Clashing Tempest (Men of Myth Book 3)

by Brandon Witt

Wrell let his spears fall beside him and replied with another repeat of him remaining with the queen while the rest of us exited the scene. As he did, he started forward toward Lelas and the queen, his quills finally flat against his body. He made it obvious he was complying with her demands.

  Terror encompassed me, watching him move toward Lelas and the queen. How long would they let him live? Would we even get out of the kelp forest before they fell all over him?

  Though I didn’t notice any gesture from the queen, one of the Volitan males broke ranks from directly behind her. He could have been Wrell’s twin, with his massive tattooed form and shaved head. He darted as fast as a speedboat in Wrell’s direction, his long body as sleek as the spear that sliced a path before him.

  They were all too close, Wrell, the approaching Volitan, Lelas. On instinct my hands rose, and I shoved with all my strength at the water. As when the shark had descended on Lelas, twin spirals cut through the dark space between us.

  The growing funnels hit the Volitan square in his side. I had no way to tell if the snapping sound that accompanied the impact was his spear or his spine. He careened through the water, my power pushing him farther from Wrell. He’d been close enough to Lelas and the queen that, as his body cut between them, his spear sliced into Lelas and blood instantly bloomed around her. The currents from my jets of water pushed at both Lelas and the queen, flinging them apart—the queen pushed back toward her warriors, Lelas crashing into Wrell, knocking him aside.

  The next few events took no more than thirty seconds total, but the slow-motion effects were burned into my memory.

  From somewhere in the horde of Volitans, a cluster of spears shot toward me. At the same time, Nalu tore off in a blur toward Lelas’s bleeding form.

  I started to raise my hands to use the water to thrust the oncoming spears from me. In the millisecond it took to realize I wasn’t going to be able to redirect my power that quickly, the spears buried themselves in a dark blur that appeared in front of me.

  The force of their impact made the body whip around, an arm smashing against my chest at the movement. Through the plumes of blackish blood, Wrell’s face plunged toward my own, the end of one of the stone spears protruding from the collapsed section of his skull above his right eyebrow.

  I screamed his name out loud, bubbles bursting from my mouth, blocking his face from view. I grasped at his body as the force shoved him past me. One of the points of other spears that riddled his body cut through my skin as he rocketed past.

  Before I could attempt to reach out to stop his body’s trajectory, another detonation of dark blood drew my attention. Only a few feet from where Lelas was regaining her equilibrium, a forest of spears secured Nalu’s body to the sand.

  The horror narrowed my vision to one of the spears that had sunk through Nalu’s outstretched hand.

  Turning back toward the Volitans, jets of water spewed forth, creating a blast that struck the Volitan warriors. Those at the pinnacle of the wall received the worst of the whiplash, their bodies nothing more than rags caught in a hurricane. More blood bloomed as their forms bashed into each other in the torrent.

  “Brett!” Therin’s panicked screaming in my head was the only thing that pulled me back to the moment. Turning my attention in his direction, I saw Therin, his blade raised in aggression, blocking Lelas from a small cluster of Volitan that had escaped my shock wave. Behind him, Lelas dragged herself over the sand to Nalu, reaching out to clasp his hand, which had been stretched out to her in death.

  Even as I watched, a spear sliced through Therin’s tail, driving him backward. Still another shot past him and plunged into Nalu. His body jerked at the impact.

  Water poured forth once more, gushing from me with the strength of a hurricane, and again the Volitans lost control and flew back into the flattened kelp behind them.

  “Brett!” Therin motioned in front of him, past where I was looking. Turning, I saw Volitans swimming back toward us. I raised my hands, ready to send them back again.

  “Brett, no! Help me with Lelas!”

  I turned back to him, his form already curved over her tiny figure as he tried to pull her away from the body of her mate.

  Bringing my attention back to the Volitan, water shot forth and shoved the closest away once more.

  “No, Brett. Not like that. We must save Lelas!”

  His words finally broke through, and I pushed off the sand and closed the distance between us in less than a second.

  It took both of us to drag her away, Therin pulling at her waist, me peeling her fingers from where they clenched over Nalu’s hand.

  Her screams cut through my skull as sharply as the spears that fell around us. Another found its mark, and it pierced through Lelas’s forearm as she continued to reach for Nalu. Still she struggled against us.

  Dad’s calm cut through the hell in my brain. “You’re part demon for a reason, Brett. Use it.”

  As if it had been waiting for permission, fire poured forth, this time using the same conduit as the water. With one crushing hand, I held onto my best friend, and with the other, I let the fire eat up everything behind us.

  Sensations of agony joined Lelas’s screams in my skull as my fire tore through the kelp forest, the meadow, and began to engulf the Volitans. Craning my head around to follow the path of my outstretched hand, my gaze only paused over Nalu’s body being devoured by the flame. It was Wrell that I watched be consumed by the very thing that had saved his life just a few short months ago. I watched until Therin pulled at my arm hard enough to bring my attention to Lelas, who was still trying to claw her way back to Nalu.

  Twenty-Five

  BRETT WRIGHT

  During the blur of the next few hours, we only paused long enough to pull out the spear that was buried in Lelas’s right forearm and to take care of her wounds. Though it had to hurt, she didn’t even grunt as Therin held her arm steady and I yanked out the stone spike. Not even when I sealed the puncture wound on either side of her arm with the fire of one of my fingers.

  A long cut sliced down her clavicle and over her heart, barely missing her breast. I assumed it was from the spear the first Volitan I’d hit with my water had been wielding. Though it bled profusely, it didn’t seem to be life threatening—more a surface wound than anything. Therin and I decided to let it be, that sealing it with my fire would do more damage than good and drastically scar her body.

  She’d quit fighting us after we’d exited the kelp forest, but what was left was worse than her fury. Her face was slack, her eyes dilated and unfocused. She neither spoke nor moved. Therin and I held her under her arms and carried her with us while we swam. Within a couple of hours, her tail began to move as if on automatic pilot, but slow enough that we continued to assist. From the way she looked, I wasn’t convinced my friend would ever truly return to her body. She was buried somewhere deep inside, or maybe she’d left to travel to wherever it was Nalu’s soul had gone.

  The only other wound I attended to was the puncture in Therin’s tail. The spear had sliced through the lower portion, right above his fins. Luckily, it was lateral enough that the damage it seemed to have done was cosmetic. The only lasting harm would be that no golden scales would cover the entrance or exit wounds I’d cauterized closed.

  While Therin wasn’t lost to a world of shock, he didn’t speak either. At least not any more than to advise against using my fire on Lelas’s chest wound. He didn’t even protest when I toasted one of the sharks that got too close. They’d been drawn by our blood but left us alone after the death of their fellow, and probably smelling the blood from the kelp forest—if I hadn’t burned it all away—they chose that option for an easier feast.

  I was functioning better than I thought I should. I felt like I ought to be curled into a ball on the sand, unable to move. Maybe I still would be, maybe it would all come crashing down at once. As we swam through the dark ocean, back the way we’d come, no true thoughts formed, only an incessant replay of the night’s e
vents.

  If I’d used my fire when the Volitan rushed at Wrell with his spear, maybe that would have changed things. But every time I played that option, instead of seeing Lelas hit by the warrior’s spear as he shot back into the kelp, she was engulfed in flames right along with him.

  I should have stood in front of the other four. Between my fire and my water, they all would have been safe, or at least had a chance to get away. Though the queen would never have spoken to us then. But she hadn’t, had she?

  That was the part my brain refused to accept, and as a result, the realization hit me anew every time. The queen had told us nothing. We’d learned nothing from the Volitan that would be of any use in locating the vampires that were capturing mers. We hadn’t even found out if the Volitans had been experiencing the same thing.

  All of it was for nothing.

  Nalu, dead. For no other reason than he was there. That he’d been mated to Lelas. If only I’d encouraged her to stay with him and the Scarus tribe, he’d still be alive, and Lelas would be fine now. She’d have her mate and not have to face all she was going to have to deal with when she returned to her body. If she ever did.

  But, no. I’d been too selfish. I wanted her with me. Wanted her with the Chromis. Well, I got my wish. She was still with me.

  Seeing the agony on Lelas’s face as she’d dragged herself across the ocean floor toward Nalu’s dead form, struggling against her force as she’d fought Therin and me as we pulled her away from him, feeling the absence of her spirit as we carried her over the miles—it all reminded me of how I’d felt when Sonia was killed.

  As much as I loved Sonia, more than anyone else I’d ever known, somehow I knew this was worse. Whatever magic had happened between Lelas and Nalu that mated them together was beyond any other connection I’d seen in my life. I couldn’t see how Lelas would ever get through it, let alone be the same mermaid I’d grown to love so intensely. She wouldn’t be, would she? A person doesn’t come back from something like that unscathed. If Lelas returned, she wouldn’t be the same girl she’d been before.

  All for nothing.

  Wrell.

  All for nothing.

  Each time his visage shot through my mind, Syleen’s voice during the Great Hunt accompanied it.

  “We are not in charge of our life. It is the choice of Moheetla who retains their immortality. Let him pass in honor.”

  If only I’d let him die from the shark wound. What had I bought him by saving him? A few short weeks of life? A couple of months?

  Even as I thought it, I knew it was what Wrell would have wanted. He would have chosen to go on this mission, try to save his adoptive tribe. He would do everything he could to save his race.

  Along with Syleen’s words came the vision Wrell had shown me after I’d saved him. His beautiful form in front of me. His body bleeding. Mine healthy and whole. Some nameless threat shadowing over us. His pledge to give his life for me in payment for saving him. It wasn’t supposed to be prophetic, simply a promise.

  But it had been prophetic. He had bled in front of me while I remained unharmed. Sacrificing his life for the immortal demon.

  The vision was too close to what had actually transpired.

  Maybe he had known, somehow.

  All for nothing.

  It all might have been for nothing, but it was all because of me. Me, who only had scratches on my chest and stomach from the impact of the spears that punctured Wrell’s body.

  Because of me. Syleen had said as much. They all had. I was the catalyst for this fucked-up quest. My damned demonic power. My damned legs. It was even part of the reason Therin had sought me out. I would be able to do things none of them ever could. All because I could walk on land. It hadn’t even been due to my power at all, just one simple difference in our anatomy that allowed me to go places they could not. Walk on land and find who was slowly ending the mer line.

  And what a bang-up job I’d done. Helped kill two other mers and destroyed whatever life Lelas might have had in front of her. Not to mention however many Volitan I’d killed. That certainly didn’t help the mer population.

  That’s what I should have done. The instant it had looked like they were going to try to keep Wrell with them, I should have set the whole fucking lot of them on fire. Would have avoided the whole damned mess.

  That, or never followed Therin in the first place.

  After I’d found Sonia changed into the very creature that had killed her, my intent had been to walk into the ocean and let it claim me. Let it hold me frozen in darkness for eternity or let it end my life.

  Hadn’t quite worked out that way. I’d done nothing but harm its children. The ocean was worse off with me in it. Just like the de Moriscos had been. Without me, the vampire would never have been after them. Never killed Rodrigo. Never tried to kill Peter. I should have left well enough alone.

  I should have left Finn alone. Never involved him in any of this. Never loved him. Never hurt him.

  “Stop.”

  What could be expected from the offspring of a demon? Of the grandchild of a rape?

  “Stop.” Therin’s voice cut through my thoughts. His tone harsh. Commanding.

  Turning my head, I looked at him over Lelas’s body, which we carried between us. His light eyes met mine in the dim glow of dawn breaking fathoms above us.

  “You must stop, son.”

  “Stop what?”

  “Whatever it is you are thinking. The darkness of it leaches out from you. It covers the three of us. Whatever is in your mind is a net that has you entangled.”

  I looked away from him, both dismissing his words and oddly ashamed he was somehow aware of my thoughts.

  “Brett!”

  I turned back at his command, my heart clenching at the love in his expression.

  “This is not your fault. Without you, Lelas and I would also have perished.”

  “Without me, none of you would have been there to begin with. If I hadn’t—”

  He cut me off. “It is not our place to question Moheetla’s will. We are all where we were meant to be.”

  Anger replaced my angst. Even in the midst of it, I was conscious of keeping the fire chambered in my chest, keeping Lelas safe in my hands. “Bullshit! I’m so sick of everyone saying that all the shit that happens is God’s will, so we’re just supposed to be fine with it. If that’s true, He’s one fucked-up asshole.”

  “It is not your fault, my son.”

  “I’m serious, Therin. God, Moheetla, who-the-fuck-ever. If it’s not my fault, then it’s his.” I swiped my hand through the water, gesturing toward the surface. My motion caused Lelas’s body to jostle, and her tail flicked of its own volition to keep her upright. “He’s not there, Dad. He’s not. He can’t be. This is my fault.”

  “No, Brett. It’s not. However, if it helps you, cast blame on Moheetla. He can handle your fury.” He looked away finally. “He has handled mine many times.”

  Several more hours passed before we stopped swimming. I wasn’t even sure why we’d kept going. Maybe Therin had been worried about remaining members of the Volitan seeking us out. My guess, however, was that we’d continued swimming because we had no idea what else to do.

  Therin and I curled around Lelas, our arms draped protectively over her torso, and we fell asleep, or at least some form of sleep. Before exhaustion overtook me, I forced one of my legs under the sand, securing my body in the same way Wrell had done. I nearly jerked it back out when I realized it was also the way of the Volitan, but I did it to honor Wrell, so I kept it where it was.

  Twenty-Six

  BRETT WRIGHT

  We continued on through the rest of the afternoon, resting again that night and then continuing on the following day. Perhaps Therin knew where we were going or had a destination in mind, but it seemed we traveled on aimlessly.

  Lelas swam on her own. Her body seemed to function normally, though she never spoke. By the end of the second day, she even began to eat, which made
me believe whatever happened, she was going to live through this. That somewhere in there a part of her was fighting to survive. However, I never saw any aspect of my friend looking through her eyes.

  Therin and I didn’t speak again. The silence wasn’t stressed or angry, only quiet. Both of us caught in our shared and individual grief. Occasionally, he would stretch out his hand and let it rest on my back as we swam. He did the same to Lelas.

  At some point during the third day after the deaths of Wrell and Nalu, or maybe it was the fourth, Syleen and Greylin joined us.

  I knew they didn’t simply appear out of nowhere, but they might as well have. I’m certain Therin saw their approach, but I didn’t, caught up in my inner world where Wrell, Sonia, Finn, and Nalu were continually morphing into one body, then dispersing again.

  By the time I really began to attend to their presence, Therin had filled them in on the events with the Volitan—having also explained who Nalu was and why he’d been with us.

  Greylin had swum away, far enough to be out of eyeshot. He and Wrell had been as close as brothers. I was willing to bet he was beating himself up as well, wondering if his friend would still be alive if he’d joined us on our quest instead of returning with Syleen to keep up appearances. I was thankful Greylin hadn’t been with us—one more death I would have been responsible for.

  During Therin’s synopsis of the tragedy, Syleen sat beside Lelas, her hand covering my friend’s, her thumb making tiny circles on the back of Lelas’s hand. Of all things, I think it was this motherly act that truly brought me back to the moment. It was such an un-Syleen-like thing to do.

  Though she didn’t speak, nor did I see any spark of Lelas inside, she was clearly aware of who was with us, her gaze traveling over the darker mermaid, flitting to Therin, then to me, then somewhere out to sea. Whether eye contact was too much or she was searching for Nalu off in the distance, I couldn’t be sure.

  A strange sense of normalcy came over me with Syleen in our presence, offering a modicum of relief and highlighting the absence of Wrell even further.