Frigid hells. Elei reached back, traced the marks with his fingertips. Slightly raised, they spilled from the line around his neck down his spine. “You said you don’t know this parasite.”
Hera shook her head. “Whatever it is, it’s powerful. Yet, cronion and telmion are the strongest parasites we know of.”
“Except Regina,” Maera said.
“Except Regina,” Hera agreed and fell silent.
Elei shifted his weight. Sweat trickled down his face. What if…
“Think about it, Hera!” Kalaes’ breath was coming in short gasps and he gestured toward Elei. “Think of Regina’s constant mutating. Only a parasite could ever beat it, a parasite developing and changing at the same pace, matching Regina change for change.”
Exactly.
“I have studied this,” Hera said firmly. “There is no such parasite, nothing as powerful as Regina, not even telmion.”
“But Regina’s a strain of telmion. You said so yourself, fe. Telmion is controlled by cronion. This new parasite sent the telmion in Elei’s body into a total remission in a matter of days.”
So Pelia had discovered a parasite that could mark the end of the Gultur. Holy shit.
“Just think about it.” Kalaes voice rose with excitement. “A stronger form of cronion. It’s been maturing. It replaced cronion, took its place. That done, it went on to attack telmion and suppressed it, maybe ate it up. I wonder if—”
“You’re just guessing things,” Maera said. “We know nothing.”
Kalaes shrugged, frowning.
Elei’s back burned, the fire was spreading to his legs. He was so damn thirsty. Waterwaterwater.
“What will you do now, Elei?” Hera whispered.
Running away, that had been the only thought. Escaping, surviving. And now they were talking about… what, exactly? “What do you expect me to do?”
Hera turned to him, face somber. “Stop Regina.”
“But you can’t live without it,” he pointed out. “You said it’d kill you.”
Kill the entire Gultur race? Gods, what an idea.
“I do not think this parasite will kill Regina, or me,” Hera whispered.
Pelia had been happy that day. So happy. She must have found the solution. And yet… “The parasite seems to have killed telmion off.”
Hera nodded. “Perhaps. We do not know this for sure. But, in any case, Regina is much stronger than telmion. Regina will fight back, and maybe, hopefully, there will be a balance, like you had between cronion and telmion. You’re carrying Rex, the King. The stuff of old tales.”
The king. Pelia had been talking about it right before she died. A tale for children, or so he’d thought.
Kalaes raised a brow. “King?”
“It is a story we are taught at school. About the opponent of the golden queen,” Hera whispered. “I never thought… Like cronion controls telmion, Rex can control Regina. Rex, the strong one, who was locked away and kept in darkness in the box of dreams.”
Elei shivered. The tale spoke of a temple where the king was kept dormant, lying underneath a knife, in a sealed box. Preserved for eternity until someone sought him out again. Then, once aroused, the king had to merge with a living body.
My body. Elei wiped his palms on his thighs and swallowed hard.
So the priests had kept the parasite dormant for centuries and forgot its power, its function, its possibilities, until Pelia had made sense of the tales and gone to visit the temple. She’d found Rex and stolen it, revived it and given it to Elei.
Joy.
Pelia had injected him with Rex and had either explained and he’d been too out of it to understand, or she’d hoped the parasite would make sure he did what he had to do.
Had she thought of what Rex would do to him? Or had she simply placed the fate of the islands above him? One down to save the many?
He wondered if he could ever hate her for that.
“How long does it take the parasite to incubate?” Hera’s long fingers curled into fists. “Did Pelia tell you?”
Pelia’s voice whispered in Elei’s memory. “Ten days,” he said, surprised that he remembered. “That’s what she said. Ten days for the king to rise.” She’d laughed at his perplexity and told him it all really made sense.
Well, it did now.
“So the tale runs true,” Hera said in a hushed voice. “The King will emerge to claim what is his.”
“What does that mean?” Elei mumbled. “Claim who?”
“His bride,” Hera said. “The queen.”
Regina.
Ten days. How many had passed already? ‘My king.’ Poena’s face came to his mind. ‘I represent the king in you.’
He didn’t know if he should laugh or cry. “And now?”
“That’s all. We know no more.” Hera glanced at Elei and a light played in her gaze. Maybe fear. Maybe hope. “You’re the King now. What will you do?”
Chapter 23
Rex. The King.
Hera’s pulse raced. Now she saw how it all fit together — the way Regina reacted in Elei’s presence, twisting in her gut; the way telmion flared, then lost the fight.
Was that really what Pelia had been trying to find? A super parasite? Impossible. Yet what if it was true?
It had to be. All the signs told her so. Sudden fear gripped her. What if Rex did not just weaken Regina? What if it suppressed Regina, devoured the parasite, killed the Gultur? No matter how much she wanted them to fall and change, she had not wished for their death.
The fear turned into jagged crystals of ice digging into her insides. She was of the Echo line, pure Gultur. She had not told the others how Pelia’s drugs had affected her — the pain, the vomiting, the strange visions.
Maybe that was where it had all started, her dreams of the islands rising, her obsession with the beginning of the world. Maybe it had affected her mind.
What would it be like to be overcome by Rex, to be conquered and possessed?
She shuddered and wondered how Elei would change as the parasite matured in him. Maybe he’d already been changing, in stages, and she had not noticed.
Soon they might all notice. Soon everything might change.
For better or for worse.
* * *
Elei stayed up while the others went back to their beds. It was after all still the middle of the night. Slumped over the table, his heavy head resting on his folded arms, he wondered what to do.
‘You are the King now.’ Poena’s voice teased him. ‘The king is awake.’
Pissing hells.
Save the world from the Gultur. Shit, yeah. “How?” His head pounded. “Break into the Sacred Citadel, the Bone Tower? Spill my blood into the water? That’s insane.”
‘So you’ll just sit back and let the world crumble when you could fix this?’ he thought he heard Poena say, and her small, frowning face flashed before his eyes. ‘Show some backbone!’
Backbone. Right.
He rubbed his eyes, pinched his nose. He stretched, wincing as muscles pulled, bones creaked and skin burned like fire. He passed a hand over this neck, felt the tiny marks there and swallowed past a permanently parched throat.
A parasite to save the world. What if it wasn’t true? What if they were all wrong? Blood in the water. Could he do it? Could he make it to the fountain, drip some of his blood and escape alive?
He realized he hoped for the parasite to take him over, to force him to do what had to be done. But it didn’t work that way, did it? He was on his own in this. As in everything.
Pelia had died for this cure. ‘Good luck,’ she’d said — had she known what he had to do? If she loved him as a mother, would she send him to open his veins in the Gultur fountain? Did she think the world was more important than him?
Was it?
Pale light seeped through the window, outlining the others’ slumbering forms on the beds. Kalaes, Maera, Hera. They deserved a better life. What if he could give it to them?
Besides,
what did he have to go back to? Albi and Pelia were dead and gone.
A deafening buzz broke through his thoughts. It rose to a high-pitched whine and he clutched at his head. From the corner of his eye, he saw lights moving.
Shit.
He pushed back the chair and distantly heard it crash to the floor. The lights danced in the distance, flying in a diamond formation.
“The Fleet!” He stood in a daze. How had they found them again? Had the Gultur at the checkpoint recognized him after all?
It made no sense. Why would they have waited so long to come and get them?
“Elei?” rasped Kalaes’ sleepy voice.
“We’re out of here, now! The damn Fleet’s here!” Elei raced to the door and threw it open into the dim corridor.
“Elei, have you lost it?” Maera groaned. “It’s still night time! What are you talking about?”
“Get up.” Hera tsked. “You know he can see in the dark. Come on. Hurry.”
Kalaes drew his legs to the side. “What’s happening, fe?”
The buzzing shrilled. Elei gritted his teeth. “Hurry up! They’re almost here.”
He stumbled down the narrow stairs, the others at his back, and startled an old man dozing at the reception desk. They spilled out into the street and clambered into the aircar, cursing. Elei took the driver’s seat, while Hera climbed next to him and the others into the back, not talking, huddling together for warmth.
Elei’s hands shook so much that the act of fitting the key in the ignition came close to defeating him. His head pounded. He thought for a moment to ask Hera to drive, or even Kalaes, but then thought better of it and forced himself to function. He couldn’t trust anyone. Someone among them had betrayed them again — and it wasn’t Kalaes.
The aircar rose from the ground with a hum that vibrated through the nepheline seats. Elei checked the systems, while his vision lit up the inside of the aircar in a pale blue glow. He set the accelerator and they took off down the dirty, empty avenue. The gloam was chilly and gray. Mist rose from the soil in low clouds. The Fleet darkened the horizon. How to lose them?
He turned into side streets, trying to gauge their width so that the aircar wouldn’t become stuck between the buildings.
“They’re coming!” Hera’s long hair hung in loose waves, softening her grim expression. “They cannot follow you in the narrow streets.”
“But they can level the town,” he said through gritted teeth.
“They’ll bomb us down!” Maera shouted.
“There is nowhere else to hide around here. Go to the northern side, there are many tall buildings.” Hera didn’t even look back, but her voice held a warning tone. “Elei…”
“Got it.”
He cocked the balance lever, steadying the vehicle, and took them through deserted suburbs with their overgrown gardens, then, checking the vehicle compass, headed north. Missiles zipped by, rocking them. Ahead, a tall building exploded into fire and a rain of mortar and metal.
“Shit.” He maneuvered the aircar behind a two-story building and then onto a main avenue. “Hold on.”
A multiple-story storehouse exploded on their right and the impact sent the vehicle skidding. Elei pulled the brake, slowing, but the aircar crashed sideways into a squat administrative building. Elei’s head slammed into the side window and for a moment he blacked out.
The world swam back into focus. Keeping his groan behind gritted teeth, he straightened and turned around. “Is everyone okay?”
They all looked dazed but nobody seemed hurt. Heart pounding, he forced himself to focus. He checked the systems one by one, fingers flying on the control panel. Apart from damage reported on one of the dakron slots, everything was okay. He slumped in relief and took the aircar off the ground once more. If he led the Fleet on a mad chase through the town and came out on the western side, they’d hopefully lose them and then he’d drive west, to the mountains.
Another explosion rocked them. Jaw clenched, he turned into a side street, wobbling crazily as he fought to equalize the protesting car systems.
“This way!” Hera pointed left, and he swerved into a huge refueling station, roofed and walled.
“Are you mad?” Elei’s jaw ached from the tension as he drove into the dimness of the high-ceilinged building. “If a missile hits the fuel, we’re history.” The explosion would be spectacular. What a way to go.
“Now right,” she said, calm and imperturbable. That moment he envied her composure. “Hurry or your fears may come true.”
Damn her. Maybe she wasn’t human after all.
They shot through a maze of alleys and claustrophobic twisting roads. One turn was too narrow, and the aircar screeched against the station wall as they veered into a dark multi-level parking lot. “How’s this so much better?”
“Down, go down!” Maera yelled from the back seat. “If a missile hits this, the whole thing may fall on our heads.”
The walls glimmered white, pulsing with a pale glow, and an arrow pointed to the left. He slowed as he took the turns, and they spiraled down.
A detonation shook them, rattling Elei’s teeth and bones. The ground trembled, and the aircar swayed and careened into the wall. Jerking on the steering lever, he brought it back to the passage as a light ahead announced the exit. He drove on, grim, gaze fixed ahead.
That had been the refuel station. They’d barely made it out alive.
They shot out of the parking lot, in the last minute avoiding a frontal collision with another vehicle. Heart in his throat, Elei twisted the lever and they spun about.
“Elei, take right!” Kalaes hollered.
At least the chase had managed to snap the man out of the daze he’d been in.
Elei managed to steady the aircar, drove around the other vehicle with the driver shouting obscenities at them, and zoomed down the narrow road. A deep hum entered his audio sphere and then the high pitched whine was back. “Incoming.”
Maera grabbed his shoulder from behind. “What are you saying—”
He swerved and dipped into an alley. Blinding light erupted behind them, followed by a deafening boom, and debris clattered on the roof of the aircar.
“Pissing hells,” Kalaes muttered.
The hum of planes rose closer, sending pulses of pain through Elei’s head. “They’re sending drones now.” He spotted an old garage on one side and turned the aircar into the dark opening.
“We’ll be trapped!” Kalaes said. “Dammit, Elei!”
“Wait.” Elei didn’t power down the vehicle. Rectangular drone crafts zipped past outside the garage, line after line of flashing lights, while the Fleet darkened the sky above. Elei checked the compass. Hands tight on the controls, he waited until the last drone zoomed past, then he backed the aircar out onto the street. He hit on the lights and fell in line with the last drone, following it.
“What in Sobek’s name are you doing?” Hera whispered, breathless. “They’ll see us—”
“Blending in.” The aircar was slightly bigger than the drones — but drones were basic tech. There was the possibility they wouldn’t notice.
“Gods,” Maera muttered, grabbing the back of Elei’s seat.
They zoomed through alley after alley, at the tail of the drone row. “They’re heading south. We need to break off.”
“Where to?” Kalaes asked.
“West,” was all Elei said as he veered off and dove back into the maze of alleys and streets.
Nobody spoke as he wove through dead-end streets and narrow lanes, everyone’s gaze up to the sky, checking if the Fleet had spotted them. The houses started to thin out and they shot out of the town onto the connecting road, among algae fields.
In the distance, the Bone Tower soared against the gray sky. The mountains around it rose steeply from the plain, pale pinnacles like the buildings of an oversized city. They reminded him of Ost, of the Spire Mountains that lay beyond the trashlands and the marshes.
The rearview mirror didn’t show him
any pursuers. Pressing down on the accelerator, Elei drove away from Tisis.
As adrenaline faded and the pounding in his head eased, the scalding need for water returned full force. Waves of fiery pain rippled down his legs. He thought he heard water rushing and looked down, expecting to see it lapping at his knees. He licked lips dry as paper, tried to swallow past a closed throat.
Waterwaterwater. He had to submerge himself in it, fall into it, let it close over his head. The skin on his face burned against his cheekbones and his jaw, around his eyes and mouth.
Ponds. Algae ponds had to line the interplain road, the one leading to the sacred heart of Dakru, to the Bone Tower. Most of them were brine, but some may be brackish. He didn’t mind brackish. Not at this point.
“Not bad, Elei.” Hera was studying her hands as if she’d never seen them before. “Not bad at all.”
A weight fell on his shoulder. “Good job, fe.” Kalaes pulled his hand back. “Relax, Mae. I’m not trying anything.”
“Just being careful,” she ground out.
And things were back to their delightful normalcy.
He drove. Where to? Which town? He didn’t ask. He didn’t care.
Water.
Always checking for anyone tailing them, he skirted towns and farms, but saw no pond or even a salt lake. No water. The headache threatened to blind him, pounding hammers behind his eyes. Nothing. No shimmer of a fountain or brook.
Ahead, the glimmering waters of Bone Tower called to him, and the great source waited.
His hands finally stopped shaking. Of course. He was only delaying the inevitable, when he’d already made his decision. He had to hurry, before the Fleet discovered them again. He set the course in the direction of the Bone Tower, the sacred citadel of the Gultur.
The others were so out of it that it took them some time to figure it out.
Maera was the first to speak. “Elei, where do you think you’re going? You can’t go into the Citadel!”
Kalaes and Hera stirred.
“Turn around.” Hera grabbed his arm. “Sobek’s piss, turn right now! Have you gone mad?”
He didn’t answer and didn’t swerve. The Fleet thundered over them, making another pass, heading back toward Tisis, rows of seleukids flying low in streaks of blinding light. Elei wished they would crash and disappear like smoke. He wished Poena was there, making it all a dream. But no fountain splashed, no girlish voice spoke in his ear. He flew grimly on, toward the ghostly agaric forest and the citadel of Bone Tower.
Rex Rising (Elei's Chronicles) Page 21