We develop of trailing crowd of Aerlings as Cedrick leads us through the courtyards and hallways that will take us to where the Father has been trapped for so many years I can’t even begin to comprehend. It strikes me again what an awful existence that would be. I don’t necessarily pity the Father after everything he’s done, but I certainly wouldn’t wish this fate on anyone.
By the time Cedrick stops in front of the same door he led Olivia and me to the last time we were here, the hallway behind us is flooded with Aerlings. It’s only when Cedrick turns to face us that he seems to notice them. Frustration and weariness overwhelm him in that second and he shouts, “Get back to your duties! We’re preparing for a possible invasion. This isn’t a circus act!”
His sharp words startle more than one Aerling, but they all start shuffling back down the hall. Well, I see a few of them dart down hallways only to peek their heads back out a second later. The majority of them are heading back to whatever they were doing before we arrived.
I felt sorry for Cedrick being stuck with the job of explaining all the lies Tāwhiri told to the Aerlings before, but now I realize I should have pitied him for having to face the truth while getting ready for a war they are sadly unprepared for. Even with centuries of knowing this day would come, they aren’t powerful enough to win and no amount of training or preparation will change that.
“What do you need from me?” Cedrick asks, his question bringing me back to the present. “I still have a team inside guarding the Father, but there haven’t been any problems so far. Whatever power Olivia left is continuing to hold him.”
Focusing on my mission, I say, “How many of your people in there know how to shield themselves?”
“Some are stronger than others,” Cedrick admits, “but they can all put up a shield.”
Well, that’s a relief. Mason wasn’t sure how many other Aerlings could create shields. “Once Sloane and I go in…”
“Wait,” Cedrick interrupts, “Sloane’s not going in there. She’s not trained for this. I can’t risk her life.”
Sloane’s mouth pops open to defend herself, but I step in front of her and square up with Cedrick. At eye level with each other, I pull out a commanding stance I rarely ever use. “Sloane will be coming with me. Before you think this has something to do with what you saw, just know you’re wrong. Escorts can be transferred, correct?”
“Yes,” Cedrick says slowly. It takes him a moment to put two and two together. His eyes snap over to Sloane before coming back to me. “You’re her Escort now?” His eyes squint like he’s warding off a headache. Finally he shakes his head. “I should have considered it before. Transfer along bloodlines doesn’t happen often, but it should have at least crossed my mind.”
If Sloane hadn’t become my Aerling, I’d be right there with Cedrick demanding she stay out of harm’s way. That’s not possible, unfortunately. “I need her in there with me if we have any hope of controlling the Father and transporting him back to Earth.”
Cedrick presses his fingers to his temples and begins rubbing them in small circles. “How do you even plan to do all of this? Olivia said you had to have Tāwhiri’s power to affect the bonds.”
“Yeah,” I agree, “that’s why she let me borrow some.”
The confusion that flashes across Cedrick’s face is almost laughable. He holds his hands up in defeat. “You know what? I don’t even want to know at this point. I have too much going on to try and stitch this mess back together. Just do what you need to and we’ll help however we can. You have full command of every Aerling in the room once you enter, including me.”
Wow, well that’s kind of cool. Not that I plan on using this conditional and fairly limited power for anything other than surviving this encounter, but still. I’ve never been in command of anything before. Siblings don’t count. They don’t listen anyway.
“All right, well, let’s go then,” I say.
Sloane steps up next to me and takes my hand regardless of what Cedrick might think. He looks away and pretends he didn’t see anything. Pushing open the door that was once impenetrable except by Tāwhiri himself, Cedrick takes the lead. Sloane and I follow behind. Olivia explained what she could of this place, but I’m still not prepared for the strange vastness of the room. There are walls. There has to be walls, right? I can’t see them, though. It’s like this space exists independently from everything else around it. I don’t even try to understand what’s going on in here.
My whole focus goes squarely to the squadron of intense looking Aerling soldiers stationed in a circle around the captive Father. They aren’t wearing armor or holding guns like you might think. At first glance, they just look like they’re all getting ready to pray or perform some kind of strange ritual. It’s not until I get closer that I can pick up the feel of massive amounts of power being used.
As an Escort, I’m really only tuned into my own Aerling’s power, but after having been around Mason so much while he trained, I know what the air feels like when a lot of power is being used. I’m not sure what they’re doing, exactly. The bonds Olivia left in place are keeping the Father captive, so the soldiers’ efforts must be preventative, in case he tries to escape or something. I’m glad for it, but they’re crowded in so close there’s no room for me to approach the Father.
“Uh, excuse me,” I say, not really sure how to address Aerling soldiers while acting as their temporary commander. “Could everyone please move back from the Father? I need to be able to get close to him.”
Not a single one of the soldiers looks to Cedrick for approval or contradiction. They all take three steps back without question, still maintaining whatever they’re doing. I nod my thanks and Sloane and I step into the circle together. As soon as I do, I gasp in shock. If I thought the soldiers were using a lot of power, I was dead wrong. What they’re doing doesn’t even come close to comparing to the combination of Tāwhiri’s powerful bonds and the Father’s own compressed power.
Olivia warned me that this wouldn’t be easy, but only now do I truly understand what I’m up against. “I’m really going to need your help,” I whisper to Sloane.
Her head bobs slowly. “And maybe then some.”
I sure hope not, but we have to make the attempt either way. Olivia said I could do this. This isn’t the first time I’ve put almost blind faith in that girl, and I doubt it will be the last. I take in a deep breath and hold it for a second as Sloane’s power rushes into me. For once, I’m not immediately drawn in by her. I’m way too freaked out for that right now. The touch of her power does help me calm down and focus, which is a really good thing.
Shutting out everything else, I focus on Olivia’s instructions. Reaching inward for Tāwhiri’s power is strange. Sloane helps guide me to it, but using it is all on me. I try to do what Olivia said, feeling it, but it’s not working. She thought Tāwhiri divided up his power between her and Mason based on their own personal inclinations, but I don’t think she’s right. I can’t use Tāwhiri’s power the same way she did.
Olivia said she had to feel and understand the reason behind the Father’s captivity before she could even enter the room. When it came to manipulating Tāwhiri’s power, she again said she had to make an emotional connection behind her actions before it started to work. Sure, it worked for her, but her personality and abilities as an Escort support that. I’m not Olivia, and I can’t approach this exactly like she did.
Delving deeper into my own abilities and inner self, one word clues me in. Judge. Olivia was wrong about why she had to use Tāwhiri’s power differently than she felt Mason would. It’s not his power, it’s us. I let my focus slip away from Sloane and her power. My full concentration goes toward extending my power toward the bonds holding the Father hostage. The strange feel of Tāwhiri’s power is buffeted constantly by a sharper, more aggravated power beneath it.
I recognize the second power as the Father’s immediately. Its texture is abrasive, intent on causing harm. I don’t have to question his mot
ives or reasons, I know his basest desires are to consume power and rule over the other Aerlings. He’ll only give so much to protect them. His needs always come first. That is not something he can hide from me.
Understanding him more fully, I go back to Tāwhiri’s power, to the bonds squeezing the Father nearly to the point of breaking. Tāwhiri may not have had all the right answers. He may not have always made the best choices and led the Aerlings down the most correct paths. This, these bonds, the imprisonment of his own father…this was necessary. It was needed. He did what had to be done, and I can’t fault him for locking away this creature who only seeks to devour others.
As this surety settles over me, the bonds react to my presence. They don’t exactly loosen or soften, but they become more pliable under my touch. When I assert my will over them, pushing Tāwhiri’s power into them, cutting the links that bind him to the Aerling world and instead wrapping what remains more tightly around him, they do as I command. The Father is another matter altogether.
Everyone in the bizarre room reacts when the Father roars. His power blasts against the bonds, throwing me back into one of the Aerlings behind me. Sloane is ripped out of my grip by the blow, but she dives for me, reaching out and grabbing hold of me as another assault from the Father knocks me back down. Smacking my head against whatever the floor is made out of leaves me reeling for a few seconds. Sloane’s voice begging to know if I’m okay grounds me to this moment when all my mind wants to do is float away to something less terrifying.
“Are the bonds set?” Sloane demands. She’s practically screaming, and I can’t figure out why until I try to stand and gale force winds bash into me.
Back down on the ground, I shake myself and try to clear my head. “Almost,” I shout back. Hearing that, Sloane helps me up to my knees. It’s the best either of us can manage. The Aerling soldiers around us are trying to counteract the winds the Father is somehow managing to throw at us, but it’s painfully obvious that they’re about as effective as an umbrella in a hurricane.
Throwing her arms around my waist, Sloane presses herself to my back, increasing the contact and the amount of power she’s sharing with me. The rush of stability and comfort rolls over me like a blanket. The steadiness of her power and faith in me clears the last of the haziness left from hitting my head and lets me focus on what I’m doing.
Wrangling Tāwhiri’s power back under my control, I don’t have to force it to seek out the bonds around the Father. It’s as if the power is eager to help, to fix what it couldn’t before. The last of the bonds holding the Father to the Aerling world, to this weird room, snap in two and send everything into chaos.
The Father is incapable of directly hurting any of us, thanks to the bonds, but they aren’t enough to contain his power completely. I don’t know if anything will be. The loose power raging around the room doesn’t have to be directed at us to do damage. One of the Aerling soldiers is swept up in a gale and tossed out into the mists filling the room. A second later, another one goes flying.
Sloane is knocked off her feet, but she manages to throw up a shield before another Aerling soldier takes us both out. She’s lost contact with me, her power dropping away in an instant. Not only do I feel the loss immediately, I panic as the Father’s barrages increase to a deafening level. He’s getting completely out of control! I don’t know how to rein him back in. Without Sloane’s help, I know it’s impossible. I’m not strong enough. Not even close!
Too afraid to take my eyes off the Father, I reach behind me and grab hold of Sloane’s arm. Her power seeps into my hand, but it’s not enough and too slow to have any real effect. My eyes completely bug when I feel the bonds stretching, straining to keep hold of their prisoner. I have to do something fast or we’ll lose this battle.
Scrambling for a way to boost my power and Tāwhiri’s, I do the first thing I that pops into my head.
Sloane’s eyes snap open in surprise as my lips crash against hers. Half my attention is still on the Father, but even that starts to slip as Sloane forgets what she was doing and responds. Her shield falls away, but neither one of us notices the increase in the winds. Her desire to heal and help others reaches out to me. All the scars and aches left behind from Levi and Olivia and everything we’ve been through draw her in. My desire to see the truth and show others who they truly are and what strength they possess consumes Sloane in a single breath.
In the middle of it all is Tāwhiri’s power, begging for help. Sloane’s power wraps around mine in the most exquisite way. It fills in all the places where pieces have been torn away. Tāwhiri’s power sits patiently in between as mine rolls over Sloane’s to reassure her. Even though she has lost everyone else she ever cared about and has been passed over by the other Aerlings as inconsequential because her power is not as outwardly eye-catching as everyone else’s, she is an amazing person who deserves happiness and love.
This is what my power whispers to her as it passes judgment. As is does, our power swells, soaking up every ounce of power left in the room. The bonds holding the Father tighten, making him howl in pain and rage until he has used up the last of his strength and will. When everything is rung out of him, silence fills the space.
The vacuum of sounds and activity is disturbing. I pull away from Sloane even though I’d rather stay there with her until this is all over, and we both look behind us to where the Father is hunched over, beaten, broken. I don’t need my power to tell me the fight is over for good, but it reassures me anyway. I have never seen such an empty expression on a person’s face as I see on the Father’s in this moment.
“He has nothing left,” Sloane whispers. “Tāwhiri was the only person he cared about enough to make small sacrifices for. He’s gone now, even the prison he created for him is gone, and with it the last of his son’s power. He’s given up.”
It’s almost sad. Olivia told me how captivated she was with him when she first saw him. His strength and beauty are gone now. I get the feeling that his power is the only thing left to hold this husk of a god together, and he knows even that won’t be there to sustain him much longer. He is a god. One of the most powerful beings in this world, but that is exactly what finally broke him.
Before we left, Sloane asked what we will do with the power after Mason and Olivia take it away from those who are abusing it. I still don’t know the answer to that question, but I know they can’t keep it. If they do, they’ll end up just like this, consumed by it.
Chapter 30
Destroying Angel
(Olivia)
Snapping my power back to my body, I start hyperventilating. I can’t control it. Panic wraps its sticky hands around my throat and squeezes. Fighting against my seatbelt, I try to get my head down, breath slower, something! The screech of tires and sudden deceleration of the car only escalates my fear. I can’t even begin to process what’s happening around me because my vision is starting to go black.
I think I might have screamed when my hands are suddenly shoved over my mouth and nose if I could have taken a deep breath, but a moment later Mason’s voice begins to quell the panic. “Breathe into your hands, Olivia,” he begs. “You’ve got to calm down and tell me what the hell just happened.”
Vaguely, I wonder how he knew to make me put my hands over my face, but I’m more focused on the fact that it’s working. Eventually, my breathing slows and my numb and tingly fingers begin to warm from my breath and the blood finally reaching them again. It takes several minutes, but I fall back against my seat a while later, thankfully still conscious.
“Thanks,” I croak.
“You nearly scared me to death, Ollie! What happened?” Mason demands.
It’s not his tone that nearly sends me back into panic mode, but remembering what caused the attack in the first place. “I got too close,” I say as my breathing begins to escalate again.
Mason jumps in right away and presses both hands to my face. He pulls me in close, forcing me to focus. “Don’t freak out again, okay?”
He waits until I nod before continuing. “You got too close to what?”
“The Mother.”
That elicits a response. Mason hangs onto his control better than I did, but the sudden deflating of his body shows his shock. “Okay. Okay. We knew this would happen eventually.”
“But Hayden and Sloane aren’t back yet!” My head starts shaking back and forth, completely out of my control. “We can’t face her yet. We can’t. I don’t…we aren’t. We just can’t!”
Mason runs his hands through his hair slowly. “She may not come right away. We have no idea. She won’t run, though. I don’t think she’ll run.”
“Why not?” I ask. “She’ll do anything to save herself. We already know that.”
“Anything but lose a chance to gain more power,” Mason says. Sitting back against his seat, he sighs, deep and heavy. “She knows what Tū has been doing, what he’s planning. There’s no way she’ll pass up a chance to take his twin’s power. Imagine what that would do to Tū’s chance of defeating her.”
“There would be no chance for him,” I say.
“Exactly,” Mason says with another sigh. Scrubbing his hands through his hair, he stops halfway through the motion and pulls it in frustration. “She’s coming. We have to get ready, whether Sloane and Hayden make it back in time or not.”
My stomach drops at the thought of facing the Mother without them here. Not only do we need their moral support and the added bonus of their power to help contain her in whatever way we can, I have the feeling that we’re going to need the Father’s power if we have any hope of defeating her. The combination of the twins’ power and the Aerling-Escort bond will be more than I can even really wrap my head around, but the Mother has been sitting here on Earth since almost the beginning of the world, stealing Aerling children’s power as often as she can, drawing on the Earth’s power when she couldn’t, and hoarding everything she takes.
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