Elfmoon (6 page)

We started on our way again, following the direction of the loudest sirens and howls. I wasn’t entirely wrong about the noises sounding closer than they had a little while ago; the commotion of police and beasts seemed to be circling back towards the direction of the park. When Daniel and I came around a corner about three blocks away from the bus stop, we saw a barricade of police cars blocking the road. The pendant around my neck began to pulse again, and I could see it giving off a bright light just under my face. Numerous officers knelt behind their cars, weapons drawn and aimed down the road. It might’ve been hard for a human to see past the swirling blue and red lights and the smoke from the gas cans, but, with my renewed power, I could see clearly.

Bodies lay in growing puddles of blood on the pavement, but not a one of them was a beast. Each body was mangled in some way, so I assumed they were victims of the beasts. The police were firing on the beasts, but their bullets were doing no damage whatsoever. Daniel and I stood back, not wanting to sneak up on any of the officers and startle them. Eventually one glanced our way and I waved a hand at him to get his attention.

“You really need to go home and stay out of the way,” the officer said, walking towards us with his hands braced on his tool belt.

“No, officer,” I said, picking my hands up to show him we were a couple of harmless, unarmed people. “I know how to stop the moon-stricken.”

“And how could you know that?” he asked, one eyebrow arching under the brim of his cap.

“Pure luck,” I said with a shrug.

“How’s that?”

“We were still in the park when everyone fled,” I began explaining. “A pack of beasts came back and tried to tear apart the bonfire.”

“And?”

“Well, it seemed strange to me,” I said. “So I figured they didn’t want it lit. So,” I shrugged, “I lit it.” I explained what happened to the moon-stricken once the smoke washed over them. His face paled visibly when I told him they turned back into humans and didn’t survive the cleansing. He stood there and questioned us for a while, another officer joined him eventually and when I thought my head was going to explode, they started questioning us all over again. It wasn’t until they all agreed that bullets weren’t working on the beasts that they would even consider trying to herd the beasts back to the park. The officers ran back to the barricade, shouting to the other police. There was a flurry of movement, and suddenly two officers converged on us and rushed us into a police cruiser, slamming the doors behind us.

“Are we being arrested?” Daniel asked, but the cops weren’t inside with us yet. We watched through the metal lattice that separated us from the front seat and saw some of the officers climbing into their cars, while others, dressed in riot gear and carrying full body shields, formed a human barrier and started walking forward. In another moment, the two officers that had ushered us into the car joined us. All the other cars around us came to life and we started creeping down the road behind the human shield.

“Excuse me,” I said, my fingers holding onto the lattice. “What is going on?”

“We’re trying to get the damn things back to the park,” the officer in the passenger seat said. By his tone, I could tell they weren’t trying to be rude or abrupt; they were just consumed with their task.

“At least they believed us,” Daniel said when I let go of the divider and fell back into the seat next to him. I tried not to watch what was going on outside the car, but I couldn’t help but catch a few glimpses of violence as the human shield tried to keep pressing the beasts backwards, catching them with shock sticks and clubs when they tried to sneak around the edges, back to the cars. I flinched when I saw one officer strike down a moon-stricken with the crack of his club across its head, and then again on its back, and then two others converged upon it with their shock sticks, only then making the beast go still.

“Is that necessary?” I asked, but no one answered me. I guessed it was futile to worry about that since I knew we were herding them back to The Great Bonfire where, once they breathed in the cleansing smoke, they would collapse and die before our eyes. Daniel’s hand captured mine, his thumb gently caressing the heel of my palm, trying to comfort me.

Though we were only a few blocks away from the park, it was slow going trying to get the beasts to go the exact route the officers wanted them to go; other cruisers had to leapfrog ahead to block off other roads before the beasts reached them. When we finally made it to the park, the cops left their cars blocking off the roads leading into the neighborhoods – it was the best they could do to keep them blocked in. I think the hope was that the obstacles of the police and the cars would make the beasts run into the park to get away and eventually run through the smoke of the bonfire.

“Oy!” Daniel shouted suddenly, jarring me out of my thoughts. The two officers had gotten out of the car, and it didn’t look like they were letting us out.

“What?” the driver stuck his head back in the car, glaring at us through the grate.

“Are you just going to leave us here?” I demanded.

“Yep,” was his curt reply before he pulled his head back out of the car and slammed the door in our blinking faces.

“Well, what the fuck?” Daniel asked for both of us.

“Why did they even bring us if they were just going to shut us up in the car?” I asked even though neither of us had the answer.

I turned to watch out of the window facing the park and saw the police moving in formation, directing the snarling, snapping beasts backwards. In the distance, the glow of The Great Bonfire could still be seen above the treetops and the billowing smoke curled into the sky. A knot in my chest loosened when I realized this could all be over soon. I was sorry for the families that would lose loved ones, but at least the horror would be over. We could wash the blood from the streets and bury or burn the dead and get past this nightmare.

“Oh, gods,” I whispered, my thoughts of peace evaporating with a new dawning horror; three police officers were baiting a beast backwards with their shock sticks, the tips igniting in sinister sparks. The beast they were attempting to corral was angry and snarling, lashing out with claws and snapping teeth. All the while, the remains of a tattered sundress fluttered around its body, hanging lamely from the halter-top around its neck.

“What is it?” Daniel asked, craning his neck to look over my shoulder at what had caught my eye.

“That’s Roxy!” I screamed, pounding my fists against the door, cursing its lack of a handle to let me out. I spun in my seat and lifted my feet and frantically kicked at the window, but it never gave. Daniel was next to me yelling at me to calm down, trying to contain me, but I batted his hands away with another scream. They were going to kill Roxy! That just couldn’t happen!

“Taryn, please!” Daniel tried again, but his words were lost to me in my panic. I tried to kick out the lattice barrier in front of me, but I only succeeded in jarring myself, nearly biting my tongue. I screamed wordlessly and felt my magic lash out of me, awakened by my mindless rage. The electric power pulsed at my hands and, without thinking, I threw my power at the door and was rewarded with the sound of twisting metal and shattering glass as the door came away from its hinges.

I scrambled out of the car and took off at a dead run toward Roxy and her captors. Daniel was hot on my heels, yelling for me to wait or to stop or something, I couldn’t be sure; my whole world had narrowed down to my goal of saving Roxy. They were almost through the gate of the park. I threw myself at one of the officers, hitting him bodily at the waist, and we crashed to the ground, his shock stick flying from his grasp into the foliage around us.

“Roxy!” I screamed, kicking at the officer under me, trying to get away from him. One of the other two officers looked away from Roxy to see what had happened to his partner, and she took that moment to strike out at him. Roxy struck the cop in the face, sending him reeling and unconscious to the ground. The last officer still standing hit her with his shock stick, making her howl in pain and lash out blindly. I balled up my fist and punched the officer under me with all of my strength, made all the harder with my magic alive in my hands, and he went limp under me.

I got to my feet and rushed forward, yelling and begging the cop to stop, that Roxy was my friend, but he wouldn’t look away from her. I had enough sense still to know if I attacked the last cop, Roxy would probably strike out at both of us. The cop had managed to get Roxy through the gates and started down the midway while I was wrestling with the other cop. I could see the rolling clouds of smoke filling the area, coming ever closer to us. Closer to Roxy.

“Roxy, it’s me,” I said, putting my hands out in front of me, trying to get her to hear me, recognize me. She growled and snapped at me. The pendent around my neck vibrated with power; the closer I got to Roxy, the brighter its light shone, and I could see Roxy’s black eyes narrow at the sight of it.

“Lady, whoever she was, she ain’t now; you’re only wasting your time,” the cop said to me as he continued to urge Roxy backwards.

“Taryn!” Daniel yelled behind me, startling me, but I didn’t take my eyes off of Roxy. Roxy, however, looked towards him, and a nasty bit of drool slipped from her muzzle. In one moment she was taking a step backwards, and in the next she was leaping over our heads and rushing towards Daniel. I screamed and spun on the spot and ran after her. I called on my magic again and used it to propel me forward and leaped onto her back, wrapping my arms around her neck and pulling backwards. We hit the ground hard, knocking all of the breath out of me. Roxy thrashed above me like a turtle on its back, growing and snarling madly.

Suddenly the pendent at my neck flashed bright enough to blind me. Roxy howled and screamed, her back arching, pushing her shoulders into my chest as if she were caught in some horrific pain. Slowly her howl died away to a whimper and, for a second, I thought I heard her sob in her natural voice, but before I could be sure, she was back to the snarling, snapping fur ball of anger. Her moves were more sedate now, as though she were afraid of something and trying to get away from it, rather than trying to get at something to attack it.

“Sunnovabitch!” the third, as yet unharmed, cop said as he circled us, his shock stick held out in front of him.

“Don’t!” I yelled at him, straining to hold Roxy down without getting sliced by her vicious claws, feeling the pendent still burning my skin as if it were trying to repel Roxy.

“Taryn!” Daniel was back, catching his breath with his hands on his knees, staying well back from us.

“Daniel, don’t let him do it!” I screamed and was relieved to see him move towards the cop, making him take his attention off of us.

“Don’t do it, guy,” the cop said, shaking his head slowly.

“Just leave her be,” Daniel said, trying to negotiate with him.

“Look, you guys saw what these things were doing,” the cop said, his voice switching to a calm, soothing tone as if he were trying to talk us off a ledge. “I’m sorry that was a friend of yours, but there’s nothing I can do about this.”

“She’s a Bright Elf,” I screamed. My arms were starting to burn with the effort to control Roxy.

“What does that have to do with anything?” the officer asked.

“All of the others have been human,” Daniel offered.

“So?”

“She shouldn’t have changed!” I yelled, though I don’t know how I knew that for sure; it just seemed that all of the other moon-stricken were humans.

“Taryn,” Daniel said, creeping closer to us. “Didn’t you tell me Roxy was part human?”

“But maybe her elf blood can save her.” I was crying now, feeling the tears rolling backwards off my face and into my hair. I couldn’t let them kill Roxy; she was my best friend and like a sister to me. I just couldn’t sit back and let them march her into the smoke and watch her die.

“If you think her elf blood can save her, then maybe you have to let them try,” Daniel said, his voice low. He was much closer to me now, but still outside of Roxy’s reach.

“No!” I yelled, clutching Roxy’s writhing body to me in spite of my protesting muscles.

“It doesn’t matter,” the cop said, and Daniel and I looked to see him pointing down the midway. When I craned my head in that direction, I saw the smoke had reached us. It billowed and roiled along the walkway and converged upon us. The smoke slipped into me, filling my lungs with the burning, cleansing essence of the bonfire. I sobbed as it washed over us and I felt Roxy’s body go limp on top of me. Her bones were shifting under my arms and legs, her head lulled back on my shoulder, putting her cheek next to mine.

I watched as her face contorted like melting wax until it settled magically back into place and her soft, pale face was hers again. I felt her thick, curling, dark hair cascade over my shoulder when the tuffs of fur disappeared. Her weight was normal again and I clung to her, my eyes shut tight, terrified to see the life missing from her once bright eyes. I rolled us to the side, her body sliding to the ground and off of me, but I kept my arms and legs wrapped around her body as I wept. I could hear Daniel whispering to me, felt his hand on my shoulder, but I wouldn’t turn to him. I wouldn’t let go of Roxy.

And then Roxy coughed. My eyes flew open at the sound and I scrambled to sit up and look down at her. Roxy’s eyes were fluttering open slowly. When her vision came into focus, she looked up at me in bewilderment.

“Roxy?” I asked, choking on her name.

“Tare,” she replied. “What’s going on?”

“Sunnovabitch,” the stunned officer said as that seemed to be the only exclamation he was capable of. I didn’t know what happened, and I didn’t really care just then. I collapsed on top of Roxy, hugging her as hard as my exhausted limbs could.

“Guess you were right, luv,” Daniel said from somewhere behind me.

“About what?” I asked, still not pulling away from Roxy.

“Her being a Bright Elf; maybe her human blood made her a victim to whatever the Madness is, but her elven blood saved her?” Daniel explained.