by Brea Viragh
He honestly had not thought his son stupid enough, surely not brave enough, to try and escape. Leo knew the consequences of disobeying. Orestes had made sure they were clear. There would be payment due.
He retrieved the fallen keys from the floor and made his way out of the Vault, slamming the door behind him with obvious relish. Let them decay down there. Once the equinox came and the elementals made their appearance, Orestes would be far beyond the rest of them.
The fourth Cavaldi girl…
The words slithered along his skin. Orestes cracked his neck on a growl and stopped just outside of the exit door
“What about her?” he asked the empty air.
I know where she is. Send your weapon.
He stared at the cocoon in which he’d imprisoned the less than agreeable Zelda Vuur, the head of the Great Lakes Fire Elementals. The floor outside of the Vault was made of wood. His element. Orestes was able to manipulate carbon and silica molecules and once he realized Zelda was attempting to betray him, he’d reacted. She had no chance to retaliate before he’d fashioned a cage from the wood and trapped her inside with enough air to breathe but not enough to conjure her fire. The same wards used on the Vault he utilized there. Keeping her locked inside.
Issuing an order to keep others away from the Vault was child’s play. What good was his hard-won status if not to use his commanding presence for self-gain?
“I can’t send Zelda out there. The moment I break the enchantment on her, she’ll attack. There’s no way for me to control her,” Orestes said, considering. “If I let her loose she will use her magic against me. She’ll never willingly follow orders. Not anymore. We’ve parted ways, you could say.”
He ran his fingers along the wooden shell, one of his more ingenious creations. One he’d never have accomplished without the help of his Dark Lady. She’d given birth to the idea in his head split seconds before he’d implemented it. Resourceful. Clever.
Are you sure there’s no way? There is a mental dominant upstairs, is there not?
The mental dominant! Rare witches and wizards with the capability to manipulate minds. Orestes could have slapped himself. How could he have forgotten? He should have never doubted his companion. The shadow watching out for him. Always over his shoulder.
“How will I get Zelda to the girl?” he mused, liking the plan more and more. “I still haven’t been able to locate her. We don’t have time to search every street corner.”
Leave it to me.
Yes, he knew. He could leave it to her and know it would be done. The closer to the eclipse, the stronger she became. Soon she would walk next to him as they ushered in a great era of change. Tip the balance in his favor.
Orestes stomped to the elevator with a smile on his face. When he got to his floor, he called out. “Kelsi!”
Leo watched his father retreat and tried to come to terms with his failure. Maybe it was true what everyone said. No one escaped the Vault.
I have to find a way.
He was trapped beneath the earth, ironic since his power stemmed from it, and there was only one person who could let him out. The same person who put him there. Leo looked up at the walls of his prison.
“So much for your escape,” came Zee’s weary voice. “I’m sorry it didn’t work out for you.”
“I’ll try again,” Leo insisted.
“Don’t bother. It’s useless.”
Wincing in pain, Leo summoned the rest of his mental facilities to think of a suitable Plan Z. It was a desperate task ahead of him, he knew, but without a plan, he really would be nothing but a failure.
CHAPTER 15
Nasira kept her eyes on the cracked sidewalk and tried to shut out the drone of voices inside her head. The ones telling her she wasn’t good enough. She never would be good enough, no matter what she did or how hard she tried. It wasn’t possible to measure up.
The rest of her accomplishments faded into haze until all she could focus on was today. This moment. Clenching her fingers and squeezing her eyes shut trying to summon even a shred of what she saw in her sister’s when they conjured.
There must be something wrong with her.
She was no Cavaldi. She didn’t even deserve to be called a Khepri, because surely her mother would be ashamed of her. How could she ever go home and try to swallow the indignity?
If her grandmother were alive, she would disown Nasira. It was simple.
The city tore past her as she tried to clear her mind and found the negative and the positive profoundly intertwined. Her own tiny voice tried to pipe up that yes, she was good enough, otherwise she wouldn’t have been able to accomplish half of the awesome things she’d done. Then it was promptly crushed under the doubt.
Footsteps sounded behind her and in seconds Brock had caught up. His breath heaved out. “You don’t know what you’re doing,” he said, winded.
Nasira hiked her bag over her shoulder and tightened her grip on the handle. Kept walking. “Sorry, I don’t remember asking you for your opinion. Keep them to yourself.”
“Whatever is going on with you, running away isn’t going to solve anything. The best thing you can do is go back and talk this out. You aren’t acting like you.”
Nasira scratched the side of her head, noting her double shadow. Hers and another, hovering just above it. She blinked and the image was gone. For a brief instant, the doubt was replaced by a wave of fear.
No, she was letting the stress get to her head. Her mind was playing tricks on her eyes. There wasn’t some ancient entity stalking her, waiting for the right moment to strike, getting stronger by the day. She was letting her imagination get carried away by a story.
And really, if there was some gigantic good versus evil battle royal headed their way, she didn’t want to be around to experience it. The repetitive declarations in her head was adamant. It was time to go. Her place was at home.
“I needed a walk, Brock,” she insisted. “It’s the only way I’m going to clear my mind and get these voices to silence.”
He grabbed her arm, staring down at her and searching her face. “Voices?”
“It’s nothing. Leave me alone, okay? Go do something else and let me be. It’s what you’re good at.” The dig felt good. Her feet couldn’t keep still and she broke his hold on her, heading away from the house.
Instead of making a show of trying to hold her, Brock caught up and laced his arm through hers so that they were connected at the elbow. “Honey, I’m not going to take offense. Not when you look spooked.” He pried her fingers away from her bag and took it, transferring the weight to his other hand.
“It’s stupid,” she insisted. “I don’t feel like myself and I know if I stay in the house it isn’t going to get better. I was hoping a walk and some fresh air would get me back to normal, because right now I feel pretty strongly about going home. In fact, it sounds amazing.”
“I think a walk is a good idea. As long as you aren’t trying to run away.” He shook the bag. “This says otherwise.”
“I’m trying to keep my options open.”
“I can see,” Brock said.
The more they walked, the more time Nasira had to get her heart rate to settle down. To calm her frantic pulse and pull herself into the role she played best. The knowledgeable nurturer. It didn’t come fast and it didn’t come easy.
“You remember the night my grandmother died, and you walked me home from school because I couldn’t think straight?” she asked, clinging to the memory.
Brock shuddered. “I’m not likely to forget. You were out of your mind. Screaming and crying. You fell over a couple times and I had to pick you up.” He pictured it. “Is that how you feel now? You can tell me if you’re up to it.”
Brows drawn together, Nasira stopped and looked at him. “This is worse. It’s like there’s a second voice in my head telling me what a failure I am. No matter what I say to the contrary or how I try to block it out, it gets stronger and stronger. I want to lash out even when I know i
t’s not the right thing to do.”
“Maybe it’s Bast,” he replied, trying to be optimistic when every instinct was telling him to scoop her close and never let her go. Take her somewhere safe and stand over her, prepared to fight anyone who challenged him.
“Maybe,” she said hesitantly. “It’s like the voice is me but not. It could be her.” She wasn’t sure.
He gave her a smile. “There you go. Maybe she’s testing you, to see how strong you are. Whether you’re prepared to handle whatever happens.”
“Why wouldn’t she just tell me, then?”
“Beats me. I have no clue what makes mythical beings tick. I’m just here to look pretty.”
He was rewarded with a brief, flashing smile. “Apparently. Your advice leaves little to be desired. You’re useless.”
“Careful. A few more jabs like that and you’re going to hurt my feelings. You’re almost sounding like yourself again.”
She shoved away from him with a scowl. Her feet stumbled back and she heard the crunch of leaves. When she finally tuned into her surroundings the street was gone, trees and grass in its place.
“Ummm? Brock?”
He tore his attention away from her face. Was shocked when he realized where they were. They both stood in silence for a long minute, staring at the sky and listening to the wind whistle through tree branches. “Nasira, is it possible to be enthralled in a conversation to the point where you look up and realize you’re in an entirely different place? Or did we just happen to walk the many, many miles out of town and end up in the woods?”
Her hands went in the air and she slapped them down on her cheek. “No. No, no it’s not possible. What the hell is happening?” She repeated the question once more on a scream before she urged herself to quiet.
“Calm down. There has to be a plausible explanation.”
“For what? Spontaneously appearing in a forest? Oh my god, where are we?” Nasira spun around in a circle staring at nothing but trees.
“It’s fine. I’ll pull up the GPS on my phone and we can go from there.” Brock patted his pockets, then dropped her bag to the ground and pawed through the contents. “Okay, it seems I left my phone back at the house and you didn’t pack one.”
“This isn’t the time to be funny.”
“I’m not trying to be funny. It’s a fact.”
Focus, she told herself. Concentrate. Try to look at the clues in front of them and go from there. Her breath quickened and the tip of her tongue ran along her teeth. At once her mind was blank. It was a hell of a time for the voices to go away! Maybe she could have asked them where they were.
The woods around them smelled fresh. It held a peace and serenity full of sweet, tangy scents and the chirps of songbirds. Through the trees to the east, the sky filled with fluffy white clouds.
On any other day she would have sat and admired the scene. Found tranquility in the peace and used it to focus. Today there was only panic. More mystical bullshit she didn’t feel prepared to handle.
The rosy light filtered down through the limbs toward the forest floor. Small sprigs of violets burst through the mossy ground, little pops of color among the budding green as spring filled the air. There were robins perching, squirrels searching for their next meal, the important businesses that came with the burgeoning warm weather.
A twig snapped behind them and Nasira caught a flash of red. Her heart gave a single hard thump before she realized it was hair. Hair flowing over petite shoulders. People. People meant civilization! Wherever they were, it wasn’t some godforsaken place in the middle of nowhere.
Brock caught sight of the woman then and let out a breath. “See?” he told Nasira, rising and dusting off his pants. Dried leaves clung stubbornly to the material. “Let’s ask for directions. I’m man enough to admit when I’m lost.”
Nasira was too steps ahead of him. She jogged across the greenspace. “Miss! Hello, I’m sorry interrupt whatever it is you’re doing. We’re not sure where we are.”
The woman hunched her shoulders, hands in her pockets, and made no move to answer them. The tiny hairs on the back of Brock’s neck stood to attention and his skin prickled the closer they got to her.
Something wasn’t right about this, beyond the obvious fact that they’d been transported out of town and neither one of them had noticed. That he stuffed down, determined to deal with later, when he could probably lose his mind.
The niggling uncertainty he’d felt since they left the house doubled, then tripled, until he was sure Nasira needed to get away from the strange woman. Immediately.
He reached out and took her by the arm to stop her. “I don’t think this is a good idea,” he murmured.
She gave him a look that said he was being ridiculous. “You have to be shitting me.”
“I have a bad feeling.”
“Tell it to someone else. We’re lost and there’s a person to talk to. The only one we’ve seen so far, and without you coming up with a better idea…” She huffed out a breath and squared her shoulders. Breaking his hold easily. Letting her last statement hang. “Stay here. Excuse me, Miss.”
The woman whirled around with wide eyes. Nasira opened her mouth to speak again when a rush of fire breezed past her. She felt a searing pain in her hand and stumbled forward, struggling with the shock. Struggling to understand what was going on. When she glanced down at her arm there was a streak of bright pink skin with black blistered edges. The agony of the burn registered seconds later.
“What—”
Brock pulled her back in time to avoid a second round of fire blasting across the clearing at them. They crouched on the ground next to an oak tree and Nasira lowered her gaze to the stranger’s hands. Pulsating with magic and aimed directly at them.
Like something out of a dream—or a nightmare, more like—the woman had materialized in front of them. A menacing threat in a petite body.
Nasira smelled blood and it conjured images of injured animals, the hundreds she’d helped since receiving her doctorate. She did all right then. Human blood was a different story.
“I’m sorry.” The stranger finally spoke.
She might look like a fairy from a story book, but the woman had a voice like a serious drinker waking up from a two-week bender. Gruff, husky, deep.
Slowly, Nasira peeked around the tree trunk to stare at her attacker. Her face paled and a wave of cold washed along her spine followed by alarm. “I don’t know what’s going on!” she exclaimed. “Who are you?”
The stranger yelled and another round of magic came shooting out of her hands. In one fluid motion, Brock dived and took Nasira with him, rolling them out of the way. The tree exploded in a shower of wood and sparks.
He swung his arm out to break their fall.
When her head stopped spinning, she saw Brock hauling her to her feet. “We need to get out of here,” he was saying. “Now!”
She watched his lips move and barely made out what he said. Her skin prickled with a run-while-you-have-the-chance feeling.
“Stop!” the woman called out to them.
“Like we’re going to listen to you, you psycho!” Brock’s fingers fell on the small of Nasira’s back and he urged her to move. Something slowed them down, like they were walking through knee-deep water.
Nasira shook her head and covered her ears, feeling dirt on her skin. The angry burn on her hand throbbed in time with her pulse.
Then, against her better judgement, she slowed to a stop. Brock felt the last of his hopes for escape plummeting toward the earth. “What are you doing?”
This is a death sentence, her mind warned. You clearly demonstrated you don’t have magic. How do you think this will end?
Nasira turned and her eyes narrowed dangerously. “You don’t want to do this.”
The redheaded woman’s arms jerked. “I…do…” she managed through teeth ground together hard enough to shatter. On a cry she released a wave of magic. It shot across the space separating them in a single blaz
e of pure hot fire.
Nasira leapt out of the way and narrowly missed singing off the ends of her hair. She landed hard on the ground and rolled into a safer position, coming up on her knees.
“Who the fuck are you, lady?”
Zelda.
The voice echoed in her head. By nose, Nasira knew better than to question it.
“Zelda, stop!” she tried pleading. “You don’t know me, but I don’t want to hurt you. Whoever sent you, maybe we can sit and talk rationally about what’s going on.”
Zelda cricked her upper half to the side, her head tilted like she was listening to something far off. Something no one else could hear. Her mouth moved. “He…wants you.”
“Who does?”
“Orestes.”
There was enough hatred in that one name to make one thing clear. Zelda was being controlled. Someone off site was pulling the strings. Who—or what—had that kind of power?
Another round of fire shot across the clearing and took out a grove of sapling oak trees.
“Nasira, let me handle this.” Brock stepped in front of her. “I can protect you.”
Zelda let a plume of fire erupt in her palm, wrapping it around her wrist and swinging it above her head. A burning lasso.
“No, I don’t think you can!”
He stared at the lasso, the heat burning his eyes and threatening to blister his skin. “I can try.”
“This isn’t your kind of fight, Brock. There’s nothing you can do. You want to help? Run. Like you said. Run!” Her body reacted on instinct. She heaved herself forward and dropped, stretching her arms and fingers. The blow missed her by inches.
“Oh, but it’s yours?” he exclaimed loudly. Trying to rush toward her and finding he couldn’t move fast enough. The spurts of fire forced him to duck and weave. To stop on a dime unless he wanted his eyebrows burned off.
“I’m the witch here. I can do things you can’t.” She had to believe it. Otherwise they were sitting targets waiting to be burned alive. Protectiveness rose until Nasira was filled with a fierce desire to reverse their roles. Brock might have been sent with her on this journey to be her guardian but now, she would make sure he lived to see his daughter again.