Allyn drove his forehead into Lukas’s nose. Lukas fell back with a curse. Blood poured from his nose, dripping off his chin. Allyn thought about wielding, but his poor training sessions with Mason gave him pause.
“You piece of shit!” Lukas screamed, flashing white teeth that were stained red. He kicked Allyn, aiming for his head, but the angle was awkward, and his legs were too short to land anything but a glancing blow. “Get out here!”
Again, Lukas reached in, this time projecting fire into the belt. The belt gave way, and Allyn crashed onto the roof of the car, landing on his head and rolling onto his side. Lukas grabbed his foot and yanked him through the shattered window, dragging Allyn over glass that sliced into his arms and back. Lukas drove his foot into Allyn’s chest again and again.
Allyn groaned and tried to roll away, but Lukas continued. “Okay!” Allyn screamed between kicks. “Please!”
Lukas growled and stood over Allyn with his hands on his hips, breathing heavily, but he stopped.
Headlights rounded the bend, coming directly at them. Allyn was filled with hope, followed by dread as he remembered the fallen officer. Allyn tried to yell for the car to stop, turn around, go back the way they came, and save themselves. But he struggled to make his voice any louder than a whisper.
The car came closer. The orange headlights were blinding. Lukas cursed, diving to the side. No. Not headlights—
A pair of fireballs soared over Allyn’s head and crashed into Lukas’s car, bathing the lonely road in an orange light. Two figures raced toward him. He squinted, trying to make them out. Another fireball shot forward, quickly followed by a blast of ice.
Someone grabbed him by his armpits and dragged him away. “It’s okay. I’ve got you,” Leira said.
That meant the other person was Jaxon. Relief flooded through Allyn. They hadn’t left. They’d kept their promise. Allyn could see him, a shadow in the night, stalking Lukas with fists wrapped in air. Leira dragged Allyn behind the overturned squad car and probed him, her hand glowing softly on his chest.
“Nothing serious,” she said, relaxing.
“Get the cuffs off me.”
Hidden behind the squad car, Allyn could no longer see the battle. If Jaxon could divert Lukas’s attention long enough, Allyn might be able to hit him with an electric charge.
Leira found the officer and reached inside his pockets.
“On his belt,” Allyn shouted. “Beside his radio.”
Leira found the keys, unhooked them from his belt, and ran back to unlock Allyn’s cuffs.
“Thank you,” Allyn said, gently massaging his wrists where the cuffs had rubbed him raw.
“We need to take care of that before it gets infected,” Leira said.
“In a—”
An explosion rocked the night, shattering the remaining windows of the squad car.
Jaxon was on the ground, blood pouring from his forehead. Lukas was several feet away, rolling to his feet. His car was on its side. One of his fireballs must have struck the gas tank. Stumbling toward Jaxon’s motionless body, Lukas, with a wild look in his eye, formed something in his hands.
“No!” Leira shouted, bolting toward him. She would make it to Jaxon before Lukas did, but what did she hope to do? Die with him? She couldn’t fight Lukas. Twenty feet before she reached Jaxon, she skidded to a stop, grabbing Grimes’s gun from the pavement. It surprised Lukas as much as it did Allyn.
A shot rang out in the night. Lukas dove behind the smoldering car. Leira continued to shoot, striding forward as bullets clanged against the scorched metal.
Allyn made a wide arc to flank Lukas from the side. He calmed his breathing, trying to steady his nerves, and dug inside. He found the void easily, but without anger, he didn’t have anything to fill it.
Leira shot two more rounds, keeping Lukas at bay behind the overturned car.
Allyn struggled to wield. I should be the one with the gun.
Pop! Pop! Pop! Leira shot. Then click, click, click. She looked at the gun, confused, seemingly unaware she was out of ammo.
Lukas rose from behind the car, his face a mix of relief and amusement. “Technology always pales in comparison to what we can do.”
Leira hurled the gun at him.
Allyn reached out with a yell, wishing he could stop her. The officer would have more magazines on his belt. The gun flew harmlessly over Lukas’s shoulder, skidding to a halt on the blacktop.
Allyn fished inside for something—anything. Frustration began to build. He tried to quell it before the anger took him.
“How many people have already died because of you, Allyn?” Lukas asked. “Your selfishness has cost others everything.”
Anger rippled through him like a shiver in the night, its heat suddenly surrounding the void.
“Fuck it.” Allyn succumbed to the anger, drawing from its power like a turbine sucking water from a river. Red coils of electricity wrapped around his arms, alive, ready to be unleashed.
Lukas took a step backward.
Allyn hurled electric bolts at Lukas. Those are new. Before, the electricity had come out as a long connected charge like a lightning whip, but these were separate charges, like electric bullets. Lukas met them in the air with ice, creating a sparking miniature blast when they hit. Allyn cursed. Jaxon had said his charges wouldn’t have an elemental counter, but ice could apparently be used to slow his attacks, and because he was unable to attack with anything but electricity, Lukas quickly quelled his advance.
“Good!” Lukas shouted. He looked proud. “You have the ability to become a powerful magi. Let me show you how.”
Allyn growled and continued to throw charges in Lukas’s direction, but nothing came close to landing.
“You hate me, but you shouldn’t,” Lukas said.
“You’ve taken everything from me!” Allyn said.
“I’ve given you everything. Without me, you wouldn’t know what you were capable of. Without me, you wouldn’t be able to wield. You’re special because of me. You should appreciate it.”
“Why me? Why my sister? What is so special about us?”
“You’re twins,” Lukas said.
Allyn shook his head. “There has to be more.”
Lukas smiled like a cornered child. “Okay, Allyn. I’ll tell you as a gesture of good faith. I want to heal the Fractured Families, end this life of hiding, live as we were meant to.”
“Then end the war.”
“It’s not so simple. If it weren’t me, it would be someone else. Mine is a noble cause, and for that, I’m justified. With you, I can prove that there are more magi in the world. That their abilities are only dormant. That we are not as weak as we appear to be.”
“That won’t heal the splinter you’ve created. It won’t heal the splinters developing in other Families or bring back the magi you’ve killed.”
“What is a magi Family, Allyn?” Lukas asked. “It’s a group of people that are only distantly related, if related at all. We’re held together by a common purpose and similar goals. What better way to unify the Fractured Families than a new common purpose? Don’t you understand? You and your sister are proof. Symbols.”
“You believe the Families will unite around you to search for more like us.”
“Is it really so hard to believe? Magi went into hiding after the Fracture, but their abilities didn’t die. They just went into hiding, too. As generations went by, the ability lay dormant until it was forgotten entirely. But there are still echoes of it—a connection between siblings, a parent doing the impossible to save a child, someone surviving an impossible fall. You call them miracles but ignore what they really are. I sought you out because you were the perfect combination: a set of twins from a broken family. After a terribly emotional childhood full of heartache and lo
ss, you’re more in tune with your bodies and your feelings than most. If anyone were capable of finding their dormant ability, it would be you.”
“It was a guess,” Allyn said almost to himself, not believing his ears. “You didn’t know I could wield. You only hoped I could.”
“And I was right.”
Allyn didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. A guess. Lukas would never understand what he’d cost Allyn, because he’d never cared about anything more than himself and his own ambitions. He didn’t do it for a greater good. He did it for his greater good.
“We weren’t the first twins you tortured, were we?” Allyn asked.
Lukas smiled. “Why does it matter, Allyn? We found you. Our line will continue. The magi race won’t die out. It’ll thrive!”
“It matters because you destroyed lives and families. Your Family didn’t splinter because of what you believed. It splintered because of how you proved it. You abducted and tortured innocent people under the false pretense of the greater good.” He almost spat those last words.
The smile melted off Lukas’s face. “Don’t think yourself too important to kill, Allyn. There are thousands more like you. You are not the last, only the first.”
“I’ll never join you.” Allyn watched as understanding grew on Lukas’s face. Allyn would always be the enemy. Lukas had created a monster who wouldn’t be satisfied until his creator was dead.
Fire burned in Lukas’s hands. Allyn had no counter to it. If it struck him, he was gone. He steadied himself, ready to attack, and surveyed his surroundings, searching for cover. The car was a good fifteen paces behind him, and the road fell away to his right, but he had no idea how far down it went. The hillside was to his left, but it was steep, and he could never scale it in time.
Lukas blasted fire at him. It burned brightly, radiating heat like a bonfire. A killing blow. Allyn dove, narrowly avoiding the blast, then rolled to his feet, but Lukas was already wielding a wall of fire ten feet wide and almost as tall. Heaving it forward as if he were shoving a boulder, the wall of fire slid toward Allyn faster than he could run.
Allyn threw his hand forward as if reaching for Lukas. A red rope of electricity shot out, arcing through the air and lassoing Lukas. Flames continued to race toward him, reaching for Allyn to pull him into their glowing abyss. Even ten paces away, the heat stung his face. Allyn yanked on the electric lasso. Arms pinned at his sides, Lukas flew toward him, slamming against the ground, unable to soften the impact. The wall of fire began to dissipate, but it wouldn’t do so in time. Allyn crouched, throwing his arms over his head to protect himself from the incoming fire.
Something wet and cool covered him.
The fire, scalding hot, passed over him, hissing upon contact. Once the fire was beyond him, Allyn stood, his clothing steaming.
Jaxon was on his feet, too, barely. Leira was at his shoulder, helping him walk. Their faces were an identical mess of torn flesh. She healed him, and he saved me. He didn’t know who to thank. There would be time to figure that out later.
Lukas, no longer bound by Allyn’s electric lasso and visibly weak from creating his wall of fire, was on his feet, teetering at the edge of the road. He looked down the steep hillside, weighing his options. Something shot into the air across the valley. Bright and orange, it looked like a flare.
Jaxon rushed forward suddenly. Lukas disappeared off the road.
Rushing to the side of the road, Allyn and Jaxon peered down. It was dark enough that they couldn’t see the bottom, so Jaxon dropped a weak fireball from the edge. It hit the ground, briefly illuminating the bottom of the valley before being doused by the wet ground.
Lukas was gone.
Jaxon breathed a sigh of relief.
“Thank you,” Allyn said.
“Don’t thank me,” Jaxon said, looking out over the valley. “It isn’t over. Lukas has taken the manor.”
Jaxon hadn’t sighed in relief, Allyn realized. He’d sighed in despair.
Chapter 22
Gunshots split the night. Not distant, over the valley like before, these were closer, outside the manor. Liam crept forward, staying low to the ground. Officers had searched the forest, sticking mostly near the tree line, scared to venture too far inside. They had flashlights and floodlights capable of illuminating large portions of the forest, but the light also made shadows. The officers were so focused on what they could see that they didn’t think about what they couldn’t. They’d passed by, sometimes mere feet from Liam, never seeing him. The forest was quiet now, the officers having long since returned to the manor empty-handed.
As the night had worn on, the police presence had thinned. Allyn was in custody, his father had been arrested, and they’d taken Kendyl. The manor was empty since the magi had fled just before the front doors came down. When they didn’t find anyone else, the police had finished their business inside and left.
Liam walked through a spider web. Its fine, sticky threads tickled his nose and lips. No spiders, he told himself, wiping the web off his face. There aren’t any spiders. He fought the urge to brush his shirt and run his fingers through his hair again. I hate the forest. It’s so… dirty. It even smells dirty.
Nearing the tree line, where the manor was visible beyond the foliage, Liam dropped to all fours. The manor was so dark, quiet—and dead. Seeing it so lifeless was eerie. Only a single squad car remained to protect the crime scene. A husky officer bent over its hood, pointing his gun at the tree line.
A fireball shot out from Liam’s right. The officer dove for cover, narrowly avoiding being torched as the fireball exploded against the hood of his squad car. His cry of pain and confusion was quickly replaced by the sound of gunshots being fired blindly into the forest.
Bullets whistled through the air, catching dead limbs and embedding into trees but never finding a human target. When the clip was empty, a mass of magi rushed out of the forest, storming the grounds. The officer was quickly dispatched with an ice blast to the neck as magi ran past, climbing the stairs and darting into the manor. Darian Hyland stopped atop the landing, turning to overlook the grounds.
Like he wants to be seen, Liam thought, slowly creeping back into the forest, unsure of whether Darian could see him. Probably not. But his steady, confident gaze unnerved him.
Darian shot a fireball into the air. It burned brightly in the darkness, a flare that would be visible for miles as it reflected through the thin clouds. Darian turned and strode into the manor, closing the door behind him.
Liam pulled his phone out of his pocket, shielding the LED screen with his hand so that it didn’t expose his position. He sent out a one-word text message to every member of the McCollum Family with a phone. Homestead. Anyone who received it would know where to find him. It was a risk. Someone might have left a phone inside the manor, or in his father’s case, the police might have collected it, but it was a risk he needed to take.
He meant to retake the manor.
Nestled deep within the forest, the homestead was nothing more than a crumbling foundation that stood three or four feet above the ground. The dwelling had been small—only one room with a single door that was currently recognizable only as a rectangle cut out of the foundation. A chilly wind whined through the naked branches as Liam approached. It had taken him nearly an hour to arrive at the heart of the forest.
What do I do if nobody comes? Liam shivered at the thought. Somebody would come. Won’t they? He sat down in the corner of the homestead, the rough porous foundation against his back, and pulled out his phone. He smiled as he toggled up the security cameras. His network was still up. That meant he had an element of control.
Liam drew his knees close to his chest. The night was cold, and while his clothing was flame resistant, it wasn’t particularly warm, and the ground was soggy from an afternoon of rain. Teeth chattering, Liam set his phone
on a broken piece of foundation and rested his forehead on his knees, fighting to keep his eyes open. It was late, closer to dawn than dusk, and this was the first time he hadn’t been running or hunted for hours. Fatigue had finally caught up with him.
I can close my eyes, Liam thought, just for a second. Just… for… a… Sleep washed over him.
A branch snapped in the distance.
Liam’s eyes popped open. “Who’s there?” He stood, his muscles aching, his left arm asleep, preparing to wield. Wield what? He still didn’t know what he was capable of, and deep in the forest, he was far away from a computer.
I hate the forest.
Straining his ears, he thought he heard something in the distance—voices or whispers. Maybe it was the forest playing tricks on him again. That shadow over there looked like a man. It moved. It was a man! “Stop!” Liam commanded.
“Liam?” The deep voice was powerful if slightly strained, and it came from that towering shadow.
“Jaxon?”
The forest came alive with activity as several people stepped forward: Jaxon, Leira, Allyn, and the group that Jaxon had led away. Jaxon strode directly toward him, then picked him up and… gave him a hug. “Are you hurt?”
“No.” Liam’s voice was strained from being squeezed so tightly. What had gotten into him? Jaxon let him go, and Allyn stepped forward, tousling his hair and smiling at him as Leira reached out to probe him. She could have just asked if he was okay.
“This was smart, Liam,” Jaxon said. “Only those of us who live here would know of this place.”
“Or anyone who has lived here,” Leira said, clearly implying that Lukas might also recognize the code.
“A risk I would have taken, as well,” Jaxon said.
Liam swelled with pride. “They’ve taken the manor.”
Fracture (Book 1) Page 25