Children of the Elementi (11 page)

Adramelech shook his head, not understanding what the man wanted, Adramelech looked from the man to the baby and sneered in contempt. What would he do with a human child?

The Elder’s smile faded, the God didn’t understand. He pointed to Adramelech, the child and the fire. Finally realizing that the fiery spirit was not interested in taking the baby, the Elder threw the baby at the fire. The mother screamed and ran to the edge. The men who took the baby grabbed her arms as she passed them to hold her back. She struggled, but they were too strong. She shrieked incoherently - desperate to get to her child. They held her for a few moments more before allowing her to run to the fire. Mercifully the baby died instantly, its small head crushed by a sharp branch.

These people had to be the most primitive Adramelech had ever seen.

...but he began to see the possibilities.

Those people were a pathetic malnourished group of nomads when he found them but by the time he left, they were a force to be reckoned with. Under his guidance, the camp evolved into a huge city split into two, controlling most of the continent. He reveled in the memories. The power he had wielded. He could destroy whole armies just by pointing at them with fire. The dying screams were music to his ears. Battle after battle his people fought and won. The indigenous people no match for his power. He reveled in the adulation.

That was until news reached the Atlanteans. They were a clever people. They’d hidden their city under water so he hadn’t known of their existence until it was too late. They’d captured him surprisingly easily. The Atlanteans knew there was nothing on Earth that could hold him for long, so they had summarily banished him. One minute he was at the head of an army, weapon in hand, rallying his men. Their answering shouts instilling glorious fear in the enemy. The next, nothingness, he was between worlds. Of course he tried to get back. Earth had easy pickings for a creature like him, but they sent him too far away - he couldn’t get his bearings.

Luckily, or not so luckily as it turned out, he had managed to get home. When his people found out what he had done, they banished him as well, but this time it was done properly.

Adramelech mentally thanked Aras. If he couldn’t defeat the boy-king, which was frankly ludicrous, he would find a way to break the compulsion and just take over this world. They may not be as primitive as when he was last here but they hadn’t met anything like him for a thousand years.

His thoughts returning to the present day, Adramelech stood surveying the edge of the crater. Sulfuric steam belched from underground - a perfect way in.

The tourist finishing his photo of the village moved his camera around the rim of the crater. He wanted to get a panoramic of the sea next. The tripod juddered as it scraped against volcanic rock. The picture blurred as he focused the lens. Tapping it he saw Adramelech through the viewfinder. He blinked. He hadn’t been there moments before. He blinked again. The man was melting?

As he watched, Adramelech let his true form burn the veneer he’d created. Giving a wave to the nonplussed visitor, he jumped into the vent.

Oh, he’d missed this. He plunged deep into the core. The heat was glorious. One little push here and the whole volcano would spurt into the sky devouring the whole island. The raw energy seeped into his being. As he grew stronger his awareness exulted in the feeling of power. He twisted and turned through the tunnels created by the latent steams of lava, it was just too tempting. Besides, that man had seen far too much.

Floating towards the nearest tectonic plate he began to push. Cracks began to appear and the hot magma bubbled. He pushed harder. Suddenly there was a resounding crack and the crust covering the top collapsed. With a rush, the red fiery mixture of molten gas and rocks, kept in for hundreds of years, leapt into the air to form a black cloud of ash high above the island of Vulcano.

Fully charged and aware the volcano could not hurt him, Adramelech melted into steam. He rode the current into the cloud and floated above it. The cloud was expanding rapidly; it was beginning to collapse under its own weight. To Adramelech’s amusement he saw the tourist running down the volcanic face. The man was overweight and gasping for breath. There was no way he would be able to outrun the flow of fire and lava.

Hot red stones fell, forcing the man to change his course continually. Thick lava spilled over the edge of the crater, pouring faster and faster as the extra weight pushed it along. The man craned his neck and saw it gathering speed. Panicked, he tried to run faster but tripped over an abandoned drinks-can. He fell heavily to his knees. He just had time to scream once before the lava overtook him - erasing all trace of his body.

Floating above the cloud, Adramelech felt the compulsion tighten around his consciousness. He remembered why he was here - the boy. He had to find that boy. Reaching out with his awareness, he searched for the recent use of the spirit element. There was none but a small trace to the west suggested there had been a few days ago. Recalling one of the forms he had chosen in the past, the Deoc compacted his energies, drawing them in to a tight kernel of power deep within him. There was a large clap of thunder and he transmuted mid-air into a gold and red-feathered bird. Comfortable in the familiar phoenix form, he unfurled his new wings and flew to investigate.

CHAPTER TEN: EARTH QUEEN 

Kiera leant against the hard metal of the bus stop. The number 377 had just passed without stopping and the timetable said there wouldn’t be another for 20 minutes. As she waited she began to feel a strange pressure building beneath her. Her head jerked up and she looked around at the other people waiting but everyone else had the same bored expression they held moments before. No one else seemed to be noticing anything different.

An energy surge made her blink and the crystal under her shirt began to glow an iridescent green. At the same time she began to feel the pressure underneath her intensify. It was as if the Earth itself was under stress. Her body hummed in response. She took out her crystal and cupped it in her left hand. Tiny pinpoints of light danced in its depths and she became mesmerized by its beauty. The crystal almost seemed to be telling her something. It was tantalizing, almost beyond her reach, then she understood. Compelled to answer the call of distress - she now instinctively knew what to do.

Directing her mind down through the pavement, she felt the slow mind of the Earth’s crust. It was slow, alien and... in pain she decided. She pictured the Earth deep underneath, trying to follow the source of the pain. Her geography was hazy but she knew as she travelled west, that her mind had left the UK, passed France and on into Italy.

Arriving at the source, she was horrified at the chaos she saw. Somehow the plates were pushed further away than they should be. She could feel the Earth's pain as if it were her own. Her arms ached as if stretched beyond their limits, held fast in a medieval torture device. Her mind raced and she realized she needed to make it cooler first. Kiera drew the heat away into the nearby sea, simultaneously assessing the damage.

 It felt wrong, the plates needed to be closer to heal the rift.
How had they moved so far apart?
She concentrated, aligning herself to the tectonic plates. They felt as if they were part of her. Kiera pictured the plates fully in her mind as extensions to her arms, she began to pull them slowly together. It was slow and they felt so heavy. As her hands drew together, in reality the plates grew closer, until finally judging by feel they were where they should have been only minutes before.

Back in London, Mirim also knew exactly when the Earthquake hit. The work Kiera was doing was too late for the village at the bottom of the volcano. As the lava encased the houses, a thousand minds went silent. The chatter of their minds had been a drop in the ocean a few moments ago but their sudden absence was more profound to Mirim than anything she had experienced before.

Mirim raised her head, tears streaming down her cheeks. So many dead! Her eyes focused at the bus stop across the road. While she had been standing with Jake, the street lamp opposite them had blocked their view, but now, sat on the low brick wall she could see her. The girl from the train was sitting directly across from her.

Mirim rose to her feet, she had to get to her before a bus did. She raced to the pedestrian crossing only meters away. As she ran, a double-decker red bus paused to let her cross. Seeing the girl rise to her feet at the bus stop, she knew she must not let her get on that bus.

She wished Jake were there; he could have easily melted the engine. Or if she had been a water power, she could have flooded it. This was no computerized car such as they had at the Citadel. She had to influence the driver. Her mother’s words came back to her. You must never use your power to control others. Mirim knew it was unethical. Her mother had made her promise on the family’s honor to never to use her power to overshadow or control others against their will.

Standing in the middle of the pedestrian crossing she faced a dilemma. If she let the girl get on the bus, it might be hours or days before she could trace her again. It might be too late. She knew she had to do it now when it was safe to do so. She sent waves of thought to the driver and passengers. ‘
The bus has broken down
,’ she transmitted. She repeated the message again and again. ‘
The bus has broken down; we might as well get off
.
The bus has broken down, we may as well get off.
’

Mechanically the driver pulled the handbrake and shouted instructions to the passengers.

“Everybody off! The next bus will be along shortly.”

As if sleepwalking, the driver and passengers filed off leaving the bus parked in front of the crossing.

Relieved, Mirim rushed to the bus stop to talk to the girl. As she approached, the girl was looking at her oddly. Mirim pulled the other girl’s name from her mind.

“Kiera, my name is Mirim Ariel. I really need to talk with you.”

“Who are you? How do you know my name?”

“Mirim. This is not the place. Something big has just happened and from the look of you, you know what it was. Let’s go into the park.”

Confused, Kiera just stared back at the blond girl. There was no way she was going with this stranger. Exasperated, Mirim slipped into the girl’s thoughts. She didn’t have time for this! In a split-second she told Kiera about Eleria, the Citadel, who she was, what she was and what she was about to do.

Knowing the other girl would not be as experienced as her, she watched Kiera's eyes widen as she clamped her own awareness around the girl's mind. Mirim knew it was wrong but this was urgent, she had to do it. Their whole world was at stake. She commanded the earth talent to follow her. The girl’s mind fluttered in response, seeking to escape its cage but she was no match for Mirim. With expert skill she cut off every escape route mercilessly until her mind was still.

As if in a daze, Kiera nodded. She picked up her rucksack, balanced against the signpost and trailed behind her weaving through the abandoned passengers. She was petrified. She couldn’t escape the grasp of the alien mind surrounding her. Today she’d escaped her life in Ireland, saved a baby’s life and possibly stopped an earthquake in its tracks and now she was being forcibly dragged away by a stranger. She had to be going mad!

Walking into the park, Mirim didn’t stop at the first bench they passed. It wasn’t until they’d walked at least ten minutes in silence down a gravel path before she sat down. The further they walked the more agitated Kiera’s mind became as it tried to escape Mirim’s grasp.

Mirim sat and forced Kiera to sit beside her. She gently withdrew from Kiera’s consciousness and began to speak rapidly.

“We’ll be safe here. We’ll be able to see if anyone comes along. You are not from this world. I can prove it.” She added more slowly in a softer tone, “Do you have a green pendant or necklace?”

Nonplussed, Kiera stared wildly around. There was no one she could call for help. Sensing the other girl’s distress, Mirim sent her thoughts back to Kiera soothing her as if she were a wild animal. She settled herself back on the bench and tried to make herself as non-threatening as possible and waited.

Calming down slowly, Kiera silently reached behind her white shirt and brought out the small green crystal her aunt had given her.

Mirim continued, “That represents the earth element. It belongs to the Terill family - your family. It focuses your power. I’m not an Earth element so I don’t really know what you can do with it, but I do know that it is linked with nature. You can heal and you probably have an affinity with stones.”

Strange as it was to hear this, Kiera had always known that she was different. She thought it was because of her traveler blood. She had heard of fortune-tellers in other groups, so she just assumed that her power was some sort of extension to that. She didn’t really look like any of her family, she mused. It would explain why her father never paid her any attention - except when it profited him.

“OK, so if I am an earth element, what are you?” she asked.

“Air.” Mirim replied. Reaching into her own shirt she brought out a silk purse and showed her own small crystal.

“We are opposites or complementary powers - depending on your point of view. Traditionally yours and my family were great friends.”

“So what are we, priestesses or something?” Kiera asked.

“Huh, oh no. Our families, along with three others used to rule Eleria, our home world,” Mirim explained. “Somehow, the Magi, I’ll explain later, tricked their way into an Elementi stronghold and killed nearly all the ruling caste. There were five ruling families, the Firellis, Ariels, Aquels, Terills and the Omnax family. The eldest in the Omnax family is our High-King or Queen. The rest of the families are Kings and Queens of lesser domains. Each has a power. Your family has powers over earth and nature, mine air and sky, the Firelli had control over fire, and the Aquels water and the sea.”