by Dee, Bonnie
“That’s correct,” Lily said. “The magma activity is at the same depth; it is a more subtle reading, but Carr has amplified my ability to detect nuances. If we can short-circuit the pressure from the slippage caused by the expansion of the magma pool, we might be able to dissipate energy and keep it from reaching the surface.”
“Amazing.” The older man coughed. “May I pace your essence and watch you work?”
“Our essences…” Lily began.
“No,” Carr said, cutting off her words. “Lily and I must work closely together. We can’t have observers on either plane of existence.” He automatically soothed his love’s red cheeks with a kiss and a nuzzle.
The older man frowned. After a few seconds, he turned beet-red. “Oh my, yes, I forgot that part of the prophecy. Quite right. You’ll need complete privacy. I’ll make sure my Keepers are working away from the area you choose. Would that work?”
“Yes, thank you,” he replied. “We could use a small tent or something to give us even more privacy.” He looked down at Lily and rubbed her back gently. It’s okay, Lily. We won’t have an audience while we make love. Where do you want to set up, baby?
“Over there.” She pointed to an outcropping of rocks at the farthest end of the clearing. “We’ll be out of the way of the planes and helicopters, but close enough in case we need to get a ride to get closer to the South Sister.”
Morrissey’s eyes bugged as he realized Carr had communicated mentally with Lily. “You really are the Consort to the Talisman. I just thought…” He trailed off.
Carr glared at him.
“There is no doubt, Professor. We wouldn’t be here if they weren’t the Talismanic couple.” Donovan’s eyes had followed Lily’s finger. “Mark?”
“Yeah, boss?” Mark came to Donovan’s side.
“Get one of the survival tents and kits from the jet and set up camp for Lily and Carr at the far end of the airfield, at that outcropping of rocks. Make sure they have water and emergency rations.”
“Got it.” Mark hurried back to the jet.
Donovan turned toward him and Lily. “Carr, what else will you need?”
“Mark and maybe one other Protector as guards for our perimeter.” He thought about what he’d be comfortable with, considered Lily’s modesty, and doubled it. “Have Mark keep people at least forty yards away. The rock formation at our back should take care of any approaches from that direction.” He snuggled Lily’s shuddering body closer in an attempt to absorb some of the excess energy she instinctively processed. “While we work, we’re not aware of our surroundings.”
“You got it.” Donovan set off after Mark.
“You’re already working, aren’t you, Lily?” Morrissey said. “I feel you opposing the energy, but I’m not sure how you do it.”
“She can’t answer right now, Professor.” Carr massaged the small of Lily’s aching back. “I can tell you that she takes in the energy, processing it through her Earth Keeper essence, then dissipates it into harmless liquefaction areas, empty spaces, or other more stable faults. But exactly how her essence does it is a mystery to us both.”
Lily sagged against him. Her eyes closed and her breathing so shallow the only reason he knew she still breathed was his mindlink with her. “Excuse us, but I need to get Lily in the tent and horizontal so we can work the quakes. Whatever your other Keepers can do on the periphery will help take the whole burden off us.” Off his little Talisman.
“I’ve already deployed Earth and Fire Keepers to each Sister,” Morrissey replied. “I have a core group here. We’ll supplement your work the best we can using traditional Terran methods. May Gaia and the gods bless us all.”
“Amen to that.” Carr swept Lily into his arms and strode after Mark, Donovan and the other Protector they’d drafted into guard duty.
* * * *
Tuesday, 5:45 a.m. PST, outside of Eugene, Oregon.
After a long jet ride and four time zone changes, Darcy reached the Eugene, Oregon, airport where his father awaited him with a rented vehicle. On the road in the general direction of the Three Sisters areas, he pushed the rental Hummer to ninety miles an hour. He was very aware of his wussy-assed father’s tension. It hung in the car’s atmosphere like a thick wet blanket. It suffocated him so much he popped the sunroof and then pushed the car’s speed to one hundred.
He glanced over to his unwanted passenger and smiled evilly. His father gripped the sissy bar. Must not like Darcy’s push for speed on the twisting mountain roads.
“I still don’t see why you had to come, Father.” He gripped the steering wheel so hard he’d probably leave dents. “I can handle retrieving Lily and eliminating Madoc all by myself.”
“I don’t doubt that, son,” Ben said, his voice shaky. “But Brody wanted me along to ensure you would follow his instructions to the letter.”
“What? He’s afraid I’ll keep Lily?” he sneered. “Well, he’s right, I will. What can he do to me clear across the country? I’m out of the reach of his powers.”
“He has your mother.”
The pregnant silence in the vehicle was only broken by engine and road noise. Darcy wasn’t even sure either of them took a breath.
Finally, he turned to look at this father. “How could you let him take Mom?” He may have hated his father with everything in him, but he adored, worshipped, his mother. She was the only person in his life who loved and cared for him unconditionally. He’d kill or be killed to protect her.
“I had no choice.” Ben shook his head, his eyes moist. “They came in the middle of the night. Terrorized us.” He paused, choking back tears. “They tied me to a chair, forced me to watch. They hurt her, son. They tied her to the bed, then they…” Ben gasped, tears streaming down his face. “If we don’t report in regularly … they’ll … they’ll hurt her worse.”
“Shit. Damn. Fuck.” Darcy pounded the steering wheel. He swore low and long, wishing it were Brody’s face under his fists. His father’s face.
If the bastard Brody had threatened his father, he could’ve ignored it. His father and he had never seen eye-to-eye. Hell, he hated the old fucker, but his mother—well, he loved her more than anything in the world. Damn, damn, damn. He’d kill the fucking bastards who’d hurt her—and Brody too.
The jury was still out on what he would do to his dear old dad. His mother loved the son of a bitch. He turned to the pathetic excuse for a man. “You’re fucking useless, ya know that, old man?”
“Brody can read people like a book.” Ben sighed. “He knew you’d try to cross him. He also knew threatening me would not work with you. Knew you loved your mother. Brody always knows where to apply the pressure.”
Strained silence reigned in the vehicle. His father broke it first. “Darcy? Son? What are you going to do?”
“I’m going to get Lily Redfern, take care of Madoc, then…” he snarled under his breath, gripping the wheel so he wouldn’t kill his father because the old man might be of some use, though the gods only knew how, “…we’ll go home and rescue Mom.”
“Darcy! Brody will know. He’ll kill us all.”
He threw a disgusted glare at his father. “How can he know? He’s clear across the country in New York State.” At his father’s absolute silence, he snapped out, “What haven’t you told me?”
“They hurt her, showed me what would be done to her if we didn’t stay in touch,” his old man gasped in a sobbing breath, “then they took her to New York—to Brody’s estate.”
“Great, just fucking great.” He swallowed anything else he might have said to his father. What could he do about it now? Nothing. Letting out an angry growl, he said, “We’ll get Lily and then go to New York to rescue Mom.” He turned to his father. “There’s no way I’m letting that bastard hurt Mom or take Lily away from me, do you hear me?”
“Yes, son.” His father shrank in his seat.
He glanced at his old man’s face. Anger swelled within him and, before he could stop himself, he backha
nded the coward across the face, splitting his lip. “You don’t believe I can do it! Damn you! You’ve never believed in me. Only Mom did. Well, fuck you! I’m the strongest member of this family. And the gods know I got all the good genes from Mom and not your wimp ass.”
Darcy took several deep breaths, letting them in and out slowly. He had to regain control. “Just make the reports to Brody like the dutiful little slave you are. I’ll handle the evil fucker when the time comes. I’ll rescue Mom. As for you, after this is over, if Mom still wants you, I’ll stay quiet. But if she even hints she wants to be rid of you, you’ll be gone. Do you hear me?”
“Yes, son.”
“Good. Now, where in the hell did your old friend Morrissey say he was set up?”
“They put the headquarters at the only airfield near the town of Sisters.”
“Well, that helps me a whole bunch.” Not.
“I have the GPS coordinates.” His father pulled out a Blackberry and hit a few buttons.
“Can you manage to program them into the Hummer’s GPS system?” sneered Darcy.
“Yes, son. That I can do.”
He detected no sarcasm in his father’s response. Good, he had the old man cowed. He didn’t want dear old Dad to think for himself. Royal fuckups occurred when his father tried to think. They were lucky that Morrissey, a foul old bastard of a Terran, and unfortunately as honest as the day was long, maintained a lifelong friendship from his schooldays with his dear old Dad. If the good professor knew his old school friend had gone over to the Destroyer side, they’d never have gotten the inside track on where Lily would be.
“It’s programmed.” Ben hit the plotting button. The route lit up on the on-board mapping system. “Looks like we are about seventy-eight miles from Sisters, Oregon, which is the gateway to the Three Sisters Wilderness. Yes, the airport is on the map.”
“Good. We’ll get there, find Lily and leave. They’ll be too busy dealing with the seismic activity to worry about people coming and going.”
“Uh, son,” Ben mumbled.
He glared at his idiot father. “What?”
“Wouldn’t they have the area cordoned off?” Ben hemmed and hawed, then said, “If the area has the potential of volcanic activity they would evacuate all unnecessary people.” His father stared out the front of the car. “Look at the traffic heading away from the Cascades. They’ll probably have roadblocks to turn people away.”
“Then, Father, you’ll throw your KOTE weight around and tell them we’re coming in at Morrissey’s request. Won’t you?”
“I guess so.”
“You guess so? Mom’s life depends on us getting Lily—so you’ll tell the most convincing story of your life—or you’ll die.”
“Yes, of course I will. I love your mother, never doubt that, Darcy.”
“Well, it didn’t sound like it there for a moment.”
“I forgot … the stress. I’m not used to it the way you are.”
“Well fucking get used to it—and do it fast. People who can’t keep up, get left behind.” A few miles later, he slowed for the predicted roadblock. The fact that it was this far out from the volcanoes just underlined the urgency for them to get in and get out before all hell broke loose. Even he could feel the tremors, and he was only an Earth Protector.
“You’re on, Father—make it good. Mom’s life—and yours—depends on your lies.”
Chapter Sixteen
Tuesday, 8:45 a.m. (EST)
KOTE Hurricane Response Headquarters, near Gulf Shores, Alabama.
Autumn leaned over Trent’s shoulder as he tracked the incoming storm on a computer screen assigned to them. They’d been put to work immediately upon their arrival. With all the natural disasters popping up around the globe, all volunteers were welcome.
She chose to stay with Trent. When his amulet appeared that would be her cue to act. Until that moment, the Air and Water Keeper teams present in the region seemed to be handling the storms as best as could be expected.
Around them, the Keeper-Protector teams spoke in hushed voices, heads bent over computer monitors and communications equipment, following their own lines of investigation concerning the incoming hurricanes and coordinating the efforts on the ground, in the air, and at sea to diffuse them. It was 21st century technology meeting ancient Terran elemental skills. With information from the monitoring devices, the Keepers in the field were delicately altering ground and atmospheric conditions so as to weaken the storm generators of heat and humidity.
The first of a line of deadly storms had hit Cuba and were now headed to vulnerable coastlines of panhandle Florida, Alabama and Mississippi, with a projected path to hit New Orleans head-on. The storm measured a Category 4 when it made landfall at Cuba—but the pressure system in the Gulf had just shifted and now fed the monster storm with even more moist, hot air.
Air and Water Keepers on boats off the coast of Cuba attempted to cool off the hot surface moisture of the Gulf waters from being swept into the atmosphere but had reported their efforts had failed.
“Still a Category 4 over the Caymans,” a voice shouted out. A hushed, pregnant silence filled with too much knowledge swept over the room for a mere second or two, then the white noise of many voices erupted once more.
“Air Keepers at Cayman Brac couldn’t get a handle on the atmospheric conditions feeding the storm. They lost it.” Trent turned a worried glance toward Autumn.
“It’ll be a Category 5,” she said, no doubt in her mind, something in her gut, maybe the Talisman part of her bestowed by Gaia, told her so, “when it hits here.”
“Maybe worse,” Trent said.
That meant 155 plus miles per hour winds and storm surges of eighteen feet or more. Complete coastal devastation would ensue and the tornadoes and straight line winds from the storm would create further havoc inland, not to mention the huge amounts of rain that would be dumped in such a system.
Trent’s hand reached for hers where it lay trembling on his shoulder. She brushed a kiss over his cheek. He patted her hand, then typed their conclusions about the storm’s escalation into the system. Immediately, an upgraded hurricane warning went out to the local meteorologists who would post new storm warnings along the coast. Evacuation plans that had been voluntary to this point would now become mandatory.
She shuddered as a particularly heavy blast of straight line winds buffeted the heavy metal doors leading to the subterranean military facility taken over by KOTE. A slight change in air pressure made itself felt in every joint in her body. The air grew more humid and everything in the room took on the pea green aura that often presaged a tornado.
“Will they hold if there are tornadoes, Trent?” She glanced around the cavernous room, the only vulnerable part of the room were those doors.
Trent’s eyes narrowed. “Are you feeling what I am?”
“An increase in pressure and the sense a tornado is forming, yes.”
At her words, the doors flew open. Swirling, violent, hungry winds tore into the room as if they wanted to destroy those who might control them. Desks, Terrans and paper were tossed about the enclosed room in mini-cyclonic up-bursts. The danger of being sucked into the updraft and out of the shelter was high.
The amulet on her chest lit up like a searchlight, almost burning her skin. A quick glance toward Trent’s chest showed his amulet had appeared.
A sepulchral voice resounded in the room. Air Talisman. Consort. Act now. Trust your instincts. Only you can stop the storms.
“Autumn?” Trent shouted, reaching for her with one hand as his other grasped the energy-spitting pendant hanging around his neck. “What is this?”
Use this connection, Trent. We’re it. Hold onto me. We’re on a short learning curve here. I need you to feed me your Protector strength. She only hoped their essences would know what to do. She had no clue, had fully expected detailed instructions from Gaia when the time came. Talk about being thrown into the deep end.
The Air Keepers in the room
worked to contain the winds, but had little to no effect. The tornado generated by supercells fed by the hurricane conditions was escalating. The wind speed had increased from 100 mph to 140 mph within seconds and seemed to be holding a pattern on the ground immediately over the Hurricane Response headquarters.
Get down, Autumn! Trent attempted to push her under the heavy desk.
No, I need to gather the winds.
Or at least that is what her essence told her she needed to do. Buffeted by strong winds, she stood up with Trent’s arms around her waist. He struggled to hold her to his solid male strength; she knew he would never let go. She raised her arms, opening them as wide as she could. It sounded insane, but instinct told her to draw the winds into her body and dissipate the wind energy inside the walls of her essence, then release it back into the atmosphere as a harmless breeze. Her mind told her she was crazy and the energy would kill her.
Gaia’s voice: Go with your instincts, Air Talisman. Trust in my gift to you.
Trent’s gasp told her this time he’d heard the voice. His lips touched her neck, and in her head she heard, I’ve got you, baby.
I love you, Trent.
Their hearts and souls were united. Together they were stronger than apart. They would live or die together—and since she really hadn’t had a chance to live with her man yet—she planned on surviving.
Blocking out the chaos in the room, she reached into her essence and found more power than she’d ever dealt with before. All along her back, energy bounced back and forth between her and Trent. Fighting energy with energy, she absorbed the winds.
The wind energy sought her, filling a vacuum her body created to tempt the storm winds. The winds now circled within her. Her essence walls strengthened by a combination of her and Trent’s power, she beat the storm into submission. The more of the violent, swirling wind she took in, the calmer the air in the room became, until finally, the winds swirling in the room died down to a mere breeze.
Two Protectors rushed to the doors, closing and locking them.
Controlling the energy had been bruising but bearable. Now she had to get rid of the excess energy she dare not release into her body or the atmosphere.