Chilled: Elemental Warriors (A Sci-Fi Alien Warrior Paranormal Romance)

by Ashley West

  “That’s his point, I guess,” Sadie replied with a shrug. “I make it hard for him to do that.”

  “That sounds like an excuse.”

  Sadie just gaped at him, not really sure what was happening. “Weren’t you the one telling him that I was a danger?” she demanded. “Weren’t you telling him that having me here was a bad idea? And now you’re saying this?”

  Overon shrugged. “He was happy. You don’t get it. Ithilir...we don’t really aim for happy. We don’t aim for love. We take what we can get, and we’re happy for it. We don’t change, we don’t branch out, we don’t travel. And most of us are fine with that. It’s just how things are, how they’ve always been. But coming here opened up something in Cullen. Something that was probably always there in him.”

  “Something you didn’t approve of.”

  “Something I don’t understand,” Overon corrected. “Doesn’t mean he had to stop doing it.”

  “Well, it’s too late for that now,” Sadie said. “He doesn’t want me anymore, and I’m leaving.”

  “That’s not a good idea, considering we only just got you back from K’varot. You think he won’t come looking for you again?”

  Sadie shrugged a shoulder. “That’s a risk I’ll just have to take.”

  She didn’t see Cullen again before she left. Tiama told her that he was in a healing sleep, repairing the damage that K’varot had done to him. Sadie remembered how he’d looked, so bruised and beaten in that bed, unable to even sit up without pain, and she felt guilt. It was her fault that had happened to him, and maybe Cullen had been right. Maybe this was for the best for everyone.

  “You won’t even say goodbye?” Tiama wanted to know. She, and Overon of all people, had offered to walk with Sadie back to her house. Hopefully it was still standing and not swarming with aliens by now. Hopefully K’varot wouldn’t send someone there to look for her.

  “He’s asleep,” Sadie pointed out. “What would be the point?”

  “You could wait until he wakes up.”

  She shook her head. Every moment she waited was a moment wasted. She had this vague hope that Cullen would wake up and have changed his mind, but waiting around for that only to have it not happen sounded like a brand of torture she didn’t want to deal with and didn’t think she could handle.

  “No,” she said. “This is better.”

  And so she went home. Her house was just as she’d left it before, plus more dust. It was empty and quiet and horrible. She hated being alone. She hated the silence. Here, she couldn’t hide from the fact that she’d failed Jasmine or that she missed Cullen or that she was terrified of being taken again.

  Here, all she had were the remnants of food she’d gathered before she’d been taken and what Tiama had left her with and the news.

  People were still missing, everyone was still afraid.

  Days passed like this, and Sadie thought she was going to lose her mind with boredom and discontent.

  And then, on the eighth day since she’d left the ship, something changed.

  The news had started a new program, where people could call in about sightings of aliens or any experiences they had. Apparently the idea was to make people feel less alone and to open the lines of communication and let people know that there were humans still out there, still fighting.

  On the evening news on the eighth day, someone called in to report that there was another kind of alien on Earth.

  “I don’t know what to say about them,” she said, sounding nervous. “But I don’t think they’re bad. They were fighting the big ones, you know. The ones with the trident things and the electricity? And they had weapons made out of ice of all things! Saved a whole block full of people.”

  And then the next night, the same thing happened.

  “I saw some of those ice guys today!” a man said excitedly. “Real huge, but they look like people. Froze one of those beast looking things right in his tracks and then shattered it. Never seen anything like it.”

  The calls started pouring in from people who had seen the Ithilir. Some told stories of being saved by them, rescued right when they were going to be killed or snatched up. Others seemed content to say they had just seen them, and how it made them feel safer.

  For the first time in nearly half a year, people had something that looked like hope.

  “Are these mysterious ice aliens here to help us?” asked the anchor on the eleventh night. “Or are they just weeding out the competition? It seems unlikely anyone will get close enough to ask.”

  Sadie hadn’t intended to say anything, to reveal what she knew, but she wanted to add to this hope. She wanted to do something to help.

  On the twelfth night, she called in.

  She explained who she was to the woman doing the call screening and was immediately put on the air.

  “And now we have a woman on the line who claims to have actually spoken with these ice aliens. What’s your name, ma’am?”

  “Sadie,” she replied. “And yes, I’ve heard all the Sadie Hawkins jokes before.”

  The anchor chuckled. “You’re claiming to have actually spoken with these aliens, is that correct?”

  “Yes, it is. And it’s not just a claim. It’s the truth.”

  “Will you tell us your story?”

  And so she began to tell them what had happened to her. She started with being captured by K’varot and being locked on his ship for days with no food and water. She told them how Cullen had come to her aid and how he’d kept her safe and then how K’varot had come to claim her again. She talked about the Ithilir being noble and strong and how they’d gone against their very nature to come here and save them.

  “They’ve promised to defeat him,” she said. “I’ve seen up close how well they fight, how strong they are. They’ll keep their promise and make things safe again. I know they will.”

  There was a moment of silence from the other end of the line. “Oh wow,” the anchor said. “You really did meet them. You spent time with them.”

  “That’s what I said,” Sadie pointed out.

  “No, just...wow.” He cleared his throat, and then looked back into the camera. “You heard it here, folks. Humanity may have some hope left. If you see one of these Ithilir, remember to thank them. Remember to root for them and the hope that we will survive this. I’m Carl Danson, signing off.”

  Knowing someone was fighting for them seemed to give the humans a new lease on life. The food scrounging that had dropped off with the killing of humans had picked up and people were actually going out of their way to help others again. Something in knowing that they weren't alone resuscitated their fighting spirit, and Sadie was proud of them all. It was like a slap in the face to K'varot, showing him that his terrorizing couldn't stop them from living and trying. They were more than just vermin.

  She got back into it, as well. Something told her that she probably wasn't going to see Jasmine again, and she let that hurt go for the moment, working to do what she could to help people instead. She found food, she used her welding skills to fix things, she helped people out of the city when enough was just enough for them.

  Several of them offered to take her with them, but she turned them all down. It was foolish, and Sadie was well aware of that, but she wanted to see this through until the end. She felt like there was unfinished business between her and K'varot and the Ithilir, and she'd been there from the beginning of it, so she wanted to be there until it was done.

  She didn't really believe in gods or higher powers, but she hadn't believed in aliens either until recently, so she started praying. She prayed for Cullen and his people, she prayed for her family, out there somewhere, hopefully still alive. She prayed for everything to work out and for K'varot to get his, which maybe wasn't something she was supposed to pray for, but oh well. It was for the good of everyone that he be taken down.

  Everyone was waiting with bated breath to see what was going to happen. Every night the news reported more and more sightings
of Ithilir, more of K'varot's minions defeated, more unrest growing. People were urged to stay in their homes if they could and to be safe if they couldn't.

  The tension grew and grew and grew, and everyone knew that it wouldn't be long before that bubble popped and the final showdown began.

  You could taste it on the air, you could hear it in the voices of the people who called in to the news at night. And Sadie urged them to keep believing. She called in every night and repeated her story for anyone who hadn't heard it yet. She tried to give them her faith in the Ithilir as much as possible. She urged them to keep their loved ones safe.

  Maybe she wouldn't ever see Cullen again after this. Maybe K'varot would kill him, or they would defeat the madman and then quietly go back to Fora. Maybe the last words she said to him were the last words she'd ever say to him, but that didn't stop her from believing in him and knowing that he and the rest of them wouldn't let them down.

  Chapter Fourteen: A Blizzard

  When Cullen woke up, it was to find out that his people had a plan. Apparently they'd discovered a fair amount of useful information while they'd been saving him from K'varot, and they'd used that to put together a working plan to take him down.

  He also found out that Sadie had left.

  He hobbled from his bed in the infirmary down to where she'd been sleeping, and everything was gone.

  "I walked her out myself," Overon said, coming up behind him.

  "That must have been a good day for you," Cullen replied, and his voice was frigid.

  "Cullen, it wasn't like that."

  "I don't care what it was like," Cullen said. And honestly, he didn't. Not right then. All he cared about was getting this taken care of. He'd promised Sadie that they would take down K'varot, and they needed to do it. They needed to make sure that he couldn't hurt anyone anymore and then go back to Fora.

  Maybe everything would be alright once they got back home. Maybe the emptiness inside of him would change into...he didn't know. Something that felt less bad than this.

  People kept trying to talk to him about Sadie, but Cullen kept brushing them off. He didn't want to talk about her, he wanted to talk about the plan.

  "It's going to take some time," Caelum said. "We need to be absolutely sure. I think the humans are starting to resist more than they were before, and I think the Yndri are getting impatient. K'varot made promises to them, and he's not keeping them, so far. If we can get them to turn on him..."

  "Then a lot of his power goes away," Cullen followed. "The Gilots and the rest of his army are mindless enough that we can get them to scatter once we take K'varot down. He might even manage that himself if he gets angry enough and starts abusing them."

  "So we're going to let him be his own downfall," Overon said, sitting back in his chair. "I like it."

  "And we're going to kill him," Cullen put in. Everyone turned their heads to look at him. "We don't have a choice," he said. "He's too dangerous." He knew most of them knew the reason why he wanted K'varot dead was because of what he'd done to Sadie, but whatever. The reason didn't matter. K'varot was too dangerous to leave alive, and Cullen knew the Prince would back him up on that.

  They started putting a dent in his army, patrolling every night and taking down any of his army that they saw. They saved humans, they gathered information, then sent people to safe places, making it harder for the Yndri or whoever else to find them. They were little things, an almost underground resistance, but it was going to make a large difference in the end.

  The end took everyone by surprise, honestly. One day, the patrols just seemed to slack off and they went for two full days without seeing anyone from K'varot's army, Gilot or otherwise. They hadn't killed them all, they all knew that, so K'varot must have pulled them back. Meaning he was either afraid or rallying for one final blow against them.

  Whichever one it was, they were ready. They went out in force, all fifty of them, armed to the teeth with weapons and their power, determination coursing through them.

  They marched through the streets, and where humans saw them they cheered. It was odd, Cullen hadn't expected that they would actually be treated as heroes in this strange place, but there it was. People were happy to see them and relying on them to make things better. It seemed like none of the Ithilir wanted to let them down.

  Somewhere out there was Sadie, and Cullen hoped that she still believed in them. He hoped that she knew that he was going to try his best to keep his other promises to her, even if she wasn't there at the moment. Even if they weren't together.

  K'varot's ship was just as they had left it the last time, though significantly less full than it had been before. They'd put a dent in his forces, and it pleased them to see that there was some kind of mutiny happening when they arrived.

  As per usual, they killed the guards.

  "Seriously, you'd think he'd try harder," Overon said.

  The rest of them shushed him.

  "I need more time!" K'varot was saying when they went in. The Yndri were clustered around him, and for the first time, K'varot seemed small.

  The shadowy Yndri seemed to take up more space than usual in their apparent anger, and they were staring K'varot down. Or they seemed to be. The lack of facial features made it hard to tell.

  One of them said something in an undulating hissing language none of the rest of them understood, and K'varot paled. "No," he said. "No. I'm still in control of this. I can turn this around. The Earth with break before me, and you can have what's left! I've promised you that."

  The hissing sounded more urgent this time, and K'varot shook his head. "Just a bit more time. My plan—”

  "Is really terrible," Cullen said, stepping out of the shadows.

  "You," K'varot said, narrowing his eye. "You came back. Didn't my army give you enough to contend with last time?" He tried to summon his usual air of flippancy, but it wasn't working. They could all tell that he was grasping at nothing.

  "It's done, K'varot," Overon said as he stepped forward. He looked to the Yndri and then motioned for Tiama. They'd all decided that she, as the one who was most likely to be able to hold her own against them, should be the one to speak to them.

  "He can't keep his promises to you," she said. "The humans were never under his control, and now they flock to us. They are under our protection, and we're here to kill him. So now would be the time to sever your alliance."

  They hissed amongst themselves for a moment and then turned back to Tiama.

  She smirked. "You can have him when we're done."

  And that seemed to be enough for them. They hissed loudly and then turned from K'varot, flooding into the back of the ship in a shadowy wave.

  "No!" K'varot shouted. "No! I will not be beaten! Not like this! You are nothing! Do you hear me? Nothing! I will not be cast aside. I will not be thrown away."

  Cullen stepped forward, his eyes hard and icy cold. "You have this coming," he said, and then began to fight.

  It was one of the harder fights of his life, honestly. He was still healing a bit, and K'varot was a formidable opponent in his own strength. But he was crazed and fighting wildly, swinging with a dagger that he pulled from his belt.

  He threw it, and Cullen ducked, and lashed out with one hand, sending a wave of ice to coat the floor. K'varot slipped and went down in a heap. Cullen stood over him, breathing hard.

  "It's over," he said, and then sliced forward with his blade, removing the madman's head from his body in one neat motion.

  Now it really was over.

  Chapter Fifteen: Thawed

  The fall of K’varot was actually quite anti-climactic when it came down to it. His own greed and poor planning had worked against him to such a stunning degree that the Ithilir hadn’t had to do much at all. They’d killed him, of course, and Cullen had taken a small degree of pleasure in beheading the bastard, and then let the Yndri had his remains.

  They’d been promised a planet, but the remnants of K’varot sufficed, and so they disappear
ed. Where to, no one could say, and Cullen knew the humans were wary to trust that they were just gone.

  Fora suffered a bit for their absence, not because of K’varot directly, but rather indirectly because they’d left and it turned out that the people who were best suited for protecting the icy planet with its Walled City were the people who could bend ice to their will. Prince Kalias had reached out to them, and so the return trip was scheduled.

  The thing that surprised Cullen and the others so much about it all was the reactions the humans gave them when K'varot fell. It was like they were heroes, being applauded and praised in the streets. Prince Kalias had contacted the heads of the governments of Earth and explained what had happened, and everyone was so grateful to them, rather than mistrustful.

  It felt odd to have another race be so pleased with them, and none of them knew quite what to do with it.

  It was a victory. A hard fought one that had taken too long to get to, costing people their lives, but a victory. In the grand scheme of things, it could have been much, much worse, and Cullen was proud of his people for what they had accomplished.

  Even if it was slightly hollow for him, they had done something great. Something they hadn’t been sure at all that they were going to be able to accomplish.

  "Are you going to mope around here until we leave?" Overon asked, leaning in the doorway while Cullen was performing a systems check on the ship. Everyone else had decided that this was a wonderful time to try out human spirits and had eagerly accepted and then ripped into a gift basket from the mayor of the city that had several bottles of something called champagne in it.

  "I'm not moping, Overon," Cullen said coolly. "I'm being productive."

  "You're not celebrating, so it's practically the same thing."

  Cullen ground his teeth together. The thing about Overon's sudden change in demeanor that made him angry was that it was too little too late. Suddenly he didn't think that humans were a plague or whatever, and he'd definitely been eying the pretty human woman who had delivered the gift basket to their ship. When Cullen did it, it was cause for concern and anger, but once it was alright, there were no consequences, apparently.