Warrior from the Shadowland (3 page)

It
gave Nia a pang, realizing that this was how Ty would have been about
everything
if Parald hadn’t come into their lives.  Competent and creative and secure with
herself.  The Water House had always bred artists and academics, but Ty had the
potential to be their greatest gift to the universe

Ty
brushed her hair behind her ear.  Mixed in with the mass of red curls was a
shot of vibrant blue.  Each House was born with a different color streak at
their temple.  For the Water House, it was a bright turquoise that matched
their eyes.  “This might take a few minutes.”  She murmured.

Uriel
and Tharsis, meanwhile, started ransacking desks.  Drawers were ripped out,
files dumped, even the wastepaper baskets were overturned and the contents
scrutinized.  Everything that looked remotely useful was passed to their
friendly, neighborhood Wood Phase.  As long as it was printed on a piece of
paper, Uriel could see it once and then recreate it forever.  He was like a
combination printer and scanner, only he didn’t have a plug and you needed to
feed him a lot.

“Should
I copy these family pictures, too?”  Uriel picked up a photograph from a random
desktop.  He squinted down at the snapshot of a smiling boy with a birthday
cake.  Then, he cleared his throat.  “I’d rather not, unless you really think
they could be important.  It will take more energy to do an image of this
quality.”

“No,
we won’t need those.” Nia assured him, quietly.

Uriel
gave a sharp nod and carefully set the frame aside, facedown on the desk.

Nia
moved closer to him and laid a palm on his shoulder.  So much would’ve been
different if the Fall hadn’t struck.   The unfairness of it staggered Nia
sometimes.  That’s why they were doing this.  Because maybe,
maybe,
they
could fix it.

“Okay?” 
She whispered, so only he could hear.

He
nodded.  “Okay.”  He pressed a friendly kiss the top of her head.  “Thank
you.”  Uriel might have come to the Water House as a guard, but he’d become
another brother to Nia over the last year.

She
gave him an understanding squeeze and headed over to investigate an office
towards the back of the lab.  “Thar, how we doin’ on time?”

“We’ve
got -like- fifteen minutes left to find it and get the hell outta here.”  He
reported, not looking up from the day planner he was fanning through.  “Ty? 
Think we should try again when everybody’s gone for the entire
weekend
or are you planning to crack that computer sometime today?”

“I’m
almost there.  Don’t nag.”

Nia
almost grinned at her cousin’s irritated tone.  She didn’t hear that delightful
bitchy-ness very much from Ty anymore.  Luckily, Tharsis could bring out the
worst qualities in everyone around him.

The
office at the back of the lab looked like it belonged to some sort of neat
freak.  Everything was perfectly arranged and pristinely white.  It made Nia
sort of sad for the person who worked in the beige box.  There was literally
nothing in the room but a desk, a chair and a four foot tall fake plant in the
corner…

…So,
Nia was pretty damn surprised when she was attacked.

The
overhead light suddenly blew out, sending sparks raining down on her.  The
telltale crackle of Elemental energy filled the air.  She looked up at the
broken fixture, dread filling her, and saw six armed Phases just appeared in
the empty space.

They
must have been monitoring the Water Phases, waiting for them to leave the
protective barriers of their homeland and expose themselves to attack.  Not
seeming the least bit disoriented from their jump into the human realm, the men
pulled their swords and looked around.  Their eyes fell on her like a pack of
wolves scenting a rabbit.

Nia
knew immediately that it wasn’t Job coming to enforce the Council’s law and
arrest her.  First of all, Job loved the Water House.  He wouldn’t really harm
Nia or her family, no matter what she did.  Job could be a stodgy pain, but he
was also like her uncle or something.  What’s more, Job’s energy was a
controlled, flowing strength.  He didn’t panic about anything.  These Phases
were riding a high of frantic excitement.

That
meant they must be some of the Water Houses’
real
enemies.  The Air
House or the Reprisal stood as the most likely candidates, although there were
probably more contenders out there, too.  Nia had given up on counting all the
people who wanted her dead.  It was depressing.

When
the men first appeared, Nia had been bending to investigate the bottom drawer
and now she used the desk as cover.  She ducked down instinctively as the
Phases came at her, swords held high.  One of them swung it at her, going for a
clean slice across her neck.  Nia’s swift movement caused him to miss and catch
her along her shoulder, instead.  The blade sliced a shallow cut into her
flesh.  Pain radiated through her body.  Nia fell sideways, griping the wound
with one hand.  Blood leaked out between her fingers as she rolled under the
desk.

These
guys were playing full contact.

Definitely
not
Reprisal, then.  Chason’s men were all zealot-preacher nuts, but
most of them knew better than to actually
kill
her.  Nia supported a
third of the Water House.  Even if her charms never got her named Elemental of
the Year, Nia remained vital for everyone’s survival.  Keeping Water around
sustained the entire world.  Without her, Ty and Tharsis would have to hold all
the Water by themselves and neither one of them had Nia’s power.  Odds were
high that the whole House would topple.

That
was another reason Nia felt confident about her little rebellion.  Even if Job
got pissed enough to
want
to behead her, he’d never doom the universe
and really
do
it.  These Phases seemed suicidal enough to chop first and
worry about the apocalypse later, though.

Only
Parald was stupid enough for that kind of behavior.  Sure enough, Nia focused
long enough to spot the yellow gold streak at their blond temples, marking them
as members of the Air House.

Idiots.

“
Ty,
go!
”  She screamed, knowing that her cousin would be their main target. 
Nia kicked out as one of the Phases made a grab for her, catching him in the
knee.  He staggered sideways, swearing viciously in Elemental.  Another sword
swung at her, the blade imbedding itself in the fake wood of the desk.  Nia
aimed a second kick at the wrist of the man holding it, knocking his hand off
of the handle as he tried to pry it free.

She
heard Tharsis and Uriel shoving their way into the office.  Uriel, like most
Wood Phases, trained for warrior-hood from birth.  He had a sword of his own. 
But, the Water House had always been the most peaceful of all the Elementals. 
Tharsis’ only experience with violence had been during the Fall and the horror
of it still haunted them all.

Nia’s
eyes widened as two Air Phases headed for her twin.  “Uriel!”  She bellowed. 
“Get Thar out of here!”  She lunged for the sword stuck in the desk, needing a
weapon.

Wood
Phases made excellent soldiers.  Their sense of duty and respect for authority
fit in nicely with military work.  Uriel’s fighting skills were certainly
superior to the Air House stooges’.  One on one, two on one, maybe even
three
on one, Uriel could have beaten them all.  But, there were six armed
mercenaries and Uriel only had half a second to react.

Uriel
slammed into one of the guys headed for Thar, sending the Air Phase into the
wall.  Two more tackled Uriel from behind.

“Son
of a bitch!”  Tharsis toppled the potted fern into the path of the other Phase
headed his way and scrabbled backwards out of range of the deadly arc of the
blade.  “Nia!”

“I’m
alright.”  Nia lied.  “You and Ty run!”  She pried the sword loose and gave an
experimental swing with her wrist, trying to figure out how to use it.  Since
the guy whose shin she aimed at let out a bellow and reached down to grab the
wound, she guessed she’d done it right.

The
desk was suddenly lifted right from over her.  One of the Air House assholes
toppled the whole thing sideways so Nia was exposed, again.

From
the outer room, Ty let out a cry of alarm.  Nia could hear her trying to get
into
the fight, rather than run away from it.  Typical.  Ty found waiters
intimidating, but had no trouble taking on a half dozen, blood-thirsty
assassins.  As Job delighted in pointing out: for all its emphasis on
education, the Water House had never been known for its rational thinkers.

Nia
drew on her powers to gather up as much water vapor as she could.  Since the
air conditioning in the building kept the humidity annoyingly low, it really
wasn’t much, though.  Elementals didn’t usually use their power in fights
against each other.  It wasn’t considered honorable.  But, neither was
attacking unarmed people, so Nia wasn’t worrying about playing fair.

She
slammed Water energy at her attackers like a punch, trying to evade their
clutching hands and get to her feet.  It wasn’t going to be enough.  She knew
it.  Nia realized in a distant sort of way that they were all going to die.

And
that’s when she felt a new force enter the fray.

Not
Uriel’s steady Wood Phase energy, not the flowing strength of the Water House,
but something so huge and dark that it swamped her senses.  Nia’s head snapped
around, expecting to find
another
army of Phases standing in front of
her.  Instead, she saw a single, shadowed shape.  Even then she didn’t
see
it so much as
sense
it as it moved.

The
two men attacking her must’ve noticed it, too, because they shifted in unison
to face the new threat.  Nia wasn’t sure what happened after that.  Everything
moved too fast.  The sword was ripped from her hand and took the heads off both
men in one long, clean slice.  Blood splattered on the beige walls in a
horrible rainbow shape.

Nia
felt her mouth drop open in shock.

The
Air Phase going after Tharsis fell next.  The guy didn’t even have the chance
to turn and see his death coming.  The power behind the sword swing sent the
attacker’s head slamming into the ground like a dropped cantaloupe.

“Holy
shit.”  Tharsis whispered.  He stared at the Air Phase’s decapitated body in a
sick sort of fascination.  Behind his shoulder, Ty looked more terrified than
ever.

Nia’s
brain finally registered that the sword was actually held by a male Phase.  A
very
big
Phase, wearing black and grey camouflaged pants and a
sleeveless t-shirt.  The horror of the situation must’ve been making her
slightly hysterical, because Nia had the very clear thought that every man’s
muscles should look so good in a muscle shirt

Most
Elementals ranked high on any attractiveness scale.  It was the nature of their
species.  This particular Phase made the rest of them look like everybody’s
last choice for prom date, though.  Even covered in the blood of his victims
and twirling a massive sword around like a baton, the man was beautiful.  The
kind of beauty that didn’t seem quite real; as if you might blink and he’d just
disappear right in front of you.  Every move he made had a purpose and easy
masculine grace.  His mercury colored eyes fixed on his next target with a
deadly intensity that really shouldn’t have been nearly as hot as it was.  He
was gorgeous.

And
then Nia noticed the silver streak at his temple that declared him part of the
Shadow House.  Her heart stopped.

There
was only one Shadow Phase left in the universe.

Cross.

Words
tumbled through Nia’s memory.  Whispers she’d heard about Cross.  Warnings from
anyone who ventured too close to the Shadowland.

Unstable.

Dangerous.

Wrong.

After
the Fall, every Elemental felt Cross lose his grip on the Shadows.  They’d all
braced themselves as the end of the world began unfolding in an explosive chain
reaction.  For many Phases, it had been a relief when Cross let go and his
House crumbled.  Others had panicked.  Most were already too far gone to care
what happened.

Nia
had been sitting at Ty’s bedside when she’d sensed the pull of oblivion.  She
vividly recalled the rush of it, the terrible power promising to stop all the
pain and despair.  Nia had thought that she’d been one of the Phases passed
feeling anything, at that point.  But, when the Shadows burst free, her eyes
had filled with frightened tears.  She’d never felt so alone in her life.  Like
she’d suddenly been abandoned at the edge of some great, yawning abyss.

Except,
there’d been no
end
at the end of the world.

Cross
somehow stopped it and pulled the Shadows back.  He’d shouldered the entire
House himself.  It shouldn’t have been possible for one, single Phase to do
that.  Every Elemental knew that it just couldn’t be done.  In all of history,
it had never even been attempted.   Yet, Cross had held the weight of the
Shadow House for two solid years, now… Alone.

No
one could do something so impossible and stay sane.

Unpredictable.