He gave her that smile that made her want to put everything on pause and spend several hours alone with him in their bed.
Picking up the clothes, she dressed and followed him through the door.
“Where are we going?”
“Let’s start with the lake. If that’s not the place, we’ll go to the mountain, but I think whatever is coming will have to be done outside.”
She nodded; the thought of the blackness in the river still bothered her.
“Why are we taking the jeep?”
“In case you need a method to escape.”
She held her words but they both knew if she needed to escape there would be nothing to escape to. Mutufa meant business and if he cracked through the planes, he would destroy this little sliver of paradise and laugh while he did it.
Standing in the middle of the road were two Selins, the same ones they encountered in the mountain. Alexa raised her hands to blast them but they waved a white flag.
“We come asking for peace.”
Syn stopped the jeep and looked at them, waiting.
“We do not support our leaders in this. The majority of us have declared we will not take part in this, even if it means our lives. But our leaders are a different story. They have decided with or without their people, they will back Mutufa. You must stop them.”
Alexa looked them over searching for a double meaning to their words; instead she found males that were sincere. She looked at Syn and nodded.
“We will stop them. When this is done come to the community center.”
“We will tell our people we have been invited.” They disappeared into the trees that lined the side of the road.
“That’s good, right?”
“That’s a start. Maybe we will be able to align all of our people.”
She gave an easy laugh. “Maybe we’ll be able to find that city of gold.”
“Oh that reminds me, later I’ll show it to you.”
She gave him a sharp look not knowing if he was serious or not. He didn’t give anything away in his expression as he started the jeep again.
The water’s edge was full of people as if they were drawn there against their will. She got out of the jeep and moved through the throng of people in order to see what they were looking at.
There was a long pathway from the surface of the water to deep within and chanting voices rising from it. The water expanded and contracted along the walkway as if it were being damaged by being there. At the very end of the walkway was a shadowy door.
Tamia walked up to her and took her hand. Alexa doubled over and Tamia let her go quickly.
“Sorry,” her voice came out raspy. “We all feel the rivers pain like a physical blow to our bodies. I didn’t know I could pass it along through touch.”
“Thank you. It hasn’t gotten strong enough for me to feel yet but now that you touched me I can feel it too.”
“Why are you just standing here?”
“We’re trapped. I can’t move away, the effort almost killed me earlier. It’s draining us but will out right kill us before letting us go.”
“Then we’ll have to stop it.”
“You can’t go in there, Alexa.”
“I’m dead either way. I’d rather die trying to save you and everyone else than die watching you die.”
“Sometimes you can be selfish.”
“I know, but not now.”
She moved away from Tamia until she found Syn. “We have to go down that walkway.”
“I know. What’s happening to our people?”
“Mutufa is draining them of energy. If they try to leave this place, then he is willing to forfeit the energy but it will kill them.”
“Is it any wonder why no one wants to play nice with him?”
“Well, he managed to get the leaders of the Selins to play ball with him.” She looked around unable to spot them. “Where do you think they are?”
“On the other side of that door. Are you ready?”
She nodded.
“Shield.” Raising her shield, she followed him to the walkway and stepped into the water.
Walking into the water should have been easy, but every step she took was like walking through thick molasses designed to hold her in place. Her legs shook with the effort even as her mind tried to define how water could drag on you to this degree.
Power, that was the word that slipped through her mental fingers. Her own power whispered it. It cataloged it for her. It was deadly and cold, leaching its warmth from the living that surrounded them. It was the type of power that was only satisfied with the complete and utter destruction of life. Now it wanted their life. It wanted to tear her body apart to reach the glowing red power within her.
It would engulf her power, embrace it in a deadly game and then free itself from everything holding it back to wreak vengeance on the world.
So many opposing thoughts. So many opposing agendas. She could feel a malevolence so deadly it made her want to run back to where she came from. The imagery wasn’t coming from the power but the power was coming from the one who was behind it all. Was it Mutufa and if it was, then where was the second source of evil coming from?
Nothing made sense and she thought she would die before she reached the door, then she was there. Alive and, relatively speaking, well.
Nice slow deep breaths she reminded herself. No sudden moves or she’d be trying to breathe water. Her shield was providing oxygen and that’s what she needed right now.
Syn reached for the handle of the door before them. One touch and it opened up pulling them into a vortex tossing them around. Wild laughter surrounded them as they were hurled against solid objects.
“Fools.” The word bounced around them. “How dare you think you can beat the high council of the Selins.”
On the last word they were dropped unceremoniously on the floor of wherever they were.
The Selins stood before them. Malice and anger twisting their features.
“Don’t do this.” Syn stretched his hands out in supplication giving them a way out.
“Bow to us, ruler of the dragons. You have kept our people down long enough.”
Your people don’t want this. They came to me.”
“Our people never know what is good for them.”
“But you do?” Alexa asked in a doubtful voice.
“Yes we do. They will be accepted by the whole world and then we, the high council of the Selins, will rule that world. They will be happy to follow us then.”
Syn lowered his hands taking the chance of redemption off the table. With one smooth move, he shot a ball of power at the two Selins driving them apart.
They laughed. “You can’t even aim in a straight line.”
Alexa was on them understanding that Syn had driven them apart. She took the one on the left driving him into the wall with a blast of power he hadn’t been expecting. He recovered quickly to dart away but she followed him.
Her follow up was a two-prong attack, one catching him in the shoulders while the other caught him in the leg. She wanted to go in to finish him off but her power whispered no and spun her body back. She listened, conceding movement to it. A blast of blackness came for them. Their quick movements allowed them to escape it.
Taking a moment, she thanked her power for its quick thinking. They were pressed against a wall eyeing the Selins, wondering if it had another blast where that first one came from. Her power was busily reinforcing her shields to be able to stand a blast of that magnitude.
A Selin stood, a smile of victory on his face as he rolled a ball of blackness in his hands caressing it like it was his favorite pet.
“All I have to do is get rid of you, mate of the dragon and it’s all over.”
Alexa eyed that ball of power in his hands the one that should scare her down to her socks but there was something about it that felt familiar.
“Where are you drawing your power from, Selin?”
“That is ruler of the high council to you!”
“Whatever.”
“Why don’t you find out for yourself.” He threw a ball of power at her causing her to jump out of its way as it dented the wall and caused a small leak.
She looked at the leak. They must still be in the lake and not on some other plane. That could work in her favor. Turning her head, she watched Syn; he looked like he was about to put the other Selin down. She needed to work faster.
The next time he threw that ball of power, she opened her arms to embrace it pulling every last bit of it from him before catching it in a different shield.
His scream wrenched her attention from the ball as he went down his body aging as he sagged to his death in front of her. The shield holding the ball of power enlarged until the blackness drifted away and her parents stood before her.
Her mother’s hand went to the shield and she smiled at her before she passed out.
“You saved your parents.”
“How did I do it?”
“You were in tune with them even though you didn’t know it. The power inside you is now in tune with them just like you’re in tune with me.” He reached down and kissed her.
“Is it over?”
“Not even close. Let’s wake your parents and send them out before we go to meet Mutufa.”
Her parents were alive, and right now they were blinking up at her with surprised eyes. Syn was helping her mother stand while her father was still totally disorientated.
“He used his power to amplify mine,” her mother’s soft voice said as she reached down to caress her husband’s face.
“Ray?” There was such love in her voice.
“Love?” Her father looked around as if he couldn’t believe what he was seeing.
“We’re free. Lex did it, love.”
“Lexy,” her father’s stronger voice rang out, hope slowly seeping into it.
“Your free, Dad.” She ran into his arms and held him tightly. “We did it, Mom. Not just me, but Syn and I together.”
Her dad set her gently away and then sprang up to his feet. He was unsteady but he was going to make it.
“We have to stop Mutufa before he breaks free.”
“Dad, you and Mom need to get to safety and let Syn and I take care of this.”
“Mr. Graham,” Syn broke in smoothly. “You’ve done your part but now we need to do ours and Alexa won’t be able to concentrate if she’s worried about both of you.”
“He’s right, Ray, and you know it,” her mother said with a wry smile. “Let’s go check out the mountain and pick out our rooms.
Syn’s eyes flew to Alexa’s and he bit back a groan at the joy in her eyes.
“I know, you’re right,” Ray took his wife’s hand. “Be careful, Lexy and you also.”
“His name is Syn, Dad and I’ll be sure he’s careful.”
Ray muttered under his breath as he pulled his wife towards the bridge. Alexa raised a shield around them and watched until she saw them touch dry land.
“Mace and Zeno will take care of them,” Syn said. She nodded and turned to face the door.
“What can we expect when we go through that door?”
“There’s no telling. I expect we will be on a different plane. Will it be a spiritual plane? I doubt it. But I don’t expect anything good.”
“Perfect, for a minute I thought he might take it easy on us.”
“Alexa, do you like me calling you that or would you prefer Lex or Lexy?”
“I like when my parents call me Lex or Lexy. I love when you call me Alexa, especially when your head’s buried between my legs.”
“Woman, stop that. I’ll have the hard on from hell while I’m trying to fight.”
She laughed, the sound enchanting him. “Then why don’t we finish it already so I can take care of you.”
“Hush or we’ll never make it through that door.”
She tossed him a sassy smile before flattening her back against the wall and waiting as he pushed the door open. Nothing rushed out at them, so they cautiously moved through the door with Syn in the lead.
Evil. It took everything she had not to lose the contents of her stomach and of course, it helped that she hadn’t eaten since yesterday. If evil had a smell or a feel this would be it. An inky blackness crawled up her spine trying to bore into the base of her skull. Chanting that wouldn’t go away infiltrated her mind and all she wanted to do was take her dagger and plunge in in her own heart, anything to get her away from feeling like her body was being pulled apart at the seams.
“Alexa,” his deep voice cut through the confusion warring inside of her.
“Syn?”
“Fight, Love. Mutufa is trying to disorient you. Don’t let him. Fight.”
She opened her eyes, surprised to find that they had been shut, to see Syn already fighting, dodging power strikes and swords as he protected her from an enemy bent on killing. The space they were in changed, opening up but still it was dark and deadly. Part of the spiritual realm seeping into the realm of the living.
Alexa twisted, catching the form on Syn’s side in its gut as she tried to sidle past and catch the one behind her unawares.
“What do we have to do?”
“Nothing hard; we get through here and then make our way to the next door and shut it, keeping Mutufa on the other side and us on this side. It’s the only thing I will see that will work for now.”
“Glad it’s that easy.” She gave a chuckle as she brought down her knife into the chest of the form that ran at her trying to intimidate her.
They backed up giving her a chance to take a breath. She looked down to find she was standing in a river of blood. She lifted a leg to find it clinging to her boot.
It’s just an illusion, she assured herself even as she watched it writhe around her as it began to climb up her body. Wild eyes swung to Syn only to see him look down with a frown on his face. She raised her knife and tried cutting it off, but another strand reached up and closed around her arm and brought it tight to her body.
It was covering her and she knew what it wanted. It could take her down, submerge her in the lake of blood then she would be lost, paralyzed, unable to help herself. She struggled to move. Her body refused the simplest of commands. She shut down her mental pathways to Syn, an unreasonable fear entered her making her think the blood could get into her mind and simply take over, or worse hurt Syn.
At least her parents were free, though not for long. If she went down, they didn’t stand a chance but unlike her and Syn, maybe they would get to say goodbye to each other. She pulled out every moment with Syn, going over them cataloging them one last time. The muscles in her face tried to smile although she resisted.