The Five Elements (43 page)

Aaron approached Shanna from the control-side of the machine. She stood close enough now that Aaron had only to take a few steps past the levers and dials to properly address her. She looked… sickly. Exhausted. Pale and sunken-eyed. One hand hung limply at her side. The other was clutched at her gut where her shirt was stained crimson. Her hair had blown across her face. As if no longer possessed of the strength to brush it aside, she left it where it lay.

"Are you finished?" she asked. Her voice was hoarse, her body faltering. Yet the tone of her words remained as strong as ever.

"Yes, I'm finished," Aaron said. "I just need to turn it on and—"

"Don't bother."

Aaron narrowed his brow in confusion. "But don't you—"

"No. Not anymore."

"But why not?" Aaron felt he knew the answer to that question already, but it was the only thing he could think to say.

"Didn't you see what I just did?"

"Yes, I saw."

"The druids are gone." Such a simple statement, but there was too much satisfaction in the words, too much conviction. "Whatever Erlek had planned, whatever he'd wanted to do, it doesn't matter now. He was weak. Maybe he needed a machine to give him strength, but I don't." Then she turned away and started walking to the radiating depression.

"Shanna, wait," Aaron said, not loud, but with enough voice that he knew Shanna heard him. She didn't stop, nor even offer a look over her shoulder. "Shanna!" Shouted this time, it caused her to stop, turn, and face him.

"What?" The single word was dismissive, as if she only humored him by asking it.

"Remember what you asked me on the top of Graggly's Tower, before all of this happened?"

Shanna said nothing at first. Perhaps she was thinking. Perhaps the question was only unexpected. When it looked as if she wasn't going to say anything at all, Aaron answered for her.

"You asked me if we'd always be friends."

"I remember," she said.

"I didn't get a chance to answer. Not really. What I wanted to say was that, yes, we'll always be friends. No matter what. I mean it, too."

Her expression became one of conciliation. She shifted her weight, leaning in that way she always did. Suddenly, she was the Shanna of old again. "I know, Aaron. You were always my best friend."

"You were mine, too." Aaron held her gaze for a moment, drinking in those dark eyes, then he let his gaze fall to the ground. He could leave it at that. A simple recognition of what each meant to the other. It would be a good memory, one he could look back on for years. He only had to say nothing else and leave the exchange where it was. But he couldn't do that. "Because we're friends, Shanna, I'm going to say this one last time. Stop this. Throw the Elements into…" Aaron made a show of looking for a place. He threw up his arms in resignation. "Throw them into the ocean!" It was as good a place as any. "It's not too late. We can walk away from this. The both of us. I know things will never be the same, but we can at least try."

Shanna's shoulders rose and fell in a great sigh. "Aaron, I already told you. This is where I belong now, doing exactly what I'm doing. I'm not walking away from anything."

Aaron took a breath, then let it out slowly. "Then I have to stop you, Shanna. I'm sorry, but I have to."

The familiarity in her expression melted into one of annoyance. "Aaron, you can't stop me. You saw what I did to the druids. You know what I did to the others. How do you think you're going to stop me? You can't. Now just go away or—"

"Or what? You'll kill me, too?"

"I don't want to. But…" She paused, shaking her head, obviously torn. With not much more effort, though, she made up her mind. It was not the course of action Aaron expected. "I don't have to. You can't do anything to stop me, Aaron. You're not a sorcerer or a druid. You're not even a wizard's apprentice. I know that now. You, you're nothing more than a… a lab assistant! And it looks like you don't even have your funny lab coat with all of your alchemicals." The radiance shining from the depression behind Shanna gleamed brighter and Shanna, who rose to her full height now, still short of Aaron's but still seeming taller and absolutely more powerful, flashed Aaron a stare of such menace, framed by such pale, deadly beauty, that Aaron took an involuntary step back. "Now, go away, Aaron. I'm not going to ask you again."

Aaron kept retreating. Shanna, pleased with his reaction, crossed her arms and smirked, probably thinking his staggering, backward trend was a precursor to his turning and bolting. But Aaron only wanted to get closer to the machine's controls. He put one hand to the main lever, gripped it tight, and just as Shanna narrowed her gaze at him, wondering what he was up to, he yanked down hard, pulling the lever so that the alchemical engine was activated. The effect, much to Aaron's dismay, was not immediate. There was a buzz, followed by the squeaky turning of shafts, cogs, and gears. A visible vibration coursed through the metal of the thing and a spray of alchemicals, priming the ignition cylinders, hissed. Aaron risked a glance at the control dials, noting pressure, flow, temperature. Everything looked as expected. The machine needed only an input source of energy now.

"What are you doing?" Shanna asked. "Why did you turn that thing on?"

Aaron said nothing. There was nothing left to say.

"Aaron! Answer me!"

The Shanna he'd known had never spoken to him like that, nor had she such a temper.

"Answer me now or I'll destroy the machine and you with it!"

Never would have threatened him.

"Fine! Just remember. You did this to yourself!"

No. You did this, Shanna.

The Elements' emanation flowed from the Reliquary as a raging river of energy. Shanna's presence split it in two, but it reformed once past her so that she stood as if a rock amidst a rapids. Aaron, his mind tricking him into thinking this preternatural energy was a force that would stagger him backward and not disintegrate him on contact, grabbed onto the frame of the machine with both hands. He'd barely closed his eyes when the raging flow engulfed him.

* * *

Shanna didn't hold anything back now.

She'd given Aaron his chance to leave and he'd not taken it. Aaron was smart, sensible. He knew the power she possessed and that, if provoked, she would use it. As the energy rose up from the Reliquary of the Elements and swept past her, she told herself Aaron's death was not her fault. It was
his
fault, for making her do this. For not leaving when she'd asked him to over and over again. This was not her fault. She repeated the words, mouthing them, even as the rush of power engulfed the machine and Aaron with it.

Shanna expected it to go—poof!—just like the druids. But it did not. Neither did Aaron. She felt the earth's essence surround the alchemical engine, permeating between the metal braces and filigreed tubules, the alchemical vats and spinning, whirring gears. She even felt it brushing up against Aaron and while she tried to force the energy to collapse around the machine, to disintegrate it like she'd disintegrated the druids, its main course remained drawn to the bulging discs at the top of the device. Try as she might, she could neither influence the energy's direction nor break it free.

Fine.

Shanna reached deeper into the Reliquary, drawing forth more earth energy to strengthen the already pulsating flow. It encompassed the machine, but did nothing more than join the violent tides and eddies flowing around the engine even as more and more of it snaked upward to be absorbed by the discs. Shanna didn't stop. The power of the Fifth Element was the Four joined, becoming the ultimate power of creation, or destruction. Its power was eternal and without equal. It was the power of the gods, born anew and given life through her. It was—

Something in the pit of Shanna's stomach stirred. At first, only a pang, nothing more than an ache. But it spread to her chest, her arms, legs, then into her neck and head. Still only an ache, Shanna shook her head, as if that might cast it off. It only made her head swim and her vision blur. Her violent display did not alleviate, though its steadiness diminished into jerking fits.

Aaron stepped out from behind the machine. His person remained unharmed despite the dangerous flows surrounding him. Shanna glanced daggers at him even as she clutched her gut where she'd been stabbed. It hurt the worst of all. She staggered a step closer, wanting to ask him how he was still alive. Instead, she simply said, "What have you done?" Then there was suddenly not just one Aaron, but three, all dancing around one another.

"You can't use the Fifth Element against the machine," they all said at once. There was more, but it became a cacophony of echoes from which she discerned only 'absorption' and 'reflection'.

"I have more than just the Fifth," she said. She blinked her eyes, trying to pick out which of the Aarons was the real one. It didn't matter. She let go of the Fifth Element, expecting its power to dissipate away. Instead it kept flowing uninhibited from the Reliquary. Like a thing that had suctioned onto her, it would not release itself from her even though she focused herself on shaking it loose and bottling it away. Like a thing alive, it kept on, drawing its power from the combined Elements but also taking a bit of her strength as well with each passing second. Shanna shook her head again. This time it cleared enough for her to see just the one Aaron. There was nothing in the stare he returned. Not fear, nor loathing, nor even pity. From him, she needed the last least of all. She had more than just the Fifth. She reached into the skies, pulling down the winds and the hot, blazing rain. Beneath her feet, the earth rumbled and the distant ocean heaved as she commanded it to come to her. But the winds, though they howled, were not hers, and the fiery rain fell as a mist, warm but not burning. The earth shuddered, but did nothing more, and the ocean responded not at all. Shanna turned on Aaron with murder in her eyes.

"What have you done?" she screamed.

Aaron was calm, standing steady. When he spoke, he shouted, but it was only to be heard over the charge of energy being absorbed by the alchemical engine. "You did this, Shanna. You left me no choice."

"What—What is this?" She strained her will, but nothing was as it should be. The Elements were there—she felt them—but they would not respond to her will.

"It's a reflective wave. Locked into the periphery field of the engine. What you're feeling is the engine's energy emission. It's changing your attunement, Shanna." Aaron shook his head. "I'm sorry, Shanna. You can't stop it. Nothing can."

Snarling, Shanna lunged at him. But it was a staggering gesture that caused her to trip and fall to the ground. She managed to stand, but almost immediately fell into a swooning motion that sent her back down. The world was spinning and though she dug her fingers into the earth, seeking its stability, it would not stop. The Four Elements, nor their combined essence, would answer her. Yet the unsettling—the changes she'd wrought—did not diminish or revert. They stayed, held by her interaction with the alchemical attuning engine. Then she realized what was happening. The engine and the Elements were locked into an exchange from which neither had a mind or a will to break. Between them, binding them, keeping them Joined, was her. On one side, she felt the Elements drawing from her. On the other, she was being remade. They were in lockstep with one another, one draining her, the other changing her, robbing her of her true identity. She tried to stand, to rail against what was happening, but she could not rise above her knees. She screamed, though it was with such shortness of breath that the sound was barely discernible even to her own ears. She tried to find Aaron, but her vision had gone blurry and she saw only a crimson blur where she imagined the horizon must lie. Her eyes might have failed her, but her ears had not. She heard the howling wind, the crack of the earth shifting beneath her, and, above everything else, the spinning and grinding of gears and cogs and the electric release of energy emitted by the reattunement machine. She was already on her knees, so it was nothing to fall further, to crawl on all fours. She was so close already, it should have been nothing to reach it, to extend her hand, lift herself just enough so that she could reach the lever and turn the machine off. Aaron said it couldn't be stopped. She'd show him. Nothing could stop her. Nothing. Except that her crawl slowed, then ground to a halt, for she'd no strength left. She fell to her side, wheezing. Just drawing breath became a feat of intense concentration and effort. Aaron had beaten her. None of the others—not Nora, who would trap her in the dark forevermore stirring hot oils, or Erlek, who she'd known would have killed her the moment he'd gained control of the Elements, or Mirna, who'd stabbed her, nor even the druids—had stopped her. Yet Aaron, who was possessed of nothing but a keen mind, had undone her. Shanna raised her head, just to look on him one more time. She'd neither rage nor animosity left now. She just wanted to see him because, despite everything, he was still, to her, the best of friends. Her only true friend. Through the haze of her vision she managed to see the engine and, now, Aaron standing next to it. It was the last thing she saw before the world exploded and she felt herself falling.

* * *

Though it pained him, Aaron watched the debilitating interaction between the engine and Shanna. He wanted to turn away. He wanted to stop it, but he knew that he could not. But when the energy tore a rent in the ground and Aaron saw his friend slipping away, he knew he had to do something. Diving for her, Aaron just managed to grab hold of her hands. Right away, he felt that there was no life left in her. It didn't matter. "I'm not letting you go this time," he whispered.

Beneath him, he felt a rumble. Then the entire platform where the engine and the Reliquary lie bucked and began sinking back into the mountain from which it had sprung. As it sank, Aaron himself slipped into the crack that now had become a great maw.

"Aaron!" Serena shouted from behind him. He felt her hand on his ankle. "Let her go!"

No!

"I can't hold on, Aaron!"

He slid some more. Serena, who held him as tightly as he held Shanna, slid with him. If she didn't let go, she'd die with him.