Grounded

by Constance Sharper

  Avery flailed, unable to stay still. The wind pelted them, tearing at them from every direction. Mason held her tightly but the plummet dropped them to the ground at a breakneck speed. The ground approached in a spiral of green and only when the tops of trees were clearly visible did Mason readjust his wings. Opening them wide, he tilted until the wings slowed their fall like a parachute had opened. Avery couldn’t grasp which way was up. Still coming in fast, they ripped through the canopy of trees.

  Twigs slapped them and branches tore at their skin. Avery barely felt the burning of impact with her eyes glued on the rapidly approaching ground.

  Mason’s wings beat and they slowed, but the landing was still crippling. Mason’s knees bent to take the brunt of impact but they hit the dirt hard anyways. Avery went sprawling away from him. Hitting the ground, she rolled. For half a second, the world was a blur of brown and green of forestry and she blinked to clear up her vision.

  “What was that?” She demanded of him as soon as she was able to speak. Mason could have killed them.

  “Sorry.” He made a genuinely remorseful face, and added. “But we need to be on the ground to fight. You can’t compete in the sky.”

  His voice came with the ill reminder and Avery finally turned her eyes back on the surroundings.

  By the looks of the rural area, they’d made it out of the city but not by much. Certainly not far enough to be close to harpie island. This wasn’t good. They couldn’t be expected to fight every step of the way.

  Avery stood quickly, muscles tensing. Darkness stole the visual advantage and she stared down all the shadows collecting between the trees.

  “What did Eva see?” She demanded of Mason, vaguely aware of his position.

  Mason never answered. A figure dropped down from the trees and suddenly landed nearby with a heart stopping pop. Avery whirled to find Eva again. The harpie woman brandished a knife by her side and held it ready.

  Avery’s breath caught in her chest. Her eyes connected with Mason’s and he reached out for her hand. She greedily clenched it. The Willow magic hummed between them, spiked by anxiety but also red flagging their position to the world.

  “Where?” She asked initially.

  “And how many?” Mason seconded Avery’s question.

  Eva’s eyes flashed with something dark and dangerous. The woman scanned the scenery making Avery follow her gaze. They stood in a small forest clearing. The thickets of trees made it easy for anyone to hide. The sky was dark and cloudy, the rain trickling down. Combined with the natural noises of a forest, any snap or crackle wasn’t clear. They couldn’t have picked a more disadvantaged spot if they’d tried.

  “All of them.” Eva said after an agonizing moment. “We’re not leaving, Mason. Here is where we have to make our stand.”

  Avery’s jaw dropped.

  “No way. We can’t fight all of them alone. Not here.” She made a wild and desperate gesture to the surroundings.

  Mason squeezed her hand and gathering Avery’s attention, pressed a single finger firm to his lips. Then they heard it. Footsteps cracked over the ground. Except the distortion in the sound made it difficult to pinpoint to one location. It sounded like the footsteps came from everywhere.

  Mason suddenly used his grip on Avery to twist her, spinning her to face the opposite side of the forest. They pressed their backs together.

  Avery spotted the harpie first. A bulky male appeared at the edge of the woods that she faced. The spilt second he was spotted, the harpie rushed forward. Avery summoned the magic from her chest in a sudden burning sensation and held her hands out. The harpie must have seen it and darted to the left, a weak attempt to come at Avery’s side. Mason moved first and disallowed this. Upper arm making contact with the attacking harpie’s chest, Mason stopped the harpie’s charge. The harpie dropped back, attempting to get away but that’s when Avery was on him.

  She sprung for the back of his wings-- the most open and vulnerable position, and let out a crippling shock of magic. The attacking harpie went down. The scene never calmed. In the moment it had taken them to stop the first attacker, more Band members had surfaced in the clearing. Avery whirled, ready to face them, but then her eyes actually scanned the faces. There were at least ten Band members to every one of their group. And a few had already started in on Eva.

  Eva was a skilled fighter-- it showed in every slide, stab, and block she did. But there were too many. The harpie woman kept letting out a screech of rage every time another Band member succeeded in landing a hit. Ripped feathers soared in the air.

  Avery couldn’t help. Another Band member came at her. The magic flowed through her blood perfectly but it did little when the harpie lashed out with his talons. Avery couldn’t get a grip on him to use the magic, but the harpie’s talons made contact with her. The razor sharp claws grazed Avery’s collarbone.

  The swift motion didn’t sink in at first and feeling nothing, Avery corrected her posture and fell into a crouch. He came at her again. Avery readied herself. When he built up a charge with his talons out, she waited. Then, an inch before he’d make contact, she twisted to the side. He blew passed her, barely making grazing contact. Suddenly behind him, she used the opportunity to go for his wings. Just as her fingers made contact with the rough feathers, he spun. The massive size of wings spinning threw Avery off balance. She hit the dirt and slid on her backside. Band members appeared at each side. She scrambled to stand but a sudden pain struck her.

  She glanced down, for the first time noticing the thick, hot crimson covering her shirt. One of the attacking harpie’s had made contact, but until that moment, she never knew to what extent. Three deep red gashes covered her chest from collarbone to shoulder. Open and bleeding, they stung with a fiery burn.

  Avery gasped, choking. Her mind had blanked and left only one thought in her mind: she needed to get out.

  Her opening came quickly. Mason slid by, fighting with one of the Band members. Leaning up and calling out, Avery summoned him. Mason dropped the first harpie and ran over. The others were close behind but Mason held up his hands in warning. Avery staggered to her feet and Mason slammed their backs together again. They all had been taught well to stay out of direct contact with Avery and Mason, and that could be used as an advantage.

  Avery’s eyes darted.

  Two down, at least twenty left. The majority attacked Eva, invisible from where she stood, but audible with the violent sounds of battle. Five more stood around them. Five too many. They couldn’t keep fighting like this. Mason voiced the thoughts.

  “Avery, we have to run. Leave Eva, they’ll follow us.” He said.

  “Right.” She answered.

  Sucking in a breath, she steeled herself and went for it. Running forward, she charged two harpies.

  The harpies readied themselves, but quicker with the magic, Avery made a grazing contact. The tiny shock didn’t down them but made them move. Escape path wide open, Avery kept running. With Mason, she fled.

  Twenty-Five

  “Come on, Avery, we have to move.” Mason’s hurried words broke through her daze.

  Avery looked up and blinked at him. They had been running, fleeing through the forest with the Band’s most vicious harpies on their tail. Eva had long been left when they broke through the tree line. Avery let out a desperate breath.

  “I am moving.” She snapped, picking up the pace.

  Blood pounding in her ears, she could just hear the furious footsteps behind them. The darkness had allowed them a head start but it wasn’t much of one.

  Mason guiding her, they turned into another open field. Down a short hill sat a building. Once it might have been a construction base or a lumber warehouse but now it resembled charred remains from a fire. With scorched black walls and a halfway collapsed roof on the east side of the building, the structure had clearly taken a beating.

  “There.” Mason suddenly said. “Roof cover. It’ll make it harder to attack us from all sides.”

  He
r eyes flittered to the skies. Tiny silver darts took to the air, and though her vision grew blurry, Avery recognized them.

  “The sky.” She gasped. “Harpies.”

  Mason’s eyes finally connected with hers and his brow knotted.

  “Come on, Avery.” His voice twisted with some indiscernible emotion. “Only a little bit farther.”

  They started down the hill when the harpies came from the sky. Mason swung out first, the violent motion forcing Avery to let go of him. She collected herself and stood. That’s also when the harpies from behind caught up. They broke into the clearing. Avery whirled but wasn’t fast enough. One came straight for her, talons drawn. She sprung back, lost her balance, and when sprawling backwards down the hill. In ten feet she stilled herself. Hands descended from above her and she swatted at them. The magic in her blood wasn’t working quite right, thrown off by her ill condition, and the swats were just plain strikes.

  It didn’t work for long. One harpie grabbed her firmly by the arm, apparently unafraid, and lifted her straight up. Rafael. Avery recognized the harpie.

  “You should run faster than this.” He gave her a crooked, almost apologetic smile, and then swung out.

  His strike made contact with her jaw and Avery saw stars. Before she could fall away, Rafael grabbed her bloody shirt and held her still. Before he could swing again, Avery gripped his arm.

  She could feel the magic at the center of her chest but it was dwindling. Frantically grabbing at it, she used the magic to let out an electrical shock. Rafael screeched but she dug her nails in. Magic still surging, the harpie finally crumpled and she let go.

  Someone hit her from the back. Only after a second did she realize it was Mason. Dirt and blood now caked his face. Loose, crimson feathers littered the floor.

  They finally hit the edge of the building where a slanted but shut door awaited them. Mason let go of her for half a second, and grabbed for the knob.

  He wrenched it but the old iron didn’t give.

  “Use the magic.” Avery commanded but Mason just kept wrenching. She repeated herself. “Mason, use the magic. I know you know how!”

  The problem was he didn’t. Not well. Avery had taken over a month to become proficient and that was without prior, conflicting ideas on how it worked.

  Mason stopped, stress etched clear on his face and he pressed his arms against the walls. Avery could feel the spike of magic from where she sat but even that was a small simmer. It was taking too long. It was too late. And then something dawned on her.

  “Where are they?” Avery suddenly asked. The harpies should have been on them by now. Mason turned his attention to the skies at that moment too. The skies were now empty. The field was now desolate.

  Mason let out a breath of disbelief but didn’t stall for long. Turning his attention back on the knob, he finally wedged open the door. Dust and soot exploded from the inside of the building, but the dark and calm warehouse still seemed inviting. With Mason’s help, Avery lumbered inside. Only when they cleared the door and shut it did Mason say something that turned Avery’s blood to ice.

  “It’s a trap. Don’t you get it? Mikhail never intended the Band to kill us; he just needed them to separate us. First it was from Patrick and Adalyn. Now it was from Eva. We’re in this alone.” Mason said.

  Avery reached out for his hand and squeezed it. Before she was able to answer, a noise stole her attention away.

  The door had opened. Mikhail was coming. Avery could just feel it. An overwhelming aura of the magic that made her skin feel watery came closer.

  “Come on.” She tugged him, slipping into the nearest room.

  Timbers had fallen from the roof and wreckage from old, tarnished furniture littered the floor. At least the doorways remained clear. They had to get the jump on Mikhail, not the other way around. The thoughts buzzed in her head but she struggled to think quickly enough. The aura was moving closer. Before they could be caught like deer in headlights, Mason grabbed her hand and raced them through another door. The room forked three ways. Mason raced for the first one, directly parallel to where they stood, but Avery abruptly stopped.

  Something made her pause, a gut wrenching sensation that refused to be ignored. Avery’s eyes finally landed on the room. In the corner was a steel door leading outside. It sat askew in the frame, showing a peek of the night outside. Soot and ash covered the floor and the ceiling leaned in toward the floor. Mason hissed at her to follow but his pleas went ignored. She waved him onward because Avery couldn’t stop looking around. Something about this place rang familiar. In the next second, Mikhail showed up in the door frame. His eyes on her, he came forward.

  “You girl, who has Jericho’s lovely memories.” The harpie crooned. “Do you remember this place?”

  “This place?” Avery parroted but was too caught up staring at him to process a more complex answer.

  He stood in the frame, wings tucked in. The last time Avery had seen Mikhail, he had graying hair and a wrinkled etched face. Now his skin had smoothed to porcelain and his hair, feathers, and eyes shone with youth. Avery spotted no amulet on his neck. The chill racing down her spine told her Mikhail now held the magic in him. There’d be no wrestling an amulet away from him.

  “This is the same place that I last saw Jericho alive. It was on the very same night he betrayed me and cast me into this hell of life. Or maybe you know a little about that?”

  Avery’s heart skipped a beat, for in that very moment, she knew she had. Those dreams about Jericho and Mikhail and this place weren’t surreal images sporadically playing out in her sleep. It was a memory-- Jericho’s memory about that same night they were in this warehouse. The night the warehouse was burning down.

  “I don’t know.” She pressed a hand to her head, not feigning confusion. The dream kept coming back to her in flashes and the mental displacement was nauseating.

  For a second, she was in the memory again, on that night. Brilliant red flames licked the ceiling and tumulus black smoke crept through the hallway. She stood in Jericho’s body, staring out at a young Mikhail.

  “It’s not like that. You don’t understand.” Jericho’s thick, deep voice came out from her mouth.

  Even after the memory faded and Avery found herself in reality, the words echoed with her. Mikhail had taken the moment to pace closer.

  Pinned against a concrete wall, Avery couldn’t backpedal.

  Mason still hadn’t showed. Avery knew he wouldn’t leave her but whatever plan he’d had kept her waiting. Avery’s stomach clenched. She couldn’t keep talking much longer.

  “It’s funny that you brought us here of all places-- to the place that Jericho betrayed me. Do you believe in fate, girl?”

  “There had to be some reason he did it. Jericho was brilliant and he was a good man—not a traitor.” She let the words slip from her without much thought. Any coherent sentence at this point was an accomplishment.

  The aura of energy seeping off Mikhail pulsated with crippling strength.

  “Jericho is dead.” Mikhail said flatly. “Rightly so. He turned me in and did everything in his power to ruin my life. And you know girl, I was finally excommunicated over buying some artifacts for the amulet from a young Band of Thieves.” He sneered, still clearly bitter. “So when I left society, I joined this Band. Where others saw petty criminals, I saw an army. And so I spent my years turning them from a band of children into legend. My personal army to take back my throne.”

  Then Mikhail suddenly threw his hands in the air with a flurry of movement. Avery moved before her brain even caught up. A wave of electrical energy shot forth from Mikhail’s open hands. Crackling through the air, it smashed into the wall. Avery had jerked to the side but fell, hitting the ground and rolling. In another flash, Mason resurfaced, lunging at Mikhail from behind. Avery struggled to stand, ready to get her hands on Mikhail at the same time. She never got the chance. Mikhail turned on Mason and blasted him back against the opposite wall. Mason met the concrete w
ith a deafening pop.

  “Mason!” Avery gasped.

  Her companion crumpled to the floor. Avery began to run towards him when Mikhail whirled and met Avery mid-motion. Smacking her with magic, she went sprawling back to the floor with a blow that left her bones rattling. She didn’t get up in time and he was on her again. Mikhail lashed out and caught her arm, his talons drawing blood from where he held. Avery screamed when her arm suddenly felt like fire. Mikhail let a simmer of magic flood right into her and her vision threatened to black out.

  Though relatively familiar with the magic, she’d never realized it felt just like this. Her world blurred even though the moment lasted for only seconds. Mikhail suddenly dropped her and turned. Mason had lunged for him from behind but again, the older harpie held the advantage. Opening his hand, he used another blast of energy to send Mason sprawling.

  This time he landed directly behind Avery. Though her world kept spinning, she regained a quick sense of coherency. Her left hand went for Mason, fingers meeting his slumped form. Her right hand went into the air. The magic stirred in her chest, and Avery used it. She pushed the hot simmering feeling out through her blood, to her finger tips, and to the open air with a flash of blue. It made contact with Mikhail as a blast to his torso, but before he even fell back, he threw another blow at her. As if the stronger magic struck her straight out of the air, the blue flashed disappeared.

  The building trembled, rubble shaken from the ceiling and year old soot exploding. The hallway quickly became a blur of dust. Avery’s left hand still on Mason, she animated again. Grabbing him, she tugged.

  “Come on,” She yanked again. Mason moved, staggering to his feet but he didn’t stand up right. Avery didn’t have to ask to know Mason had broken something from his collision with the wall. Wedging herself under his arm, she grabbed him and pulled.

  The dust storm allowed them the barest of seconds and Avery slipped into the next hall. Her world view was distorted but her feet kept moving. They couldn’t run but began to trot. Mason let out a sick moan.