by Zoe Parker
Another truck pulls up, and as the driver begins to open the door, I run at it, jump, and hit it with both feet—effectively trapping the legs of the driver. A sword through the window finishes him off.
A quick breath and I move again. Over and over, blood and more blood. They just keep coming, and Phobe and I keep killing them. He’s quite good at it.
A lot better at it than I am because at some point, I can’t move anymore, so I stop and simply watch him. Phobe doesn’t seem tired at all, and I’m pretty sure the bastard is having fun.
A walkie-talkie squawks on the ground at my feet. Weary, I ignore it. It’s taking my precious last drops of energy to watch Phobe.
And what a thing he is to watch. The runes on him are lit up, slithering around on his skin like glowing snakes. It’s rather awesome actually. How do I get some of those?
Looking up at his face I find myself blushing because he caught me staring, so I give him a cheesy smile. With fiery eyes focused on me, he smirks as he starts walking towards me.
Uh-oh.
Eyes searching, he cups my cheek with a bloody hand.
“What the fuck are you things?” someone screams in my ear as an arm snakes around my throat. The cold metal of a gun presses against the side of my head right at my temple. A bullet shouldn’t kill me unless it’s to my head. That just might.
I sigh. I’m not nearly as worried about it as I should be. If he shoots me, I’ll get a nap. Might be a permanent one, but still.
Phobe doesn’t break our staring contest.
‘Do you ever take anything seriously, Iza?’
‘Sometimes, but mostly no.’ I answer honestly.
Phobe grunts at my answer and punches the man holding the gun to my head. I look over my shoulder to see him several feet away, his face a bloody mess of pulp and bone.
Well, I can never accuse Phobe of hitting like a girl.
Speaking of hitting like a girl I look over to where I left Jarvis, and he’s gone. He’s alive then, but I think the problem of him is temporarily solved. There will be other more dangerous problems to deal with in the immediate future.
Mentally shaking myself, I call out to the Fiends to check that the truck made it to the Sidhe. My poor Fiends are faint, they’re so tired. I’ll have to find a way to make it up to them. A present of some kind.
“Iza, are you ready to go?”
“Home?” He nods at my question.
Frowning, I look around me. Walking home will take too long. I eye a Humvee. I’ve been meaning to teach myself how to drive. Crossing to the truck, I drag the dead driver out of the seat and climb up in it.
“You are serious?” Phobe asks from outside the door.
Smiling I turn the key. It makes an awful grinding sound.
“Iza, it is already running.”
Oh. “Get the hell in. We gotta go.”
Rolling his eyes, he walks around the truck to climb inside.
Did Phobe just roll his eyes at me? My smile broadens. I’m rubbing off on him. All right, now time to get this sucker going.
“Put your foot on the brake and move the gear shift to the D,” Phobe explains patiently.
With a small jerk, I manage to do this. Aha.
“Gas pedal time?”
“Yes, you lightly—”
I floor it. The crunching of metal brings us to a jarring halt.
“Lightly, Iza.”
“I did!” I defend. Even though I didn’t.
This time when I put the gear shift on the R, I lightly tap the gas. We crash into another truck. Perhaps my version of lightly and his version of lightly aren’t the same?
“Now you—Iza, do you need me to drive?”
Frowning at him I put the gear shift back to D. “No, I’m driving, and you’re going to deal with it.”
“I am very glad I cannot die from a car accident.”
“Why do you think there will be an—oops.” The tree came out of nowhere, I swear.
“Iza.”
“The car still moves so I’m driving, Phobe.”
Chapter Thirty-Four
Phobe
Iza driving is more disastrous than any other experience I have ever had in a vehicle. She is managing to drive worse than I suspected she would. It is the closest thing to fear that I have felt ever. The handle above the window is the first casualty of this adventure with her.
The second is more than likely going to be the law enforcement vehicle currently following us. Something Iza is aware of, but she refuses to pull over until the truck dies. If the noises coming from it now are any indication, it is in the process of doing so.
Considering she has struck at least five cars and a couple of trees since this started, I am surprised it is moving at all.
“Why haven’t they gone away yet?” she mutters under her breath.
“They will pursue you until you stop.”
She sighs dramatically and says, “Fine, I’ll pull over.”
With a shudder and a mechanical cough, the truck dies the minute she puts it into park. With an annoyed smack of the steering wheel, she climbs out of the truck.
‘I recommend using your glamour. You are covered in—never mind.’
There is already a gun in her face and an officer yelling at her to get down on the ground. Iza is starting at him in confusion. This is not going to end well.
Frowning at the officer, Iza grabs his gun and crushes it and then hands it back to the shocked man. In reaction he sprays something noxious at her. Mace, they call it mace. She staggers and leans against the truck rubbing at her eyes.
I suppose I should help her. Otherwise we are going to be here for hours.
“Get out of the car with your hands up!” someone yells through the window.
“Don’t hurt them Phobe, no matter how much I kinda want to. They are just doing their jobs,’ Iza says, still rubbing at her eyes with the hem of her shirt.
She knows me well enough to know I was about to eat him.
Fine.
Opening the door with just enough force to knock him down, I climb out of the truck. Grabbing a bottle of water off the floor, I walk around the front to Iza. Her face is beet-red and her eyes are now bloodshot.
Opening the bottle, I turn it up and dump the entire bottle on her face. That should help.
“On the ground or I will open fire,” yells the officer who maced her.
“Okay, that’s enough of this shit. Let’s go,” Iza says blinking to clear her vision some more.
I grab her around the waist and run.
Chapter Thirty-Five
Iza
God, my eyes are still burning. What in the world kind of torture device is this mace? Do I need to get some for the assholes who keep coming here trying to kill me?
“Iza, you can stop whining now. I’ve healed the actual injuries,” Nika chastises.
Apparently, I was complaining out loud. Again.
“It still stings.”
“It will for a few hours. There is no way to get it off your skin completely. Not even with Magiks,” she answers, smacking me on the arm as I walk off.
“Did you get the new Feyrie fed? I need to ask them questions and I’d rather they have some comfort first,” I ask Jameson as he catches up to me.
I’m already heading towards the wing the Sidhe made for them. I ask for Auryn to be summoned.
“Yes, and the healers have already been to see them as well. Arista is asking for you,” he answers, sliding his finger across the screen of the brand new iPad he’s carrying.
I kind of miss the sound of the pages flipping.
The Sidhe makes my walk a fast one, taking me straight to their wing by forming passages for me to walk the most direct route. I find several of the healing Feyrie there, hovering—especially over the small ones.
Most especially Minos.
Goblins are flashing in and out of existence, bringing supplies and tending to the ones who need tending. I look around at all of them, but my eyes
are drawn again to Minos.
He’s sitting up in a baby seat, his red eyes following me.
I feel the smile form on my face while bending down to pick him up. “Well hello there, handsome. I have someone I want you to meet.”
“My lady, I was told you—god, is that a Nightmare child?” Right on time.
“Yes, Auryn. I have a feeling he’s connected to you. All things considering.”
Eyes wide, she puts a shaking hand out for Minos to wrap his own tiny one around her finger. Clearing her throat, she says, “One of my daughters disappeared. This… this is her child.”
“His name is Minos. I think that he wants to be with Grandma.” I hand him over to her and look for Arista. Minos will be taken care of incredibly well. He needs to be with his family.
Arista isn’t a wingless, so it’s strange that Kael gave her up to the humans. There’s a story there and I want to hear it. In clean clothes, she steps out of a room off to the side and smiles at me hesitantly.
I smile back and hope it’s kindly. I’m still working on it.
“I need you to tell me how—” I indicate the room full of people. “—this happened.”
“The King came to me a year ago…” Arista looks around and hesitates. The room blurs around us as the Sidhe, sensing my need for privacy obliges. Well, that’s neat.
“Continue,” I urge.
“He came to me a year ago and said I needed to go into town and meet a man who was going to provide some much-needed supplies for our colony. I was surprised by the request. I’d never been asked to leave before. But I went because the King ordered me to.” For a moment her eyes burn amber with anger.
Then she continues, “They knew exactly what I am. They were prepared for a fight and I didn’t even shift before I was knocked out cold. I woke up in that place, surrounded by other Feyrie.” She clenches her jaw a few times and then continues.
“There were other dragons there, in the beginning—special ones. The wingless. They are supposed to be revered by dragonkin, but our King insisted that none survived birth since his father’s reign. He lied to all of us. Wingless cannot shift but they wield potent Magiks. Some of them are children, my lady.”
“How many?” I ask.
“Eleven. They moved them somewhere else a few days ago. Our king he betrayed them. He betrayed us all.”
He’s the one who told them about me, but he isn’t the spy still here. That sonofabitch bartered people—I’ll get them back, and then I’ll deal with Kael. Or perhaps it isn’t me that will deal with him.
“You’re safe here. Kael can’t hurt you. I’ll find the wingless.”
And I will.
“My lady, in the time I’ve been there—there have been hundreds of Feyrie brought there.”
This brings me up short. Hundreds?
“Where are they?” I demand.
“They’ve sent them to other facilities spread throughout the world. I heard the humans talking.”
“Do you know of any specifically?”
She wrings her hands in anxiety as she answers. “I know some of the towns.”
“That’s a start. Can you please give them all to Jameson?” She nods and because I have no idea how to help her feel better, I stand there awkwardly.
“Come, Arista, let’s get you some hot food.” Nika to the rescue.
The adrenaline that’s been sustaining me for the last month is gone, I think. And the mental momentum I manage to keep up falls around me in broken shards. I’m shaky and there were dead Feyrie in some of those cells. They were dead. A car’s ride away from me and they were dead.
Minos’s mother is dead.
My mother is dead.
At damn near a run, I head outside.
The crunch of snow under my feet is strange and sort of soothing. It’s the first time I’ve seen snow in… ever. I slow my pace and watch the fat snowflakes fall, dancing like fairies on the wind.
They fill the air everywhere and a slight breeze makes them swirl around me in a little snow tornado. As I walk, the long-buried memories of my mother carrying me on her scaly back in the snow-choked winds of the sky bursts in vivid detail in my brain.
The heat of a tear sliding down my cheek is quickly followed by another. I shove my hands in my pockets and keep walking. And the tears keep falling. Just like the snow.
For the first time since I escaped, I can let go and truly grieve. For my mother, for the childhood ripped away from me, for the pure injustice of it all. Not because I have to, but this time because I can.
Something I haven’t let myself do. This will be my choice!
I walk until the toes of my boots touch the edge of the lake. Looking down at the calm waters, my rage boils up. Letting the tears pour, I scream into the night. Then I start kicking the ground. Over and over I kick it, and with each strike a little more pain comes out.
The pain for the people I didn’t save. For the people I can’t save. For the mother who died because of me. For everything I’ve lost and will lose. The wind and snow rip it away from me and pull into the cold waters of the lake.
“Why them?” I scream, into the night sky. “Why me?” I scream again, sobbing.
Tired of it all, I collapse onto my knees in the snow. Ignoring the cold wetness seeping into my pants, I say, “To whatever god is out there, I beg you. Help me. They can’t fight. If the Light Fey come they will be slaughtered, and I can’t live with that. Please—” I sob, “—help me save them.”
“Have you ever heard the story of creation?” The voice startles me. I look up to see the homeless man from the park. He’s still wearing the orange filthy coat and no hat.
I hiccup and wipe my face to hide my shame and climb to my feet.
“No, can’t say I have.” I answer, pulling the hat off my head and putting it on his.
The Sidhe has no idea he’s here. A human who can sneak past the Sidhe is an interesting human. Or not a human at all? He doesn’t smell—well, he smells a lot, but he doesn’t smell non-human. Isn’t this interesting? He smiles at me, exposing the gap where his front teeth should be.
Hiccupping a sob—damn things don’t go away—I try to smile back.
“I have a shack just over the hill there, with a fire. I hope you don’t mind it’s there. I don’t bother anyone.” He turns and starts shuffling along.
Not really feeling like going back to the Sidhe—and incredibly curious about him—I follow.
“I heard all the yelling and came to make sure no one was fiddling about. When I saw you kneeling there, I figured you might need someone to pull you from the place you were heading to. Not a good road to travel, grief.” He pauses to catch his breath then continues, “Besides I kinda wanted some company.”
He does indeed have a little shack; it even has a small window in the front that has the glowing flicker of a fire inside. He opens the door and ushers me in. Closing it behind him, he dusts off one of the milk crates around the small fire and waves towards it.
Sitting on it, I watch him move around to hang up his coat and the hat I gave him. He dusts off his own crate and smiles that gap-toothed smile again at me before sitting down.
This home is small, but surprisingly clean.
“That’s a fine hat. I appreciate you sharing it,” he says, rubbing his hands together beside the fire.
I simply watch him. The feeling of calm I’m getting from being near him is nice and I’m not going to question it. Not this time.
“Like I was saying the story of creation. Strange that one like you has never heard of it. But then again not many care about it anymore. Shame that, it’s a good story.” He runs a wrinkled hand down his scruffy, bearded face then continues.
“When this world was born there were three: Light, Life and Darkness. And two of those three together created the first five. The sun, water, air, earth, and of course spirit. These first five were all given specific things to do, and because they were so happy doing it they became the things they were born
to be.” He pauses and blows his nose loudly into a worn handkerchief.
Then he resumes his story, “Life and Light, having made the first five, felt satisfied in their creations. But Darkness was the first to touch the world and didn’t know what to create. So, Darkness made nothing.” He pauses and opens up a can of sardines that he dug out of one of his pockets.
“One day, Life and Light go off to create in other places, other worlds. Darkness was left alone.” He takes a long drink out of a dirty cup and offers it to me. I take it and sip then hand it back. It’s the best water I’ve tasted in my life.
“Years later, Life stops in to check on Darkness and sees how empty the world is. Life shows him how to create and Darkness makes the Eldest, the second born.” Slurping up a sardine, he smiles his gappy smile with fish on his teeth and says, “Life was concerned about the strength of these creations, so he gave each of them a specific task, much like the first.” He offers me a sardine, and of course I take it—it’s food.
“When Light saw what Darkness created, Light became angry with Life for showing Darkness how to create. You see, worshiped by all the Light creations, Light considered themselves to be superior to Life and Darkness. So, when Darkness created the Feyrie, Light made ones opposite them. It became a competition to Light you see? So were born the races of the Light Fey. Oddly enough, the schoth were the first race of the Light Fey to be created. Humans call them elves here, ya believe that?” He smiles at me again and eats the rest of his sardines.
“Life, seeing how Light was so jealous, decided to make other creations in other places. Including this world. Humans and every animal and insect that graces this planet.” He sighs. “Life ran and hid like a coward.”
He stares into the fire, his blue eyes seeing something I can’t. I wait; I can sense the story isn’t over.
“It’s then that everything went wrong. The Light creatures began to fight the Dark ones. And in that war, a foolish vain creature tried to capture and enslave his creator, the Darkness. So the Darkness ate him. And in eating him, Darkness became aware like a man, and in that he began to hate, and as he hated, he destroyed.” A single crystal tear runs down his cheek.