“Is there anything we can do to help?” he said just to have something to say, something to do, anything to clear his head of piercing green eyes and cherry blossoms.
“Back wall needs rebuilding,” Henry said around a mouthful of mushy oats.
Perfect. It’d give them a chance to really see how fortified this place was.
~~~
Between the three of them and Henry, with two others watching guard, they were able to take down the weak section of the cinder block wall, a five foot wide section of the back wall of the motel’s old employees area near the dumpsters, and rebuild it with fresh cement. The cinder blocks were thick enough to keep Sifts out who weren’t rifting their way inside.
Most likely the only thing that would hold them off should the humans holding out in the motel be discovered, was the very real uncertainty of rifting into a solid wall after leaping into a hole the monsters had never been to before. At least that’s how it worked for sorcerers. Safer to jump into places you’d previously been.
Not being a Sift, Alexander assumed it worked the same for the beasts. The monsters certainly had enough intelligence to reason that out unless their desperation for food forced them into a kamikaze leap.
Starvation could make a monster mighty desperate.
Once he had the anti-rift serum dispatched on a wide scale, walls like this could hold the beasts off indefinitely, and with enough aerosol at their disposal, hold out groups such as this could spray any beasts that approached and then simply shoot them at will once the ability to make holes in the world was gone.
Alexander’s trowel slowed on the cement he was smoothing, his mind going over possible solutions to increase the potency of the spray. He needed to get back to his lab.
If Sheppard wasn’t convinced to go with them, he’d do what he could for them, leave them the two anti-rift canisters they had left and return with more later. That would give them a fighting chance to survive here.
His father’s voice filtered through his thoughts. Ye cannot save those who refuse aid. Do what ye can, lad, but return to us safe.
He hefted the final cinder block up to scrape it into place when he caught movement out of the corner of his eye.
Jewel? He moved closer to the hole for a better look. What was she doing out of the safety of the motel? And by herself?
He scanned the area, as much as he could see, for any of the monsters. She went directly to a low retaining wall at the edge of the parking lot, looked around and up toward the roofline to see if any of the guards up there might be watching. Sneaky little thing was up to something she didn’t want any of her own people to know about. She walked straight to the edge of the lot which backed up to a wooded gully.
Alexander looked at the men with him. Only Dez seemed to notice he had stopped with his hand on the cinder block. Shifting, Dez angled his head slightly to get a view of what Alexander was looking at. His brows rose at spotting Jewel out there and then he went back to smoothing the cement on his part of the wall.
Alexander looked back out. Seemingly satisfied, Jewel took a slip of cardboard from her pocket and stuck it deep within a crack in the cement curb, before darting back toward the front of the motel.
Now what was that about?
Not wanting to give her away to her own people, Alexander pushed the cinder block in place and began smoothing the wet cement.
~~~
They gathered for supper in the lobby, everyone but the men and women guarding the perimeters and keeping watch from the roof.
At dusk, everyone lingered, lighting a few candles and lamps, while Tapper, the wiry geezer who had first patted Ethan down, told riveting tales of his life as a marauder before joining Sheppard.
Staying at the edge of the group near the kitchen, Alexander crossed his arms over his chest. He never would have taken the easy-going fellow as the marauder type, then again, in this time, people did what they had to in order to survive. And he was certain Tapper had done plenty, and more certain he was leaving out the more horrific details for the sake of the children.
“What about you, strangers?” Tapper forced everyone’s attention onto them. “How did you fellas meet up?”
Alexander shifted beneath the expectant stares. It was a good opportunity to let these people warm up to them.
“Ah, well, me and Dez were quite young actually.” Ethan moved into the center of the room, once again drawing the attention off Alexander. He crouched down near two of the younger boys, not quite into their teens. “A little younger than you I’d guess.” He ruffled the younger’s hair.
“I was hiding in the sewers, running—“
“From the monsters?” The red-headed girl asked, eyes wide.
“Not this time. From men who had taken me in.”
The girl blinked up at him. “Were your mom lost?”
Ethan paused, glanced around for help, then quietly nodded.
“Oh,” the child said. “Why did you hide from the men?”
“They…” Ethan grimaced. “They weren’t good people.” A gross understatement. Ethan wouldn’t talk about just how bad the men who found him first after his family died, but Dez had warned him off after Ethan experienced a particularly nasty nightmare after he’d first joined up with them.
“Shhh, Gracie,” a woman hushed the child. “Let him go on.”
Ethan rubbed his palm along the back of his neck, attempting to hide the way his muscles had completely tensed. He blew out a breath to cover his anxiety. Alexander felt Dez also tense beside him.
But Ethan regrouped and pushed on. “So, I was hiding in the sewers, hadn’t eaten for days. Wasn’t sure I ever could again because the smell down there was horrible. Like a bloated cow’s liver.”
“Eew,” the kids cried in unison.
“Left out in the sun,” Ethan added to the children’s delight.
“Then what?” The older of the boys leaned forward over his crossed legs.
“I heard something scraping. It was dark in there so I didn’t know what it was. I hoped it was just a rat. The only light came from a grate in the ceiling above me where water drops seeped down the walls. But my eyesight had adjusted to it. I could barely make out a shape. It wasn’t no rat. Way too big. I was so scared it was one of those men after me…”
“Was it?”
Ethan shook his head.
“One of the monsters?”
He continued shaking his head. Everyone seemed to be holding in a collective breath.
“Wolf,” Ethan exclaimed and several people gasped. The older boy squeaked.
Alexander searched their faces, seeking one in particular. Jewel had been absent since before supper.
“There I was, just a kid, weak from hunger, scared out of my mind—“
“You was scared?” the young boy asked, eyes glued to Ethan.
“Terrified,” Ethan confirmed, and if possible the kid’s face shone with something akin to worship. “There was only a few rocks around me I could use for a weapon. And that wolf was hungry too. Its ribs pushed tight against its skin. It had his sights set on me. I was a goner for sure.”
“Oh no.” Gracie began to cry.
That’s when Ethan decided to cut the tale short. His gaze settled on her, softened. “I had a rock in my fist. I wasn’t going down without a fight. When all of a sudden I hear this voice shout from the grate above, ‘Get down! Get down!’ I didn’t get down. I froze right where I stood. And something dropped down and exploded all around me. Sparks ricocheted off the walls. Pop, pop, pop, pop! I thought the world was exploding. I’d never seen anything like it.”
Everyone “awed” around him, hanging on his every word.
“That old wolf took off running. I took off running the other way out of the sewer and when I reached the end and came out there was this scrawny kid—Dez—laughing and hooting, holding strings of firecrackers. He had enough to light every wolf’s tail we came across for months.” Ethan smiled fondly. They’d survived together, two o
rphans on their own, ever since.
And thank the gods for that. Alexander looked from Ethan to Dez. They’d saved him too. He’d been so sure about coming to this timeline, had thought of nothing else since that first Sift tried to kill him when he was young and discovered personally that there were monsters in the world.
Monsters he’d worked hard hours to discover how to stop them. He’d studied chemistry and genetics, conferred with some of the top scientific minds—theoretically of course, in person when he could and over the Internet. Once he figured how to stop them from creating rifts, and calculated the most opportune time in the future for the human race to make their stand, he’d opened his own sorcerer’s rift and plunged recklessly headlong into the future where he believed he could do the most good.
He’d been totally unprepared for the harsh reality of what the world had become, the unbelievable destruction, and only lived beyond his first day due to fortune favoring him in the form of Ethan and Dez tracking a colony of Sifts that Alexander had no idea had caught his scent and were coming up behind him. He’d been caught unawares and nearly lost his life because of it.
“We’re considering your offer to join your group.” Sheppard stood in front of Dez while Ethan continued to entertain the majority of the people in the lobby.
Dez nodded and indicated for Sheppard to take the chair Ethan had vacated.
Sheppard lowered into the seat. “We want to see this aerosol formula work for ourselves first.”
“A fair request.” Dez rubbed the stubble darkening his jaw. “I’d require the same if our roles were reversed.”
“So we understand each other.”
“We do. We’ll need to scout out a large enough colony of the beasts.”
“Already on it. We’ll leave at first light so I suggest getting a good’s night rest.” Sheppard stood. Tipped his head. “Gentlemen.”
“Sifts! One of the guards from the roof ran into the lobby from the courtyard. “East side forty feet from the north east corner.”
Immediately anyone near a candle or lamp doused the flame, plunging them in the streaks of moonlight filtering in from the courtyard.
Everyone sprang to action. Men pulling out the weapons they had on them, others running into the munitions storeroom. The motel office as Ethan had surmised earlier. Some of the women hurried the children into a room off to the left, hopefully a secure area without windows like a maintenance closest.
Ethan grabbed onto Tapper. “Where’s our equipment? We can help.”
Tapper flashed them a worried look before dashing off. The rustling of footsteps and hushed breathing was the only sound. Dez stormed over to the storeroom. Hank stood in front of the door and shook his head. No help there.
“Morons,” Ethan muttered and ran into the stairwell, Dez on his heels.
Alexander searched for Jewel. He didn’t see her in the quiet rush of people hurrying to their posts. She was most likely already on guard duty. He hoped she hadn’t ventured outside alone again.
Seeing the children were all taken care of, he ran up the steps, coming out of the stairwell housing onto the flat rooftop and immediately hunched over the same as everyone else, below the four foot extension of the protective walls running around the rooftop.
From up here the crossing concertina wire over the courtyard looked like a giant metal spiderweb.
He shouldered in between Dez and Ethan crouched behind the side of the short wall.
Dez pointed with his first two fingers together toward his left. Alexander barely made out a small colony of the beasts, seven or so, moving parallel to the motel. Moonlight glistened off fleshy blubber and long claws scraping across the cracked sidewalks as they ambled along the broken glass storefront of a strip mall.
Alexander itched to get down there and have another go at his anti-rift canisters. He looked around for Sheppard to see if he had one of the aerosols on him and hitched in a breath when he found Jewel standing near the east stairwell, her face pinched with strain, fingers pressed against the brick of the stairwell house. Was she ill? Is that why she had missed the gathering after supper?
He shifted to go to her when Dez whispered. “They’re passing right by.” His voice hinted at his incredulousness. “How do they not smell this many people living in one place?”
“Wait,” Ethan cautioned.
One of the beasts scrambled into the street, between the strip mall and the motel’s parking lot, long black claws scraping the cement, muscled legs bent as it swayed side-to-side while it scented the air, nostrils flaring and chuffing.
Along the rooftop wall, rifles and crossbows creaked within sweating palms.
The beasts would be on them in minutes. With so many Sifts in the area, it was only a matter of time before Sheppard’s group was discovered.
Alexander was relieved that he was here to help them when they needed it.
He drew his magic from deep within himself, feeling the warm press of it flow beneath his skin.
Let the beasts come. He had something for them.
“They’re leaving.” Ethan edged closer against the wall, disbelief coating his tone. Once a Sift had your scent they followed it like sharks to blood. There’s no way they could have missed it even from this distance.
Alexander let his magic subside. As it drew back he caught the faint pulse of another’s essence thrumming in the air. Startled, he whipped around, seeking whomever was working magic.
Everyone was still and quiet, watching the monsters move away farther down the street.
All except…Jewel clutched the little building, housing the stairwell exit as though it was the only thing keeping her upright. A thin trickle of blood ran from her nose.
Her eyes met his and she flinched. She dabbed at the wetness above her lip with her sleeve and then clumsily stumbled into the stairwell.
Alexander was up and going after her before he realized he was moving. He clamored down the first set of steps, glimpsing Jewel as she exited onto the landing of the second floor.
He caught up to her on the outside walkway above the courtyard. “Jewel, what’s going on?” He kept his voice low, fully aware those above on the roof could hear them.
She spun back, large frightened eyes glossy in her pale face. She glanced around, swiping at her nose again. “Nothing.”
“I know what I felt.”
She flinched again and looked up at the concertina wire just above their heads. “Quick. In here.” Spinning on her heel, she entered one of the rooms. “Leave the door open for the light.”
Alexander followed her inside and left the door ajar.
“It’s just a nosebleed.” She grabbed up some cloths from the standard motel night stand still in the room and sat on one of the two beds and held the cloth beneath her nose.
Spying a pitcher of water on the nightstand, Alexander poured a bit onto another one of the cloths and brought it to her. “Here.” He sat on the bed beside her and pressed the damp cloth on the back of her neck. “Headache too?”
She nodded. “It will pass.”
“Um-hmm.” He pushed the cloth up, obstructed by the unbecoming cap she always wore so he tugged it off, not expecting the thick fall of hair to come loose like satin over his hands. The scent of cherries released around them.
“It’s stopped bleeding.”
“What?” Alexander’s voice caught.
“My nosebleed. It’s stopped.”
“Oh.” Alexander moved the wet cloth to her cheek and over her mouth, wiping away any remaining flecks of blood.
Her eyes shone in the silver light and his mouth went dry. He looked away from her vulnerable gaze and reached over to place the cloth back onto the night stand. He smiled at the assortment of products she’d somehow managed to scavenge for herself. Cherry blossom shampoo. Cherry lip balm. Cherry scented lotion. Faded cardboard car fresheners in the shape of the fruit.
“What?” She’d followed the direction of his gaze to her collection.
“Nothing.” His smile widened. She was a rare mix of surprises. Self-assured and able, and a feminine wonder beneath that ugly cap. A female whose features were weary and pale.
Without thinking, he slipped his large palms into her hair and started rubbing her temples to ease the ache. “My mam used to do this for me.”
She stiffened beneath his touch.
“Of course she was a healer so the pain was gone in a matter of minutes. I’m sorry I don’t have that talent.”
The soft gasp speared right into his heart. She was afraid. Of magic. Of her own magic. He had suspected as much. Bits and pieces of the puzzle that was Jewel began to take shape.
“I wish I did. I’d take your pain away, Jewel. I’d take it all away.”
She turned to face him, pulling his hands down into hers. “Please stop talking. Don’t say anything to anyone.”
He studied her wary features. “What did you do, Jewel? What made the Sifts leave?”
She pushed away from the bed. “Please, we shouldn’t talk about it. You can’t say anything. To anyone.”
Her plea was so heartfelt and frightened, he’d promise her anything to erase the fear in her eyes.
“But you did something. You used magic,” he prodded her. “You can trust me.”
“Can I?”
He suddenly realized he wanted her to, not just out of need to know what was going on to help her people, but he wanted her to trust him. For herself. It felt like the most vital thing in the world. Yet, was it reasonable to expect her to trust him, a stranger she didn’t know, when she didn’t even trust her own people? Which, that was an entirely different perplexing matter.
Why didn’t she trust her own group to know she had magic? That it had been her all along keeping the Sifts away from the motel, because that’s obviously what had been going on here all this time.
Highland Son (Highland Sorcery: A New Dawn) Page 4