Flame Caller (22 page)

He thought about just flying but
didn’t want to risk being too visible as they inspected the island.
The Fire Warriors had clearly been there. There was no way to know
if they were still around, lying in wait to ambush Xander now that
he’d returned.

They didn’t have far to climb. Xander
had no intention of checking the far end of the island. His only
concern was the ruined central dome and the home nearby in which
his grandfather had been recovering. The dome was visible from
where he stood, though it was barely recognizable. The bell tower
had vanished in a cloud of debris. The roof was collapsed. Large
shards of broken stone jutted from its battered interior like
spearheads. The central dome had been a sturdy building but it
hadn’t stood a chance in the island’s collapse. If the island’s
main structure hadn’t withstood the impact, he wondered what chance
there would be that the side houses had remained standing. Taking a
deep breath to steady his nerves, Xander began scaling the sloped
road.

The rubble quickly proved to be a
benefit during the climb. The marble slabs were heavy enough that
they wouldn’t shift as they used them for support. In between the
debris, he strained to find purchase with his shoes on the slick
cobblestone.

As they climbed past a ruined
building, Xander caught sight of a pale hand jutting from beneath a
crumbled wall. His stomach danced in his gut at the sight. He
hurried over and tried to lift the stones but they were too heavy
for one person alone. Sammy materialized beside him and wordlessly
took her place on the far side of the stone. Together, they lifted.
Their muscles strained from the weight and Xander gritted his teeth
as he lifted.

With a final grunt, they lifted the
stone and slid it aside. Beneath the marble debris, the body was
barely recognizable as human. Most of the bones had been shattered
by the impact. Xander had to look away in disgust. A few important
details remained seared into his mind, though. The man—if, in fact,
it had been a man—had been clad in dark leather armor and what
remained of his head was framed in a halo of pale blonde hair.
Despite his queasiness at the sight of the crushed corpse, he
smiled slightly to himself. The body had been a Fire Warrior. It
hadn’t been a member of his family.

A sob from the far side of the body
drew his attention. He turned and found Sammy crouched beside the
body, tears streaming down her face. It was easy for Xander to
forget that she was a Fire Warrior first, that she had grown up
with the people that were trying to kill him.

“
Did you know him?” he
asked, though he doubted she would have been able to recognize the
warrior as the man he had once been.

Sammy shook her head and wiped her
eyes. “No. It’s just… I may have betrayed them but these are still
my people. It’s hard to see this. I’m sorry.”

“
You don’t have to be
sorry,” he said as he walked to her side.

He pulled her into a hug and let her
hide her face in his chest. Looking over her head, Xander cringed
at the sight. Beyond the ruined house, there were a dozen other
Fire Warrior corpses in various stages of ruination. He wasn’t sure
how many had died as a result of conflicts with the Wind Warriors
and how many had just died from the fall. Either way, he wasn’t
eager for Sammy to see that sight.

“
Come on,” he said,
guiding her gently away from the scene of death behind her. “Let’s
go find the others.”

He cast one last glance over his
shoulder, catching the gaze of a Fire Caste body who stared at him
accusingly, even in death.

They climbed past a few more ruined
houses before the streets all converged into what had once been the
center of the island. The damage to the central dome seemed far
worse up close than what it had been from a distance. Xander
cringed as he saw that the entire wall around the front entrance
had shattered into little more than a mound of sharpened marble
shards.

“
We need to find my
grandpa,” Xander said as he took her hand.

He paused as they skirted the side of
the dome. It had been easy to locate the buildings on the island
when it had been held aloft and all the buildings had been whole.
Now, everything looked the same. It was impossible to tell where
one ruined building ended and another began. He wanted to yell
again for his aunts and uncles but was more hesitant after seeing
all the Fire Warriors strewn about. There was no way to know if
some survived.

“
Which way?” Sammy asked,
echoing Xander’s concerns.

He looked both directions and chewed
on his lip. He shook his head before pointing randomly toward the
right of the dome. They stepped off hesitantly. Xander wished he
could keep the wind swirling around his legs in preparation.
Despite not having his powers for long, he felt naked without the
wind summoned in defense. He also couldn’t forget the lesson he
just learned in White Halls. The Fire Caste could sense their power
the same way the Wind Warriors could sense the flames.

Xander climbed up a sloped marble slab
that blocked the way ahead. It rested against a crumbling wall,
leaving the far end hanging nearly six feet over the cracked
roadway. As Xander reached the crest, he finally had a better view
of the area around the dome. He saw what he expected to see—nothing
remained standing.

As he scanned the area, his breath
caught in his throat when he saw someone moving amongst the rubble
of the central dome. It was hard to see the person as they emerged
and disappeared quickly behind more jutting shards of stone. Xander
looked over his shoulder and waved for Sammy to join him. She
crawled up to the top in time to see the figure emerging once again
from the pile of stones.

The man’s dark hair was pulled back in
a ponytail. Dirt coated his face and chest, which was exposed since
his tunic had long ago been removed.

Xander leapt to his feet and jumped
from the edge of the slab. His feet never touched the ground as he
flew toward the figure.

“
Giovanni,” he yelled as
he landed directly in front of the weary and worn
Italian.

Giovanni’s face lit up at the sight of
the young Wind Warrior. The Italian wrapped his arms around Xander
and buried him in an emotional hug.

“
Oh, silly boy, I’m so
glad you’re okay,” he muttered.

As they pulled apart, Xander’s
furrowed his brow suddenly in concern. “What happened? We saw some
dead Fire Warriors. How did they find us?”

Giovanni shook his head. “I don’t
know. They showed up in the middle of the night. They were on top
of us before we even knew what was happening.”

Xander grabbed the Italian’s arm and
squeezed tightly. “When we were in White Halls, we felt the
earthquake.”

He left the question hanging but he
could read the sadness in Giovanni’s eyes.

“
Is everyone okay?” Xander
finally asked.

Giovanni shook his head. He tried to
explain but Xander could see him choking with emotion.

“
Please tell me,” Xander
said quietly. He heard Sammy approaching from behind but he didn’t
turn. He needed to know the truth first. “Please tell me my grandpa
is still alive.”

“
He lives,” Giovanni
replied with a sad smile. “I was with him when the island fell and
was able to fly him to safety.”

“
Then who?” Xander
frowned. “It was Robert, wasn’t it?”

He cursed himself for not seeing it
sooner. Robert had controlled both the waterspout and kept the
island aloft. With both gone, he should have been able to guess
right away.

“
I’m so sorry,” Sammy
added, stepping beside Xander.

“
He was too weak to fight
back when he was attacked,” Giovanni explained. “He couldn’t even
fly away after he lost his concentration and the island fell.
He’s…” the Italian had to pause as he looked around him at the
rubble. “He was still in the dome when it collapsed. I’ve been
trying to find him so he could get a proper burial.”

“
Where’s my
grandpa?”

Giovanni motioned to the far side of
the rubble. Before Xander could fly in that direction, he felt
Giovanni’s hand close over his arm.

“
You need to know
something, Xander. Your grandfather was already weak from his fight
with the Fire Warrior general. Alicia told you before that he
shouldn’t have been moved but I didn’t have a choice when
everything was falling apart. He’s in bad shape. I don’t know if I
helped or hurt him even more by flying him out of his house. I
don’t know how much longer he has. Go to him.”

Xander turned to Sammy to explain but
she didn’t need one. “Go. I’ll catch up.”

Xander launched into the air and
soared over the rubble. From the air, it was easy to see the other
aunts and uncles stretched out on a churned stretch of grass and
mud. Between them, his grandfather lay prone on a
blanket.

He touched down in the middle of the
ground, landing directly beside his grandfather. The elder man’s
eyes were closed but they opened slowly as Xander knelt at his
side.

“
You look terrible,” his
grandfather croaked, staring at the streaks of tears that cut
through the smudges of dirt on his face.

Xander laughed lightly. “You still
look like a million bucks, Grandpa.”

“
Xander,” his grandfather
said seriously. “We have too much to talk about and I don’t have
nearly enough time to go through it all with you.”

“
Are you kidding?” Xander
joked, not ready to admit how serious the situation was. He
wouldn’t have guessed it possible before his return to the island
but his grandfather looked thinner and weaker than he had been. His
burns looked infected and they oozed through the bandages wrapped
tightly around his body. “You’ll outlive us all.”

“
Enough of your crap, kid.
I’m dying. And before I go, there’s something you need to
know.”

“
You’re special, Xander,”
his grandfather began, after he had taken a sip of water. “I don’t
mean the window-licker kind of special either. I’m sure you’ve
noticed that you tap into a power that most of us can’t. And you’re
young, way younger than all of us.”

“
I know,” Xander replied,
“but I don’t know what it means.”

His grandfather coughed painfully. “It
means you were chosen. I can’t think it’s just some coincidence
that you come along when the Fire Caste is ready to burn the
planet.”

Xander shook his head. He didn’t want
to contradict his grandfather but he didn’t believe he was destined
to stop the Fire Warriors. “I don’t know, Grandpa. I don’t exactly
have a great track record when going up against the Fire Warriors.
I just don’t know if my power is enough.”

His grandfather looked at him sternly.
“It’s not, that’s what I’ve been trying to tell you.”

The growl in his voice led to another
coughing fit. Alicia stooped beside him and rolled him onto his
side, letting the phlegm spill onto the edge of the blanket as he
coughed. As the fit subsided, she rolled him gently onto his back
once again. His grandfather took a deep breath and Xander could
hear the rasp in the elder man’s lungs.

“
He shouldn’t be straining
himself right now,” Alicia said. “It could kill him.”

His grandfather reached up and pushed
Alicia aside. “If I speak, I die in the next couple minutes. The
alternative is, if I don’t talk, I die in the next hour. Three may
be a bigger number than two, but both of them sound pretty crappy
to me.”

Alicia nodded and stood, taking her
place beside the other aunts and uncles. When he was satisfied she
wasn’t going to interfere again, Xander’s grandfather turned back
toward his young grandson.

“
I respect your drive,
boy. I like that you’re willing to fight back against the Fire
Warriors. I even like that you’ve lit a fire under these other
slackers. I guess that was a bad choice of words, huh?”

Xander laughed abruptly, surprised by
his grandfather’s continued ability to be abrasive even when
injured and dying.

“
But you’re not strong
enough on your own,” he continued. “You’re just not tough enough to
stop the Fire Caste alone.”