by Rowena Rede
The wind whipped frantically around Maya, causing her to look wild and unhinged. Thatcher’s suit jacket had disappeared and he’d rolled up his shirtsleeves, pistol holsters visible to anyone who looked. They made an intimidating duo and were hellbent on finishing business. As they neared the boathouses, Maya caught sight of the first mercenary. Harnessing her anger and frustration over the entire Oberon operation, she flicked her wrist to the side, causing a strong gust of wind to direct itself straight for him. He was effortlessly blown off the dock and into the water. Maya kept forging ahead, Park, stayed on point, determined to cover them both when necessary.
While Maya knocked as many hired guns out of the way as she came upon them, Park took out a sniper position in the window of the largest warehouse as they came upon it.
“Looks like this is the place. That sniper in the window wouldn’t be there if he wasn’t guarding someone.”
“I imagine what we just picked off was only the tip of the iceberg. They’ll have an army of highly trained personal protection.”
“Super personal protection. Persons of all abilities will be in there. Don’t underestimate anyone. Aim for the head, not the heart. That’s a sure kill shot.” Maya shook her head, “Gods I wish one of us would’ve thought to bring a machete. Severed heads are always a sure way to make sure nothing comes back.”
As if to drive the point home, they were hit with a random energy blast, knocking them off their feet and onto their backs. An earsplitting howl filled the space between them.
“Looks like they know we’ve arrived,” Thatcher groaned in discomfort, trying to catch his breath. The energy bolt felt like he’d been hit with high voltage electricity.
“I’ll take the orb thrower if you take the werewolf,” Maya offered.
“I’ll take that deal,” he huffed as he got back on his feet. Another energy blast landed at his feet. Maya ran off in the direction it came from, while Park waited for the wolf to start circling him. All he needed was a good clear shot to the head. He knew from the last tangle he had with a wolf that they were highly sensitive to silver. He needed to find some high ground. Another orb landed too close for comfort. Maya must not have found the source yet.
He frantically searched for cover and found it behind an overturned rowboat. The wolf was waiting for him. Catching him off guard, it pounced, razor-sharp claws nearly ending him right then. He fired a warning shot to scare it away from him. It only bought him a few seconds though. Ducking around the corner of the warehouse, he waited. Another orb came sailing in his direction, this time he didn’t move. He wasn’t going to be driven out into the open. Just as the orb was about to hit him dead center in the chest, it pivoted to the left and dissolved against the building. He looked up and saw Maya a few yards away. She’d found the source of the energy balls and had managed to deflect it from him just in time.
He heard the howl of the wolf again, it was close. He crouched low and waited for it to come around the corner. He could hear its heavy panting as it came closer. As it rounded the corner and came into view, he took his shot. He capped it in the knee, causing it to fall to the ground. The silver was working quickly, the creature cried out in agony, unable to move anymore.
He wasn’t going to kill in cold blood, but he sure as hell made sure it wasn’t going to come after him again.
Before he could catch his breath, he heard another howl. More orbs came his way. He dodged most of them and took cover again.
Maya redirected as much fire as she could, but she was losing steam. The anger that fueled her power was waning, reminding her once again, that she wasn’t at full capacity with her magic. She fought her way to Thatcher’s hiding spot and took cover with him.
More howls started pouring in. It sounded like multiple packs were warring with each other as the howls gave way to growls and cries of pain.
“Well, look what we have here. I’m surprised you two made it this far. Congratulations.” Merle’s drawl felt like a warm hug to Maya as he helped her up. He extended his hand to Thatcher who nodded an acknowledgment.
“Glad you showed up. When we get out of this, you have a lot of explaining to do.” Maya wasn’t about to let him off the hook just because he swooped in and saved the day.
“It took me a while to garner up the support I needed. Luckily, Mr. Morgan has deeply offended several wolf packs in the area. They were more than willing to pick a fight with him. He gestured for them to look around.
Giant wolves were everywhere, pouncing on anything that moved. It was a terrifying sight to behold. Merle continued, “Now that we have the hired guns taken care of, may I suggest we move forward with our rescue?”
Stone heard the howls outside and knew he was under siege. He ordered what was left of his team to barricade the doors, while he hid under a pile of rotted cloth sails, near Apple’s resting spot, but it was too late.
With all the strength she could muster, Maya caused the main doors to blow off their hinges. Wind with hurricane force strength battered them to the ground. The fury of her winds, knocked over everything in sight, causing an obstacle course for anyone trying to escape.
Utilizing his heightened senses, Merle quickly located Stone and moved with lightning speed to grab the dimensional key from him.
Thatcher efficiently managed to take out the remaining guards with precision, a pistol in each hand as he shot in both directions.
I believe, Mr. Morgan, you are finished.” Merle teased as he waved Stone’s only escape in front of him.
Stone looked in disbelief at the chaos around him. There was no way he was going to let this riff-raff beat him. He was Stone Morgan of House Oberon. A Fae of the noblest bloodline. A vampire, a human, and a witch were not going to best him.
Laughing maniacally, he edged toward his sleeping cousin, “You can’t have her. You’re death and decay and darkness. She’s light and warmth, and life itself. All Seelie are creatures of the light. I’ll show you.”
Catching even the vampire off guard, Stone managed to produce the tiniest flame with his fingertips. It wasn’t much, but the dry rotted sailing cloth quickly caught fire, engulfing everything surrounding it. Merle hissed in anger and fear. Vampires were susceptible to fire. He wouldn’t die, but it would hurt like hell and take years to heal if he caught himself ablaze.
Apple was still unconscious and in immediate danger. Maya saw everything unfolding as if it were in slow motion. She immediately knew what to do, but she wasn’t sure if she had the energy or the control to do it.
Park ran toward the blaze, fearless and ready to help in any way he could. She hoped for his sake, she did this right. The next actions she took would be critical to everyone’s lives.
Park instinctively ran toward the fire instead of away from it. He knew he had to help Merle save Apple somehow. The small blaze quickly developed into an inferno, thanks to the wind Maya had trapped inside the building with her door opening trick. As he ran closer to the flame, he felt his body give out and he struggled to breathe. He slowed to a halt, unable to move any further, gasping for air. He was getting dizzy. As he started to slump to the ground, he noticed the flames were dying out too. Looking over his shoulder, he saw Maya advancing towards the center of the flames, her fist clenched tight as if she were suffocating the whole room. Every living thing was starting to slump with him, deprived of oxygen.
He smiled to himself as he got closer to the ground. He rested his head on the rough floorboards and closed his eyes as if he were going into a peaceful sleep.
As she contained the flames by depriving the room of oxygen, Merle became the only creature unaffected. He was already dead, he didn’t need to breathe. She was becoming affected by the lack of air. Her lungs burned and she grew weaker by the second. The vampire didn’t waste any time. He stepped over the minute flames and plucked Apple up as if she were a tiny doll.
Maya pleaded with her eyes toward Thatcher’s body. Merle knew what she was asking and picked him up as well. He zipped out o
f there with them at lightning speed. Once she was sure he was at a safe distance, Maya let go of her control and sighed in relief as she hit the floor.
##
Park awoke gasping for air, flat on his back in a parking lot overlooking the warehouse. Next to him was a beautiful blonde, sleeping peacefully in Merle’s arms. The warehouse was an uncontrollable inferno now and the only thing to do was watch as the flames hungrily devoured it. Maya had done it. She’d made sure they got out safely. He was in awe of her now that he’d seen her in action. He couldn’t wait to tell Ison about this.
“Where’s Maya? I would think she’d want to watch this go down.” His jubilant tone died immediately as he saw Merle’s crestfallen look.
“I went back for her after I got you two safely out of the way, but I couldn’t find her. I wasn’t fast enough. The building erupted instantly. I think once she knew we were safe, she let her guard down. The sudden influx of oxygen into the deprived atmosphere caused the fire to build back up. I’m sorry.”
Park couldn’t believe it. Just a few days ago, it didn’t even know Maya existed and now he couldn’t imagine working a case without her. Like Ison, she just fit. She was part of the tribe. “No, I don’t believe this is how it ends for her. She just saved us all. That’s not how it should be.”
“I’m sorry, but I don’t see a way she could have survived. She’d not immune to oxygen deprivation either. As she choked out that fire, she choked every living thing in that building. It’s why you dropped so fast. As a witch, her tolerance would have been a little higher, but not much. Think about it. The only way that inferno restarted would have had to have been because she lost control. Her will is too strong to be careless. It’s logical to think she lost consciousness and in doing so lost control of everything. If she was was unconscious when the fire started up again…” Merle couldn’t finish the sentence and Thatcher didn’t want him to.
Park refused to let this be the end for Maya. There had to be something. Some way to stop this. “Hey, that dimensional key. How does it work?”
“It opens a rift into another dimension. A world similar to ours but with different timelines and events.”
“Could we go back to the moment just before the building exploded?”
Merle could see the wheels in Thatcher’s head turning and he liked the direction he was headed in, but he was going to have to detour him.
“We couldn’t because you would succumb to oxygen deprivation again. I could. I don’t need air. My lungs haven’t worked in over a hundred years.”
Park flinched just a little at the reminder of Merle’s undead status. I’ll never get used to vampires, or any of this.
“It wouldn’t be our Maya though. You can’t go back in time with them. You can visit other timelines and she would be there, but if you took her out of that world, it could have devastating repercussions. As a rule, it’s best not to mess with time travel. The butterfly effect is truly heinous. I lost the key anyway. When I was getting you and Apple Dumpling out.”
Park felt himself deflate. That small sliver of hope he’d had vanished. Overwhelming fatigue washed over him. He just needed to disappear. Before he knew what had overcome him, tears covered his cheeks. Soon he was outright sobbing. Ugly loud sobs wracked his entire body until he didn’t have the energy to sit up. He was so tired of losing everything. His job, his friends, nothing mattered anymore.
Maya felt the heat searing her skin. She jolted herself awake, expecting to smell smoke and see chaos. Instead, she was on a beach, facedown in the sand. Her arms turning pink from the sun, her black clothes absorbing the sun’s heat, causing her to sweat.
Where the hell am I? Is this the afterlife? She pinched herself hard. “Ow! Shit!” No, she wasn’t dead. Dead people didn’t get sunburns or feel pain. How did she get here? The last thing she remembered was giving up control of the air supply in the warehouse and passing out as the building reignited.
Replaying her last moments of consciousness in her mind, she remembered signaling to Merle, to grab Park on the way out. He moved so fast, his image was a blur. Something fell out fo his hands though. The dimensional key. She crawled over to it and put her hands on it as she started to fade into oblivion. Her last thoughts were, Get me out of here.
She didn’t know exactly how to use one of those keys, only Fae had them and they never gave them away. Her final thoughts must have been strong enough to activate it. If she used it to get here, she could use it to get back. She just had to find it first. It must have fallen out of her hands when she landed here. She hoped the ocean hadn’t swallowed it.
She sifted her fingers around in the sand near where she’d woken up. “C’mon, where are you?” Gods she was exhausted. Frustration overtook her as she threw sand around causing it to embed in her hair and on her skin. “I am so friggin’ tired. I’ve lost everything, my powers aren’t at my beck and call anymore, I’m lost in another dimension, if I do make it home, I’m probably facing the wrath of the Fae! Please someone just give me a break,” She screamed as loud as she could before breaking into uncontrollable sobbing.
Park was having a hard time letting go. After the fire, he’d collected Ison and they’d returned to their hotel room and packed their bags, but they hadn’t returned home. He didn’t want to without knowing a definitive answer about Maya.
Her body hadn’t been found and neither had the dimensional key. It gave him enough hope to keep looking. Ison supported his theory wholeheartedly and began studying everything he could on other dimensions, while Thatcher leaned heavily on River Oberon to make things right. He still wasn’t sure if the prince knew what his cousin had been up to. He wanted to believe he didn’t have any knowledge of it. When he embraced his sister after she’d been returned to him, Park thought he saw genuine emotion. He even gave his blessing for Apple to continue her relationship with the vampire who’d saved them all.
Merle still hadn’t given satisfactory reasons as to why he hadn’t been more forthcoming at the beginning of the investigation, and he never heard from the mysterious phone demon again, but Park had more pressing matters to attend to.
“Okay Will, the last missing person has been reunited with their family. We can officially consider this case closed.”
Ison smiled, happy to be done with it. “That just leaves our missing person.”
“Let’s drink to that,” Thatcher grabbed his tumbler of whiskey and held it in the air. Ison did the same with his can of soda. “Here’s to Maya, may we find her quickly and may she not kill us when she finds out we took over her office. Salut.”
After he swallowed that impromptu mouthful of soda, Ison spoke up. “Hey, speaking of taking over the office, I got the new sign. Wanna see it?”
They hadn’t really taken over Maya’s business. It was still all hers, but Thatcher wanted to stay and keep it running. He promised to keep the lights on for her until she returned.
Ison opened the new door decal. He’d come up with the design himself. It was the alchemy symbol for air, a triangle with a line running horizontally through the center. TMI, INC resting underneath the base.
“Thatcher, Morales, Ison, incorporated. I put her in the middle because she’s the base of this operation and we’re just the angles. Without her, this wouldn’t exist.”
“You know she’ll pitch a fit when she sees it,” Ison laughed. Thatcher grinned, “Oh I’m counting on it.”
I always dread this part. I’m terrified of forgetting someone fundamentally important. I want to thank my close-knit tribe of fellow creators. Each of us has a truly unique and entertaining outlook on life. I am improved tenfold just for knowing you. Your impacts on me are profound and lifelong.
I also want to thank my family and friends who have supported me on this journey. For as long as I can remember, I’ve always wanted to create new worlds full of interesting characters. You have always encouraged me to do so and that positive support is the reason I’ve finally achieved that lifelong dream.
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br /> Thank you, everyone, from the bottom of my heart!
-Rowena
Rowena Rede lives on a small farm in rural West Virginia. She’s an avid pop culture and book enthusiast. She misses the good old days when she had her own pull list at the comic book shop in the next county. A self-professed curmudgeon who loves reading and writing Historical, Science Fiction, Paranormal, Horror, and Urban Fantasy books when time allows. She is quite proud of her humongous TBR pile which will never be finished much like her Netflix queue. She always has time for a good meme and has never turned down a carbohydrate.
For more information please visit
https://rowenarede.com