The Seven (Fist of Light Series) (21 page)

Jeeves laughed, and my face heated up. “Boy, you cannot command the wind! You must call upon it, much like a lover or a friend. The moment you try to wrangle it, force it, you have wasted precious time and energy. Try again.”

After forcing the rising weariness away from me, I attempted to amass more power. I rode the sensations of the Air as before, except this time called, rather than demanded that it acquiesce to my directives. Wind swirled around me, surrounding and enveloping me completely. Jeeves grunted, cracking a slight smile. It was the first amiable expression he had projected since assuming the mantle of teacher.

“Now, stop those goblins from trying to kill you.”

“What?” I asked, flabbergasted.

Without the slightest idea what a goblin looked like, excepting hazy recollections provided by Jeeves, I was at a loss to respond. Plus, there was no reason to believe that any goblins resided in my mind. Why would there be a need to protect myself from anything within the depths of my cognizance, something that was assumed to be a stronghold? I scrutinized the landscape around me and saw… nothing. Perhaps Jeeves had just been trying to shake me out of my concentration, yank my chain.

“Jeeves, what the hell are you talking about? There aren’t any—”

That was, of course, when the goblins materialized. One second there was a glade devoid of other life forms, except us. In the blink of an eye, ten goblins surrounded me in a rough semicircle, and Jeeves appeared behind them. I figured there was about two seconds allotted to study of my momentarily disoriented enemies, and I scrambled to take advantage. Half of them were short, green and ugly. The other half were still short, but packed with muscle, red, slightly taller, and really,
really
ugly. Their scent was not a pleasing one, to say the least. There wasn’t any more time to think as they rushed me, screaming unintelligible war cries. Great, what a way to go, mauled by a bunch of ugly goblins.

My emotions exploded beneath a sea of fright that attempted to turn my insides to jelly. While struggling to regain mobility, the Air around me began to dissipate, returning to its natural tendencies. I shoved my fear into the enclosure created for the other sensations and hoped for the best. After calling the Air toward me once more, I moved forward, thinking it was my best bet to put the goblins off balance from the start.

They obviously weren’t used to the tactics of a crazed teenager. Their incoherent screaming slackened abruptly, and one even stopped to scratch its head in confusion. My initial attack entailed dashing toward the first goblin, which was slow in reacting to a kick in the nads. I don’t care what kind of preternatural being you are: if you’re male, a kick to the jewels is going to put you on your knees. The goblin did go down, although slowly and with a highly entertaining array of visages. The urge overcame me to impart a “Meep, meep.” I pivoted to the left and crushed a red goblin’s face with a left hook. The next one was on me. Its clawed green hand arced toward me in an undisciplined but powerful haymaker.

I snapped up and held my forearm tight against my cheek. If any regular person had thrown the punch, the simple counter would have been sufficient. The problem was that the goblin in front of me had
claws
. They raked deeply into me, spilling imaginary first blood. Grunting as a fiery line traced itself down my skin, I lashed outward toward a hairy chest with an open palm, the entirety of my weight behind the blow. Purple traceries flared out from the impact site. My goblin friend tumbled backward an impressive distance before colliding with one of his red brethren.

Fear and apprehension I had been able to deal with, but the surprise knocked my concentration off kilter and the carefully constructed cubbyhole of emotions blew up in my incorporeal face. The Air slipped out of my control. My quick responses went with it. Groaning loudly, I dodged a blurred red swipe aimed at my face, then redirected a clawed punch to the left side of my body, putting the creature off balance in the process. I delivered a roundhouse into the side of the tripping monster before I was grabbed in a bear hug from behind.

A menacing growl stopped me in my tracks, but disgruntled, rage-filled faces had me moving again quickly enough. Twisting my body back and forth, my elbows moved with the enhanced power provided by some well-timed pivots of the body. Grunts of pain emanated from my captor. I added a heel stomp into the mix as my left arm was ran down a hairy red arm. I peeled off the restraining appendage, twisting a beefy index finger backwards until it broke with an audible snap, crackle, and pop. My cry of triumph was abruptly silenced when a meaty fist slammed into my skull from behind. Like a felled tree, I slowly toppled to the ground. I brought up my elbows to my face in a daze and held my hands held protectively behind my head before the expected pummeling commenced.

It took several long minutes for my rattled brain to process that there was no longer a threat to face. I withdrew my body parts from their defensive positions, and I absorbed the vacant glade. There most definitely weren’t any Christmas-colored goblins out to brain me. My palpable relief was expressed in a pent up exhalation of tension, while I forced myself wearily to a relatively respectable standing position. With my head feeling like it was packed with wool and any sense of balance sorely affected by a raging headache, my first impression was that round one wasn’t completed at a level of excellence.

I went with what first came to mind. “Ouch.”

Jeeves was tapping his foot impatiently, and his body language broadcasted aggravation. “You lost control of your power almost immediately, and—”

“Couldn’t you have warned me? Those were some very real-looking goblins, Jeeves. How’d you manage that? And was the smell completely necessary?” A gagging noise punctuated the questions.

“If you can hold your concentration in an ambush, you will have no trouble with your control,” Jeeves explained simply.

“
Okay
. But why don’t you give me two seconds of prep time, first? I’m new to this, remember?”

He imparted some wisdom, dragging out each word painfully. “Use your imagination. You are only limited by what you can imagine and enforce with your will.”

He was obviously in a hurry to get this teaching session finished, and his reasoning was not likely to be flawed. A major event was impending, and my doom was soon to follow if I couldn’t learn how to employ my powers properly. This time, I assumed a defensive position before anything else. I put my left foot forward, feet shoulder width apart, and brought my hands up, balled into fists before my face. Then, I repeated the process with my emotional garbage disposal, summoned my power, and called Air. The entire process was concluded in twenty seconds, which brought me to the realization that my timing was much too slow in harnessing my power for an actual confrontation. There would be mere seconds to act and react.

The goblins returned and this time my actions commenced before they could come within closing distance. Most of them were charging heedlessly toward me, so I began to visualize a preliminary defense. The purplish hue of Air marked my progress. My success was assured when the first two green goblins stumbled over the two-foot high retaining wall fashioned of Air. Grinning, I sent a concussion of purple wind toward two closely grouped goblins, and they went down for the count. Some of my imaginary breath was lost from the excessive drain of my exertions as I sought to harness additional power. Three more goblins approached. The rest were merely observing the altercation as it unfolded. Some rudimentary Air orbs were dispatched toward the three approaching goblins and they too collapsed. I noticed the “defeated” ones dissolved seamlessly into the landscape soon after hitting the glade’s floor.

A snarl caused me to react without conscious thought, sending another concussive blast toward the discordant sound. Turning my head to take in the destruction wrought by the deed, I discovered that the perceived enemy was but a child. At least, it appeared to be a male child. I’m no expert, give me a break here. Only a few feet in height, it wore a pitifully desolate expression as it too, vanished. The remaining goblins were busy cowering, trying, for what it was worth, to stay unnoticed and escape my wrath.

“What the?
Jeeves
!”

Jeeves had gotten an apple from somewhere, and busied himself with polishing it on his silk shirt. “Not every goblin is evil, Caleb. Just because most give in to their animalistic nature doesn’t mean that all of them are of the same mind. Note that next time you destroy one of their young. They tend to get… Let’s say, irascible.” Jeeves took a bite into his apple, smirking.

“Damn it.” I felt my body tense up while feasting my eyes upon some very angry, very enflamed goblins. From within the folds of reality, they had produced axes to better dismember my flailing torso.

I sought momentary reassurance as they encroached upon my position, roaring retribution. They were just imaginary constructs created to help me learn how to exert over control my abilities. I took a deep breath. By the time I regained control over my body, it was almost too late. The goblins were an arm’s length away from me, their axes descending from their zeniths, toward my vulnerable body, almost too me! This epiphany was my cue to move.

Power surged through my veins and the weapons swung toward me as if moving through molasses. I sidestepped out of the line of attack, making it to relative safety as my three attackers weapons stuck fast in the ground, instead of my pretty face. Lashing out solidly with one foot, I connected with the base of a red appendage. Another snap, crackle, and pop gave me the impression that I wouldn’t have to worry about its axe hand.

An inhuman scream emanated from the throat of the injured goblin, and its buddies were suddenly even less pleased with me. Great. I delivered a side kick to an approaching goblin and followed through with a brutally executed elbow. A searing pain enveloped the band of my neck. I had an instant to feel my imaginary head plummet from its perch between my shoulder blades. Ouch.

One moment, a murky nothingness consumed me, where I was devoid of pain or suffering, which could only be considered a positive side effect of death. Then my consciousness was dragged back forcibly into existence. Jeeves had his teacher face on, so I knew better than to expect a poorly manufactured pun or two.

Jeeves brought his hands up in a universal gesture of exasperation. “
Again
.”

This was going to hurt. A lot. At least, though, I had something to focus on.

T
he next two weeks passed in a blur that came with extreme fatigue, intense cramming sessions, and enjoyment. Jas joined in on occasion with my training, though not as a bunny, so it was hard to kick his ass. Noah, Jas, and I became closer. There was little communication to be had with the ghoul, but I learned his name, an indecipherable hissing and clacking that put my teeth on edge. Having been forgiven for wreaking havoc upon the interior of the limo, it appeared that I had garnered a family of my own, albeit an oddly fashioned one. And every day, treks were made out to the clearing to escape within myself and learn what Jeeves had to drill into me.

Jeeves grumbled under his breath and acted like an impatient child throughout the entire time he taught me. No matter how fast I learned he was dissatisfied with my progress. I put it down to nerves. Jeeves was still withholding information from me, refusing to illuminate the dark places of understanding. But I knew there was something bothering him, as I too sensed the foreboding discordance he toiled under. The tolling of bells rang through my mind, and age-old, enchanting music called me south. These bells were trying to tell me something.