Winter's Fury - Volume Two of The Saga of the Twelves (16 page)

Mere feet away, Mugzy and
the creature became a deadly ball of teeth and claws, hacking and
biting. They were a pair of savage beasts, uncaring of who they
might hurt. Their massive bodies were, at any time, capable of
smashing Elena to a pulp.

“
No!” Sophie screamed,
knowing if they rolled the wrong way, they would crush the
girl.

As quick as she could she
bent down and grabbed Elena under the shoulders. She did not bother
trying to lift the little girl to her feet. She yanked the girl,
with all the strength she could muster, out of harm’s way, dragging
her as she back-peddled.

Mikalah, who had been a
few feet farther away, screamed and stumbled after them. She fell
to the ground. Her legs were not quite functioning as they should.
She was too scared.

Out of nowhere, Anthony
came upon them, grabbing for Elena, planting her on her feet in one
swift movement.

The little girl clutched
at her right shoulder and upper arm, and began to cry.

“
Elena! Elena, are you
hurt?” cried Anthony.

She was too
shaken.

Sophie could see her
brother’s words held no meaning for her. She was too dazed to
respond.

Then, there was a barrage
of sound.

Sophie glanced over her
shoulder and saw both Jason and Joaquin running toward them. Both
of them were pointing, gesticulating like a pair of wild banshees.
They were screaming at the top of their lungs.

She could not understand
what they were saying, even though they were yelling. Too much was
occurring at once, too fast. Her brain could not keep
up.

Louis screamed at her
left.

Oh God!

She whipped her head
around to see a third squirrel-pig leap for the young boy’s fleshy
throat. She knew there was nothing she could do.

There was nothing any of
them could do.

He was too far away to
rescue.

She felt her heart twist
in pain for her precious newfound friend. The sweet, happy-go-lucky
child was about to be rent asunder right before her eyes, eaten
alive.

And, she could only watch
it happen.

~~~~~~~<<<
ᴥ
>>>~~~~~~~

~ 10 ~

As One

Day Four, Sunday, 8:29
am…

Mikalah froze, crippled
with fright. Moreso than what she had experienced when she had seen
the Swüreg arrow headed straight for her brother. She had known
then it would hurt him bad, maybe even kill him.

She knew now she was about
to witness something even more terrible.

She watched with morbid
fascination as the squirrel-pig leaped for Louis. Its’ jaws were
wide, gaping, as it flew through the air toward the plump
boy.

The boy was turning from
the beast, slow, exposing his meaty left shoulder. His hands
covered his face as he cried out in terror.

She was sure he was
screeching as loud as he could. Yet, she had not heard. She did not
want to look. All she wanted to do was hide her face and cover her
ears. She did neither.

She was aware of Garfield,
and Kodiak and Kenai, even the boys. She knew they were sprinting
toward Louis. She could see the desperate, straining hope on each
of their faces, wishing above all else they could reach him in
time.

She knew their efforts
were futile.

They were too far
away.

There was not enough
time.

She seized the vestiges of
her Gift, ignoring thought, not allowing anything to take form. It
went unprocessed. Her mind stayed blank.

There was not enough
time.

Everything about her was
instinctive now. She squared her tiny body toward the place of
inevitable impact. Everything seemed to slow down, and then
it
slowed
again.
It crawled, only a fraction faster than frozen. She blinked. She
glanced at squirrel-pig surprised, but only for a moment. The beast
was
suspended
in
mid-air, a miraculous sight. She was the only thing that moved upon
the land. She was the only one who
could
move for that
matter.

All about her, there were
inklings of movement. There were hints and guesses that things,
whether it was a chunk of upturned snow or a gooey string of
squirrel-pig spit, were capable of moving, but it was only
that.

To Mikalah, all else was
in temporary hiatus. Her companions, the familiars, the horrid
beasts, even the detritus kicked-up into the air, stalled. The
trampled snow and dirt and twigs, the fallen leaves and small rocks
churned, went flying only to come to a halt. Her perception
increased a thousand-fold. On the ground or in the air, everything
around the little girl had stopped - almost. It crept forth at
one-quarter a snail’s pace.

This was her time. This
was where she as the master. In the vacant spaces between ticks of
a second, she ruled supreme.

With a breath, she became
explosion and was gone.

She heard a faint popping
sound behind her and knew the ice and snow, upon which she had been
standing, erupted in a ferocious plume. It expanded outward from
her feet like a Japanese folding fan. And still, even that was
moving at no more than a creep compared to her. Relative to
everything else around her, she was blinding, unseen, too swift to
follow. She was invisible to the naked eye.

From her perspective, she
reached Louis in no more than two seconds.

In reality, dividing that
number by a factor of twenty was a more accurate depiction of her
velocity.

She felt her feet sink
below the snow, into the frozen soil below. Her traction was
fantastic. Her speed was unfathomable as she plowed across the
pathway and toward her new-made friend.

The beast was still in the
air, a foot closer than before.

She pushed Louis, to one
side and out of the path of the squirrel-pig, delicate as she
could. She knew she must use the least amount of force. Her
momentum alone would be enough to shatter every bone in Louis’
upper body. She could kill him. Thus, she gave him no more than a
tap of her middle and index fingers. As dainty as she could, she
placed them upon the boy’s shoulder, pushing a fraction of an inch.
It was a small nudge, all she was able to give him.

Yet, the effect on Louis
was drastic and immediate, and simultaneous.

It began with his face. It
went from a mask of death to brazen surprise. There was only a
moment of registered shock before Louis’ arm pin wheeled. He left
his feet as if Lawrence Taylor had clothes-lined him. Only this
motion was slow, creeping like instant replay on the
television.

Mikalah shook her head,
her brain having difficulty focusing on the strange sight. Her
eyebrows rose as she watched Louis come off the ground. Her
incredible velocity threw him into the air - even if it was three
times slower than molasses seeping from a toppled jar.

She prayed she had not hit
him too hard, but she could’ve done no better.

There was no
time.

She stopped in her tracks,
digging tremendous furrows in the ground. Her small feet tore up
everything as if she were as heavy as an elephant. Unlike the time
when the Swüreg arrow sped for Anthony’s heart, she did not
fall.

She turned around, looking
behind her to see Jason. He was moving with relative speed when
compared with everything else in the immediate area. She backed up
a few feet, knowing what was coming. She had seen a similar display
in the cave. She brought up her hands, shielding her
face.

The teenage boy strode up
to the squirrel-pig at one-quarter normal speed and punched it with
all his might. He struck the creature in the lower jaw. It had been
lolling below the rest of its snout with ravenous
anticipation.

The next moment, she
squinted; glad because of her foresight. A bright red cloud
detonated where the creature’s mandible had been moments prior. She
blinked through blast of blood. Mikalah knew the collision between
Jason’s fist and the creature’s jawbone had been catastrophic. The
squirrel-pig’s sanguine fluid turned to a fine mist. The entire
lower area of its’ snout was no more than a fleshy stump, hanging,
gruesome. The beast’s tongue ripped to shreds, flapping like a flag
in the wind, dragging alongside the side of its’ mouth.

Mikalah felt like she was
going to throw up, and lost her hold upon her Gift. She focused on
Jason instead, choosing to lose herself in the bizarre golden glow
enveloping him. Her nausea passed.

Across what had been an
infinite divide, but was now bridged by a miraculous tendril, they
spoke,
“We are The Twelve.”
A connection forged that had not been there
seconds before.

She could see the
strength, the enormous vigor surging through him with every beat of
his heart. She could feel the immense power coursing through his
muscles. He was beautiful, so full of life. And yet, he was
imposing, made dreadful by the destruction he could unleash. She
could not quell the awe consuming her.

He was in the midst of his
Gift.

She was within the grip of
hers.

Their minds were one.
Their thoughts intermixed.

Save him! Save him! Do not
think, Jas, move!
he was saying to
himself.

They were two of The
Twelve in concert.

Was this what it meant to
belong?

“
I see you, Jason, I see
you!”

The world sped up to its’
normal pace. Her Gift drained from her. Her thoughts seemed to hang
in the air before her.

But not before…
“I see you, too!”

It had not been her voice
in her mind. It had been his.

Then, the squirrel-pig
slammed onto the ground with a slushy squish, dead.

Jason had slain it with a
single blow.

A heartbeat later, Louis
smacked into the snow with an audible Woof! He was on the opposite
side of the trail, unmoving in a large snow drift. He was safe for
the time being. Stunned and bewildered, having flown eight feet
from where he had been standing before the attack. But, he was
safe.

Mikalah glanced around.
Her burst of speed had not only knocked down her brother, sister
and Sophie, it had tossed Mugzy and the second squirrel-pig too.
Every one of them covered in a thick sheet of snowy
dirt.

Mugzy and the squirrel-pig
confronting him had landed clear of one another because of the
blast. But only the man-dog seemed stunned by the concussion of
Mikalah’s departure.

The squirrel-pig had
already gained its’ feet and was snarling at him, pure malice in
its’ beady eyes.

Garfield and the rest of
the animals were quick to surround Mugzy.

Mikalah thought about
reaching for her Gift, slowing down time once more, but did not
have to.

The squirrel-pig turned
and fled into the forest and out of sight, its' morale crushed.
With the loss of its’ companions, its’ chances of garnering a meal
amounted to nil.

“
Good
god, Mikalah, can you at least give us some type of warning when
you’re gonna go
ludicrous speed
on us?” complained Anthony as he climbed to his
feet, helping up Elena and Sophie. He dusted all the snow and dirt
from his coat and jeans, and anything else that she had uprooted
onto him. It seemed as though he had taken the brunt of the little
girls’ onslaught.

There were chuckles all
around at that.

Then Anthony bent one knee
as he brushed off Elena, who was still clutching at her shoulder,
her face a mask of pain. “How do you feel, Weesy-woo? Are you
hurting?”

The little girl nodded,
but tried her hardest not to cry.

“
Can you move your arm for
me, so I can make sure it isn’t broken?” he asked with a tender
inflection.

Again, she returned
mournful nod. She was able to lift her arm from her side and pivot
it within the socket of her shoulder without much impendence. Yet,
when she raised her arm straight up over her head, Mikalah saw her
grimace as a sharp lance of pain seemed to stab her
sister.

Elena brought the limb
back down to her side with a muffled, “Ooow!”

Anthony grunted and
massaged her shoulder, his touch soft. “I'm one hundred percent
sure it's only a bruise, a big bruise, but only that. I don’t see
any broken bones or dislocation. You think you will live?” asked
her brother, playful.

About them, the five
familiars formed a cordon.

Elena smiled in spite of
the anguish in her shoulder, one eye tearing up.

Anthony wiped it away
quick as she nodded in affirmation.

Mikalah came forward and
peered into her sister’s eyes, knowing she would find the truth
there. Relief washed through her when it appeared Elena was not
hiding any more than she was expressing to them.