Scales: Book 1 of the Fate and Fire Series

by Amity Green

  * * *

  Nocturnal humans dozed on chaises and chairs, sleeping the day away in preparation for nightfall when the party would start again. I scanned the place, looking for Ezra and found him waving me forward, book in hand. Kai continued after me, unable to see Ezra, staying close because he trusted me about as much as I trusted him.

  Ezra sat the book on a table beside a large chair, making sure I was watching his motions. One hand remained on the cover, keeping him out of sight.

  “Where is it?” Kai was losing patience. He grabbed my shoulders, spinning me to face him. “Give me what’s mine, right this moment or I might do something you won’t enjoy,” he warned. He shook me hard for emphasis.

  “It’s over there,” I gritted. “On that table.” I pointed in Ezra’s direction best I could with him gripping me so hard.

  He released my shoulders in exchange for a wrist, dragging me as he stalked toward the table. Ezra was nowhere that I could see, having left the safety of the tome’s wards to stash himself away somewhere. Not seeing Ezra made me panic. I struggled against Kai’s grip, forcing him to pull me along as we came nearer.

  “Put your hand on it so I can see it,” he commanded.

  “W-what?” That would be a show-stopper. Our plan didn’t contain steps that read “What to do if psycho gets his book back”.

  “Bring me inside the wards so I can take the bloody things off or I won’t be able to see it,” he snarled. “Put a hand on it now.” He squeezed the delicate bones in my wrist, forcing me to cry out. I nearly went to my knees in pain.

  “Okay!” I cried. He released the pressure. I sent my free hand slowly questing toward the leather cover.

  Beyond where the book rested on the table, a face formed in the water. The features of the female Tyren who’d saved me came into view. She rose from the surface with fluid silence. A watery finger pressed to her lips in a universal gesture to remain silent. I didn’t see what she could possibly do to help the situation, being made of water. And besides that, she was about twenty-five feet away from us. I was losing hope. She continued to materialize, a transparent, glistening form above the surface. Water surged, trapped beneath her skin, like a see-through pot full of boiling water. My heart raced as I watched my shaking hand touch the book.

  Kai saw the leather tome on the table that instant. His face lit up, a kid at Christmas. It was over. We’d lost. I’d sealed our fates by giving him sight of his tool of devastation.

  For a split second he smiled.

  His grin faded when Peter hit him with the spirit of a professional linebacker, running hard and sending them both to the ground with a series of smacks as solid bone met the hard tile. My wrist popped loose of Kai’s grip as they went down. The two tumbled, throwing punches and grappling. Peter landed a mean sounding hook to Kai’s chin. Both men regained footing, slugging it out. Peter hit Kai’s torso hard, his upper body tight with bulging muscle that sent his fists pounding like steel. Kai swung back at the perfect moment, catching Peter straight on, splitting open his bottom lip, sending him spinning to the floor. Peter was on his feet quick as Kai advanced and the two went at it again, striking each other with vicious, horrible sounding blows, with rage finally released after more than a century of hatred churned and grew for the other.

  The sound of boiling water erupted as the Tyren drug herself forward with her arms, the rest of her body trailing in a malformed pool of transmuting limbs and faces. She wrapped her arms around the men, taking them down.

  “No! Peter!” I screamed. They continued to thrash, coated with water that clung to their bodies rather than falling away with gravity. I lunged forward, intent on grasping onto him somehow to free him from the Tyren’s grip. I grabbed him around the waist, ducking blows from Kai and pulling Peter back as hard as I could.

  “Let go Tessa, before you get yourself hurt,” Peter growled.

  I held fast, feeling water hesitate for a second, as if it was repelled by my touch. Peter and I fell backward, free of the Tyrens as they covered Kai’s thrashing body.

  “Are you okay?” Peter was on his feet in an instant, pulling me in front of him, checking my wrist and scanning my face. His nose bled a little from one side, adding to the stream from his lip. A long, angry scratch ran the length of one side of his neck. He panted, turning my face in his hands, searching for any sign of injury.

  “What are you doing here?” I felt like crying. If he was in the cavern, no one was getting Brea away from the psycho with the knife.

  “You shouldn’t have believed for one second I’d leave you on your own down here. I found Osgar and he knows where Petra is,” he said, nodding down at me.

  “What about Brea? This nut with a knife has her!”

  “They’re going to get her,” he said, turning to look at Kai and the Tyren.

  Kai wasn’t going down without a fight. He growled and flung his arms to get free, managing to make it to his feet, dragging the liquid form up with him. The water-being’s multiple faces melted away into a sack of bubbling, churning liquid.

  “Holy hell,” There was more than one Tyren in the pool that escaped the stream. They’d clung together somehow. As Kai stood, more Tyrens materialized, breaking off from the main body. They wrapped themselves firmly around each part of him as if translucent anacondas decided to work together to take down a gorilla.

  Kai glared at Peter. “You,” he spat. He eyed me, huddled, tiny beside Peter. Kai’s eyes softened, rage deserting him and leaving nothing but sorrow.

  I knew it for what it was; a mixture of heartbreak and resignation. He’d missed me and he’d never stop. Mistakes were made, recognized. His face held an apology. “Remember,” he whispered.

  Each syllable of the word resonated inside me. My ears buzzed as it sounded again and again. I stumbled forward, gripping my head. Kai’s face floated in my mind’s eye. I stood in front of him, reaching up to caress his cheek with my hands. He caught one and placed a kiss in my palm. I grew warm, enjoying the contact with him, knowing we’d done it before, just like that, hundreds of times. From a haze, I was aware that Kai struggled for breath. He called for me. I had to save him ….

  I spun on Kai and the Tyren, reaching, with intentions of prying the bitch off him. I couldn’t let him be killed. We were to be together. Just as my hand touched a watery arm, something hit me from the side, cradling me tight and drove me straight toward the stream. I thrashed as I sank deep, touched down on the riverbed and shot forth, up and out of the water. I floated to the floor.

  A Tyren lay on the bank, feeble from attempting to take me down. His essence leaked around him as he tried to hold form. I bent, sending a fist through his chest. Water exploded around my arm and he was gone.

  “Tessa!” Peter called for me as I stalked back toward Kai. “Tessa, stop.

  I turned to him, shaking, water steaming away from me. I looked at my hands. I’d killed again.

  “Tessa? Can you hear me?”

  I nodded as tears cascaded onto my cheeks.

  “Come away from the water,” Peter said.

  That sounded like a good idea. I ran to him. “I killed him,” I said, hating myself a little bit more.

  “It’s going to be alright.”

  Kai thrashed in the Tyren’s grip. Watery arms gripped his shoulders, stilling him. His eyes shot wide and he grew quite, jaw snapping shut.

  Everything just stopped. No sounds of struggle. No gushing mineral stream. The baths rested unmoving, mirroring the celling of the cavern like glassy lakes at sunrise. Kai no longer flailed to be free of the Tyrens and they ceased moving around him. Foreboding hung in the sulfur-laced air like a black veil.

  The Tyrens seemed to shrink. I thought maybe there was only a certain amount of time they could stay out of the stream without evaporating.

  Kai’s face began to bulge in places as if tumors grew in seconds under his skin. On his neck and hands, flesh seemed to develop sagging cysts where soft tissue gave way. His body began to tremble as
all parts of him swelled and skin gained impossible elasticity. His eyes rolled to the ceiling as blood and clear fluids began to ooze from the orifices on his face and ears, then leak from his fingernails.

  The Tyrens were nearly invisible against his skin, deflated to a shimmering coat of moisture that clung like spray lacquer.

  “Ugh,” I said in disbelief. The Tyrens pushed through the pores in Kai’s skin. His entire body was completely filled with water. A lot of it. I couldn’t imagine what that felt like. I shuddered.

  Silence gave way to sounds of cloth tearing and membrane separating from muscle and tissue.

  I took the first tentative step backward.

  Kai’s head rocked back and his jaw fell open as a geyser of water spewed forth. Blood pooled in each pore of his skin, soon coating him in crimson. I wondered how much more his body could stand just as water split through the softer parts of his form, starting with the thin flesh beneath his arms, under his eyes, and neck.

  A pop sounded. All the water found its way out. Simultaneously.

  I averted my face a beat before I was pelted with things ranging from blood and liquefied bone, to bile and off-colored water. I cried and jumped back, but it was too late. My body was covered with fluids. Had I not turned my head at the right moment, my face would have been plastered, too. Luckily, there was so much water mixed in, that other things sloughed off me, but they still left disgusting trails of goo that smelled worse than anything I’d ever encountered. I took off running and threw up with gusto.

  The sound of the stream moving overtook the grotto in seconds. My heart pounded in my ears. I glanced at Peter through watering eyes.

  “Aw,” he said. “Damn.” He flung his hands hard toward the floor, dispelling clinging streams of flesh. Multihued blobs of gook clung to his shirt and dripped from his soaking hair.

  I gagged.

  He looked over at me, instant worry crossing his features, even though he was just as covered in crap as I was. He began wiping at my clothes to help get it all off, but when he touched it, the fluid pressed through the cloth, coming into contact with my skin. I continued to retch, turning away and waving him off.

  After a few moments, I was able to approach him again, although my eyes watered and nausea rested at the back of my throat.

  Peter reached slowly to brush at my shoulder, picking my hair out of solidified chunk of matter there. “You have a little bit of …” he trailed off, still wiping at me.

  “Ewwww! I have Kai on my shoulder?” I shuttered. I felt like I was going to cry, wanting to sprint in circles to try to control the panic in my chest.

  “Go straight to the car,” he said.

  All I could do was nod, which I did, enthusiastically.

  The gold torc Kai had worn boiled to the surface of the water. Peter bent to retrieve it, turning the precious cuff in his hand.The finality of what happened began to settle.

  “Best go,” he said, gesturing toward the stairs.

  I did as he said, so numb from the shock of what I’d seen that I didn’t really feel the gooey way my clothes clung to my legs as I stepped.

  “What about you?” I called to him.

  “I’ll get the humans out of here and meet at the car. Leave. Now Tessa,” he urged.

  I sprinted up the stairs into the afternoon sun.

  The sound of gushing water roared from the grate-covered hole over the cavern. Electricity popped as if lightning struck. I was certain I’d just heard the stream break free, overflowing the rocky bed holding it in place below ground. A crystalline geyser exploded upward in the courtyard, topping the bars of the grate and began flooding the grass, gushing onto the grounds.

  I was disoriented, standing in plain daylight, covered with things I didn’t want to think about, watching a small typhoon erupt from a hole in the grass like a water-filled volcano. Faces formed in the swirling geyser but they were Tyren’s I’d never seen before.

  I searched the balcony, but saw no trace of Brea. A crumpled form lay beneath the wrought iron railing, blackened skin visible in the waning sunlight. Someone had rescued her. I rejoiced with a couple excited hops before I found my senses.

  Stick to the plan. Ezra words shot through my mind. I turned toward the garage and ran to where we’d agreed to meet. I dove behind the car, out of view of the house. I hoped Osgar was able to find Brea and Petra and that I saw Ezra appear soon. I fought the urge to run to the house and look for the others, but I knew that could cause problems if I was seen by Hamish or another of Kai’s lackeys. I stayed put with the worst of scenarios playing through my imagination, stretching the minutes into what seemed like hours as I waited for anyone else to show up. Daylight would be scarce soon. I couldn’t stand the smell of my skin and clothes. I fought the urge to retch.

  The sound of many pairs of feet pounding gravel grew louder by the second. The humans that slept in the cavern sprinted past me, down the drive in various stages of undress. Peter had apparently sobered them up and put the fear of a higher power into them because not a single one looked back as they ran out of sight, toward Kelty.

  Time dragged on painfully as I waited for someone else to meet me. I had a clear view of the outer courtyard wall where the flow of water crashed against stone, churning back onto itself in a frothy tube. The fledgling current roared with new life, carving a new bed, disappearing into the forest beyond the driveway. I worried the cavern had been flooded far too long to support life. There was still no sign of Ezra.

  I fidgeted anxiously, watching as the afternoon sun waned.

  Something was wrong. No longer able to wait, I stepped out from between the car and the wall, ready to sprint toward the house to help Peter find Brea and Petra. It was going to be dark soon, and I didn’t want to think about what would happen when the grounds crawled with gargoyles.

  A man I’d never seen before watched me rise from beside the Aston. He’d been heading from the direction of the house toward the stairs leading to the underground baths, likely to investigate the eruption of mineral water. I’d stepped from the safety of the car with impeccably bad timing.

  We stared at each other, both a little shocked.

  Please be a good guy ….

  “Ah the girl prodigy. I suppose you’re behind this,” he gestured to the flooding yard and rushing, detoured stream, stepping toward me.

  I instinctively stepped back. Something about him was hard to read. He wasn’t acting all that friendly, but he hadn’t threatened my life, which gave him at least one point on the “good guy” board. He spoke distinctively British, what the Scots would consider a “lowlander”. The skin of his face was dirty against a frame of greasy, dishwater hair. He wore a motley blend of modern clothing that could use a good laundering.

  “What the hell happened to you?” he asked, curling his lip in disgust.

  I found that terribly ironic coming from a guy who looked like he made a home in a Dumpster. I could just shower and change clothes. That guy needed to be boiled, bleached and spend a couple days with a dentist who had a hammer and chisel.

  He made a grab for my elbow, but I dodged it.

  “Come on then, Kai will be looking for you.”

  Not so much, I thought. I backed up against the wall of the garage, not sure where to go. His possible “good guy” point was revoked.

  A quick check of my options to bail myself out came back entirely lacking. I pushed away from the wall to sprint toward the house and find Peter, hoping to be able to outrun the nasty guy. He didn’t look too healthy so I thought maybe I’d be faster. My foot caught on something and I hit the gravel so hard my neck popped with the force of impact. Air left my body, locking my lungs. A deafening siren shrilled in my head while lights flashed, outlining objects in my view.

  The grungy guy yanked me off the ground by the back of my soiled hoodie.

  “Where you off too so fast?” He pulled me to standing with a huge, yellowed smile. “Can’t have you running away. Let’s go have a look at what you�
��ve done,” he gritted.

  I did my best to shake him off but he hung onto the fabric of my jacket tight with one hand. He laughed. I swung my elbows furiously to free myself. I couldn’t let one guy and my inability to sit tight ruin the chances of us getting out of there. One elbow connected with his chest.

  He grunted and stepped back, releasing my sweatshirt. Awkward silence grew between us while the fact that I’d struck him registered. He swung fast, slapping me across the face so hard I spun and doubled over to keep my feet. My jaw exploded with stinging pain. Blood dripped from the tip of my nose to the gravel and the stained net toes of my Asics. He hit me in the back of the neck, taking me to my knees. I fell onto my side, hoping he wouldn’t do anything else so I had a second to recover. Running away wasn’t going to work.

  He paced a tight arc around me against the wall of the garage.

  I lay curled in a ball, ragged breath dragging blood into my mouth. My face throbbed. The shock of being tripped and landing so hard wore off quickly because of pain and fear. I felt along the inside of my shin for the dirk Ezra gave me. My hand worked quickly at the slimy leg of my jeans to slide the dagger from the sheath as if I rubbed a bruised shin. The knife slid free against my leg while I worked it lower, the blade poking at the top of my shoe. I curled up tighter and pulled it loose, gripping the jeweled handle tight.

  He was going to have to come down to get me. I waited.

  My nose still bled a little, but adrenaline was working for me. I could have been much worse off. That thought bolstered my determination.

  “Get up.” He kicked gravel, spraying me with small rocks.