by Unknown
He nodded, gave Carl a little salute, accepted his jacket back, and slipped out the door.
“Breena’s having trouble finding Jason,” Carl said as he leaned against the work bench, right where Roman had just stood.
“No problem,” Sam replied, trying her best to look as relaxed as she sounded.
Truth was, panic coursed through her veins. Carl was acting as though they were best buds. Either he had been brained washed since their last encounter or something was very wrong. The last time they talked, he was evasive at best, and the time before that, he had basically turned on her. Had he been a dog, she would have needed a rabies shot.
Why was he here, supposedly taking care of her?
Before she could decide what to do, the doors of the warehouse burst open and a handful of fae stepped in, their powers crackling on the surface, ready to be used. Sam recognized the redheaded Víz clan leader who had been present at a number of the murder scenes. Suddenly it all came into focus.
Her aching head whipped around to glare at Carl.
“You too?” she asked, though she wasn’t entirely certain what she was asking.
“They had to be stopped,” Carl said as he stepped away from her, his electricity jumping from one hand to the other, as though he was tossing a baseball back in forth in anticipation of a good game of catch.
“The vampires?” Sam asked innocently.
“They don’t deserve to live,” replied a woman standing at one of the other doors.
Sam turned to stare at her. The woman in question glared at her a second before disappearing and reappearing three feet closer to where Sam stood in the center of the enormous room. It was a power play, a way to display what she could do. Sam lowered her arms from where they had been, tightly wrapped around her battered body. She hurt, but she needed to look as though she didn’t have a care in the world. Truth was, she suspected her end was fast approaching.
“And do I even want to know your reasoning behind that?”
“They live off the blood of others,” spat a man standing behind her.
Sam turned to see him. He was taking careful steps to the left to complete the circle around her, his hands were smoldering with small flames.
“And we fae have never done something despicable,” Sam countered.
The longer she kept them talking, the better her chances of Breena finding Jason, assuming they weren’t dead somewhere. Sam swallowed the lump in her throat.
“Are you suggesting we’re as evil as the vampires?” asked another man.
Sam stared at him, trying to gage his power. She couldn’t by sight and so she allowed her power the slightest taste. He was a wind-bender of some sort. The last man she already knew. He was a prominent clan leader of the Föld clan—a superstar of sorts—and a powerful beast conjurer. He could bring an animal of some sort out of the depths of the earth to fight in his stead, like a bear or a wolf.
They had brought a number of extremely powerful warriors, knowing her ability to take their powers and balancing the effects. They had brought someone who could make fire and someone who could counter that attack in case she took the fire-maker’s power. They brought a teleporter and a wind-bender who would make teleporting dangerous to anyone but the most practiced fae.
Sam couldn’t help but smile. They had worked out their strategy well, preparing for her skills and her weaknesses.
“And me?” Sam asked.
“You just couldn’t accept that the vampires were the culprits,” replied the red-haired clan leader, water dripping from his fingertips.
Sam felt fresh tears escape her lids.
“And so you killed your own people.” It wasn’t a question.
“The sacrifice of the few for the good of the many,” quoted the woman.
Sam eyed her out of the corner of her eye. The teleporter was the least of her worries. Sure, she could materialize near Sam and punch her, but the woman was a scrawny little thing, and Sam was a dirty fighter, especially against six powerful warriors.
Six?
Sam turned in a circle to stare at her old friend.
“And you Carl? You helped kill your own people to eradicate the vampires? You electrocuted them… until they couldn’t move so that the others could drain them of their lifeblood?” asked Sam as her mind trailed back to the necromancer in the port.
The burn on his cheek had come from too many volts of electricity coursing through his body. Carl had done his job too well. Suddenly it all made sense.
“You guys have been planning this for a long time,” Sam said, turning back to the redheaded Víz leader. “About a year and a half.”
He smiled. “How’d you guess?”
“That’s when they poured the concrete in the building where they found the body of the vampire you decapitated… the same vampire whose jaw you used to make the bite marks on the victims.”
The clan leader gave her a little bow.
“You were right, Carl. She does figure things out quickly. You were right to be concerned. Well done.”
Sam wanted to turn and look at Carl, but he wasn’t the real threat. She knew him better than the clan leader. When it all went down, she doubted Carl would have the courage to enter the fight. Then again, she hadn’t expected him to be able to pin another fae down with his electricity. Maybe she underestimated the scrawny man.
“Now, Miss Gollet, will you be insisting on fighting us?” asked the clan leader.
“You could just surrender,” Sam offered magnanimously.
The fae laughed and Sam made her move. She had no idea if her plan would work, but she was ready to try it. She reach out her hands, ignoring the stabbing pain in her ribs, and drew from the fire and water fae at the same time. The two powers collided inside her, making her stagger backwards. Within seconds she felt unpleasantly drunk and unstable. Long before the two fae were drained of their powers, her tank was full.
Despite the tumult of the room as the fae started to counter her sudden attack, Sam worked to calm her mind and focus her borrowed powers. If she knew nothing else, she knew she would not manage this new trick without complete concentration and discipline.
Even as she closed her eyes and focused inward, she sensed the beast conjurer begin to work his magic. It would take him some time to draw the animal from the earth, especially while standing inside a freaking concrete warehouse. The two fae she had attacked needed time to recuperate. The Huzat wind fae was already kicking up the plaster dust of the warehouse with his meager attack, while the teleporter was doing something.
Sam smiled as she realized Carl had yet to move.
She kept her eyes closed—half to keep the plaster dust out of her eyes and half to concentrate on the powers surging in her veins. She had to be able to separate the powers if she wanted to control them. Slowly, as she began to recognize the subtle differences between the feel of water and fire flowing through her, she directed the powers out of her two hands, the water directed at where she remembered the fire fae standing and the fire directed at where the water fae had been standing.
The results were dismal.
The powers surged forth on her command, burning away some of the plaster dust in the air, but doing little more as the fire turned the water into a large burst of steam—both powers coming out of both hands. On top of the dismal failure of her attempts, the fae had managed to crawl away, completely out of range of her attack. At most, all she had managed to do was use up the power she had taken.
Sam opened her eyes, blinking furiously at the plaster dust in her eyes. The dust from the work done within the walls of the warehouse was so thick she couldn’t make out the figures of her attackers as the wind-bender continued to work up the dust.
Had they planned this? Sam wondered as a few choice curse words passed through her mind and fresh tears of pain pricked her eyes.
Seemingly out of nowhere, a large, warm body collided with her, knocking her off her feet. Her head cracked against the work bench on her way
to the floor. Sharp teeth bit into her good shoulder, giving her a rough shake. Even through the dust, she caught a glimpse of an angry cougar as it adjusted its grip on her shoulder.
Sam did her best to ignore the new agony tearing through her body as the animal pinned her to the ground. She released her hold on her gift, focusing it on the beast conjurer. With her tank emptied and her gift focused on just one enemy, it didn’t take her long to drain all the power from the Föld fae. With his power coursing through her, all she had to do was figure out how to use it and the cougar would be under her control.
Sam drew her thoughts inward, thought hard on the cougar, and projected the image of the cougar defending her from the other fae. To her amazement, the animal immediately released her shoulder and turned, ready to attack anyone who came near her. Sam used her other shoulder—the one recently dislocated, but not mauled by a damn giant cat—and dragged herself under the work bench. The animal backed up until its hind quarters bumped into her, baring its teeth at the other fae as they drew nearer.
Unlike the other fae whose powers and skills came naturally to one degree or another, Sam had been left to figure her abilities out on her own. It meant she was left with a powerful mind and a well-defined mental concentration. She used the power controlling the cougar as slowly as she could, knowing it might well be the only thing that was keeping her alive.
At the same time, she began to sip from the fire fae, using his power to take the place of the conjurer’s power draining out of her. It didn’t really mater. Soon enough, they would figure out how to take out the cougar and she would be finished.
“Just give up, Sam,” called the red-haired leader.
“Why?” she asked, a little cough following her question. “You tired?”
She heard a soft laugh from behind her. It was the teleporter. Sam lifted her hand over her shoulder, not worrying about aiming and blasted what fire-power she had taken so far, catching the teleporter in the face.
She heard the woman scream, wincing at the volume and nearness of the sound. Sam ducked, surprised at how close the woman had gotten. The teleporter stumbled backwards, slapping at her face in an effort to put out the fire. At the same time the cougar turned, ready to lunge at her. Sam gave the animal the mental command to stay near. There was no need for the cat to attack the teleporter. She was out of the fight for at least the next few minutes.
Sam closed her eyes again, focusing on the movements of the fae via their powers, the slow drain of the animal-power, and the slow increase of the fire-power. It was a lot, even for her, and she felt her mind growing tired and sluggish, just like any other overused muscle. She couldn’t keep this up indefinitely, no matter how long her battered body lasted.
“Carl,” called there leader. “You still with us, Carl?”
Like Sam, their leader knew the lynch pin in all this would be where Carl fell between the two groups.
“Yeah, Carl. How’re you doing, old friend?” Sam asked as loudly as she could despite the pain of her broken ribs.
The cougar growled in reaction to her pain.
Carl didn’t respond.
Chapter Twenty
“Carl,” Sam called again into the haze of the plaster dust still being whipped up by the wind fae.
Little did they realize, the dusty air was working in Sam’s favor, despite the pain in her eyes. She didn’t need her eyes to know where they were. Her gift told her everything she needed to know about them to fight them, and more.
“I-I’m still here,” Carl finally said.
“You gonna pitch in?” asked the clan leader.
“’Cause you’ve been so helpful,” Sam said, wisely goading her enemy.
“Who’s the one bleeding?” replied the leader.
“I’m sorry, but remind me of the numbers. Six verses one, if I’m not mistaken? And I’ve already killed one of yours and injured three others. You want to learn how to fight then come get a lesson,” she added for good measure.
To her amazement, he complied. An enormous river of water rushed through the warehouse, lifting Sam off her rump and sending her out from under her hiding place. The cougar was swept away too, sliding farther than her. Before she could catch a solid object, the teleporter appeared, half her face looking as though she had been hit with a sizzling cast-iron pan. The woman grabbed Sam’s hair and pushed her down under the flow of the grimy water, Sam’s nose grazing the cement floor.
Sam struggled against her, panic clouding her ability to focus on the various powers coursing through her body. As though clinging to one last thread of sanity, she barely supported her control over the cougar, but all efforts to drain the power from the fire fae ceased. Rather than use what fire burned within her or specifically call the cougar to her, she flailed against the woman holding her under the water.
If nothing else, the warehouse was getting a thorough washing.
The weight of the teleporter’s attack increased, slamming Sam down onto the floor of the warehouse, the woman’s body pinning her under the water. An errant claw caught her in the hip suggesting the cougar had attacked the teleporter on its own, accidentally pinning Sam under the water.
Fresh blood from her shoulder wound—and the new scratch on her hip—turned the flowing water red. Sam squeezed her eyes shut as her lungs burned with the need for air. Sam placed her palms on the concrete slab of the floor and tried to push up, but between the weight of two bodies and the damage done to both shoulders, there was no hope of pushing herself upward by her own meager strength.
In a last ditch effort, Sam focused on the cougar, imagining the enormous animal dragging the teleporter off her body. Just as she felt her consciousness begin to fade, she felt the weight lift. Sam pushed herself up with the last of her strength, gasping for air the second her lips passed the choppy water.
In reality, the water produced by the clan leader was no more than nine or ten inches deep, but it was more than enough to recreate their battlefield.
Sam felt the last of the conjurer’s power leave her. The cougar was free to attack whoever it wanted now, including her.
Rather than announce this information to the others, she began to crawl away, while simultaneously inching toward the water fae, a plan of attack taking shape. Sam ducked under one of the workbenches and kept crawling, doing her best to ignore the pain tearing through her torn shoulder and the screams coming from the teleporter battling the enraged cougar.
Sam made it to another workbench, where she pulled herself up to her feet and hopped up onto the clear surface. Standing a few feet above the others, she spread her fingers and focused on the powers of the Víz clan leader and his water flowing around the enclosed space. Sam, completely devoid of power, allowed her gift all the freedom it craved. Much like the cougar, her gift pounced on the redhead, draining him faster than Sam had ever managed before. Within seconds, the leader crumpled to the ground, nearly disappearing beneath the choppy water.
Closing her eyes, Sam refused to look on the dead body. Instead she drew her attention to the energy of the water lapping against the legs of the table she stood on. With the other fae’s power filling her, she could feel the energy of the water, each molecule filling the room, each drop falling from her wet hair. They sang to her.
Was this what it was like to have power within her all the time?
As though it was jealous, her own gift turned to the Túz fire fae, trying to take from him even though her proverbial tank was good and full.
Her eyes still closed, Sam pulled at the water, swirling it up and around her in a cyclone. When she had the water moving to her satisfaction, she flung it in the direction of the fire fae. Through the wash of water, Sam couldn’t see how the enormous waterfall affected the fae, but when the water finished sloshing about, she saw the fire fae crumpled under a toppled workbench.
Sam ran her eyes over the mess that had been Fae Manufacturing, only then noticing the shredded remains of the teleporter and the sizzling body of the cougar layin
g at Carl’s feet. The thin, young man sat on his rump, his knees pulled up to his chin with one hand outstretched, as though he had just used his power to kill the cougar.
His gaze jerked up to where Sam stood atop the workbench, blood dripping from her various wounds.
They stared at each other, the only sound being that of water dripping as it worked its way down into the enormous lake created by the dead Víz fae.
Sam swallowed. She had to say something. If they waited much longer she was going to collapse.
“Is this over?” she finally asked, deciding that bluntness was the best option; she needed to know if he was on her side or theirs.
“What do you mean?” he asked, just above a whisper as he climbed to his feet.
“Are you going to carry this foolish vendetta to the end? You still want all vampires dead? You still planning on killing your own people to make that happen? Or have you seen reason?” she asked, sneering at him in disgust.
Carl drop his eyes before nodding.
“I need more than a nod. I need a promise,” Sam said before dropping down into the water.
As if her statement had been a cue, the back door burst open. The water rushed toward the narrow exit in a rapid torrent, effectively knocking both Carl and Sam off their feet. Sam’s head slammed against the hard floor of the warehouse and she struggled as unconsciousness threatened to engulf her, but the rage of water rushing around her forced her body to fight the darkness—she needed to work to keep her head above the water line.
She flailed until her fingers curled around something and her body’s headlong dive came to a sudden stop. Sam sat up and brushed her white hair out of her eyes as she climbed back to her feet. Carl was doing the same next to her, his own hand wrapped around one of the machines used to make the molds for the ceramic figurines.
The two young fae turned to see who had come upon them.
Once again, it wasn’t Breena and Jason.