Elemental Damage: Confessions of a Summoner Book 2

by William Stadler

  Each of them had nestled up next to one another underneath the table that held the Tiffany lamp. They hadn’t so much as opened an eye when Carter had come in.

 

  I asked.

 

  The very thought of that caught me off guard, and I was about to rebut it, but suddenly I realized that Rebekah might just be onto something. The look in Carter’s eyes when Zakhar had been after us—that sheer, manic rage—that had come upon him because Zakhar was trying to kill us. And it had been the same fury I’d seen in him when Stephanie had been killed back at the warehouse on Yonkers Rd.

  Aggression and anger did not go hand in hand. Bears were aggressive, not necessarily angry. Anger meant something more, something deeper, a sense of injustice. The anger Carter felt, the rage that surged in him, it had only seemed to come up whenever someone he apparently cared about was threatened. Most other times, he was just nonchalant, apathetic.

  I said.

  Rebekah fell silent.

 

 

  I asked.

 

  That made me blush, which was awkward, because I knew Rebekah could tell. Fortunately, she didn’t mention it. I asked her.

 

  I asked.

 

  I got up from the couch and did a long, exaggerated stretch.

  The goblins had set up a laptop with three monitors on the kitchen table, so I sat down, figuring I’d do some internet surfing. Of course, Umara’s computer was password locked, but she had been kind enough to allow for guest entry, which I selected without qualms.

  The Windows screen did that intro song that we all know and love, and icons began popping up all over the desktop with a surfer riding a ten-foot wave. I went to Firefox and straight to Google, figuring I’d check out some more information about this neurologist.

  Rebekah asked.

 

  Rebekah said.

  I pecked at the keys until images of an eighty-year-old Ethiopian woman with deep, golden skin appeared on the right pane. Her head was wrapped in a yellow and black African scarf that matched her boubou, and she was sitting at a desk displaying the countless books she’d published.

 

 

 

  I shrugged.

 

  I said, clicking on her Wikipedia entry—the Encyclopedia Brittanica of the modern age.

 

 

 

 

  she said.

 

 

 

  she said, continuing her redundancies.

  I didn’t humor her this time.

  she asked.

 

 

  I shook my head.

 

  I asked.

 

 

 

  I rubbed my forehead.

 

  I said.

 

  I leaned back in my chair, rustling my hair, drawing in my thoughts, thousands of them at once. Feral thoughts, sinister thoughts, kind thoughts, brilliant thoughts, reeling in each of them one by one.

  My body began to transform, my bones softening, my cheeks sagging and wrinkling. A few parts that shouldn’t have been there retracted, while others protruded. I shrank in height, and my eyesight grew unnaturally blurry. I couldn’t even make out the words on the webpage. Paresthesia seemed to be in every part of me like tiny sparks, and I couldn’t get used to it. And this paresthesia was worse. It was constant, like there was some weird current flowing all through my body.

 

 

 

  Rebekah snapped.

  I sat there, pensive, recalling past loved ones of Dr. Ubala’s. The recent passing of her sister. The sadness of her brother Mbayo moving down to the Congo. The lingering disappointment that she’d accomplished so much, but didn’t have a family of her own.

  The emotions weren’t all sad though. Especially not with the acceptance of her twin nieces into Cambridge University on full scholarships or her brother’s son’s decision to serve in Swaziland helping out the AIDS victims there. And to know a person, I had to figure out both what made her happy and what made her sad.

  She was trying to do a northern accent. Not one of her strong suits.

  Even in the obelisk, my voice sounded strange, since it wasn’t my own. It was aged and strong and wise.

&nbs
p;

 

 

  I decanted back to myself, not really liking how foreign my voice sounded to me.

 

 

 

 

  Rebekah asked.

  I nodded.

  Rebekah busted out laughing.

  I said, not sharing a laugh with her. It was odd. In my head, I knew that what Rebekah was saying was funny, but there was still some part of Dr. Ubala lingering in me, so it made me feel like she was mocking my life’s work. Another reason Decanters are not shapeshifters.

  She was still snickering.

 

 

  I shrugged.

  One of the bedroom doors opened, and I shut the laptop in a hurry. It wasn’t even like I wasn’t supposed to be on it, but something about the opening door and the night and the information about Dr. Ubala, it just made me jumpy on the inside.

  “You’re still up?” Umara patted her mouth, yawning, fairy dust sparkling to the floor.

  The dust is back. “I did go to sleep, if that’s what you’re asking.”

  “I see you’ve been online. Find anything interesting?”

  I rubbed my sweaty palms on my bare legs, though the Semblance still showed me wearing navy shorts and a gray shirt. “Maybe.”

  Umara looked surprised, like she hadn’t been expecting a straight answer and that she’d only been making small talk. “Okay. Shoot.”

  “Ever heard of a woman named Dr. Belin Ubala?” I turned around in my chair to face her.

  “Name sounds familiar. Should I know her?”

  “Possibly. She was apparently a big deal neurologist who passed away a few years ago.”

  Umara shook her head. “Not ringing a bell.”

  “Anyway, I met her a few years ago, decanted her, you know…” I rolled my hand around a few times like what I was saying was common for Decanters to do. “Turns out, Stephanie knows about her and even went as far as to say that my reputation precedes me in relation to this woman.”

  “I’m not sure why that’s important.” Umara blinked poignantly a few times.

  “Me neither, but apparently there’s a book out there called The Elemental Mind written by Dr. Ubala, claiming that—”

  “People can be mind-controlled,” Umara said, finishing my sentence. “Yes, I’ve read the book several times. Didn’t know it was written by a woman though. Must have been a penname, because the author of the book was Dr. Mbayo Ubala.”

  Her brother, I recalled.

  “The woman’s arguments were flawed though,” Umara noted, clearing her throat. “She used several variables in her calculations. Six to be exact. Five of them made sense, but the sixth…not so much. And because the sixth variable couldn’t be determined, neither could the other five, meaning that the equation had no solution.”

  “Or varying solutions,” came a voice from the living room. Stephanie rubbed at her eyes, apparently only get a little bit of rest herself. “The G variable—the one that appears that it can’t be determined—I’ve heard it said that this variable has multiple solutions, meaning that it’s in a constant state of flux.”

  Umara observed her as I had before, with a “how could you know something like that” look, though she kept her opinion to herself. “Lyle says you brought up this doctor in relation to him. Any reason why?”

  “When I worked for Anton LaCastro,” she said, “he mentioned Lyle a few times. It wasn’t until I came to North Carolina that I actually got to meet the man behind the fame. Seems like the Fairy Godfather is looking for you.”

  I eyed her from my seat. “And what does he want with me?”

  “Had you asked me that before Zakhar came to Raleigh, I would have had no idea. But…I get the feeling that this Shaman is here specifically to find you.”

  “Doubt that,” I said. “He tried to kill me, remember? And if he wanted to find me, he could have just nabbed me at my apartment. But he didn’t.”

  Stephanie sighed. “Mmm, I guess.”

  “Anyway,” I said. “We can’t just stay here. If we’re going to find this Shaman, we probably should make a move pretty soon. I know he doesn’t know that we’re here, but sooner or later, he might figure it out. And we might not be so lucky.”

  “Lyle’s right,” Umara said. “The three of us can go. Carter should probably stay here and rest up.”

  I frowned at that, but I didn’t speak up. They didn’t need to know that Carter had been up already and that he’d been out on the prowl. “I agree.”

  CHAPTER

  THIRTEEN

  Morning came and, choosing not to freak everyone out, I decided to do my Decantercises on the back porch patio. Since the porch was closed in and faced the woods, I wasn’t concerned that someone would see me, more for their sake than my own. More than once I’d witnessed people pass out who’d seen me spilling into other forms.

  Decanting back to myself, I heard the sliding glass door open. It was Carter in rare form. Clean and washed. Hair straight and all. Well, as straight as it could be, considering that he didn’t have a comb and that he’d probably just raked his hands through it. He wasn’t even wearing tattered clothes, but he’d showered up and cleaned off all the blood. That was a first.

  He had on a blue long-sleeve shirt under a black shirt sporting a chest-sized print for Sharknado—some ridiculous movie that grabbed a cult following because of how unbelievable it was. I mean a tornado/hurricane thing throwing sharks on land and killing people? C’mon. Really?

  What sucks about the movie was that Rebekah wasn’t around to watch it, since she was in the obelisk, and so she had this thing for making me watch movies and literally describing everything that was happening. Everything.

  Do you know how may times I’ve seen My Best Friend’s Wedding? “Wishing and hoping and praying.” Yeah, that’s exactly what I do every time she asks me to stream that stupid, idiotic movie on Amazon Instant Video. And yes, I know that’s redundant. Whatever.

  And here’s the thing. Keep in mind that I hadn’t ever seen Carter even attempt to care about his appearance. Rebekah said that he’d tidied up for a date they’d gone on, but I hadn’t been around to see that. This is my roommate Carter I’m talking about. The one who eats people and doesn’t use a toothpick to pluck the hanging meat out from between his incisors. Yeah, that Carter. But I’m telling you as clearly as I’m sitting here that he actually looked like a decent human being…decent vampire being, I mean. Can’t believe you’re pretending to even care about this.

  “Up early,” Carter said.

  “Gotta’ be.” I was a little out of breath with all of the transformations. “How else can I keep from weirding out everybody inside?” I thumbed to the door.

  He tossed a green plastic disc up, then tossed it under the charcoal grill.

  “What’s that?” I asked.

  “Broken Frisbee driver disc. Ain’t good for nothin’ now.”

  I knuckled my nose. “I didn’t know you played Frisbee golf.”

  “Lotta’ thangs you don’t know about me. Far as these ole discs go. Crave it like I cra
ve m’food.” His tone grew more serious. “What you saw last night, that wasn’t me. Not the new me.”

  I waved him off. “Ah, forget about it.” Though, I couldn’t cast out the brutal image of him mutilating all those people.

  “No,” he grunted. “You need to know. I made a promise to the lil’ lady. And breakin’ promises, that ain’t me.”

  I nodded, kicking my leg to loosen it up. “What are you going to do about it?”

  “Nothing. Can’t. What’s done is done. But I’m turning over a new leaf.”

  And that was all he said. The sliding glass door opened, and he was on his way back inside.

  “Carter?”

  He turned to face me.

  “Can I ask you something?”

  “Ya’ just did.”

  “Something else, I mean?”

  He sniffed and shut the door, waiting for my question.

  “You showed me that newspaper clipping of you a few years ago—the one after you were bitten. But you never said what happened.”

  “Ya’ never asked.”

  “I didn’t think you wanted to tell me.”

  He leaned against the glass, arms folded. And when he started to speak, I noticed something I hadn’t ever seen before. His teeth were flat. Not fanged like normal, but flat.

  “Know what I found out?” he said. “People see fangs and blood and they listen. But they don’t listen from here.” He pounded a fist on his heart twice. “They just wanna’ do whatever it’s gone take to make sure they don’t end up on my plate.”

  “And you think that’s our fault?” I hope he didn’t take my candidness for being too forthright, but he had to admit, a lot of the intimidation that he exuded, it was mostly—if not all—his own doing.

  Strangely, he owned up to it. “Nah, it ain’t y’alls’ fault. It’s mine. I’m the one with the fangs. What’s that sayin’? The one with the gun makes all the rules? Well that’s me.”

  “Doesn’t put you on the favorites list in anybody’s phones, you know.”

  He snorted. “Those lists ain’t ‘bout nothin’ no way. A buncha’ fake friends pretendin’ to be real. I bet you there ain’t nary a one of’em that’ll pick up the phone if ever you was in a bind.”