I nodded. “The only one I know with enough of a grudge, connections and power. Especially after what I did to her.”
“So…” Ashe started, looking to me. “What do we do now?”
“We find shelter. The woods are probably best.”
“I doubt that, darling.” Goldie stepped forward and pointed at the woods behind me. I saw Ashe’s eyes illuminate and widen before I turned around myself to see a blaze across the front of the forest.
The entire woods were silently screaming out in pain as it was burned alive.
“What the…” I gasped right before a Salamander leapt from a tree, burning the air as it descended toward me, causing it to make a whistling sound.
I yanked a hatchet into each hand and slipped one into Ashe’s hand before jumping forward and slicing my blade through the flaming creature. It hit the sand cut in two pieces. One half skidded into the water and made sizzling sounds as steam rose.
The other half jumped to life and turned on Goldie, who slipped her sword out and stepped forward before smacking the elemental beast with the flat end of her sword.
The fiery creature hurled through the air and landed in the ocean some distance away. It cried with a sizzle as well.
“That wasn’t so bad.” Goldie mused.
I smiled over my shoulder to her, before directing my attention to the hundreds of fiery elemental beings that stepped out from the burning woods.
“Glad you thought so, since we will need to do that a few hundred more times.”
“She must really hate you.” The thief sighed.
I glanced over to the golden-haired thief and copied her as I mused. “You have no idea.”
Twenty-Four
Sizzling Salamanders
“What do we do?” Goldie screamed at me as salamanders crawled toward us in every direction except the shoreline.
“Get in the water!” I yelled as I turned my back half-way to the elementals. Ashe was already jumping into the shallow waves. I followed after her just as one of the fiery lizards landed at the edge of the tide.
I heard it screech in pain at trying to move in closer, when my head broke the surface of the waves.
My eyes settled on the blazing inferno set with the starry night and the smoke furling in strange angles and designs. It was both a horrifying and stunning sight at the same time. The same could be said for the salamanders surrounding us as they burned different brilliant colors of fire.
All three of us were bobbing in the ocean waves with our weapons drawn.
“Now what?” Goldie roared over the crackle of the fire and crash of the water. “Magic?”
I shook my head. “I need rest, I told you that. I have enough for a few spells but not to handle hundreds of these like I did the Ondine.”
“Then we just need to be selective with the spell, right Gnidori?” Ashe smiled to me like she had an idea.
“You have something in mind?” I grinned back at her.
Goldie groaned. “Save the foreplay for later and focus on the giant flaming beasts.”
Ashe ignored the thief; thankfully, as she asked me, “Think you could manage weapons made of water?”
My grin grew. “I can do one better than that.”
I reached my hand into the water. As I slowly pulled it back out, waves rolled up my hand and gathered around it, swirling and illuminating, as it took the shape of a sword which I then tossed to Goldie. I swiped the water again and pulled out another swirling colored-water sword, which I threw to Ashe.
Once that was finished I slotted a hatchet on my belt and reached into the water to form a massive battle-axe of shifting waves and colors. I tossed it over my shoulder as I turned to glance at the girls. “Get ready, it’s going to feel a little weird.”
“What is?” Goldie asked before she shrieked.
“That.” I laughed while the water around us crept up our skin, giving me the strangest feeling of spiders or ants crawling all over me. It rolled along our clothing and finished finally with just our faces exposed.
“Suits of water.” Ashe giggled, not at all sounding distressed from the odd feeling.
“Exactly.” I beamed while stepping closer to the shore. I didn’t even have to turn back as Ashe stood up right next to me on the shoreline. “Stay at the shore and be careful they can still burn you through the water, or with the water.”
“You really think we can do this?” Ashe asked as she swallowed hard.
“You really think I’d let you burn to death?”
She shook her head and I smiled at her. “Then we can do this.”
I stopped at the sand and yanked my battle axe in a large sweep across roughly five salamanders crowded around. They all hissed and gave off steam like it was blood as they were severed horizontally.
Stepping past those, I dropped my body low before sweeping my axe in a circle around me. Some of the water unleashed from the blade of the axe to produce a wave that pushed the recovering severed elementals into the sea and drenched the ones encroaching toward me.
My eyes briefly shot to Ashe who had blocked and launched away one fiery beast before leaning across and stabbing one of the creatures I drenched. Skewered as it was, she just twisted her foot and tossed it out to the ocean.
A smile shot across my lips, before I noticed some of the fiery lizards were jumping and crawling over each other to get to us. Even with the water around me I was feeling the heat from that many.
I had to thin the numbers and in a large way or they would just swarm over each other until they were a wall of fire trapping us in.
Slashing across one of the flaming beings, I took one step toward the fire decorated forest before dropping some energy into my legs and spinning my axe around me. As the axe came back around my body, I launched forward with one foot, hurdling through and over the salamanders.
When I landed, on a fire salamander no less, I sprung again through the air, slicing across the creatures in my way until I touched down on the edge of the burning woods and turned to face the creatures behind me.
Some of them turned to face me as I prepped my axe. There was a way I could do this, with a duplicating spell.
I pulled my battle axe back then swept it in front of me, releasing and duplicating as much of the water in the axe as I could surrender to produce a wave of aquatic destruction. The water gushed and crashed over the salamanders and washed them toward the sea.
Fizzling and the hissing of steam could be heard everywhere on the shoreline. I couldn’t see much though, since the combination of smoke and heated water made visibility poor. I could still see somewhere around half of them left, most fuming with small puffs of heat like they were pissed they had just been doused with some water.
And me with no water weapon now.
Two of the nearest ones jumped me after they recovered and I punched the first across the sandy field with a water-encrusted fist while the other one took my elbow as I spun to thrust back at it.
I had to get back to the shore. I settled for jumping again but after the first leap into a mob of the beasts I didn’t have the juice left in me to make another super jump.
“Faerie Fudge…” I cried as twenty salamanders hopped at me all in a single, coordinated tackle. I managed to throw an axe through one and punch two or three more before they knocked me down and piled on top of me.
The one directly on my chest bit my shoulder, most likely just trying to bear through the pain of touching my water armor. It ripped its mouth away when it tasted more water, but the burns and heat of all the fiery beings were starting to make me antsy with overheating and pain.
I would feel this later. If I even survive.
My chest heaved against the weight on me while I pulled an axe from my belt and slashed into the side of the one on top of me, then the next one after that. My other hand grabbed another hatchet and helped with ripping away at them. But it was doing no good.
So I settled for one last push, and took all the water gathered ar
ound my body and released it upwards with another duplicating spell. It burst like a geyser, sending salamanders in every direction through the air.
The beasts rained down everywhere as I stood back up, dropped an axe and gripped my shoulder. Most of my body felt burnt but I couldn’t let that get to me, there was still a lot more of these things left.
I lowered my axe and looked around. The area near me had been cleared back by Goldie and Ashe. Both of whom were at my flanks now.
“How many do you think are left?” I groaned and shuffled in pain before jumping to stab one of the fiery beings with my hatchet when it tried to storm Ashe from behind. I sliced its head and kicked it to the shore. Slowly we were moving back to the safety of the sea.
“Twenty or forty or eighty or hundreds? I don’t know. They just keep coming even when I’ve slashed them ten times.” Goldie ranted as she sliced perfectly through four of the fiery bastards with a swipe from each of her swords. I ducked under her and punted two of the salamanders to the water before slashing one more trying to drop on both of us.
I should have been working together from the beginning.
“There’s not many left compared to before.” Ashe grunted as she shouldered her water sword into a stab at one of the salamanders launching at her. It almost looked like she was going to roast it for a meal before she flung it toward the sea.
I sighed and kicked away another just as we reached the sand where the tide ran over our feet. I turned just in time to catch Ashe stepping in front of me and slashing through an elemental to cause its halves to fly past me and fizzle in the water.
She smiled proudly at me before her body shifted and she swished to cut down another beast trying to capture her side. I had thrust forth to her other side just in time to backhand another attacker into the sizzling sea.
My eyebrows raised and I smiled back at her before twirling and tossing my axe into another salamander then dropping to the floor to let one soar over me into the water by itself.
I could see only a few left, crowded around us, and a couple of stragglers that were ripped in pieces in some way. We were managing the fire spirits, somehow.
Goldie’s assault only grew more vicious as she must have noticed the same thing I had.
She stabbed and swiped down at least five more herself, while I tossed two and Ashe sliced through three plus flicked another into the sea.
There were only two left standing between the three of us. They must have known because they both backed away before Goldie shot forward, stabbing one and tossing it. The other ran toward the burnt forest only to take a thrown axe through its back.
The axe didn’t come from me or Ashe though.
Twenty-Five
Power of Passion
My new travel companion had to skewer the last salamander and throw it to the ocean because Goldie and I were both staring at Hue, whom was standing across the sand.
“In case you hadn’t noticed, there are no damsels in distress here, move along mister prince.” I shooed him with my hands.
“No.” He replied coolly, spoiling my playful mood thanks to the high from taking down a horde of fire elementals with three women and three magical water weapons.
“Someone else deal with him. I’m too exhausted to play twenty questions.” I sighed while walking over to collect my hatchets I’d thrown. It wasn’t until I bent down to retrieve the first one that I even noticed most of the sand not near the water had been heated to the point of being glass on the surface. The squeals of steam had been covering the sounds of the crunching glass I now made.
That was how hot it had been…
I checked my shoulder to find gnarled black flesh, yet my cloak was untouched by the heat. That wasn’t a new occurrence; my cloak never seemed to suffer damage like that, despite how bad I might look. Something to do with the magic my Grandmamma used when she made it.
Ashe walked over as I slipped my ugly shoulder away and scooped up the last hatchet I’d thrown. She tried to hand hers to me, but I pushed it away. “Keep it. You need a weapon with you, especially out here. I’ll see about getting you something made from Ettie and Han later.”
She beamed a smile and thanked me before turning away then glancing back shyly. “Um… Gnidori? I know you overheard me the other night…”
“Don’t worry about that. I shouldn’t have done it. I just never normally got to hear your thoughts about me, or us.” I tried to explain before she continued.
Her smile didn’t fade as she turned all the way around and still went on. “I know, I was kind of glad you overheard me. I wanted to say that stuff to you for years. And…”
She stepped closer to me as she went on slowly, “…after that battle; fighting beside you. There’s more I wanted to tell you…”
Ashe stopped in front of me and reached a gentle hand out to touch my cheek. Her hands were somewhere between that coarse yet soft feeling, like she had been a warrior all her life that still kept their hands cleaned regularly. The hatchet in her other hand dropped as she took up the other side of my face and leaned toward me.
I breathed in her scent and it sent a ripple of relaxation along my body as Ashe continued, “I…”
My eyes had settled to watching her lips, with how close they had drawn to me, I just couldn’t resist. My heart thudded in my chest like I had just stopped from running hundreds of miles and sweat seemed to continue to pour from me as I followed after her melodic words.
“…can communicate with animals.” She concluded and caused my breath to hitch in my chest and nearly cough. I might have been expecting her to say something completely different, to do something completely different.
My face must have projected my strange disappointment because it almost seemed to be mirrored in Ashe’s expression as I lifted my hands up and laid them against hers to peel them from my cheeks.
“That’s wonderful… Um… it must mean you are nature-touched.” I replied, forcing a smile through this awkward moment. She looked away; rather sullen for a moment, before turning back with a gentle smile.
Had she wanted me to make a move? Was I even allowed to? A few days from now Ettie would kiss me, well… a few days ago she kissed me. Was it wrong to express my passion in the moment? Ettie had told me countless times before she couldn’t handle a deeper relationship with me.
I tried to just not think about it, focusing on Ashe instead. I wondered, “What led you to tell me that after all this?”
“Well…” She began with a soft roll of her eyes like she was drawing on memories. “Alonso Roberts said I definitely should share my thoughts more, especially with you. And when Goldie caught me talking to Reynard on the ship she found out and I said not to say anything to you ‘cause I wanted to tell you myself.”
Ashe’s face lowered but her eyes looked to me. “She was surprised you didn’t know and basically told me the same thing as Alonso. That fight and the flood on the ship made me realize: Life is short, even for a legendary, so I shouldn’t be keeping things like that in, especially since Goldie said it could be a really helpful skill.”
Her hazel eyes tipped away from my sight as she sucked in her lower lip before finally lifting her head up to add, “And well… I wanted to share secrets like that with the person I… care about the most.”
My whole body went stiff like a Billy goat. I tried to think of anything to say in reply to that, but all that would come to mind was ‘wow’ and that was not the right response I was looking for. There must have been silence between us for a few minutes, as I held her hands and we took shifts looking at each other and then glancing away.
The silence was finally shattered by Goldie’s voice. “Oh darlings! Hue has a camp set up by a river. He guarantees the fire won’t reach it and its all ready for us.”
Even with the intrusion we both stood still and silent. She almost seemed to be waiting for something from me.
Life is short, even for a legendary…
She was right. Again.
&nb
sp; So I finally pulled her by the hands into my body as swiftly as I could muster and leaned up into her lips with mine.
My hands held both of hers between us, before I let go of one to slide my fingers up her body and curl them into the strands of her ashen chocolate hair. I slowly watched the sparkle of her eyes being covered by her eyelid, in the same way as the sun would set almost.
I took a deep breath into the kiss, as my eyes came to close as well. My remaining hand trailing from holding hers to flow along her arm, only gently brushing against her skin as it sailed to a shoulder blade so I could press her more closely against me while my head twisted to the side to taste at her lips in a different angle.
A shiver of energy rolled from me as Ashe found her hands against my waist and neck. Her breath escaped her in a soft giggle, before I pulled at one of her lips and finally broke from her. I could feel her shudder as her eyes peeled open and she gasped softly, “Wow…”
I let out a heavy breath with all the darting energy that gathered in me from the uplifting sensations of her touch, then opened my eyes to catch her sweet dimples once more when I replied, “That would have been my response three minutes ago.”
“I’m glad you waited then.” She blushed.
My face heated up with her. “Me too.”
Even if it was a complete act of passion, which I’m not saying it totally was. I couldn’t take the kiss back any more than Ettie could with hers. I wasn’t even sure I wanted to anyway.
Nothing had really changed as we made our way to the camp, other than Ashe occasionally holding my hand when Goldie wasn’t berating her about it. She also stood and walked around my sides or in front of me rather than behind. It was like the fight and kiss made her realize she had permission to do that now, even though she never needed permission in the first place.
It wasn’t until we reached the small encampment, with a stream rushing nearby, and got around to sleeping that I realized the extent of what I had done with that kiss. Despite having separate sleeping bags, somehow in the middle of the night Ashe got the courage to slip into mine. I hadn’t even noticed until I woke in the morning with her body pressed into mine and her arms casually wrapped around me.
The Real Folktale Blues (Beyond Ever After #1) Page 22