Mortiswood: Kaelia Falling (Mortiswood Tales Book 2)

by Gina Dickerson

  ‘Kaelia!’ Calix’s terrified voice rang out. ‘That’s not your Vallesm!’

  ‘I know that!’ Kaelia hissed.

  She slowly edged backwards on the floor, using her elbows to pull herself. Saliva drooled from the amber Vallesm’s pointed teeth and splattered on the cold, hard marble. Its claws tip-tapped with each paw-step it took. The thudding of Kaelia’s heart filled her ears. Her muscles stiffened in anticipation of attack. With a howl, the amber Vallesm pounced. Kaelia screamed, fell backwards, and whacked her head. Pain seared a skull cap around Kaelia’s head; she held her breath and summoned her light.

  With blue-white light swirling in readiness around her hands, she realised the amber Vallesm had sailed clean over her head and shot through the open doors of the castle. A ferocious torrent of howling streamed in from the outside.

  ‘It’s not evil!’ she shouted to Calix.

  Calix, grabbing his bag from where he had hung it on the back of his chair, nodded. ‘I gathered that...but there must be something—or someone—outside who is!’

  Pushing against the marble floor, Kaelia jumped to her feet. ‘I’ll go and see, the wolf may need my help.’ Passing Calix, she charged to the door, leaving him trailing in her wake. Adrenalin surged through her veins, the tips of her hair crackled into flames, and her blue-white light roared from her palms.

  The amber Vallesm stood outside the doors, its fur billowing as it howled at two distant figures approaching the castle gates from outside. Kaelia froze; her mouth cotton-wool dry. The potential intruders paced the front of the gates, crisscrossing each other’s steps. Kaelia felt the colour drain from her face. She swayed, lightheaded, and blinked hard several times to make sure her mind was really processing what was happening.

  Calix finally reached Kaelia’s side. Slightly out of breath, he asked, ‘What the hell is Bran doing with Thom? More importantly, why are they here? See, I told you The Dark One wasn’t to be trusted. He’s obviously chosen to side with The Salloki.’

  ‘Obviously.’ Kaelia’s voice was hollow. She remembered Bran’s face, twisted in torment as he sealed the fiery doorway from Hel’s realm to this world. ‘So much for sacrificing himself so I could escape Hel’s realm. You’re right, Calix, it was all another lie.’

  ‘They’re here for you.’ Calix trembled. ‘Shit, I have nothing to fight them with!’

  Kaelia splayed her hands out, causing her blue-white light to form pulsating balls, and stepped in front of Calix. ‘You can’t fight them, go inside.’

  ‘I’m not some kind of girl!’

  Kaelia laughed dryly. ‘No, I am. Stay behind me so I don’t have to worry about you being killed. If they get through those gates, I’m taking them down.’

  Calix made an exasperated noise. ‘I can’t just stand here and let them hurt you.’

  ‘Well, you’ll have to.’ Kaelia kept her focus on the Draugr and Necromancer. ‘Unless you have some spell in that book of yours which will stop them from coming in here?’

  ‘I reckon this castle already has a protection spell surrounding it,’ Calix replied. ‘And that’s why you were able to open the gates and I couldn’t.’

  ‘That’s what you want to think!’

  ‘Well, if there is a protection spell I hope it holds up against those two.’

  * * *

  Chapter Five

  Dark clouds swirled in the sky above the castle, casting its turrets into shadows and a chilling wind descended, whipping Kaelia’s smouldering hair up. She had felt this kind of supernatural wind before. On the day Bay had been swept over the sheer cliff, and just before the car had killed her father all of those years ago in Northdown Park. This truly confirmed one of the two had been there when Bay had been swept away.

  She knew it had been Thom who had controlled the car that had mown her father down. It must be he who had sent the wind that had carried Bay over the cliff and sent him plummeting to the savage rocks below. When she had been trapped in the Draugr’s realm he had admitted he was behind the car accident but she had been unable to hurt him there, her powers non-existent in the Draugr’s realm. Kaelia’s hands burned with intensity, matching her rising emotions. Thom had taken both her father and her love, Bay, from her. There was no way she would allow him to take anything, or anyone, else.

  ‘They’ve come looking for a fight,’ she said, a slight tremble to her voice. ‘So it’s a fight I will give them. Not everyone will walk away from here.’

  Calix stuffed his hands in his pockets, took them out again and balled them into fists. ‘Where’s your Vallesm?’

  ‘I don’t know!’ Kaelia snapped more sharply than she’d intended. ‘I guess this one will have to do.’ She stepped next to the snarling, amber furred Vallesm.

  ‘But its coat is red not grey...it’s a loner! Have you forgotten what we read about a red furred Vallesm? A red coat means the wolf is unpledged,’ Calix cried. ‘It could turn on you and me as well as them!’

  Kaelia glanced at the beast beside her. Its muzzle reached to her shoulder, with one bite it could behead her. ‘It won’t,’ she said more bravely than she felt. ‘It’s Vallesm. They’re not evil. We don’t know if all that crap about the colour of a Vallesm’s coat is true or not.’

  ‘Yours isn’t evil. Maybe yours is unique!’

  Kaelia shook her head, her flaming hair fanning out so the lit ends smoked. ‘No, they’re misunderstood and right now I’ll take any help I can get.’ Crackles of lightning forked from the balls of light surging from Kaelia’s hands. ‘I have to fight. If I can’t fight this pair then who can?’

  The tone of her words belied the fluttering butterfly feeling inside her stomach. Her bottom lip trembled and the light power around her hands, flickered. Kaelia bit down on her lip, clamping it between her teeth to stop the tremble, and the light returned to strength.

  Calix raced back inside the hall. Moments later, he re-emerged brandishing a broken leg from one of the wooden dining chairs. He charged back outside and to Kaelia’s side, red in the face and out of breath.

  She half-smiled. ‘I told you to stay behind me.’

  Calix clutched the broken chair leg tightly. ‘My place is beside you, Kaelia, it always will be.’

  They both shrank back a little, bracing as the Draugr jumped over the gates and picked up speed, tearing through the neatly tended flower beds. Bran blasted the gates with his violet light, smashing them into smithereens, and sped through, striding fast to catch up with Thom. Besides Kaelia, the new Vallesm lowered its head, ready to pounce. Kaelia could feel Calix’s fear and taste her own.

  ‘Thom,’ she said. ‘We take him out first. He’ll be the hardest.’

  Calix nodded mutely.

  Kaelia linked her thumbs together and sent a rapid succession of blue-white twisted light bolts at the rapidly advancing Draugr. His mocking laughter rang loud. He swatted the bolts away as if they were mere flies.

  ‘Keep trying!’ Calix ordered. ‘He’s not stronger than you!’

  Kaelia fired more bolts, her palms burning. ‘No, he’s not supposed to be but it feels like he is,’ she panted. ‘Plus, he’s ten million times more experienced than I am!’

  Thom and Bran were a blur of dark shapes as they flew up the slope. The ground underfoot convulsed, sending rippling waves down the hillside in an attempt to dislodge the intruders. The fruit trees swayed, spitting out their wares towards Thom and Bran, who in turn easily batted them away, showering themselves with a mix of pulp. Bran fired at the tree nearest him, his violet light consuming it. The tree twisted, its boughs waving in torture, and emitted an eerie, pained, cry. Birds swooped at Thom and Bran, the beat of their wings frenzied, their calls agitated.

  A foul, rotten smoke spread its fingers over the beautiful scent of the castle, clawing its way roughshod until the flowers turned in on themselves and withered, hanging limp over leaves already browning from the death stench smoke Thom was sending out.

  Delicate, multi-coloured butterflies formed a united c
loud so tightly synchronised it was impossible to tell one insect from another. The rabble swarmed the Draugr, whirling around and around, although the air generated from the beat of their wings did little to cut through his odour.

  ‘Enough!’ Thom bellowed. ‘These punitive enchantments will not hinder us!’

  His words scattered the butterflies, tearing their fragile wings from their bodies. The paper-thin shards fell amid a rain of rainbow coloured carcasses, settling atop the dying flowers. The hill gave one, last thrust in a final attempt to dislodge the Draugr and Necromancer, and then was still. Blood rushed through Kaelia’s head, filling her ears with a sound similar to waves crashing against seashore. Beside her the Vallesm growled, and Calix bashed the broken chair leg against the ground, testing it the way he would a cricket bat.

  Kaelia tensed. Bran and Thom nodded at each other then, with a united roar, jumped high into the air and landed several feet away from Kaelia, Calix, and the snarling Vallesm. Calix’s face paled. He wiped first one hand then the other on his jeans, and grasped the chair leg in both hands.

  Kaelia, sensing Calix’s fear, winked reassuringly at him. ‘I’ll look after you. It’ll be okay.’

  Calix laughed. ‘That may well be the overstatement of the year.’ The broken chair leg slipped from his sweaty grasp and rolled gently down the slope.

  ‘Well, well.’ Thom chuckled and bent to retrieve the piece of wood. He tossed it from one hand to the other before breaking the wood in half with such ease it may have well been a toothpick. ‘An old Vallesm and a physician who has lost his stick. Not much of a match for us, are they, Bran?’

  Bran’s heavy eyebrows rose. ‘Where’s your pet?’ he called to Kaelia.

  Kaelia looked at the Vallesm beside her; she hadn’t noticed it was older than her wolf. She didn’t answer, not wanting to give Bran or Thom more ammunition than was necessary. ‘You managed to leave Hel’s realm, then?’ she asked Bran instead. ‘What a believable performance you put on. I really thought you were saving me when all you were doing, clearly, is what you’ve always done. You obviously were able to escape any time you wished.’

  Bran withdrew his lighter from his jeans pocket and tapped it. ‘Trusty little item, this.’

  Thom snatched it from him. ‘That’s mine. I left it in Hel’s bedroom many, many, centuries ago!’

  Bran swiped it back. ‘Now it’s mine. Who do you think gave it to me? I heard it wasn’t yours in the first place.’

  Thom picked his teeth. ‘Keep it. I do not need such trifles.’ He sneered down at Bran from his vantage height. ‘I can pass through the realms as I please. Weaker beings, meaning you, have such need for magical assistance.’

  ‘I think you are forgetting who I am.’ A muscle rippled in Bran’s jaw.

  Thom prodded the rough scar splicing Bran’s left eye. ‘It is you who is forgetting, Necromancer. Does the scar I gave you not serve as a reminder as to who I am? Leader of The Salloki, I am THE Draugr. The scar should remind you every day of my power. It should also remind you that you and I are cut from the same cloth. We both desire power and control. Now, bring me the girl and we will be on our way to achieving such power.’ He clicked his long, sharp nailed, fingers together.

  Bran clenched his fists. ‘Don’t tell me what to do!’

  Thom’s hand was around Bran’s neck in an instant. He lowered his pointed face to Bran’s. ‘You will do as I order!’

  Bran’s head shook from the force of the Draugr’s breath. Deliberately, he picked the long fingers from his flesh. ‘Do not push me, Draugr. I can kill you. You are lucky I am being tolerant with you.’

  Thom cackled and threw his hands in the air. Clouds swirled furiously above his head, darkening the skies further. Jagged lightning blazed from the sky, stabbing the ground around them all and making it smoulder.

  Kaelia fired bolts of light at Thom. He laughed, swatting the bolts with a single hand. The amber Vallesm howled and pounced, sailing easily across the distance between it and Thom. Thom darted to one side but the wolf’s teeth caught his left arm, ripping material and pale-blue flesh. Thom screeched with pain and struck out at the wolf, sending it flying. The creature hit the ground in a crumpled mass of fur but jumped straight back onto its paws and charged again.

  Thom advanced towards Kaelia, who in turn fired her light in bolts at him. Bran fired at the amber Vallesm a mere second before it pounced on Thom’s back. The creature fell once more, rolling over in the dirt to extinguish the violet fire caught on its guard-hairs.

  Calix lunged for the broken chair leg, grasping the now stumpy length in his hands; he lowered his head and charged at Bran. Bran, firing at the snarling Vallesm was caught off guard as Calix’s head connected with his side, he stumbled over and Calix jumped on him, striking him with the stump of wood.

  Bran caught the wood and tore it from Calix’s hands. With ease, he pushed Calix from him and sprung back onto his feet. ‘How sweet,’ he teased. ‘The physician fighting to save his friend, The Chosen One. Do you want to die today, Human?’

  Calix squared his chin and raised his fists. ‘Fight me without using your power and then we’ll see who wins...or are you too scared you’ll lose, oh strong and powerful, Dark One?’

  Bran’s lip lifted in amusement. Raising his own fists he gestured for Calix to fight. ‘Very well, show me what you haven’t got.’

  Calix sent out the first punch, which Bran easily ducked.

  ‘You’ll have to do better than that!’ Bran snorted. Superhumanly fast his fist caught Calix’s jaw, splitting his lip.

  Calix spat out a mouthful of blood and, with a roar, charged once more. Bran danced around Calix, laughing, and Calix’s face reddened.

  Kaelia sent out a stronger ball of light, this time catching Thom clean in the face. He howled, clawing at his skin to kill the fire. At the same time, the amber Vallesm pounced on the Draugr’s back. Kaelia suddenly became aware of a figure approaching from her left and spun around, ready to take aim. Her light faltered, flickered, and fizzled out. Time stopped, even the race of her breath slowed into silence. The sounds around her: cries of Calix as Bran lifted him off his feet and tossed him aside like a ragdoll, the howls of the other Vallesm, Thom’s screeching, and Bran’s laughter, all muted.

  The figure was tall, not superhumanly tall, just normal human-sized tall, and the brown eyes were achingly familiar. Soft, chocolate-toffee hair moved with each step the person took. Strong arms hung at the figure’s sides. The greeting of a lopsided smile jumpstarted Kaelia’s awareness and all of the sounds whooshed back.

  ‘Bay?’ Kaelia fell to her knees, weakened by emotion. ‘But...but...you’re dead. Are you a ghost, have you come back to help us?’

  Trainer clad feet stopped by her knees and a hand extended. Kaelia reached out, afraid to touch it. Her fingertips grazed the other person’s before her hand was grasped by the warm, solid hand.

  ‘I’m not a ghost. Get up, Kaelia,’ Bay said. ‘Calix and my father need you. We can talk later.’

  Kaelia allowed Bay to help her to her feet. ‘Your father?’

  ‘The Vallesm currently attacking the Draugr.’

  ‘But I have a Vallesm, too.’ Kaelia’s eyes filled with tears. ‘He’s disappeared and I don’t where he is!’

  ‘I’m right here.’ Bay hooked a finger under Kaelia’s chin and tilted her face up, gently scooping up her lips with his. ‘When you said you loved me, even though I was a Vallesm, you freed me. Those simple words broke my curse.’

  Kaelia gazed into Bay’s eyes. Eyes which made her heart flip and ones she had thought she would never see anywhere else other than in her dreams. Brown eyes which were now flecked with amber. Her hands butterflied to Bay’s face. Tentatively, she touched his cheeks. ‘Freed you? It was you. You were in my dreams and by my side as a wolf,’ she whispered. ‘You never left...you’ve been with me all of this time and I didn’t even know.’

  Bay squeezed Kaelia’s hands; lifting them to his lips he kissed her fi
ngertips. ‘I would never leave you, Kaelia, not willingly. I love you too much. I will explain, I promise.’

  Kaelia watched in disbelief as the young man she had thought was lost to her forever, shook into a blur of clothes and then fur, transforming before her very eyes into a Vallesm. A large, grey and white furred wolf with luminous amber flecked eyes. Her Vallesm. Her Bay. Two and the same. A mix of pride and worry enveloped her as Bay the Vallesm joined his Vallesm father in attacking the Draugr.

  ‘What a touching scene.’ Bran’s breath was warm on the back of Kaelia’s neck, making her jump.

  Annoyed she hadn’t sensed Bran’s approach, Kaelia reached into her waistband and withdrew The Thorn of Isandr given to her by Harriet Barton from the academy. Turning to face Bran, her hand shook, wobbling the blade. ‘Step any closer and I’ll kill you.’

  Bran raked a hand through his thick, dark hair. ‘It’ll be easier for you if you co-operate.’ He glanced in the direction of Thom who was, laughingly, fighting with the Vallesm. ‘The Draugr will not lose you a second time.’

  ‘You’re such a turncoat!’ Kaelia hissed, the blade wavering. ‘When we were in Hel’s realm I could have killed you for your treachery then you saved me and I—’ She bit her lip to stop from saying the words.

  Bran chuckled. ‘You forgave me.’

  ‘I didn’t say that!’

  Bran’s tone was cocky. ‘But you were going to.’

  Kaelia tightened her hold on The Thorn of Isandr, raising the knife higher until it was level with Bran’s chest. ‘I’ll never forgive you again. You’re part of The Salloki now. You’re my enemy.’