New World Order (War of the Fae: Book 4)

New World Order

© 2012 Elle Casey, all rights reserved, worldwide.
 
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This book is dedicated to my grandmas, Jeanne and Grace.
 
Two of the ass-
kickin
-
ist
ladies you’d ever want to meet.
 
They never fit the mold their families wanted to put them in and they always rebelled, even if only just a little.
 
Their spirits live in my characters, especially Jayne.

The snarl coming from the power flux streaming through my body and out of my hands towards Ben was nearly deafening.
 
It’s as if a series of bombs were going off in the distance – in the spot where I was aiming all of it.
 
I heard a scream that could only have been Samantha getting Finn’s
mindseye
arrow surprise.
 
Happy birthday, bitch
.
 

A roar that sounded like a wounded and angry orc on a magically amplified megaphone came next, sending shivers up my spine.
 
I worried that whatever it was would be coming for me any second.
 
Was it Ben?
 
Or maybe one of the Dark Fae ogres that had been trying to kill the Light Fae elves lined up to my left? – Elves I could no longer see or hear, but whose presence I could still sense in The Green somewhere.

I didn’t let up and I didn’t let go.
 
I cast a glance over at Finn standing next to me, who was having a hard time withstanding the ferocious wind.
 
“Get back inside!” I yelled.

Finn turned to go, but the storm blowing around us was too much.
 
He bent over in an attempt to battle it, but it was no use.
 
He started to get pulled away from me, towards Ben.
 
I felt Scrum bump into me as he, too, was drawn away.
 

I started shouting in desperation and anger, unable to control the wild emotions that started erupting from me to join the forces of nature battling around us.
 
No one
was going to take my friends away from me,
especially
not Ben.

I kept up the flow but started simultaneously building a concentrated ball of power in my hands.
 
It seethed and swirled, my last-ditch effort to blow Ben to smithereens.
 
If I could launch this thing at him, I just knew something big would happen.
 
I felt the ball’s perfectly smooth sides, pulsing with energy.
 
I gathered it in towards my chest and then, without hesitating or worrying about the consequences, sent it blasting out toward the place where I thought Ben was standing.

The sound that hit my ear a split second later was not what I had imagined it would be.
 
I hadn’t been sure what to expect exactly, but this wasn’t it.
 

It’s as if I’d suddenly lost most of my hearing.
 
The percussion of a distant explosion shook the earth beneath my feet, but everything was muffled to my ear.
 
I felt a flash of heat and immediately lost my sense of space and time.
 
Moments before, there were fae all around me, both Light and Dark, and I was aware of the ground under me and my friends standing nearby in support, the sources of power that fed the beam of destruction coming from my hands.
 
Surely there must be some fallout from the
mindseye
arrow that Finn had just launched at Samantha, aiming to kill; but I couldn’t sense it.
 
Any of it.
 
I was lost in a kaleidoscope of greens and blues that made up the combined raw power of the elements Earth and Water.
 

I was afraid to let The Green go.
 
I was even more afraid to stop combining Water and Earth to overwhelm my opponents.
 
What if Ben was still there, waiting for me to lower my guard?
 
What if Samantha was poised to send another bolt of white lightning at Finn or Scrum?
 
The Dark Fae would be able to get into the Light Fae compound, my home; they would destroy my family – or turn them over to the Dark Fae side, sealing all our fates.

Images and snatches of memories flickered through my mind as I stood there frightened and confused – my father telling me my personality was going to get me into trouble some day; Tony, hugging me, telling me everything was going to get better after I’d failed a stupid history test; the looks on Dardennes’ and Céline’s faces when I explained why I had selected Mother Nature as my superhero of choice during my changeling interview.
 
I had
so
gotten that one wrong.
 
I wasn’t superhero material.
 
This proved it.
 
In a moment of need, I had lost it – cracked.
 

I closed my eyes, trying to block out the visions, but everything stayed the same.
  
I couldn’t tell anymore what was real and what was imagined.
 
My hearing issue made me want to reach up and rub the sides of my head, but I was afraid to move my hands.
 
All I needed to do was make this worse than it already was – to send a rocket of power headed off in the wrong direction, frying the Light Fae elf warriors who had come to protect our home, fighting side by side with me.

In the wake of the boom that issued from my exploding power ball, I heard the steady buzz of white noise.
 
A loud, fuzzy drone that wouldn’t go away.
 
I still couldn’t see anything but the lights, swirling and twisting around each other, and I wasn’t able to sense the presence of my friends either.
 
I felt lost.
 
Alone.
 
And, man, did it
suck.

“Jayne!” came Tony’s voice, from off in the distance.

“Tony?” I asked, tentatively.
 
Why is he here?
 
Where is here?
 
Am I still outside the gargoyle-symbol door, standing near the edge of the forest that marked the home of the Ancient One?
 
Or had I sent us both into one of the Otherworlds?

“Jayne!
 
You have to let it go!
 
Stop now!”

“I can’t.
 
I’m afraid,” I answered out into the colors swirling madly around me.
 
My voice was weak, lame-sounding, which only served to make me pissed off at myself.

“Jayne, it’s over!
 
Come back to me!
 
We can’t get near you with your power switch on like that!”
 
His voice was pleading now and he sounded scared.
 

The panic in my best friend’s voice worked like a magic spell, snapping me out of the weird place I was stuck in.
 
Tony needed me – I had to get back.
 
And if he said it was over, it should be safe to drop the stream of energy still flowing out of me and towards the forest where Ben had emerged earlier.
 
Tony would never lie to me.

At first, the power didn’t want to leave.
 
I could feel its resistance, urging against its forced retreat.
 
I had to try and recall the technique that Valentine, the incubus, taught me, focusing on the power and reining it in.
 
I knew at least one of the entities that came up through my Earth Element, the Ancient One, was there, reveling in the use of its essence above the ground.
 
I pushed it back mentally, forcefully reminding it who made the decisions around here –
me
.
 
I’m the boss of all this messed up shit.
 
I may be a total screw up, but I’d decided long ago, if you’re gonna screw shit up, you might as well own it.
 
Meet me – Jayne – the girl who just couldn’t seem to get it right.

“Good, Jayne, good.
 
Keep going,” pressed Tony, sounding a little less desperate.

“You’re doing it, Jayne, good job!” urged Scrum, way too cheerful-sounding for how crappy this all felt.

“Take me over there!
 
Put me on her shoulder!” yelled Tim’s tiny voice.
 

I should have known they wouldn’t be able to keep my stubborn pixie friend away for long.
 
And him being here meant Spike was here too, since he was the one put in charge of Tim when the shit had so recently hit the fan.

I blinked my eyes hard a few times, trying to clear them of the greens and blues, but they wouldn’t go back to normal.
 
I turned my attention back to managing the flow of power and felt The Green now completely under control, waiting for my final order to go back into the earth.
 

“Tony?”

“Yeah, Jayne?”

“Can I let The Green go now?
 
Is it safe?”