Clash of the Otherworlds: Book 3, Portal Guardians (18 page)

I was going too fast to do anything but hold my arms out in front of me and hope for the best.
 
I barreled into them like a friggin bowling ball into a group of fae pins, hitting Niles dead center and blasting his sorry little dwarf butt over like a turbo-charged tumbleweed.

I finally came to rest about fifteen feet away, my entire body aching from the impact.
 
I thought in my dazed state that the ground here was a lot lumpier than I would have expected.

"Geph moff!" yelled someone.

"What?" I asked, still unable to move.

"Geph off!" he yelled again.

Niles
.
 
I looked down at my chest and saw a tuft of gray hair there.
 
Holy shit! Did I just grow a wad of gray chest hair from the shock of almost dying!
 
How disgusting!
 
I'm going to need a new razor.

The ground beneath me wiggled.
 
The gray hair moved.
 
"Get off!" came a growl from under me.

I rolled to the side, releasing a very cranky dwarf from his elemental boob-prison.

Niles stood, half bent over, holding a crick in his lower back and brushing himself off as best he could with his other hand, while also scowling at me.
 
"Of all the ... what is it with you and ... get away from me before I think better of my current decision not to clobber you!" he growled.

I scooted away from him like a crab, still kind of on my butt.
 
"Yes, sir.
 
Geez.
 
It's not my fault you didn't get out of the way."

He looked at me with disgust and then limped away to join the others again.
 
I surveyed the group and saw that the ones who had recovered their feet were standing there staring at me in shock.
 
The others were still trying to get up.

I wasn't much of a bowler, but that had to be some kind of record.
 
I held up my finger in the number-one symbol and smiled at my friends.
 
"Strike!"

Spike shook his head as he came over to get me.
 
He put his hand down to help me up.
 
"Can we go home now?" he asked, his arm going around my waist as he walked me back to the group.

"Sure.
 
If you want."
 
I looked down at my sling, noticing it looked pretty beat up.
 
I stopped walking, now in a panic that I'd killed the baby.
 
I opened it up a little at the edge and saw him still in there.
 
Pulling down the material, I could see that he was still breathing, but that one of his wings was broken.
 
"Oh, fuck a duck."

"What?" asked Spike, trying to look inside.

"He's hurt.
 
His wing is broken."

"Damn.
 
Well, we'll get him to the clinic as soon as we get back.
 
And that can be now if you're ready."

I nodded, unable to speak.
 
The reality of the pain that Willy was going to be in when he got up from either the nap or the friggin coma he was in snapped me out of whatever haze I was in and sobered me up good.
 
I walked up to Beau and said, "Take me home or lose me forever."

He nodded once and then opened his wings, wrapping them around all of us.
 
"Jayne, connect into your Earth element.
 
Samantha, begin your spell.
 
Tony, prepare to enter the Gray."

We all nodded.
 
I felt the magic surround us, amplified by The Green.
 
It was wonderful and scary all at the same time.
 
And then, in the blink of an eye, it was over.
 
I felt myself yanked into the cold of the Gray and then dumped unceremoniously onto my back into the Infinity Meadow of the Here and Now.

I opened my eyes and saw my friends around me, most of them lying on their faces.
 
Only Tony was standing.
 
He walked over and helped me to my feet, making sure the sling that held my little pixie friend was straight and doing the best it could at supporting his unconscious body.

"Come on.
 
Let's get Willy to the healers."

"What about the others?" I asked, looking back at them over my shoulder.

"They'll be fine.
 
They'll come find us when they've recovered."

I nodded, plodding along like a condemned criminal to the hangman's gallows.
 
I was going to pay for this one.
 
Big time.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

I LEFT THE UNCONSCIOUS, BROKEN-winged baby pixie in the care of the Light and Dark fae healers who now worked together in a much updated clinic.
 
They assured me he was going to be fine, so I left to go face the music in my room - the music of two pixies telling me what a shithead I was for accidentally taking their child into battle with me and then being stupid enough to get him hurt by turning him into a bowling ball.

Much as I wanted to avoid the whole confrontation, I also realized how worried they must be, so I picked up the pace until I was nearly running.
 
I reached my door and threw it open, searching first their table and then out in the garden for them.

"Tim!
 
Abby!"
 
I yelled.
 
"Where are you guys?!
 
I have news about Willy!" I was standing in the entrance to the garden, but no answer came to my ears.
 
I was just about to leave the area completely when I realized something was off.
 
I turned back around and took in the scenery.

The flowers were dying.
 
Very few blossoms remained on the bushes, and there were dead leaves and branches everywhere.
 
Empty snail shells littered the path and weeds were growing in every bed.

"Oh. My. Effing. G," I said out into the air, my voice barely a whisper.

I heard a noise behind me and spun around.
 
Céline was standing there, looking sadder than I'd ever seen her look before.

Tears sprang to my eyes at the sight, and my throat began to ache instantly.
 
"Where are they, Céline?"

She shook her head, saying nothing.

I took five long strides in her direction, stopping only when I was a foot away from her.
 
"Where are they?!
 
Tell me,
dammit!"
 
I reached out and grabbed her upper arms, shaking her for all I was worth, trying to force an answer out of her, but she just let me do it in silence.

I finally let her go, and as soon as we broke contact my anger just disappeared into the empty wind that blew in from the garden.
 
My voice was cold.
 
Hard.
 
I stared her right in the eye.
 
"Tell me now where they are, or I'm going to leave and find them."

"They're gone," she whispered.
 
"They left the same day you did to find their son.
 
You've been gone for weeks."

"But he was with
us!"
I said, punching the air between us and crying through the words.
 
"He snuck into my backpack!"

"We know that now.
 
We did not know that then."

"So where'd they go?" I asked, feeling deflated, the most pitiful voice
ever
issuing from my mouth.

"No one knows.
 
They're out in the realm, searching.
 
That's all I can say."

A spark of memory - things said to me by Samantha in our cage - had me redirecting my anger.
 
"
You
did this, Céline," I accused advancing on her.

She took several steps back.
 
"What?
 
What are you talking about?
 
I had nothing to do with his disappearance."
 
She looked left and right, as if seeking a way out, away from the crazy elemental who'd seemingly lost it.

"You're the one behind all of this crap.
 
All
of it!
 
I've been comparing notes with Samantha.
 
And Maggie.
 
And Torrie."

Céline's face went whiter than white.
 
She looked like a corpse.

"Yeah, that's right, silver elf.
 
You did something.
 
You did something
horrible
that tilted this fucking planet off its axis, and we're all paying the price now, aren't we?
 
Aren't we?!"
I screeched, grabbing her by the upper arms again.
 
I pulled The Green into me, letting its pure, warm light fill me to the brim.
 
I felt The Ancient One there too, and for once I didn't deny its desire to share the darkness it had within.
 
I accepted every last drop of it.

"Jayne, don't!
 
You need to power down!
 
You're going to hurt yourself!"

"Shut up, Céline!
 
Tell me what you did!"
 
I shook her hard until her head whipped back and forth.
 
"Tell me what you did!"

"Jayne!" came Ben's voice from somewhere off to my right.
 
"Let her go!"

"Go to hell, Ben!
 
You don't tell me what to do!"
 
I threw up a green bubble shield around us, bathing us in a glow so strong, Céline had to close her eyes.
 
Water joined us without me even asking it to, swirling a sheen of liquid into the shield that made us seem like we were in some kind of weird energy aquarium.

"I didn't mean to hurt anyone," said Céline, openly weeping now.
 
"I didn't, I swear I didn't!"

I thrust her away from me.
 
"I
knew
it.
 
Tell me.
 
What
did you do?
 
I'm not letting you out until you spill everything."

"I can leave on the wind," she said weakly, not even looking at me.

"Try it," I dared her, almost wishing she would. "See what happens."
 
I absolutely knew that her puny control over that element was no match for the two of mine.
 
I could open up this rock and earth beneath our feet and bury us both alive.
 
I could bring an ocean of water in here and float her sorry ass all the way to Australia if I wanted to.
 
Nothing was going to stand in the way of me finding out what the hell she'd done and where my roommate and his wife had gone.

"I won't," she said in a weak voice.
 
"I swear.
 
Just let me go."

"Fuck that.
 
Tell me your deepest, darkest secrets, Céline.
 
Tell me, and I'll let you go.
 
No one's going to get hurt, but everyone has to be honest.
 
That's the rule."

"Being in the other realms has changed you, Jayne," she said, a hint of her strength showing now.

She was trying to scold me, but I wasn't buying her guilt trip.
 
"Yes, you're right.
 
It has."

She looked at me, surprised.
 
She'd probably been expecting me to deny it, but there was no use.
 
I had changed.

"I've looked death in the eye and won.
 
I've looked love and life in the eye and I'm still here.
 
And I've got friends and people who love me standing behind me and next to me.
 
I don't need your lies, or Dardennes' lies, or the games you've all been playing behind our backs.
 
I want answers so I can set things right.
 
It's time to make things right, Céline.
 
And it all starts with you.
 
I know it does.
 
You are the key to this whole fucking mess."

She dropped her face into her hands and started bawling.
 
I gave her a few minutes to get it out of her system, but I didn't touch her or say a word.
 
I thought it was important that she stew in her grief for a little while.
 
I suspected she'd caused enough of it herself that it seemed the fair thing to do.
 
Justice.

When she was finally out of tears, she lifted her eyes to stare at me.
 
"What do you want to know?" she asked in a sorrow-roughened voice.

"What's your arrangement with Maggie?"

She smiled bitterly.
 
"Do you want the arrangement or the reason for it?
 
I doubt it will make any sense without the background."

"Tell me whatever you want, so long as you get to the part eventually where you tell me how you screwed up our lives."

She sighed.
 
"It all began when I was just a young fae, about your age.
 
As you recall, I have a sister, Maléna.
 
And we were living in the Green Forest, far from here, but very close to another family by the name of Silverthorne."

She looked up at me, but I didn't give her the satisfaction of letting her know that I recognized the demon Torrie's last name.

"We spent all of our younger years with Torrence Silverthorne - Torrie - at our sides.
 
I grew to love him, not just as a brother, but as something much more.
 
I became convinced that he was my soulmate, the one to whom I was meant to be bound.
 
All I needed to do was to get him to notice me."

"I find it hard to believe he didn't notice you when he practically grew up with you,"
 
I scoffed.
 
This was sounding like the prelude to excuses to me.