Renegade (18 page)

I
leaped at Kieran and got a good hold on his ankle. Yanked the foot back before his momentum carried him over. He slid forward, but only his torso went over the railing.

Alice appeared beside me and tended to Kieran's father. I hoped it would placate Kieran to see that his father wasn't dead, but he wasn't even looking. Instead, he kicked at me with his free leg, hell-bent on breaking away.

I curled my other hand around the ankle as his foot connected with my cheekbone. White-hot pain flared across the left side of my face, and my pulse kicked. My element was misfiring, powered up and with only one place to go. Kieran unleashed a sound that was part scream, part gargle.

Having thrown everything into saving him, now I was killing him instead.

The others had staggered onto the platform, which began to sway under our weight. Ananias and Dennis grabbed Kieran too, and tried to heave him back up, but he was thrashing about so hard, they couldn't. I was sure he'd fall if I let go.

I stopped fighting my element and combined with Kieran instead—imagined my element flowing straight through him, a direct line between me and the rats. I did it to save his life, but it was a relief for me as well. Draining, yes, but we were working together now. He didn't kick me anymore. He didn't cry out. He just closed his eyes and allowed the combination to take full effect.

I heard voices. Kieran's father was groaning. Dennis was asking who had tumbled from the platform. Then everyone fell silent. They were all looking down.

I tilted my head to look through the grate. Directly below, the black mass of rats roiled like an ocean in a hurricane.

“The rats are climbing the steps,” said Ananias.

“Not the steps,” Alice said. “Each other. They're using themselves to get to us.”

If I hadn't seen it with my own eyes, I wouldn't have believed it. The top of the pile resembled the skinny, pointed sand-drip towers we used to make on the beach. And just like those towers, no matter how many times the rat-tower toppled, it always grew back even higher than before as the base grew wider, just by force of numbers. The rats were already a quarter of the way up the steps. And they weren't coming for us.

They were coming
to
Kieran.

“Make them stop, Thom,” shouted Alice. “You have to take over his element—turn the rats away.”

As I regained control of my breathing, I reduced the amount of energy pouring through him. I didn't want to take over his element entirely—Jossi had already used Kieran to serve his own ends—I just wanted to slow things down, and give us a chance to think. But Kieran responded with a keening wail that resonated through every part of me. It was a cry of agony and hopelessness. A cry for the end of the world. And still the rats came. And still the town burned. And the rats ignored their instincts and scurried into the flames, until the heat that rose to greet us was tinged with the rancid odor of burning flesh.

Alice was right: I had to do something to stop the rats and the searing heat.

But Dennis had other ideas. He linked hands with Ananias and Alice and pulled them to the railing. “Combine!” he yelled.

The result was immediate and awe-inspiring: Wind took the flames leaping from Ananias's and Alice's hands and turned them into a firestorm. It cascaded down from the tower like a waterfall, incinerating the rats as they converged below.

Beside me, Kieran screamed for his mother. He must have known the fall had killed her, but the fire raining down left no shadow of doubt. I kept waiting for him to give in, to relinquish control of the rats now that neither Jossi nor anyone else had any power over him, but he seemed more determined than ever. He drew them to himself, rank after rank, and watched them die by the thousand in the inferno.

That's when I understood. Kieran wasn't trying to punish Jossi, or the pirates, or us. He wanted to kill as many rats as possible. Burning . . . crushing . . . it didn't matter
how
they died, just as long as they were destroyed.

With a loud metallic groan, the tower shifted slightly beneath us. I couldn't even see the base of the stilts anymore—they were hidden behind flames and under the smoldering remains of countless rats. We all knew what that sound meant, and there was nothing we could do about it. No time to climb down, and no way to survive the hell below, even if we did. The inferno would kill us as quickly as the fall.

I thought of Rose and Griffin then. Mother too. If Kieran and I could kill the rats before the tower collapsed, wouldn't our lives have meant something? Surely the survivors—clan folk and elementals—could coexist peacefully on an island without rats. In time, Griffin and Nyla could cure those who had contracted Plague. There would be a future here. Even without us, there would be that.

Kieran wasn't trying to pull away anymore. There was no need. Why jump, when falling was inevitable? Instead, he grew quiet, all his energy focused on the rats. I did the same. Together, the two of us brought even the stragglers toward the tower, until a clear perimeter emerged a few hundred yards away. The heat from the burning carcasses was overwhelming. I gagged on the rancid air.

This time there was no warning sound, just a violent shift as the tower leaned ever more precariously to one side. The other elementals were jolted against the railing, but it didn't break. They didn't miss a beat, either, but rejoined hands and continued their combined assault.

I looked at each of them in turn: Dennis, who like me had lived in fear of displeasing the Guardians; Alice, the outsider, always fighting for what was right while enduring everyone's criticism; Ananias, who had only ever wanted the Guardians to respect him. I wanted them to live. I wanted all of us to live. But I said good-bye to each of them anyway, silently, so they wouldn't have to hear.

Another hideous groan as the aching stilts warped and fractured under us. The railing couldn't hold us back much longer. I didn't even have to look through the platform to see the firestorm below anymore. Limbs dangling through gaps in the railing, I could see everything perfectly because I was already facing down.

The rats plowed on to certain death, lured by Kieran's siren call. With every passing moment we were purging the island. But as the others began to tire, I knew it wouldn't be enough. Their trail of fire retreated like the ocean after high tide. With the tower straining, we were measuring life in heartbeats—ten if we were lucky, one if we weren't. Neither was long enough to rid the island of rats. They were so close too, concentrated within a radius of a hundred yards at most.

Ananias, Alice, and Dennis closed their eyes and gritted their teeth, trying to eke out something more. They must have known they were going to die here, and were determined to give everything. It wasn't enough, though. It could never be enough . . .

Unless I took over their elements. I might kill them in the process, but they were already as good as dead. Hadn't Tarn and Dare told me this moment would come?

I broke contact with Kieran. He didn't fall. He just stared at the rats and tried to hold them in his thrall.

Dennis screamed as I wrapped my arms around him. Alice and Ananias tried to resist as I placed my hands on their arms, but I wouldn't let go. They weren't elementals anymore; they were conduits, and I controlled the flow of all energy.
I
was fire and wind. Raw power flooded from me like water through a broken dam.

Fire no longer cascaded down from us. Instead, like a hurricane squeezed into a canister and unleashed in a moment, the inferno exploded. Flames radiated in an unstoppable ring, incinerating everything in their path. No rat could escape. No human either. Even high above, I was sure my skin was melting.

Ananias passed out first, unable to give any more of himself, and unable to stop me from taking from him anyway. Alice followed him into unconsciousness. I barely noticed. I didn't need their minds, just their elements. Such a betrayal to treat them like objects, but who would be alive to know what I had done?

I'd waited a lifetime to matter. To be
someone
. Now, as the world beneath me burned, I was so much more than that. I was a star—incandescent and all-powerful. And so bone-crushingly tired that I craved the moment when I'd be extinguished, and the echo would finally stop.

It was almost a relief when the first stilt gave out. The tower buckled backward, twisted sideways, and fell. I closed my eyes and let myself go.

C
ombine!” Someone was holding my hand. I didn't know who it was—Dennis, maybe. “Combine!”

Plummeting through the air, I thought of the wind and unleashed a single pulse of my element.

There was a jolt of air from under me, so powerful it was as if the earth itself had risen up and stopped my fall. My insides lurched as I flew upward, caught on the drafts of an enormous funnel. Below, the tower collapsed into the flames. The stilts were mangled, as twig-like as the bones of a dead bird.

The chute of air weakened. Hand in hand, Dennis and I began to turn. He must have wanted me to give him more power, but I couldn't do it. I just focused on the ground, and the need to stay conscious as the world twisted around me.

I wasn't sure which way was up. I thought I caught a glimpse of the others beside me. The raging fires blurred with the darkness until the entire island appeared bathed in furious orange.

I stopped rising, and began to free-fall. The heat grew more intense. Thick smoke filled the air. By the time I was able to get a look at the island, I saw something too bizarre to be real: A tidal wave crashed through Skeleton Town, large and unstoppable. And near the crest of the wave, a ship.

I willed myself not to look away. If I was dreaming, it was a dream I welcomed.

Another rapid turn through the air, but the ship was still there. Marin and Rose stood on the prow, with Nyla between them.

I braced to hit earth, but landed with a splash instead. Just as I'd been tossed about in the air, now I was twisted around in the water. It shocked me. Revived me. But I couldn't breathe.

My back scraped along what I figured was the ground, so I planted my right foot against it and pushed upward, surfacing almost immediately. About fifty yards away, the ship collided with the top corner of one of the buildings, ripping the hull to pieces.

I looked for Rose and Marin and Nyla, but I couldn't see them. I could hear Dennis's voice, though. He was close by and floundering in the shifting currents. The water level was dropping, but as it sank it created eddies that sucked objects under before tossing them out again. By the look of it, Dennis had been caught in one. I swam the couple yards over to him and grabbed his tunic. Once he saw me beside him, Dennis went limp. He was completely spent.

Kieran was nearby too. I heard him screaming, but as the last of the fires was extinguished by the advancing tide, I couldn't see him. Keeping one hand on Dennis, I swam toward the voice. Kieran let out a single, short cry. Then nothing.

“Kieran,” I shouted.

Not a sound.

“Kieran!”

Something erupted from the water beside me. A figure cleared the surface entirely before splashing down beside me.

Rose.

I couldn't make sense of how well she appeared, and how strong. There wasn't time to ask, either. “Kieran,” I said, pointing in the direction of his last cry, and even though Rose had never seen the boy, she took off to find a child in the murky gray water.

While she was gone the water receded enough that I could touch the ground again. I couldn't anchor myself, though, as the currents continued to swirl, so I allowed myself to float about. Dennis bobbed up and down on his back next to me. Apart from the ebb and flow of water, the scene was oddly quiet, so I tried to hone in on voices. I didn't hear anyone.

Rose surfaced a short distance away. Kieran seemed lifeless in her arms. “Take him,” she said, swimming to me.

Before I could ask where the others were, she was gone again. I figured it meant that someone was still underwater. I grabbed Kieran's tunic just as I'd taken Dennis's. The water level was below my armpits now, and I was able to stand. Occasionally I'd touch the two boys, and even though I was so weak I could barely keep moving, they would moan in response. I couldn't let go of them, though. In the darkness, with unpredictable currents, there was no guarantee I'd ever find them again.

A voice cut through the night: “Kieran?” It was the boy's father, calling from the direction of the wrecked ship.

“He's here,” I called back.

Slowly, painfully, we made our way toward each other. He was helping Alice. She was conscious, but weak.

Rose swam toward us. Nyla had her arms clamped around Rose's neck, which meant that almost everyone was accounted for.

“Does Marin have Ananias?” I asked.

“I don't know,” said Rose. “Marin was mostly worried about Griffin.”

So that was why Rose looked well—because Griffin had cured her. But at what cost to himself? And if Marin didn't have Ananias with her, where was he? He was a strong swimmer, but if he was in the same state as Alice or Dennis, that might not be enough.

“Ananias,” I called. No response. “We need light, Alice. I can't see.”

She raised her hand, and lowered it again. “Please,” she begged. “Just give me a moment.”

I reached out. One simple touch and I could conjure a flame, whether Alice wanted me to or not. I'd used that power already, and seen what I could accomplish with it. But Alice had seen the power too, and there was no mistaking the look on her face. She was afraid of me. Afraid of what I might do to her.

If I stole her element from her now, how would she ever trust me again?

I bowed my head and stayed back. I needed Alice to see that I wasn't like Jossi or Dare.

A moment later, she produced a flame and the hideous scene became clearer. The tidal wave had carried the dead rats away, but now the carcasses floated back toward us, mingled with the cremated remains of the pirates who had chosen to stay and fight. I told myself that we hadn't started this battle. We'd been defending ourselves. I'd been trying to save lives. But seeing so many charred bodies, it was impossible to ignore that
I
had taken over everyone's element. I'd taken a precise wall of flame and turned it into an uncontrollable fireball. Who apart from Jossi would have allowed so much destruction to occur?

And what about the other people who had been on the street a short time before? Tarn and my mother had been kneeling on the ground, tending to Jerren. Then they'd moved to the side to escape the wave of rats. But what had happened after that?

My chest tightened. For at least a hundred yards down the street the buildings were blackened shells. Even beyond that they bore the scars of the devastation I'd rained down on Skeleton Town. The clan folk had taken refuge on roofs beyond that, but how had they fared in the heat? Were they choking to death on the smoke?

No one spoke. There was nothing to say.

I waded through the water as the level dropped to my ankles. When Kieran's tunic slipped out from between my fingers, I didn't help him up. He wouldn't drown anymore, and besides, only one thought consumed me—the bleakest reality of all.

I'd killed my mother. And Tarn. And Jerren. And Ananias was gone too.

I staggered along the street, blinded by darkness, stumbling over dead rats and sharp debris. “Ananias,” I called out.

Nobody answered.

“Tarn!” Strange that hers should be the name I chose next, but I couldn't seem to make my mouth produce the word
mother
. Better not to say the word at all if she was dead so soon after reentering our lives.

“Jerren!” Still no answer. The water was almost at street level now, and I moved faster, quick enough that I fell hard as I tripped over a large dark object lying in front of me.

I struck the ground with the force and grace of a toppled tree. I wasn't able to brace myself, so my nose and forehead made contact with the inch-deep puddle and the cracked street. I tilted my head to the side to breathe, but I didn't move. It was time to stop. Time to rest.

Something shifted under my foot. I figured it was a rat, or a piece of driftwood brought in on Rose's massive wave. Then it moved again. And moaned.