03] ES) Firestorm (19 page)

Her body trembled, but I didn’t look down at her. The seconds ticked by, almost audibly as we waited for her answer. A sigh slipped out of her. “If you trust him, then I will too. He may hear what I have to say.”

And even though I’d doubted for a moment, I did trust Cactus. He was my friend.

Cactus grinned and I turned my back on him, entering the smaller room. I struggled not to gasp at what I saw.

Four tiny redwoods were planted in the hard ground; they couldn’t have been more than a few years old as they barely reached the ceiling. Without a second though, I reached out and touched one, my hand aching for the feel of home after so much time in the Deep, and now, trapped in the Pit.

This is what Banishment would be like. To always be aching for a place that speaks to your soul, yet never able to hold it in your hands or heart again.
The thought came unbidden to my mind and I closed my eyes against the sudden blur of tears.

Banishment was what every elemental feared, that they would be cast out of their home, doomed to wander the world until they faded to nothing, their souls and very beings starved of the connections that made them who they were. “Cactus, how is it you’ve survived this long outside the Rim?” I whispered as I pressed my head against the tree. Its soul was young, and very old at the same time. The history of its species called to me from the long distant past, the wisdom they held in their collective memory if I could just understand the words whispered around me.

“The fire is a part of me too, Lark. As long as I have some of the earth near me like this, I can do it. But . . . I can’t stay here any longer. There is more of me that is of the earth than fire.”

I opened my eyes to see him mimicking me, his hands and forehead pressed against the tree to my right.

Peta let out a small sigh. “Then we must all escape. And soon. I feel a firestorm coming, and none of us will want to be here for that.”

Her words brought me back to the moment, breaking the spell the trees cast over me, calling me home.

“Where do we go first, Peta? You know the Pit, where do I go for answers?”

She shifted her weight and dropped her head to my ear. “There is a secret place that Loam would go. A place only a few knew about and they are all dead and gone now. A place of old rules that even the queen can’t deny.”

A shiver ran through my spine. I looked to Cactus. “Do you know what she’s talking about?”

He frowned. “Whispers of rumors. Stories of a place that tells our history and everything that has ever happened in the elemental world. That would be a huge library though and even here, hard to hide.”

Peta shook her head a single time. “No, this place is very small. It is where all the original edicts of the Pit were created. Loam knew about it. He had to as an ambassador. And of course, the queen knows, but she doesn’t know
where
it is.”

“But Loam did?” I needed to be very certain because if Peta was wrong, I knew there was only one thing I could do to save Ash. Something he would fight me on every step of the way, so I held it as a last resort. A final gamble if I found no other way.

Forcing my feet to move, I stepped away from the trees and out of the room. “Peta, take us there.”

“Now?” Her strangled squawk was all I needed to hear to know just how dangerous this was going to be.

“Yes. Now.”

s we walked, I held Peta in my arms. I felt the struggle of her body with each breath she took, her broken ribs at a bad angle pressed against her lungs.

“That’s why I can’t shift right now,” she said softly. “A shift when I’m so injured would surely puncture my air bags and I would be of no use.”

I stroked a hand along her back as I followed Cactus through the currently well-lit tunnels. Empty tunnels.

“Cactus, stop a minute.” I laid my hand on Peta’s back, and spoke quietly to her. “We’re connected, aren’t we?”

Her green eyes narrowed. “We are.”

“And I can draw energy from you, if I need to be healed?”

She slowly nodded. “Yes.”

I closed my eyes. “Then let’s reverse the flow.” I found the bundle of emotions, the connection to Peta inside my head, right next to the place that my power with Spirit resided. Distantly I heard her saying it didn’t work that way, that I couldn’t heal her but I couldn’t see why not. It made sense that it—the connection between us—would work both ways.

Taking hold of my Spirit power and the bond to Peta I threaded them together inside my head. The strands around Peta’s energy glowed a bright pink, like a sun flare, and then faded into nothing. Peta let out a gasp and I swayed where I stood.

A dip in my energy was all I felt, but when I opened my eyes Peta glared up at me. “Stupid Dirt Girl! You aren’t supposed to sacrifice your life for me, it’s supposed to be the other way around!”

I shrugged and she leapt from my arms, immediately shifting to her snow leopard form.

Her emotions were all over the map, swinging from an intense dislike that came from years of being told Terralings were stupid and useless, to an intense loyalty that bordered on love.

Confusion I understood. So I gave her an out. A way to not feel like she was being a burden. “I can’t have you slowing us down,” I said, brushing off my shirt.

Her back stiffened. “I would not have slowed you down.”

I looked to Cactus who gave me a wink as he patted her at the base of her tail, the equivalent of an ass pat on a woman. “Yeah, you were, kitten.”

“Kitten?” She spluttered the word and I moved between them before he could make it worse. The last thing I needed was her lashing out at him. Even if he did kinda deserve it.

“Peta, just lead the way, please. I’ll talk to Cactus.”

Her long tail sliced through the air, side to side, actually hitting the wall, but she did as I asked.

Cactus settled in beside me and he opened his mouth but I beat him to it.

“Why is no one else awake yet?”

His eyes widened. “Shit.”

“Yeah, that’s what I’m thinking.”

Peta glanced back at us. “This isn’t the first time it’s happened. Eighty years ago, the queen’s father kept everyone in a subdued sleep while he hunted a threat to the throne.”

My mouth dropped open. “That’s what Fiametta’s doing. I told her there was more than one threat, that her lover Coal was answering to someone.”

Cactus stopped at the next intersection. “I have to go to her then.”

“What, why?” I stopped with him and Peta turned.

“I’m one of her enforcers, Lark. Not an Ender. I’m just brought out as a threat. She may be a hard ass, but she is still my queen. She needs to be protected.” He leaned in to kiss me and I turned my face so he only caught my cheek with his lips.

“You aren’t making any sense. Cactus, if she sees you’re awake when she put you to sleep with everyone else, what do you think she’s going to say? Thanks for waking up on your own to protect me?”

Peta snorted. “More like, ‘Ah, so here is my traitor. I’ll just kill him and be done with it. No one will miss him.’”

Cactus paled. “Shit.”

“You keep saying that.”

Peta brushed against my thigh, her fur warm under my hand. I threaded my fingers through her long fur.

“Cactus, we can’t wait. Either you’re with me, or you want to risk the queen’s suspicion that you’re one of the traitors.”

His jaw was tight, but he nodded. “Damn, there is no choice for me, is there?”

Peta shook her head. “No, there isn’t. As is often the way with life.”

There was no more discussion after that. Peta trotted in front of us and we jogged to keep up. She wove her way through the maze of hallways until she reached a dead end. A fountain of bubbling water stood in front of us, steam rising from the tiny pool. The fountain itself was made of hardened lava and shaped like a snarling tiger. The water poured out of the tiger’s mouth into the pond it stood in.

“The water is boiled as it comes through the tiger,” Peta said.

“Should have it pour out its ass,” I muttered. My only experience with a tiger was one that Maggie sent after me. So maybe I was more than a little prejudiced against that particular big cat.

Peta sniffed. “Yes, that would be fitting for a tiger, blowing smoke out its asshole.”

Cactus burst out laughing and then slapped his hand over his mouth as he winked. “Sorry.” Obviously not that sorry.

Ignoring him, I approached the fountain. “Peta, this is a dead end.”

“No, it’s not.” She dipped her face until her whiskers touched the boiling water. “You must reach in to find the thing to press. I don’t know what it is, Loam never told me. But he would reach in here, and something would click and then the wall behind us would open.”

Her eyes lifted to mine. “This is why I’m angry you healed me, Dirt Girl. You need your strength for this.”

Cactus stepped forward. “I’ll do it. I can hold the heat at bay a little.”

Peta shook her head. “No, you can’t. That is what everyone thinks but the heat is a part of the water. Only a water elemental could truly pass this without injury.”

“That doesn’t make sense,” I said. “Why would you want an Undine to be the only one to escape injury?”

Peta shrugged. “I didn’t make the rules.”

I put a hand on Cactus’s arm. “I’ll try first, if I can’t find the latch, you can try.”

His jaw ticked but he didn’t argue. We all knew our time was limited at best; no, that wasn’t true. Ash’s time was what was running out.

Taking a deep breath, I wiggled the fingers on my left hand. No point in damaging my dominant hand if I didn’t have to. “How deep, Peta?”

“To your elbow at least, based on what I saw Loam do.”

“Shit,” I whispered. “Cactus, stand by the wall. When the door opens, hold it if you have to,” then before I could stall any longer, I plunged my hand and forearm into the water.

The sensation was just like that of being tested by the mother goddess. My skin scorched instantly and I whimpered as I forced more of my hand in until I felt the slight bump of something under my hand. I jammed it hard and yanked my arm out. But the boiling water had done its damage. My hand and arm were bright red, and tiny boils broke out. I held my arm out from my body and waved it in the air, which only made the blood pulse stronger.

“Draw on me, Dirt Girl. Loam did, I know the pain will be temporary,” Peta said.

Gritting my teeth, I nodded. The pain was excruciating, and I knew now why the pool was set up that only an Undine could pass it easily. They didn’t like coming to the Pit in the first place so the likelihood of them finding this hidden place was small. But more than that, there was no way I could hide the injury from the queen. I had no doubt that was the reason behind the boiling water. How could you hide where you’d been?

The simple answer was—you couldn’t.

Peta’s energy flowed through me and I drank it down, like a bucket of ice water poured over my skin, as though her heritage in the mountains flowed through her veins into mine. The burn faded and I let go of Peta’s energy as soon as the pain was tolerable.

Peta pushed herself against me. “Fiametta will know, you should take more from me.”