad that she wasn’t immortal, that she hadn’t developed the wings of a Guardian. She would never have been able to engage in combat so readily.
Zeke burst forth from the crowd then, chasing after a retreating Siren, trapping her before she was able to escape into the woods. Callie saw why she was running: one of her wings had been completely torn off, and the other flapped limply from a small patch where it was hardly connected. Zeke caught her by that final wing and, with a sharp tug, dismembered it.
The Siren fell forwards, motionless, onto the sand. Zeke tossed the wing aside and brushed his hands together, unaware of the Siren walking stealthily towards him from behind. Callie gasped, and looked around. Surely he had to see her. He should turn any moment. But the woman kept crawling closer, and her hand took hold of one of his wings, and Callie watched in horror, crying, “Zeke!”
Except her call was unnecessary. Because at that moment, Serena descended from the heavens, planting both feet squarely in the woman’s chest and knocking her back. Serena landed, and wasted no time in picking up a nearby rock with a pointed edge. She pounced on the Siren then, digging the rock into her throat, and then yanking the woman’s hair back so forcefully that the head seemed to pop upwards for a moment, and then fall backwards, hanging on by skin alone.
The Siren’s body crumpled to the ground. Serena stood above it, panting, for a short second. Then she lunged forwards and punished the body with a solid kick.
“Bitch,” she muttered.
Serena turned, and found Zeke staring at her in wide-eyed surprise. Callie listened closely, and was just able to make out the next words.
“What?” Serena drawled. “You think I’ve put up with you all these years just to let some other woman kill you?”
Zeke chuckled in amazement, and Serena rolled her eyes, returning to the crowds once again. Zeke shook his head, still smiling at her, as he bent down and took care of yanking the Siren’s wings out. He discarded them, and then leapt back into the chaos.
Callie began to get nervous a while later, when, as the numbers of the living began to dwindle, she saw that the silver wings outnumbered the white ones. She shifted her eyes back and forth across the beach, aching to realize just how many Guardians littered it with their corpses. Alex was still off somewhere, alive, for she had seen him just a moment ago.
She knew that she had led him to believe she’d stay put. But, when she saw yet another Guardian fall, she realized that she needed to help. She had watched for long enough; she had garnered some information. Three Sirens that consistently won were relatively nearby. She could Perceive upon them as they fought, and thereby help the Guardians to defeat them.
Holding her breath, she pushed off of the branch, falling through the many feet of empty air before landing on her feet. Her ankles cracked beneath her, and she toppled over onto her back. But the fractures healed quickly, and she was able to stand up and peer out at the Sirens.
One of the three was close. She was engaged in battle with a frail-looking female Guardian, and Callie wondered how such a person had survived so long. This was a scientist or a philosopher, not a soldier. Then again, as Callie watched, the Guardian managed to land a powerful punch to the underside of the Siren’s jaw.
Callie closed her eyes, pushing herself into the Siren’s mind. The woman’s memory was almost black as she instantly recalled the blow she’d just been dealt, focusing on the way the Guardian had favored her right hand. Before Callie could exit the memory and step into the woman’s other recollections, she was pulled into a more distant memory of the day, one in which the Siren had broken a man’s right hand after he’d shown signs of favoring it. Callie shivered, and leapt out of that particular image as quickly as possible.
She found the dark hallway and raced down it, searching to her right and left for a brighter memory. This woman must never have been a very happy person, however, because Callie was having a difficult time locating one.
Finally, however, she saw a picture that glowed warmly. It wasn’t of the forest, but it would have to do. Callie stepped into it, and saw that it contained, of all things, a cat. The woman was sitting in a living room somewhere, yet wingless, looking to be only about six or seven years old. She was nursing a small cat from a bottle, cooing to it as it drank.
Callie concentrated on the sand beneath her feet to disengage from the memory. The woman had stopped fighting, was staring blankly into space, as the Guardian stepped behind her and proceeded to win that particular battle.
Her stomach in knots, Callie felt a familiar discomfort at the thought of killing. Even though the soldier had been a Siren
, she’d had a family once. She had shown compassion at one point in her life. Watching her ultimate dismemberment now was sickening, and Callie regretted playing a part in it, even as she knew it was necessary.
She shook off the nagging feeling of guilt, remembering Zeke’s training. Such emotions had no place on the battlefield. So she narrowed her eyes and focused her attention on the next Siren, inserting herself into the woman’s mind with practiced ease.
For a long while, Callie kept up this act. As before, she effortlessly navigated her way through Sirens’ minds, weaving through their memories and manipulating their thoughts, allowing the Guardians to gain an edge.
She was in the midst of exiting an unusually difficult mind, however, when the owner glanced over in suspicion. This Siren hadn’t a single bright memory; it was as though she had spent the entirety of her abnormally long life being miserable. Callie had picked out the best she could—a nondescript day spent on a sunny tree branch—but knew that such a memory couldn’t distract the woman for long.
Indeed, it hardly distracted her at all. Instantly, she turned and caught Callie’s eye, understanding what had happened to her. In fury, she quickly killed the Guardian with whom she had been fighting, and marched over to Callie.
She swallowed. This was an unusually large Siren, towering at least six inches above her. She had picked this Siren to Perceive upon because of the dozen grown men she had crippled in the past five minutes. And now that Callie had been given a taste of the woman’s mind, she could understand the source of the expertise: the woman lacked all mercy.
The Siren approached Callie and, without pause, ripped backwards on her hair, tugging at sensitive parts of Callie’s scalp in such a way that brought tears to her eyes. Her heart began to pound in her stomach, and she was lapping shallow breaths. Remembering something her father had taught her long ago, she curled an arm across her chest, and then whipped it backwards so that her elbow collided with the woman’s nose.
The Siren staggered backwards, cupping her nose in both hands, and watching as the blood flowed into her palms. But then Callie forgot the most important thing her father had told her: the part about running away as soon as she’d leveled her assailant.
As it was, her attacker looked up, more anger in her eyes than before, her face twisting into a mask of sheer fury.
Silver feathers overwhelmed Callie as the Siren flew at her, knocking her into the ground and pinning her down by the throat. Callie clawed at the backs of the restraining hands, feeling her windpipe close even as she did so. For some strange reason, as she was beginning to see stars pop into her vision, the blood vessels bursting in her eyes, she remembered a scene from a James Bond movie. She couldn’t remember if it was Goldfinger, nor was she really concerned with the title of the film. What was important was that she remembered Sean Connery digging his thumbs into the eyes of his foe, thus buying himself some time.
And so, warring with her instincts, she removed her hands from those which were suffocating her, and reached up, wincing as she watched her thumbs penetrate the eye sockets of the Siren. The feel of sticky fluid upon her skin would have made her gag, save for the restraining hands on her larynx. But the motion worked; the Siren had no choice except to distance herself from her prey so as to save herself.
As she did so, however, the Siren grabbed a handful of sand and thrust it into Callie’s face. Callie hissed as the grains fell into her eyes, blinding her. She could no longer tell where the woman was, just that she was no longer choking. She rolled over onto her belly, struggling to crawl away, to hide at least until she had recovered her sight. But that was not about to happen.
A pair of large, strong hands, the same which had previously been wrapped about Callie’s throat, lifted her by the hips. Callie folded limply as she was hoisted into the air, and then cried out as the woman flung her body into a nearby tree. She felt the bark tear at the skin on her forehead, leaving a wide gash which seeped blood into her eyes.
Callie crumpled at the base of the tree, unable to move. Agony radiated from every pore. She was still for a few long moments, blinking and rubbing her eyes, attempting to regain her vision. When the blurry outlines began to emerge, however, Callie wished for blindness. Because if she was about to die at the hands of the Siren flying directly at her, at least she would have wanted to be unaware of the fact.
The woman had launched herself through the air and was almost on top of Callie when Serena appeared. She stood suddenly between Callie and her attempting-murderer, catching the impact as the woman rammed into her. They rolled on the ground, each reaching for the other’s wings, until Serena finally claimed victory atop the Siren.
But Callie hardly saw any of this. Instead, as soon as the Siren had been removed from her field of vision, Callie was able to look beyond the silver wings, into the air beyond. It was there that she saw Emeric, suspended above the mass disorder, looking down at her. When he saw her there, broken and bleeding in a pile underneath a tree, and at the hands of one of his soldiers, he appeared to be stunned.
Callie saw the astonishment in his grey eyes, accompanied by a subtle yearning which she couldn’t quite place. She blinked as the last grains of sand left her with perfect vision once again, in time to see the vulnerability disappear from Emeric’s face. Suddenly, he was shouting in rapid Italian, though he did not seem to be addressing any one person. His face turned from side to side as he barked what sounded like orders.
One by one, the Sirens below him froze, shocked at his sudden viciousness. The war cries continued, though Callie heard the dip in timber as they began to issue solely from the Guardians. With uncanny precision and synchrony, each Siren opened her mouth in silent song. As one began, another followed, until every silver-winged creature on the beach was frozen, listening to the music that only they could hear.
The call. Callie realized that this must be what the Sirens used to communicate with each other, the special song that no one else could pick up on.
The beach stilled then in abrupt, odd peace. Even the Guardians who should have taken advantage of the situation were frozen in awe at the sight. Slowly the Sirens unfolded their wings, their jaws still lowered as they sang invisible notes. In perfectly timed choreography, every Siren lifted into the air on a sudden breath, suspended for a moment in a single, graceful layer of silver. And then, circling at once, they turned and flew away, their wings disappearing into the faint line of the horizon which separated sea and sky.
Emeric was still watching Callie. She blinked up at him in quiet amazement, unhinged by the intensity of his gaze. The moment stretched on as the silence remained present, the only sound that could be heard was the lapping of the waves upon the shore. Callie thought that she saw something in Emeric’s face as he watched her with a strange sort of tenderness: a truce.
And then, before she could draw another breath, he wrenched his eyes away from her and turned, flying into the distant divide.
Chapter Twenty Nine
Home
“IT must have been because they knew they had lost their advantage,” Serena said.
They were sitting in Shay’s living room. The sun had set hours ago, but Callie doubted that anyone in the forest was going to sleep tonight. As it was, Zeke, Serena, Shay, Alex, and she had been up all this time replaying the war.
After the Sirens had left, stock had been taken of who was still alive. The real tragedy came when, after collecting the living, they had needed to name the dead. Sobs broke forth which belonged to family members mourning their common losses, as people who had lived in harmony for centuries were forced to come to grips with a terrible new reality. The grief was overwhelming; and as Callie looked out upon those tear-stained faces on the shore, she knew that this grief would be with them for decades to come. These were a magical people, and she was coming to understand that they loved with a depth particular to the ages. Half-hearted affection was a foreign concept to the citizens of this canopy, a fact which only served to underscore hea
rtbreak which they felt now.
In an ancient ceremony, the corpses of the fallen were collected by those in whom they lived on. Their bodies were brought out to the sea at sunset, and laid to rest in the watery grave. To Callie’s surprise, Guardians hadn’t been the only people remembered. The bodies of the Sirens had been carried out as well, and deposited with equal kindness. These people remembered their fallen friends not for what they had turned into by trick of fate, but for the sisters they had been when they had lived atop the canopy.
One at a time, the white-winged mourners had faded into the background, disappearing into the forest after saying their final goodbyes. And yet, even amidst the tears, the ceremony had been somewhat hopeful. Victory hung like a bittersweet flag, weighing heavily on their hearts but optimistically in their minds. As the sun set on that historic day, it was as though a horrible chapter had come to a close, and a new one was about to begin.
“I don’t know if they had though,” Alex argued. Callie returned her attention to the present.
She was sitting with Alex, his back against the coffee table, as she sat between his legs and leaned against him. His hands were locked over her stomach, securing her to him. Zeke and Serena were across from them on the couch, while Shay sat in a neighboring chair. Zeke’s arm was around Serena, but she didn’t seem to mind.
Shay looked on dully, as though having expected this outcome the entire time. She stood up when her teapot whistled, and vanished into the kitchen.
“They were equal to us in number, and their soldiers had to be just as well trained, if not better so, than our own,” Alex continued. “It is anyone’s guess who could have won had the battle progressed.”
Shay shuffled back into the room with two mugs of tea in her hands. She handed one to Callie before turning to walk towards her chair. Callie watched her as she went; there was the barest trace of a scar around her shoulder, the rest of the evidence of her attack having disappeared completely.
The Guardian (Callista Ryan Series) Page 34