The Soothing Scent Of Earth (Elemental Awakening, Book 2) (39 page)

By the time the restraints securely wrapped around my throat, multiple trickles of blood ran down my body, pooling in the dirt at my feet. The Earth sighed its contentment. I was hoping the
Basilissa
took it as a sign of its satisfaction at having me contained. And not relief at receiving my blood again.

"Now the Prince," I demanded, feeling every single prick of the thorns, as my throat moved on those words.

The
Gi
Queen simply tossed Theo away. He landed in a dull thud several metres from where she stood, and as she started slithering - and it was a type of slither - towards me, the distance between Theo and her expanded, giving me some measure of relief and hope.

I couldn't tell if he was breathing, but his head was attached, so for now, I put him out of my
mind.

"What are you going to do to me?" I asked the approaching evil.

"Use you to fix the break in our people." I was surprised she'd bothered to answer, her eyes were blazing green now, full of hunger and greedy satisfaction.

She came closer still.

"I'm not sure I can fix what is broken," I pointed out, trying to keep the conversation going.

"You are different from us, but close enough to strengthen our weak link. It is not a perfect solution, but it will do."

"There are other options," I found myself saying. And what the hell? Reasoning with this crazy lady had not been the plan, but part of me couldn't stop myself from trying.

Just as the Queen opened her mouth to reply, movement caught my attention over her shoulder. A dishevelled and painfully weak looking Theo lifted blazing eyes of gold to meet mine.

I reached instinctively for his
Pyrkagia
, my eyes returning to the
Basilissa
for fear of giving ourselves away. I couldn't risk Theo doing something to come to my aid, though. So, I needed to act now.

"I do not believe you to be
Aether
," the Queen was saying. "Our God has forsaken us, he would not offer a guide such as that. No," she said, head shaking, eyes glinting green like the Amazon forest. "You are an imposter, but an imposter with
Gi
DNA. You'll do. In fact," she added, finally reaching me. She stood a mere foot away, close enough for me to smell her perfume.

She stank of rotten vegetation and overripe fruit.

I held her gaze, raised my eyebrow in interest...

And struck out with a pure line of Fire.
Straight for her neck.

I thought I had her. I thought I'd caught her off balance. But this was the
Gi
Queen and although her Guards were no longer present to strengthen her, Machu Picchu is not without other animal life to fuel her
Stoicheio.

Out of a now cloudless, treeless night sky came a flash of bright orange. Lit up by the flames of my Fire, matching the depth of colour; intense, vibrant, alive. The squawk of a bird, the piercing cry as it shot through the air, accompanied by another and another and another. My line of Fire abruptly stopped, midway between me and the
Basilissa,
when an Andean Cock-Of-The-Rock bird interrupted its flow. Feathers burst out in a dizzying array of bright orange. The bird disintegrated before it hit the ground. But it was not alone.

A horror movie image met my widened eyes. Making my heart leap into my throat, Fire frantically incinerate the vines that contained me, allowing my hands to rise up to protect my face. One after the other the brightly coloured birds attacked, dive bombing my head with ear piercing battle cries.

The cackle of the
Gi
Queen's laughter made an eerie accompaniment, as beaks scratched my coat sleeves, and tiny taloned feet gripped my hair tightly and then rose. The sharp sting of follicles being torn from my scalp broke the almost paralysed state I'd fallen into.
Pyrkagia
swelled. Fire flared out around me, and several of the bombarding birds burst into a flurry of burning orange feathers.

"Casey! Use
Gi
!" Theo yelled above the ever louder squawk of approaching birds.

Not only were there bright orange Andean Cock-Of-The-Rocks, but now also the red and grey of Scarlet Macaws, the jewel-like green and yellow of Hummingbirds, and the horrifically large and ominous black of the Andean Condor. The vultures blocking out the stars as they dove in units of three or more.

The noise was deafening and for a moment I couldn't quite work out what Theo had said.
Pyrkagia
still blazed around me, offering what little protection it could from the onslaught of birdlife the
Basilissa
commanded. I couldn't even see her through the flock of feathers and wings before me, but I could feel the Earth's cries of pain as she wielded that
Stoicheio
in a vice-like grip.

It had suffered enough. The Amazon so depleted. Machu Picchu Mountaintop flattened. The Andean Cloud Forest threatened by the avalanche of soil and boulders and rocks. These birds had risen from there, at the Queen's direction. She would sacrifice them all to prove her dominion. She didn't care for the Earth Element she reigned over.

She may have cared for the infertility her people suffered, but it was at the blind indifference to her
Stoicheio's
health.

I reached for my
Gi
, felt Theo's
Pyrkagia
entwine with mine and reinforce it, then stumbled to my knees, digging my hands into the loose soil at my feet. Earth rushed through me, wrapped around my Fire, and began to swell.

I had no idea where the Queen was, but the birds were becoming more frantic, screeching their anger,
her
anger, that I was touching the
Stoicheio
she controlled.

Save us,
the Earth pleaded. Me or her, I did not know.
Help us
, it begged, and tears began to coat my cheeks, burned dry in seconds by the Fire that raged almost out of control around me.

"You're killing them!" I yelled, unsure if the Queen could hear, or if she'd even care. She was beyond anything but her own agenda now, reason would not sway her mind.

The ground shook beneath me as the body of a Condor crash landed less than a metre away from where I crouched. One wing broken at a painful angle, the other stretched out, as though reaching for the sky in one final futile attempt to fly free. The enormous bird was still breathing, straining for air. Its intelligent beady eyes stared at me, willing me to end this madness.

Roots shot up from the ground, trying to impale me. My Fire cut them off before they reached their goal. The Earth shuddered, the Queen screamed, the birds squawked, wings flapped and Fire crackled. And for a second I thought the insanity of the moment would swallow me whole. Pressure had built inside my mind, making my vision blur and my hold on my
Stoicheio
waver.

I saw her then. A psychotic vision in white, brown hair framing a green glazed look in her eyes. She held my gaze, lifted her hands in that theatrical motion she had used back at the diner. Evil stared back at me; corrupt, foul, and broken.

I knew what would happen when she brought her hands together above her head. I knew it, but I couldn't move to stop it. Pain stole all function, only comprehension of the end was within my control.

"Theo," I whispered, the sound of my
Thisavros'
name devoured by the cacophony of noises on this ridge. I couldn't reach him. I couldn't reach the Queen. I couldn't even save the broken Condor which watched on with accusing black eyes.

I sucked in a breath, said a silent apology to the Earth and then released my hold on my
Stoicheio
, unable to grip it any longer.

The world dimmed, as a rush of wings sounded out by my head, the swoop and flap causing the heat of the flames around me to fluctuate, die down and then swell up to an impossible height again. I blinked, felt Theo's
Stoicheio
stroke tender fingers down my cheek, over my heart, and then leave me in a sudden exodus entangled with my own.

The Condor beside me squawked, its broken wing flapped uselessly, and then the Fire before my eyes parted enough for me to see the remaining birds in the sky dive on the Queen.

She screamed. Anger, frustration, disbelief, shock. It all mingled together to make one atrocious sound of defeat. As the birds did what they'd been instructed to do, just not as the instructor had intended.

They attacked her. Not me.

She'd wanted me alive. At the very least long enough to harvest my blood for further DNA testing. So the birds didn't kill her outright, they incapacitated her, brought her to her knees in a shocking splash of crimson blood and torn flesh and severed arteries. She began healing immediately after each strike, but there were so many. She'd culled the Cloud Forest of all its winged creatures in her endeavour to defeat me.

But the Earth responds to health, far better than it responds to rot. It took my
Stoicheio
, boosted by Theo's, and used it to cull the decay, to excise it.

She struggled. She was a Queen, she used every ounce of her power to stay alive. And perhaps she would have, but Theo appeared over her shoulder, his eyes holding mine, gold blazing bright and true. Then with a simple movement, honed by centuries of being a Scout, he twisted her head, and tore it from her neck with a shouted cry to show the effort he'd used to achieve such a brutal move.

For a moment I just knelt there, visions of the green light dimming in her eyes, the shocked look on her face just before her head separated from her body, filling my mind. Theo was breathing heavily, a grimace of pain or disgust on his face. He took a step, staggered, and then I was on my feet somehow, managing to run to him, as he picked up speed and met me halfway there.

His arms wrapped around my waist, my body lifted off the ground as he hugged me tightly to his chest, and his face nestled into the curve of my neck. He inhaled, one hand coming up to tangle in my hair, his lips pressing intimately into the soft flesh behind my ear.

"Holy freaking hell," I whispered. "We did it."

Theo nodded against my neck, still unable to voice a word.

But we weren't done yet. This hellish day held much more in store.

With no time to recover from the shock, or rejoice at our unbelievable success, out of a still cloudless dark sky lightning burst forth. One single sizzling bolt, loud enough to send my heart rate sky-rocketing all over again.

For a second I wondered if it was a cosmic reaction to the death of a powerful
Ekmetalleftis
Queen.

But as Theo and I both jumped, the electricity in the air making the fine hairs on our skin rise, a solid form replaced the blindingly bright white of lightning.

Hip stood before us a sad smile on his face.

And naively, I still thought it was because of the loss of an
Athanatos
Queen. Something we should all mourn. But Theo stiffened, his arms resolutely wound around my frame, as he turned us both to face the
Aeras
man.

"The
Basilissa
is dead," Theo announced, his tone sounding a little too imperious. "Machu Picchu is safe."

Hip nodded, glanced around the desolate and destroyed mountaintop, and then brought tired pale blue eyes back to our faces.

"We've been ordered to return you to your
Rigas
," he said, making all air leave my lungs in shock.

"No," I mouthed, unable to utter a sound due to lack of oxygen.

I'd been wrong. This had
nothing
to do with a murdered Queen, and
everything
to do with the son of a King. Or perhaps his
Thisavros
.

"We can't go back," Theo insisted.

"And we can't offer asylum," Hip countered.

Silence.

This was not good. Theo was meant to be in exile. I was considered an enemy of
Pyrkagia
. So why would the
Rigas
order the
Aeras
to hand us over?

But even more worryingly to my mind right then,
how the hell
did they even know we were here?

"Isadora,"
I snarled. It had to be Theo's ex who had betrayed us in the end. Just as I'd always suspected she would.

Theo looked thunderstruck. He shook his head. Still unable to think of her as anyone else but his
Dora
.

My fists clenched as Theo asked, "How long have we got?"

"My instructions are to deliver you immediately or they will declare war."

Athanatos
battles were not to be taken lightly. The
Aeras
, whose protective instincts were so acute, could not even contemplate that.