A grim smile twisted her lips. “Who says that’s what I want? What if I want them to kill each other off? Sean, Nosizwe, and their top lieutenants. Then the Stones will be mine alone. As the last person of power left, I’ll head both factions of the clans, uniting them into one.”
I drew back a little, stunned. Had this been her game all along? This sweet, mild-mannered, beautiful, unassuming woman in a wheelchair pulling this many strings, like a puppet master, manipulating these two powerful people and their allies? Had she coerced them into this war? A final battle to slaughter each other, leaving her the last one standing, so to speak?
I couldn’t believe it, and yet…I could. But I still couldn’t give up, despite this new wrinkle in my plan.
“What good are the Stones if you don’t have the Talos?” I pleaded, reminding her that she still had to have Carter.
She flicked a glance towards the fighting, where the Talos’ bronze figure could be seen moving it and out of shadow and light.
“I don’t think Carter will die here,” she said calmly. “He is too tough.”
She didn’t seem worried by the possibility. She was the only one, between the two of us.
“But what if he does?” I pleaded. “There’s no other Talos. That’s what I’ve heard since the beginning. It’s him. He’s it. The fact that his blood worked the first time, that it took him and me to that other world…that means he’s the key. You have to have him.”
Ciara didn’t wince. Didn’t flinch.
“He’ll come through it,” she said, almost sounding bored. “He has a knack for that. Rather like one of the filthy cockroaches here that manage to squirm out from under your shoe when you try to squish it.”
I couldn’t believe she was being so blasé about this. I tried a different tact.
“Okay, you may be right. Suppose he does survive, but Sean doesn’t. Sean dies and you get Jackson…but you never find your red cap. I bet you’ve searched for it through the years, haven’t you? Had your people search for it too? Never been able to find it? What makes you think you’ll be able to find it when Sean’s dead? What good is all this—” I waved a hand towards the Stones, the battlefield, “if you’re still a prisoner on land? If you can’t return to the sea and have control over your own body?”
That caught her attention. She swung around to face me, fury in her green eyes.
“You have a point there,” she conceded. Angrily. “What is it that you really want, Ellie? There’s got to be a reason you risked your life to come over here.”
“I want you to stop this,” I said, gesturing towards the battle raging next to us. “I know you can. You’re a Merrow. Your voice has the power to coerce people—especially men—to do anything. You could charm that guy who’s controlling the cats, have him put a stop to their attack. You can end this.”
She snorted. “For my voice to work, I have to be in water. Do you see any water around here?”
I was prepared for this too. Gulping down memories that still turned my mouth dry from fear, I said, “What about the Nakki?”
“What about her?”
“Is she here? The one who attacked me that night, after I left your home? The one you sent to Carter’s apartment to kill me?”
She smirked again. “How did you like that? A Nakki is a rather gruesome way to be introduced to our world, isn’t it? I needed to take you out as swiftly as possible, but Carter’s apartment is virtually impenetrable. And with Carter there, getting anyone inside was next to impossible. The Nakki was our best option.”
“It almost worked,” I conceded. “I still have trouble taking a shower sometimes.”
She laughed like it was a big joke between friends. “I bet you do. That’s the cost of humans poking their nose where they don’t belong.”
“I didn’t exactly—never mind.” There was no point arguing the fact that I hadn’t purposefully gotten involved in her life. Rather, I’d been dragged into her schemes. This was taking far too long. Ciara might have been willing to sit around and chat while the world burned, since that suited her purposes, but it wasn’t working for me. I kept casting glances towards the battle, praying each time I did that I’d see Carter still on his feet and moving. “What I’m asking is if the Nakki is here or not.”
“Actually, she is. She’s guarding the Stones.”
Ciara pointed in the direction of the ancient tablets. I had trouble distinguishing them at first, but after a moment I was able to pick out at least three shapes hunkered down by the Stones. They weren’t moving. They weren’t involved in the fight. They were simply there, watching. I guess they’d been ordered to guard the Stones, no matter what. Even at a time like this, so nobody from Sean’s side could break free of the battle and make an attempt on them.
I shot to my feet. “Get her over here.”
Mrs. Costas angled her neck to look up at me. “I haven’t agreed to help you.”
My hands flashed, reaching behind me and drawing my weapon. I placed the barrel on her temple. She responded as I’d known she would, by lifting her own gun, but I was ready and snatched her wrist, giving it a brutal twist. She cried out in pain and dropped the gun. It fell into the grass beside her wheelchair.
“I don’t have any more time to play nice,” I said. “I tried asking. Now I’m telling. We’re going over to the Nakki, and you’re going to tell her to transform.”
“Nakkis live in the water,” Ciara huffed. “They don’t create their own.”
“They can take whatever water is there and amplify it,” I corrected. “I saw her do it when she tried to kill me. All we need is a tiny bit for her to work with. She expands the water. You get in it. You transform. You use your voice, and you stop this war.”
“What if I don’t? What if I refuse?”
She was stone cold, angry. Underneath that façade, I sensed something else. She was brittle. Fragile as glass. A woman pushed to the edge and ready to break.
“Then I’ll kill you,” I said softly. “And Sean will probably survive, thanks to Carter, since the Talos will do anything to protect Sean. That means he’ll have your son. He’ll have Jackson, and he’ll have your red cap. Forever. Is that what you want?”
She stared me down, weighing her options, probably wondering if I’d really kill her. I held my breath and prayed. I wouldn’t, but I was hoping she wouldn’t run the risk of Sean winding up with sole custody of their child. I guess she decided not to.
“Damn you, Ellie,” she breathed. She released a breath and the rigidity left her shoulders. She slumped in her chair. “There are water bottles in the truck. Mack drove it here, and he always has water with him.” She nodded at the nearest vehicle. “Grab several of them. And follow me.”
Chapter Thirty-Three
Keeping my gun trained on her, I did as she ordered. It wasn’t easy trying to keep an eye on her, keep my gun ready, and rummage around for the water bottles, while simultaneously making sure this wasn’t a trap and another shifter wasn’t waiting to jump me.
Despite Mrs. Costas’ seeming capitulation, I still felt jittery. Anything could go wrong. My plan could still fail. I didn’t know if it was a good plan to begin with, unleashing the power of the Merrow. It would most likely work on the men. Not as likely on the women, but once the men stopped fighting, the women would too, right? That’s what I was counting on. I had no clue how long the spell would last, especially since we were using the Nakki to create a makeshift pool. This was far from a Merrow’s natural habitat. However, all we needed was a brief interlude. Because I had another idea.
Something had been teasing at the back of my brain all this time, like I could suddenly see how the puzzle that made up the Stones and Carter and the sword and the other world and the voices, the presences Carter had sensed in the other world, and the angel and the title he’d given Carter of Repairer of the Breach…I could suddenly sense how these things fit together and how to unlock them all.
I didn’t say anything about that to Mrs. Cost
as, though. I didn’t dare, as she urged her electric wheelchair across the rough ground towards the Stones. It was slow going. I was juggling the water bottles and keeping my gun trained on her. When she got stuck in the rough grass, I dropped the bottles in her lap and gave her a push with one hand to keep going. Finally, we made it, circling around behind the Stones, keeping out of the fray, coming up behind the Stones where a young woman in a filmy white tank top and dark jeans stood observing the battle. Her pale blonde hair was unbound, strands of it floating on the night breeze. I stared at her a moment, reliving the terror of that night in Carter’s bathroom, a little shocked that so much fear could’ve been caused by this girl who didn’t look any older or any more vicious than I did.
“Helena.” She turned when Mrs. Costas called her name. Her eyes widened when she saw me. “You remember Ellie, right?” Ciara jerked a thumb over her shoulder at me.
Helena smiled a little half-smile. “I’ll never forget that night. For the record, you’re the only person who ever escaped me.”
Again, it was hard to stand there and reconcile my memories of the terrifying Nakki and the implication of her being a coldblooded killer with this normal looking young woman.
“I’m sure I wouldn’t have, if Carter hadn’t been there.”
“The Talos.” She nodded towards the battle. “I’ve been watching him. He’s doing everything to protect Sean, but he’s getting worn down. He’s going to fall eventually. They both will.”
My heart jumped to my throat. I strained to see Carter. He was squaring off, again, against the terracotta warrior. As they circled each other, another shifter, some huge, dark, hulking form I couldn’t identify, took the opportunity to leap on his back. The Talos stumbled. The terracotta warrior charged.
I turned away. I couldn’t look. We had to act. Now.
“It’s time to move,” I said to Mrs. Costas, doing my best to inject steel into my voice.
She wasn’t fooled. I could tell by her smirk. But she conceded, addressing the young woman, Helena, again.
“Helena, we’re going to stop this. We need your help.”
She seemed puzzled. “Oh?”
“Well, you see I have this gun to my head,” Mrs. Costas half-laughed. “I don’t really have a choice but to ask you to help me.” Briefly, she described my plan. Helena kept glancing back and forth between Ciara, the battle, and me. She was confused, but she didn’t argue.
“I’ll do whatever you want, Ciara,” she said. “If you’re sure this is what you want.”
“I think it’s for the best,” Mrs. Costas replied coolly. “I have my reasons.”
Helena shrugged, unconcerned. “Nosizwe didn’t say not to, so…okay. Give me those,” she said to me, stretching out a hand for the water bottles.
I complied, passing them over. She held them in both hands, motionless. I was about to say drily, “Do you need help opening them?” when the caps fell off of their own accord. The plastic containing the water liquefied, dissolving into fluid, all while she was holding them. As they liquefied, so did her hands. The water splashed to the ground, and so did her body, dissolving. Before my brain could register what I was seeing, there was a large, silvery puddle on the ground, and Helena was gone, except for a face in the puddle.
“My turn, I suppose.”
Using upper body strength, Mrs. Costas pushed herself upright and then carefully wriggled her body out of her chair to slide into the makeshift pool. The instant her toes touched the water, a change rippled over her. The woman in the wheelchair was gone, and in her place with a true enchantress, a mermaid—not really a mermaid, but a Merrow. I can’t lie—it did look weird to see a beautiful half-woman, half-fish lying there in a large puddle in the middle of a field in Texas. Then again, what about this entire adventure, this entire night, hadn’t been weird?
She blinked at me. Her eyes had changed from an emerald green to a glassy blue-grey-green, shifting colors like the sea itself. Her raven hair spilled around her shoulders, down her back, to her waist. She was always lovely, even in human form, but here, as her true and natural self, she was breathtaking. When she turned towards the battlefield, opened her mouth and began to sing, she was exquisite.
I hadn’t known a voice like that existed. I hadn’t known beauty like that existed. The first few notes were so powerful they rocked me back on my heels, literally. I almost dropped my gun, but concentrated all of my willpower on my arms, my hands, my fingers to hold my stance.
Was she ordering me to drop it? I wondered.
I didn’t know, because she was singing in Gaelic. I couldn’t understand a word she said. All I could understand was what I sensed, and that was power: sheer, raw, magical power. Beneath the spell of her song, the battle stopped, nearly cold. I saw the first change with Adeola, the Nunda, who controlled the big cats. When he shifted back into human form, the felines stopped their charges, stopped their mauling, and lay down, tame as kittens, resting their heads on their paws.
The song continued, and it affected the men the most. From what I could pick out, in the shapes and shadows and figures lit up by headlights, it was the men who initially stopped in their tracks, backing off from their opponents, and shifted back into their human forms. It was the men who were glancing around as if confused, trying to figure out where they were, what they were doing, and why.
The thought occurred to me, If she has this much power to charm and control men, why didn’t she use it to control Sean a long time ago?
Logically, I knew Sean had probably considered that possibility and would’ve safeguarded himself with certain things, like the location of her cap. Not to mention, controlling the male shifters didn’t mean she had all control. From what I’d seen, female shifters could be every bit as powerful as male, and they simply weren’t affected by her magic like the men were. And Sean employed plenty of women.
In front of me, the women also stopped fighting, but none of them had the same dazed expression as their male counterparts. Like me, they initially appeared rocked by the power of the song. Afterward, they seemed more confused by the battle abruptly ending than by the Merrow’s charm. They were looking around as if wondering what to do.
The sounds of scuffling, of fighting, of death, died away. An eerie silence drifted across the darkened pastures, broken by the sigh of the wind and the Gaelic song of the Merrow. Never in my wildest imaginations could I have foreseen something like this in the Texas countryside.
Slowly, Mrs. Costas tapered off her music. The shimmering echoes of her voice died away. For a moment, there was peace.
Chapter Thirty-Four
For a moment, there was peace. Carter slid back into his human form, shaking himself physically to throw off the Merrow’s song in order to assess the situation. The terracotta warrior who’d been after him stumbled back, collapsing on the ground, breathing heavily. A hasty sweep of the area told him at least half of their numbers were down, either wounded or dead. Roughly a third of their enemies seemed to be in the same state. The Nunda with his army of big cats had done real damage. The cats were now resting on the ground. Some emitted low rumbles, almost like a purring housecat.
The war had ceased, at least temporarily, but why? Why had Ciara used her magic to stop the fight?
Carter scanned the area, squinting to pierce the shadows, until he located Ciara’s wheelchair next to one of the Stones. Only she wasn’t in her wheelchair. She was on the ground, in her Merrow form, and next to her was a slight young woman with blonde hair.
Ellie.
Even from there, he could see the gun barrel she had trained on Ciara Costas.
Ellie had forced Mrs. Costas to stop the fighting? Stopping the fighting was something Ellie would have risked her life to do, but capitulating didn’t seem like something Ciara would have done. Not even with a handgun at her temple.
It wasn’t. Carter barely had time to form the opinion when he heard a loud grunt, almost a shout, a cry of surprise. He spun towards it, a wave of sickne
ss slamming his gut, knowing already whose voice it was.
Sean. Sean stood there, both hands on his belly, blood pouring out. Next to him stood Nosizwe who, even as Carter spun to look, was shifting back from her Impundulu form into her human self. He caught the quickest glimpse of blood on a bird’s beak, and then Nosizwe stood there, wiping blood from her mouth, almost glowing with triumph.
“Backstabbing bitch,” Sean ground out. Carter’s gaze assessed his boss’s wound as he dashed towards him.
“You shouldn’t have let your wife throw you off guard,” Nosizwe sneered. “All’s fair in love and war, Sean. You know the saying.”
They’d been up against each other when the song drifted into the chaos, temporarily calming it. Beneath Ciara’s spell, Sean had stopped just long enough for his rival to take advantage of the situation. And gut him, like she’d gutted Ellie down in the Pit. Sean’s hands were pressed to his belly to hold in his entrails, but it didn’t take a doctor to see that he wasn’t going to make it. Unless…
Carter, who had been double-teamed during the fight and separated from Sean, now ran towards his boss. Could he do it? Could he get Sean to the otherworld, where there was magic, healing magic? If only the unicorn shifters were here, but they hadn’t been at the compound earlier today when Sean and he were choosing who to bring tonight. Sean didn’t have a chance unless Carter could figure it out, could get him to the other world, could find the healing water, could…
He pushed through the crowd gathered around the dying man and sank next to his boss. Sliding a hand under his head, he said, “Hang on, Sean. Hang on. We’ll get through this.”
“How?” He heard Nosizwe’s laugh from somewhere above him. “He’s done for and you know it, Ballis. He knows it too.”
Sean’s eyes were full of hate, but there was resignation there too. “Don’t…let…her…win,” he groaned, clutching at Carter’s shoulder. “Don’t.”
Carter had never seen such raw hatred, ever, from anyone.
Repairer of the Breach (Stones of Fire Book 4) Page 21