Mark of Four (31 page)

A
layne lay
, lax in Daymon’s arms, shock hazing her mind. He carried her seamlessly through the air element. She tried to recover, to take control herself, to gather her ragged edges, but a cloud had misted her head.

Jayme was gone.

Marysa was gone.

She’d failed them both. She, the Quadriweave, had been too slow, too late, too stupid, too everything and too nothing to keep them safe.

She couldn’t cry, and for the first time, she wished she could. Anything to dissolve the burning ache that hardened in the center of her chest. She writhed inwardly from the pain.

Daymon muttered a curse under his breath.

Alayne roused herself. “What?”

Daymon pointed at Clayborne’s spire.

The place was in chaos. The surrounding fields were a mosaic of fire-walkers and students. Near the support leg, Professor Brinks was in pitched battle with six fire-walkers. Other professors were scattered across the grounds, and someone had apparently gone for help. Boats and shuttles from the Continental Guard lined the river and the fields, and uniformed Elementals faced off with fire-walkers everywhere.

Daymon dropped steeply from the air near the riverbank. As soon as he landed, he set Alayne on her feet, his hands on her waist steadying her. “Alayne, can you get up to your room without help?” Two fire-walkers tackled a Continental Guard right next to them, and the man went down, screaming in pain.

Scared, she might be. In shock, she probably was. But by all that was holy, she would not go down without a fight. Two of the people she loved best in the world had died under her watch. No more.

In answer to Daymon’s question, she dug into the water element of the riverbed. A huge wave roiled up, dousing the guard and the two fire-walkers, flattening several other fire-walkers who struggled along the river bank, and rocking the Continental Guard boats in their berths.

“I’m going to help,” she shouted at Daymon.

She sprinted down the riverbank toward a large group of fire-walkers that struggled with several professors. Manders was among them, his glasses askew as he ruptured a geyser from the ground, flinging it toward the fire-walkers.

It doused some of them, but not enough. The remaining ones threw their fire to their downed partners, who revived and joined the fight again.

Alayne and Daymon arrived at the fight at the same time, Daymon hurling himself into the thick of things, blowing his uncle’s water at the nearest fire-walkers. Alayne yanked the earth beneath the walkers. She raised a long strip of sod, dropping it on top of them to smother them beneath the dirt.

Manders glanced her way, surprised. “Alayne, are you all right?” he shouted.

“I’ve been better,” she yelled back, hauling another wave of water toward a group of fire-walkers that sprinted toward them.

Manders shouted, “Corral them to the river, Daymon! The ones in the spire, we’ll force into the pools!” He dashed toward the spire, followed by several other professors.

Alayne whirled to survey the landscape. More shuttles arrived with the Continental Guard streaming from the hatches, and the air was a frenzy of elements. Currents of air, fire, water, and earth flew every which way, and Alayne slammed the elements this way and that, concentrating on the bright spots of fire-walkers, clearing the path for anyone else. She blocked out any thoughts of Jayme or Marysa; she focused on what was happening around her.

Manders stood on the steps of the spire with the professors and the Continental Guard streaming past him. He stared past Alayne, horror in his gaze.

Alayne turned.

Boulder-sized rocks and a massive geyser of mud spewed from the near bank of the river. Alayne’s eyes widened as a figure emerged from the mud, slinging it off of him in a wave.

Malachi.

For a long, eternal moment, Alayne couldn’t move, couldn’t even reach for the elements. She had collapsed a mountain range on top of this man, and yet, he approached, charging up the bank and roaring in triumph.

He’d spotted her. She moved her frozen fingers to the elements, stripping aside the shock. The river reached out to drag him back into its bed, but he had none of it. He ripped the water from her grasp and surged the river downstream, where it sloshed over its banks in a mini-tidal wave.

Manders and Daymon appeared on either side of her. “Use the other elements, Layne,” Daymon yelled. “We’ll distract him.”

“I don’t think so, boy,” Malachi shouted as he threw a shield of ice in front of a whirlwind that Daymon hurled his way. As the whirlwind flew by harmlessly, Malachi flung the shield at the three of them, but Manders exploded it before it hit them.

Alayne peeled around to come at Malachi from behind. He countered the move, running to the side where he could see all three of them.

Alayne ignited her hands and sent fire streaking across the grass. Malachi dodged it, but only barely, dousing it before it could hit him. His face was hard with concentration.

Alayne slung the resulting mud at his face, hoping to blind him, but he sliced it away and sent a barrage of ice-javelins at her. She slammed onto the ground as she dodged them, rolling to her feet.

Daymon and Manders had taken advantage of Malachi’s distraction, to throw a constant storm of wind and water his way.

Alayne checked the grounds. They were still in mass confusion, and no one had recognized Malachi.

Alayne had just decided to try lightning, though she hadn’t had any practice with it before, when Malachi pulled a massive, swirling geyser from one of the spire’s main underground waterlines. It fountained hundreds of yards, and then pounded downward in a huge javelin of water that drilled into the ground at his feet.

Daymon, Manders, and Alayne all froze in surprise. What was he doing?

With a laugh of glee, Malachi flung the water away, dropped into the hole he’d made, and emerged a moment later on a swelling bubble of water.

Marysa struggled in his arms.

“M—Marysa!” Alayne shouted.

Terror froze her friend’s eyes. Malachi’s arm hugged her neck, keeping her body pressed against his as he backed toward the river.

Alayne, Daymon, and Manders stopped throwing elements, terrified of hitting Marysa.

The chaos across the grounds hadn’t abated; no one noticed Malachi or his hostage.

Marysa’s hands glowed as she struggled to break Malachi’s hold, burning his arm, but his arm crusted over with ice, and even the heat from her hands couldn’t break through.

“Come and get ‘er, Quadriweave!” Malachi shouted. He backed along the riverbank step by step. Daymon battered him with wind, but Malachi threw up ice shields each time. He began launching ice javelins at the three of them again.

Alayne ducked a javelin, sucking at Malachi’s boots with mud, but he freed himself. She wanted to slam him with all the elements at once, but Marysa’s wan, welted face and her terror-lit eyes kept her from it. She and Daymon and Manders watched helplessly as Malachi backed into the water, dragging Marysa with him.

“Congratulations, Quadriweave!” he shouted. “You won today, but I’m gonna beat you tomorrow. Better watch your back; you don’t know when I’ll be comin’ for you.”

Fury sizzled through Alayne, so hot that it exploded from her fingertips, quaking through the elements, shredding the ground on both sides of the river, swirling the water around Malachi and Marysa.

A wall of water stretched high above Malachi’s head, flattening until it was paper thin and razor sharp all the way across.

So fast that no one had time to move or think, Alayne brought it down with all the force she could muster between Malachi and Marysa.

The edge caught part of Malachi’s face, flaying his cheek and severing his nose. The ice melted into water in a split second, and Malachi screamed, throwing his hands over his face.

Marysa lurched forward while Malachi fell backward. A severed chunk of Marysa’s black hair swirled on the surface of the water between them.

Sobbing, Marysa crawled toward the bank. Alayne splashed into the water to help her.

Malachi disappeared under the water, and Manders sprinted after the churning, writhing man as he swam downriver.

Daymon met Alayne and Marysa at the edge of the water, hefting Marysa up the bank to sit on the grass.

Marysa and Alayne were both sobbing. Marysa grabbed Alayne in a stranglehold, and neither could talk through their tears. Daymon stood behind them, staring along the riverbank. Manders had disappeared along with Malachi.

After a few minutes, Alayne pulled back, digging the heels of her hands into her eyes. “Is he coming yet?”

Daymon shook his head tersely, his jaw hard.

“Go after him; we’re all right here.”

Daymon glanced back at the school. The Continental Guard had doused nearly all the fire-walkers. At this distance, it looked as though only three more pockets of them remained, and water geysers liberally swirled in the air around them. It wouldn’t be long until the fire-walkers were gone.

“Sure you’re all right?”

“Go.” Alayne waved him away.

Daymon started to run along the riverbank, but stopped almost right away as Manders’s figure appeared through a copse of trees.

As he approached, he shook his head wearily. “The filthy spawn escaped.” He squatted next to the girls, his gray eyes not quite meeting Alayne’s. “I’m sorry.” A ragged tear in Manders’s shirt seeped blood. “He caught me with an ice-javelin. He got away.”

Alayne didn’t say anything. She couldn’t. Anger, shock, hatred, and revenge all struggled for first place, and then none of them won. Weariness took over.

“Thanks,” she managed.

Daymon stood behind his uncle, his arms crossed.

“You, too, Daymon.” She reached over and gently touched Manders’s shoulder. Relief flickered across the man’s face as the pain drained away. Alayne glanced once again at Daymon. Approval darkened his eyes.

For some reason, Alayne flushed.

Marysa leaned her head on her friend’s shoulder and closed her eyes.

T
he students huddled
in small groups in the common room, shock and daze coating most of their expressions. The Continental Guard still wove through the spire, searching for any hidden fire-walkers or Shadow-Casters. Sprynge had holed himself up in one of the classrooms with the Guard commanders to discuss the situation, and Manders wearily sipped tea on a couch across from Alayne and Marysa. Daymon rested his elbows on his knees, his hands clasped in front of him as he stared at the floor.

They were all scarred from the day. Not physically—Marysa’s welts and burns had healed as soon as she’d hugged Alayne, and her skin was smooth and clear once again. Daymon had changed into clean jeans and didn’t even walk with a limp after his deep wound that Alayne had healed earlier that day. Manders had also changed and showed no after-effects from the javelin he’d taken to his shoulder.

But all of them struggled with inward turmoil. Alayne played over and over again the expression on Jayme’s face as the knife thudded into his chest, followed by his slow fall over the edge.

Manders cleared his throat and set the tea on the table.

“How long were you in that room, Marysa?”

She shook her head. “Not long. I was at Cliffsides most of the time. Walters, Pepper, and Foy hid me in one of the caves and notched the elements out of reach. They only moved me to that room a couple of days ago.”

Alayne glanced at Manders. “But wouldn’t High Court Elementals be good enough to sense when the elements were out of reach? They combed the cliffs all semester.”

Manders nodded. “If she had been in that area. They took her several miles to the north. It was still in the same network of tunnels and caves, but far removed from the kidnapping. Once the Elementals had to expand their search, finding Marysa’s location was like searching for a single piece of paper in a paper factory.”

Alayne’s eyes slid shut.

Marysa said, “The Three were Casted stooges of the Elemental Alliance, and they’d come in and have long talks with me, trying to get information, I guess. I don’t think I gave much away, but I did get a little information from them.”

Manders leaned forward with interest. “What kind of information?”

Marysa blushed. “Well, nothing huge. I found out that Dorner had gotten caught in the crossfire between the Shadow-Casters who were roaming the area around the same time as the field-study. A group of High Court spies had come to meet with Dorner, because he’s—”

“A spy for the High Court, I know,” Manders finished.

Alayne’s eyes widened. “Dorner was a spy?”

Manders nodded. “The High Court, at this point anyway, still opposes segregation between Naturals and Elementals, and they’d appointed him as a spy at Clayborne, reasoning, I assume, that Clayborne is a big hub of Elemental influence with all the students, parents, and professors involved.”

“Makes sense.” Alayne felt sorry for the Chairman—and guilty that she’d ever mistrusted him, even a little.

“The Alliance has also been building a collection of Casted individuals taken from various places around the Continent and kept goodness knows where.” Manders shook his head ruefully. “The Last Order spies weren’t able to collect
that
information.”

“The Last Order?” Alayne looked at Marysa. “We found an ‘LO’ pin on Dorner—”

“Yes, that’s the one,” Manders nodded. “Chairman Dorner was a member of the Last Order, though he answered to Justices in the High Court, so not many knew he served the secret group.” He sighed and clapped Daymon on the shoulder. “Anyway, we’ve got a lot of work ahead of us. It doesn’t all end now. Malachi’s escaped, there’s a collection of Shadow-Casted people that the Alliance may be building into an army—”

“What happened to The Three? Walters, Pepper, and Foy?” Marysa interrupted.

Manders twisted on the couch, motioning to a group of chairs near the chute. People stood in a cluster, talking to the individuals in the chairs, and Alayne recognized the shadowed faces of the ex-professors. They looked disoriented.

“They’ll be returned to their families for some rest,” Manders said. “Being Shadow-Casted, especially for long periods of time, will take its toll. They may never again regain the personality they once had. Bringing feeling and emotion back into a body so long void of it may break them permanently. Rest is the best thing for them. They may never return to teach here, though they may surprise us.”