Lost Causes (9 page)

CHAPTER 10

W
hen I woke, the pounding inside my skull made a good argument for a head transplant.

They’d created a makeshift cot for me at the back of the bus, several blankets in the aisle softening the hard floor beneath me. Mac watched me from above.

After blinking and groaning for fifteen minutes, I managed to push myself onto my elbows. “How long?”

“A day.” He hadn’t changed his clothes since I lost consciousness.

“You there?” I tried to ask if he’d watched over me, but two-word sentences seemed about my limit.

He tilted his head, working to interpret my question. “Yes, I’m here.”

I grunted and bent my right leg, then my left. At this rate, I might be standing by Christmas.

I attempted to clarify my point. “No babysitter.”

“Then stop acting crazy.” Sera’s head popped up from the seat in front of us.

I swallowed, but my mouth was dry, the movement rough. Sera threw a canteen down to me. I gulped the water, though it was lukewarm and tasted slightly metallic, and I began to feel less wretched. More like death warmed over than death itself. At least my broken arm had healed while I slept.

I pushed myself up fully, then took a moment to catch my breath. “How much did you use?”

Sera studied me, watching for any change. “Only a few drops. We’ve got to make it last as long as we can.”

“Did you kill Luke while I was out?”

“No.” Mac’s statement might have been more promising if he hadn’t added “Not yet” under his breath.

“You interrogate him?”

“Nope,” said Sera. “We thought you should be there for that. Miriam’s been guarding him, though that may be an excuse to drool over his muscles.”

I pulled myself to standing. The world wobbled a bit, then settled. After a while, my stomach did the same. Steadying myself with both hands on the seat backs, I shuffled toward the front of the bus and stepped outside. The sun was setting, streaks of red and orange fighting a losing battle against the encroaching darkness.

“Where are we?”

Vivian was perched on a rock, fingers on her laptop keyboard. “Smack dab in the middle of nowhere. Don’t worry. I’m not connected to anything.” The anger in her voice wasn’t directed at anyone else. The rest of us had already forgiven Vivian for her overconfidence. She hadn’t caught up with us yet.

Simon sat next to her. “We do not seem to have a destination right now.”

That was an understatement. We’d found the dual, and we’d found the promised cure, and we’d barely escaped with our lives. It was safe to say our current plan had some flaws.

“Where is he?” Sera said.

Vivian pointed to a small group of trees, where Miriam and Luke competed to see who could lasso the highest branch.

“Wasn’t she supposed to tie him up?” Mac asked.

“Let’s get this over with.” I forced my body to take long, confident strides toward the pair. “So, Luke. It turns out that thing was a homicidal nutcase who attacked first and asked questions never. Something you forgot to mention?”

He dropped the rope and turned to face me, looking both resigned and defensive.

“I gave you what I knew. I… it’s a long story.”

It was a weak response, and the unimpressed faces surrounding him seemed to agree.

“And yet,” I said, “I’m pretty sure we can squeeze story time in between our busy schedule of running for our lives and driving aimlessly around the desert.”

He nodded, just once. “I’ll tell you, under one condition.”

I waited. I wasn’t particularly inclined to agree to his terms.

“No matter what you think of me right now, you keep me with you.” He met my eyes, and his own were determined. “I’ve picked up a bit of wisdom over the years, and you need it.”

Despite everything, I wasn’t ready to walk away from the only dual who understood how to control his power. “Okay.”

“No.” Both of us turned to Mac. His ears were rounding, teeth elongating. “You’re a lying bastard who damn near killed us all. You gave us no warning what to expect up there.”

“I didn’t know!” He looked at all of us in turn, hoping to find a sympathetic face. “I was about to tell you what the cure would entail, but the damn cat was too impatient.”

Simon bristled, but he couldn’t argue.

“I swear, when I left, she was unstable, but unstable like unpredictable, moody. Not mass grave unstable.”

“Left?” Sera stepped closer. “I thought you said you escaped.”

“I did! She doesn’t let people go. And I said that could happen to you, too. I warned you she would play with your magic and try to keep you.”

I took a step closer, fighting for calm. “I could have survived being a prisoner. I could have even dealt with a creature who viewed my power as her personal entertainment system. That’s not what happened. She tried to steal our magic. She ripped it from our bodies.”

Luke swallowed. “I didn’t know,” he said again. “She only fed a little, one or two sips. Easy to replenish. Nothing like what you’re describing.”

I wanted to believe him, but there were still too many holes in the story.

Sera picked up a desert rock. She threw it in the air, and each time she caught it her grip was a little tighter. “Was she sipping from the ice, too? Cause I’m not understanding how an ice could replenish itself in the middle of a desert.” Her voice was dangerously calm.

“There was one elemental she didn’t feed from, another desert. The creature fed her instead, giving her sips of magic. I guess it was like a drug, cause she worshipped the first. She went on our supply runs, because we knew she’d always return. She brought food, clothes, and bags of ice, enough to refuel the ice's magic. That’s why some elementals sought the first out. They’d heard stories from that desert of a mystical, generous creature.”

Simon gave Luke the kind of disdainful look only a cat could manage. “I am trying to care about any of this. I am not succeeding. Tell us about the cure so we can decide whether you are of any use. You will not be interrupted you this time.”

Luke met my eyes. “Learning about the cure isn’t enough. Not without a first.”

We waited, keeping Simon’s promise not to interrupt.

“The thing is, you’ve been wrong, Aidan. Separating the threads isn’t the cure. You need to join them, and join them permanently. Only a first can do that. So if you’re gonna try this again, maybe you all oughta care what I went through.”

Luke glared at the cat shifter. Simon gave him a slow, lazy blink.

“You wanna know what happened to me? Firsts control magic. You discovered that for yourselves. Well, she’d never met a dual before I stumbled into her lair. She played with both my fire and desert every day. She pulled the threads apart and stitched them back together. Whenever she ripped them apart, I thought I was dying. When she joined them, I was reborn, though that was its own torment. I was mad or sane depending on her whims. She enjoyed putting it together the most. She watched me, and though it’s hard to call anything they do human, she felt smug. Really damn pleased with herself, like she had a secret. And when I got used to being whole, she’d rip it apart. Some days she let me wallow in memories. Sometimes she stripped my humanity and demanded I fight another of her pets. Once, I killed another fire, and she rewarded me by fusing the magic together right away so I could stand over the corpse of the man I’d suffocated with desert sand.”

Each word was coated in bitterness. It was impossible to say how much of his hatred was for the first and how much was for himself.

Luke shook his head, forcing himself back to the present. “Anyway. That day, she’d just finished putting the threads together. I felt her glee, as usual, but I also felt her hunger. Fewer visitors were coming those days, and she’d been taking a bit more from each of us when she fed. That’s when a stone elemental appeared out of the blue, drawn by the rumors of a pure, glorious creature. Her joy at having a new element after so long distracted her. I didn’t waste my chance. I ran as fast as I’ve ever run in my life. Three of us did. Two didn’t made it off that slope.”

He rolled his shoulders to release the tension that built while he was telling his story.

“That was twenty years ago. Because I left when my magic was joined, I got to stay sane.” He grimaced. “More or less.”

“That’s the cure, then? Let one of those ancient fuckers mess with Ade’s magic?” Sera’s words were level, but her anger rose. Anger and fear. She threw the rock she’d been holding. It flew so close to Luke’s ear it lifted his hair as it passed. He didn’t flinch.

“I tried to tell you. You didn’t want to hear it, not really.” He exhaled. “And maybe I didn’t want to relive it. That’s on me. I should have tried harder. I guess I thought Aidan had a chance, more than I did. She’s in better shape than I was when I stumbled onto the first, and she has you guys.”

“We’re not going back there.” Mac’s tone left no room for argument, though no one was inclined to disagree.

Miriam pursed her lips in thought. “Luke, did you get anything else from her, like where the others are? Or if they’re all batshit crazy?”

“That first is the only one I ever heard about, and I don’t think they learn about each other. In their own way, they’re more trapped than I ever was. Another first might not be as far gone. This one was in better shape when I was with her, though she was already growing hungry. The bodies suggest she progressed to starving. She probably consumed all their power to fuel herself. Other firsts might not be so awful, not if they’re feeding regularly.”

It was a huge risk. The others could be even worse than what we’d found on the Utah hilltop. No reasonable person would seek out another of those creatures.

I didn’t get to be a reasonable person. “So we need to find another ancient creature born of the earth’s first magic and hope this one won’t try to kill us on sight. No big deal,” I said.

Sera snorted, and for a moment things felt normal, like we weren’t planning a course of action that led to death and destruction.

“Does anyone have any idea where to even begin looking?” I wasn’t too optimistic, and I wasn’t sure I heard correctly when Vivian spoke up.

“I do.”

I didn’t think she wanted to continue. Vivian enjoyed helping, but she preferred to do it behind a computer, from the comfort of her office. Generally, she wasn’t a fan of situations that led to chaos and bloodshed. She wasn’t timid. She just wasn’t as stupid as the rest of us.

Despite her reluctance, she squared her shoulders and finished her thought. “I know where another first is.”

“Hawaii? Seriously?” Sera hadn’t said much else since Vivian delivered the news.

She paced up and down the aisle of the bus, now heading west. It was Mac’s turn to drive, which meant, for once, we weren’t traveling at a speed that threatened to make the bus implode around us.

The minute Vivian informed us another first lived near Sera’s home, my sister demanded we start driving and debate the merits of this new plan along the way. That was her version of patiently waiting for more information.

“Where? I grew up there. My family’s compound is there. I never heard anything about this.”

“There are lots of islands,” I said.

“Not that many.” She sat down in a huff. “You’re telling me the thing we needed was right under Josiah’s nose and he had no clue?”

Sera stared at the roof, considering. She was so familiar with the islands she could navigate them with her eyes closed. “There’s Niihau, which is almost completely cut off from the public. Population of about six hundred. Kahoolawe is uninhabited, but that’s cause there’s no fresh water and the U.S. Navy liked to shoot guns there. A gathering of elementals would be noticed in either place.”

“You’re kidding me, right?” Miriam stared at Sera, incredulous. “You elementals are constantly hiding in plain sight. From what you’ve told me, your family compound is underneath a damn volcano, yet somehow no vulcanologist or tourist has ever found a bit of evidence. Brook’s family has an island right out in the open, yet somehow it disappears from any map the minute it’s found.”

I acknowledged the point. “We’re pretty much a cartographer’s urban legend.”

Sera wasn’t convinced. “Are we pretending this first has Vivian-level computer skills and can erase herself from existence?”

Vivian was offended at the mere suggestion. “Of course not. I don’t understand it, but this island has found a way to stay hidden.”

Sera plopped down on the seat across from Vivian. “Right. What have you got?”

Vivian nudged Sera with her laptop, asking her to look at the map.

“Right there. Josiah gave latitude and longitude, though I had to work through several layers of encryption to find this. The man intended for this to remain a secret. I’m almost positive this is where the other first lives.”

Simon studied it over her shoulder. “Correct me if I am wrong, but that spot does not appear to be an island.”

I sat behind Vivian and adjusted my position so I could also see the map. The spot she indicated was, in fact, in the middle of the ocean.

Vivian clicked and brought up another map. “This image is archived from a year ago. Check again.” This time, there was a tiny blur in the same spot.

I squinted. It wasn’t as defined as the other islands on the map, but we were definitely looking at something. “An island that appears and disappears? Please tell me we aren’t searching for Brigadoon.”

“What makes you believe a first is there?” Sera asked.

It was a fair question. Josiah wouldn’t have kept a map with an arrow and “First magic here” scrawled in red ink.

Vivian reclaimed her computer and pressed a few buttons, then leaned back, posture rigid. She watched Sera the way one might watch a ticking bomb. “There’s nothing in the files to indicate Josiah was aware of the connection between firsts and the cure.” Vivian took a long drink of water. “Sera, I’m not sure how to tell you this.”

“Tell me what? Vivian, you’re not Simon. Stop drawing this out.”

In a single breath, Vivian did just that. “He wasn’t trying to find the first magic. He was looking for your mother.”

Sera didn’t pale or shout or even blink. She stood up, gripped the seat backs on either side of the aisle, and watched Vivian with blazing black eyes.