Because she knew I wouldn't be leaving this cave alive to report back to the clan, my little voice said.
She was, of course, no one I had met before. Her hair was a rich honey color that reached down to her backside. She was tall, almost my height, dressed in a brown ankle-length dress with one shoulder bare, no shoes but a thin chord around her right ankle. Her face was round, her eyes black. The recognition in them told me she already knew who I was.
There was something familiar about her… Unease settled in my stomach. “Who are you?” I asked, bile rising to my throat.
There was a flash of some emotion I couldn't read before her expression cleared and she straitened. “No one of your concern.” She replied in a clear voice that had me closing my eyes. I knew that voice.
“M-Mwara?” I choked. Her voice was deeper, more mature, but still clear, still mellifluous. And now that I had an image to compare, I could see it. My hand flew to my mouth in horror. I took a step toward her, my hand clenching when a dangerous glint entered her eyes.
“Oh, Mwara. What happened to you?”
To my left, Zantry stirred. I felt a spark of hope, he wasn't dead. Unfortunately, Remo also noticed.
He turned to watch him, waited while Zantry struggled to his feet and took in the scene. It wasn't a nice view. Me, Frizz and the shadows faced Mwara, with Remo just a few steps to the side, an army of minions waiting for Remo's command. He scanned everything around us with one long sweep before returning his gaze to Remo.
“Remo.” He said in way of greeting, before raising a hand and attacking with a blast of energy that made Remo skid a few feet back. I had to give it to Remo, he was fast and strong. After a fraction of a second, Remo met the blast with a blast of his own. It was obvious that Zantry was at a disadvantage, because Remo's blast of energy started gaining on him, literally pushing Zantry back. He had been drained, deprived from his energy for over twenty six years while Remo had been gathering and collecting, building his strength. And whatever strength he'd gathered after leaving the PSS, he'd expended fighting Remo's creatures and minions. But still, the power each was exuding was overwhelming.
The energy was so strong; a supernova began to form where the two blasts met. The scent of scorched ozone filled the air, and all the hairs in my body stood at attention. An insistent whining sound grew in volume, and sparks were flying everywhere. Wind stirred tiny rocks, blew them at my face. The light where the two blasts met was blinding, growing by the second, and for a moment I couldn't tell where Zantry's energy ended and Remo's began. Then the light moved closer to Zantry, and my breath caught.
Zantry shifted first, just the widening of his feet, and I understood then he wouldn't be able to hold on for much longer. I had to do something. Without thinking twice, I took a step forward, and Mwara shifted, ready to prevent me from interrupting.
I couldn't watch Zantry die. I lunged forward, pirouetting around Mwara in a move Diggy had taught me, barely dodging her outstretched talons. I tackled Remo from the side, a gasp of pain escaping my lips when an unexpected burning zap of energy coursed through me. Both Zantry's and Remo's blast went wild before they cut off, and Remo roared, an inhuman sound that made my insides shrivel with terror.
The scent of burning hair followed the punch of an invisible force that flung me away. Before I could finish falling, I was caught by Mwara and spun around, her talons at my throat. Zantry froze mid-lunge, his eyes focused at my neck.
Frizz lunged at Mwara, digging claws and teeth on her leg, and with an extra arm, she dug talons on his wings and flung him to the side like a small insect. He fell a few feet away with a heavy thump and didn't get up. The remaining three members of Frizz's band made to attack “No!” I cried out, and with a snarl, Mwara dug her talons on my neck, breaking skin and slicing deep enough that blood began to flow.
Zantry snarled at Mwara, his eyes glowing an electric blue. I swallowed against the pain and fear, the talons cutting deeper. I closed my eyes, trying not to take deep breaths or swallow and do anything that would kill me. That's why I missed what happened next. One moment Zantry was ready to attack, the next he was stumbling backward. I couldn't tell what was wrong, and assumed Remo had hit him with some blast of energy.
But then Remo did something with his fingers, and a pulse of light appeared like a bracelet on Zantry's left wrist. He fell down to one knee as if that thin light weighed the world and stayed down for a few seconds. Slowly, teeth gritted, He struggled upright. I could tell just standing up cost him. Remo watched him struggle, then plucked something out of thin air, something that pulsed light blue. It attached to Zantry's other wrist, and a soft blue light began moving from one thin bracelet to the next. He fell to his knees with a heavy thump and a gasp, and my heart squeezed inside my chest. I knew what that light was. I had seen it before, when Zantry had been attached to all those machines back in the PSS.
A dark, shadowy movement to the far right caught my attention, but I didn't dare move – I liked my smiles white and above my neck.
Nearby to the left, Frizz was breathing, the rise and fall of his chest fast and erratic. He was badly hurt. I tried to reach out to Taz, but I couldn't sense him like I could sense Frizz.
Zantry's eyes met mine, and I read the pain, the agony in his eyes before he masked them, tried to stand up. First one knee, then the other. Remo watched the effort, waited until he was upright before plucking another thing from thin air, this one catching Zantry around the neck, like a choker made of blue light.
At this Mwara let me go, either confident that I couldn't help, or foolishly believing that I wouldn't try again.
I pressed a hand to my neck, trying to staunch the bleeding, and whirled at Remo, but didn't approach.
“Let him go,” I snarled, my blood boiling with a need to do harm. Remo didn't even glance at me.
Instead, he paced toward Zantry, and I took a step forward, but Mwara, talons bared, blocked my path, her eyes cold.
“What are you doing?” I snapped at her.
I caught another movement on my peripheral, but no one noticed.
“Look at you,” Remo was saying, “you look so pitiful, Zan. Did you know the humans begged me to bring you back, paid me a small fortune. The Russian government offered me a hundred vessels in exchange for your body.”
My boiling blood suddenly froze in my veins.
“I will let them know,” Remo continued, “that you are the reason for her death. For his…” Remo glanced up in time to catch Diggy lunging at him, fangs bared in a ferocious snarl.
Remo raised a hand, and I lunged, trying to sidestep Mwara. But she saw it coming, grabbed me by the arms and pulled them high on my back, her hold firm.
Diggy fell atop Remo, his bared fangs going straight for his neck, and for a moment I thought he was going to rip his throat out, but instead he roared with pain and fell sideways.
I couldn't tell what was wrong until he licked his front paw and I saw the thin chord of blue light contrasting against his midnight fur.
Remo stood, dusted himself off and chuckled, a sound that grated against my nerves. It was so easy. We were so easy. We were no match for him.
“I have grand plans for you, son of Tammos,” Remo said to Diggy before nodding to Mwara, who let me go and shot up into the air.
Zantry said something to Remo, his voice whispery thin.
Remo cocked his head aside. “What is it, Zantry?”
“I said. Let, her go.”
“Why would I do that?”
Zantry gasped out a word, and I took a step forward, paused when Remo's energy grabbed me by the throat. Blood gushed faster through the slashes on my neck, and I froze. The moment I stopped, Remo's energy around my neck dissipated.
“What do you have that I want?” Remo asked, not even sparing me a glance.
“I. will. Go willingly.”
Remo Drammen fell silent, his dark eyes studying his fallen kin before shifting to study me. He sniffed in my direction, his energy sp
reading all over me, caressing and burning. I took a step back, my knees buckling. Mwara reappeared behind Remo, shifted to her human form and stepped to my side, guarding me. Remo's energy retreated from around me, and he turned to face Zantry. There was a dark, glowing sphere in Mwara's hand, something like shadows shifting inside it.
“I don't need your cooperation, Zan. It's too late for that now.” Remo glanced at me and Diggy before returning his focus back to him. “I have you, I have the son of Tammos, and I have her.” With that said, Remo motioned a finger in the air, and I felt the buzzing energy concentrate. He drew an imaginary circle, cut it with a vertical line top to bottom, bottom to top and closed a fist. The hairs at my nape stood erect, as if electrified. Zantry bowed his back, a tortured scream escaping his lips as an iridescent cage formed around him.
“Stop it!” I screamed at Remo, dashing toward Zantry. An invisible force grabbed me by the throat and hurled me back. I gasped for air, blood flowing like a fountain down my neck before the pressure eased and released.
The iridescent cage faded – though I could still feel it. Zantry slumped to the ground, unconscious, his chest rising and falling with shallow breaths. Remo turned next to Diggy. Before I could think to advance, Mwara had grabbed me again, her hold like iron shackles around my wrists.
“Please, stop,” I choked out.
He traced the same symbol as before, the circle, the lines, then closed his fist again, and the sound that escaped through Diggy's panther form was a roar of torture that cut off abruptly when he too, passed out.
With that done, Remo turned to me. Mwara let me go and bowed her head with deference, and offered him the glowing sphere.
Without any evident probing from Remo, a group of minions broke rank and moved toward Zantry's prone figure, surrounding him in a tight circle.
I took a step forward and Mwara snarled a warning, the sound ugly, full of menace.
My eyes narrowed at her, anger bubbling to the surface. What had happened to that sweet child? I didn't like when some of that anger aimed toward myself. I had let her go, not once considering the dangers in her path.
“What have you done to her?” I whispered to Remo.
He ignored me, but Mwara snarled again. Maybe if I could reason with her, maybe there was still hope.
“You don't need to do this anymore,” I said, taking a step toward her, my eyes pleading with her icy black ones. “I came here looking for you. We all came looking for you. I want to take you home.” I raised my hand, let it drop when her nostrils flared in warning. “Your family's devastated. They have been searching for you, leaving not a rock unturned.”
Some fleeting emotion flashed in her eyes before she banked it, her expression going hard. “I have no family left.”
“That's not true. You have a mother and a father, a clan who loves you. Your mother's been worried sick, searching for you everywhere. Your father–”
“Left me here for years,” She finished.
I shook my head, tried not to wince when the gash on my neck twinged. “No, they haven't. It's been but a few months back in the world. Everyone's been looking everywhere for you.”
Another fleeting emotion before she hardened her expression into a mask. “This is my place. My master has shown me what my family would never dream of giving me,” she said with conviction. With reverence.
There was devotion and love in her eyes, and I couldn't help but glance at Remo, narrow my eyes when that rage inside me surfaced with vengeance. “How could you do this? She was just a child.”
Remo glanced once at Mwara. “I only gave her everything. I made her the most powerful Dhiultadh to exist.”
“No, you forced her to become a monster,” I gritted.
“I was not forced to do anything,” Mwara cut me off, straightened her shoulders, head held high as she announced proudly, “I am his familiar.”
I drew a blank at her words before horror slapped my face, shocking me into terror. “No, you can't be. You were just a child,” I said. My God, how can I undo this?
“There is nothing you can do,” She said, her chin rising in defiance. I had said that out loud.
“Look at you and your band of losers” She sneered, “I could crush you all with the power I have. One blow is all I'll need.” she closed a fist in front of her, her eyes flashing yellow. Rabid. She was rabid.
“I don't believe – No, I refuse to believe it. You didn't become a cruel monster just because he wants you to be. Think about your mother,”
“She is the reason I am here today.”
I shook my head, held back my wince. “Because you misunderstood her. They came looking for you, Mwara. She came searching for you. They tore the city apart searching in every gap. They even came here with their best trackers.”
“I know. I ran. I ran all the way to the top of the mountain.” Again that sneer, that sense of superiority, “Their best trackers didn't even sense me. I found this cave, and hid inside. They never came again.”
They couldn't sense you because there was no imprint in the ether. I glanced at Remo, knew he was the reason for that.
“I was scared, I was attacked. My mother should have known I was in danger. But she never came.” She glanced at Remo, and the soft look in her eyes sickened me. “Then he appeared, and he took care of me. He healed me, taught me how to protect myself, how to create wards, to fight. He made me strong. He gives me power when I need it, he lets me draw from the bond without limit. He gave me the wings I wouldn't grow before my first century. He taught me how to fly. He kept me safe, something my own family couldn't do.”
How could I refute that?
“You warded the cave's entrance,” I said instead, understanding now why neither Zantry nor Diggy recognized the person behind the working. The proud glint in her eyes told me I was right.
Shit. She was proud to be here.
“Your father, he was desperate.” I tried to reach the child I had met back in that cold evening. When Mwara's eyes softened for a moment, I pressed on. “Vincent was devastated. Even Archer felt your loss.” Wrong thing to say.
Her eyes hardened at that. “Archer just doesn't want us to win. He doesn't care about me. Look what he did to you.” She said “us” as if Remo's cause was her own.
I glanced at him, watching the exchange, his expression emotionless. My heart pounded so loud, I could hear it in my ears. “Let her go. Please, she's just a child. Don't do this to her.”
“She doesn't want to leave. She likes what I can give her. And soon so will you. So will the son of Tammos. Perhaps even Zantry.” he waved a tiny hand around. At me, at Zantry. At Diggy. At Mwara.
“But you don't need her!”
Remo didn't reply to that, didn't acknowledge my outburst.
“You can sever the bond.” But even as I said it, I wondered if it was true.
“To sever the bond I'll have to kill her. Do you wish her dead?”
“No!”
Remo glanced down at the sphere, studied it for a moment before glancing up at me. “In a few years, poppet, I will bend you into submission and make you my slave. And I will absorb all his energy and double my strength twice. Then I will make the son of Tammos one of my most powerful vessels. He is a very powerful Dhiultadh. He can hold so much.” His eyes gleamed for an instance, a vast universe within.
A cold so deep sipped through my bones, hollowed my insides. He would become indestructible. No one would be able to stop him. Not even with all the aid from the Sidhe.
“I am going to start with the son of Tammos. This sphere contains one being, a creature like me and Zantry. I want you to watch this.” He brought the glowing sphere near to Diggy, near the light bracelet. A molt of glowing darkness jumped from the sphere to the bracelet, and Diggy whined in pain.
“Wait. Wait. I can give you more.” Without thinking about what I was doing, I took a step forward, hands clenched into fists. Remo glanced back at me, but he kept the sphere near the bracelet, and I watched anot
her molt jump from it, heard Diggy moan.
“I,” I swallowed the bile that rose and tried again. “I'll exchange with her. I'll become your familiar. Willingly.”
It was Mwara's turn to protest. “No!” She cried out and launched herself at me, hit an invisible wall and fell down, whirling at Remo. “No! I'm your familiar. I'm loyal. She won't be,” She protested. “She's tricking you. She's lying.”
The vehemence in her voice frightened me. What had he done to her? Remo ignored her and stood, his dark eyes focused on me. The sphere was far enough from the bracelet now that no molts jumped off it.
“Silence.” He said to Mwara, and her protests abruptly cut off. She fell to her knees and sobbed quiet, silent tears.
“You will exchange with my familiar, take her place willingly?” he asked.
A sudden image of Titania hunting me throughout the worlds flashed in my mind. The thought was oddly comforting as I nodded, “with the condition you let Zantry, Diggy – the son of Tammos, and Mwara go.”
His head cocked to the side again. “I'd give you three boons in exchange of one. And I already have you.”
“A slave is hardly like a familiar. And , I come with my own familiar.”
“Once a slave accepts his place, I can make him into a familiar.”
“You know I would never accept that slot, not in a thousand years.” I raised my chin in defiance, letting him se the truth in my eyes. The PSS couldn't break me with all the experiments they had run. They wouldn't have broken me even if I had never left. In a hundred years from now, I'd have still been looking for a way out of there.
Remo fell quiet, his depthless eyes scrutinizing my resolve for any holes. “You would become my familiar, willingly, in exchange for their freedom?”
I'd be trapped inside this cave, never to see the brilliance of the sun again. I almost buckled then and there.
But if I didn't do this Remo would have all of us to do with as he pleased. Even if I managed to escape now, the clan would kill me for Mwara, who would never agree to come with me. And Zantry and Diggy…. I couldn't even think what Remo would do to them. This way, at least, I'd be the only one left behind. And alive to fight another day.
Heir Of Doom Page 35