The Tower (43 page)

Several gunshots rang out across the river.

Releasing Alia, I crouched in the shadow of the towboat and stuck my head up over the deck to see what was going on, but there was no one there.

“Addy!”

I turned my head back toward my sister. She was standing several feet away on the landing stage, looking up at the towboat’s superstructure. I looked up too and saw a human shape on the overhanging balcony of the topmost deck.

It was the pyroid. He had prepared a fireball in his hands, and a second later, it was raining down toward Alia.

Alia, her eyes fixed on the flame, didn’t move.

I’m not even sure I made any conscious decision to do what I did next. There wasn’t time for thought. Throwing my arms out toward Alia, I released a medium-powered telekinetic blast. It hit Alia squarely in the chest, knocking her off of her feet and throwing her several yards back as the pyroid’s fireball slammed into the landing stage where Alia had just been standing.

Drawing my pistol from my belt and flipping the safety off, I rapidly fired several rounds up into the air from my crouched position, but the pyroid disappeared back into the top cabin.

I looked at Alia again. She was moaning in pain, gripping her chest and trying unsuccessfully to stand up. I was about to go help her when, through the corner of my right eye, I sensed something move on the towboat’s main deck.

Jumping to my feet, I turned toward a dark, lanky man who seemed to have materialized out of thin air. He suddenly leapt high into the air – nearly as high as the towboat’s superstructure. The man sailed right over my head and landed softly several yards behind me on the landing stage. A light-foot.

I had followed him with my eyes, so I was already facing him when he touched down. And my pistol was already in my hands, so it took only a split second to aim it at him. A cloud that had been obstructing the nearly full moon chose that moment to slide aside, and the night became bright enough for me to clearly see the man’s weathered face. Time had slowed to the slowest crawl imaginable. The light-foot was going for his pistol. I had already leveled mine on his chest, and he was still drawing his from his side holster.

“Stop!” I shouted.

Our eyes met for a brief instant. The light-foot pointed his gun at me and fired twice.

The right side of my head exploded with pain. I screamed, dropping my pistol. The light-foot cursed too, and suddenly he was on top of me. I screamed again, this time in surprise. I felt his fingers around my neck. I tried to blast him, but I was being drained. I realized that my head was bleeding. I guessed it was my ear, but I couldn’t be sure.

I tried to shout for help, but I couldn’t breathe. The man’s grip around my neck was stronger now, and I knew that it was only a matter of seconds before I blacked out.

Another gunshot rang out, and suddenly the pressure on my neck weakened. The light-foot collapsed on top of me, keeping me from being able to take the deep breaths I desperately needed.

A moment later, the limp body was rolled off of me, and I found myself looking up into Terry’s anxious face. Kneeling over me, she grabbed the sides of my head with both hands and asked in a panicked tone, “You still alive, Hansel?”

“Yeah,” I gasped, taking in a huge gulp of air.

“Good! Then get up!” snapped Terry, pulling me to my feet.

“You’re bleeding!” I exclaimed, looking at Terry’s blood-covered hand.

“No, this is your blood.”

The reminder brought the pain back to me in full force.

I pressed both of my palms against the right side of my head and discovered that a large part of my ear was missing. There also seemed to be an inch-long gash on the side of my head leading up to my torn ear. That was where most of the blood was coming from.

“Gretel!” called Terry. “Stop healing yourself and get over here.”

“There’s a pyroid on the top deck,” I said, still wincing in pain. “He tried to burn Alia.”

“Let
Gretel
heal you. I’ll watch for bad guys,” said Terry, and then said sharply to Alia, “Be quick! This isn’t over.”

As Terry watched the boat, I crouched down to let Alia look at my ear.

“Ooh, this is really bad, Addy.”

“Just stop the bleeding,” I panted. “I can’t be drained now.”

I was too furious to care about my ear. I had tried to spare the light-foot, and he had tried to kill me. I looked down at his motionless body. Terry had shot him in the head from behind. I realized that I didn’t care.

Alia held her hands up close to my right ear and closed her eyes in concentration. After a few seconds, I felt the bleeding stop. I touched the scar on the right side of my head and ran my fingers along the jagged edge of my ear. It was still very tender and painful, but it was enough for now.

I stood up, still dizzy from being drained by all the blood stuck to my neck and soaked into my shirt.

I looked at Terry. “I’ve got to get this blood off me, Rabbit.”

“Then take a swim,” she suggested, pushing me over the side of the landing stage.

I came up sputtering, but free of the blood. Levitating myself out of the water, I set myself down, drenched and dripping, onto the deck of the towboat. The river water had been shockingly cold and the night air made it worse. I shivered as Terry and Alia climbed aboard the boat too.

“I couldn’t find your gun, but take this one instead,” said Terry, offering me the light-foot’s pistol. She smiled, adding, “Lucky you, Hansel. It had jammed.”

I didn’t smile back. I could only think of how stupid I had been, settling for “stop” when I had the clear advantage over the light-foot. That wasn’t going to happen again. I snatched the pistol out of Terry’s hand and, checking that the safety was on, I slid the barrel under my belt.

As we walked across the deck, I noticed Alia was massaging her chest where I had blasted her, so I asked, “Are you alright?”

Alia looked up at me reproachfully.
“That really hurt, Addy.”

“At least you’re still in one piece,” I said.

“I can’t believe you blasted me again.”

I remembered how Alia had stood petrified on the landing stage as the pyroid’s fireball rushed down at her. Not that I had fared much better against the light-foot, but I had been right about my sister after all. That she had just healed me was irrelevant. It was a mistake to bring her here. A horrible mistake. Possibly a fatal one.

I roughly grabbed Alia by the front of her shirt. “Let’s get something straight, Gretel!” I growled. “If I hadn’t blasted you, you’d be dead right now! I didn’t ask you to tag along! Now stay focused and try not to get killed!”

Alia jerked herself out of my grasp and glared at me.
Good
, I thought,
get angry.
Experience had taught me that anger was a useful emotion at times like this. As long as it kept my sister alert and alive, I really didn’t care how she felt about me right now.

“Children, please!” hissed Terry.

Still scowling at each other, Alia and I followed Terry to the open door of the cabin.

Terry led us inside. It was nearly pitch-black here. The only light was the moonlight coming in from the broken windows. Even so, I could tell that the inside of the boat was even dirtier than the outside. There was a broken table and an upturned desk leaning against one wall. There were three doors on the far side of the cabin. One of them was open, revealing a narrow corridor, but it was to dark to see more than a yard in.

There were also two dead bodies on the floor, and now I understood where Terry had been when she disappeared from the main deck. The two destroyer powers had belonged to separate psionics after all, and one of Terry’s kills had been the telekinetic: I could no longer sense him.

“I think we got most of them already,” whispered Terry. “That’s why they’re no longer attacking us. They’re hiding. They want to ambush us.”

“How many did you kill?” I asked.

“Including the one that was strangling you?” asked Terry. “Three. But I didn’t see any pyroids.”

“He’s close,” I said, still sensing the pyroid’s presence in the towboat somewhere.

“Here, Hansel,” said Terry, picking up two flashlights from the floor and offering me one. “Take this. I found them on these guys.”

“I don’t want to hold that,” I said, looking at the metal casing.

“Keep it in your pocket just in case. I’ll use mine for now.”

I took the flashlight from Terry and slipped it into my pocket. Along with the gun, this now made two metallic objects which were, though not directly touching my skin, nevertheless right up next to it. That, compounded with the cabin’s metal walls around me, meant my psionic power was noticeably weaker than usual. I didn’t like this at all.

And where were the Guardian Knights? How many minutes had it been since I activated the tracer band?

“Check your targets carefully,” whispered Terry. “Remember, we’re looking for Silver in here. And we have to hurry. If the police have caught up with our car, they probably would have heard those gunshots. They could be here any minute.”

Terry turned on her flashlight and was about to lead us into the corridor when I said, “Stop. Gretel, give me your pendant.”

Alia didn’t argue as she pulled her bloodstone pendant over her head and handed it to me. I took my amethyst off too and went back to the exit.

“What are you doing, Hansel?” asked Terry.

“Markers,” I answered, tying both pendants to the outer handle of the cabin door. “The Guardians should be here soon too.”

“Not soon enough,” said a mocking voice from the dark corridor.

“I know that voice,” said Terry.

I knew it too. It was the gray-haired Angel, Riles.

We entered the corridor. Terry led, her flashlight in her left hand, her pistol in her right. Not wanting to risk losing Alia, I put her in the middle and brought up the rear.

The corridor had an occasional window on the right side, so it wasn’t entirely dark even without Terry’s flashlight, but there were so many shadows that there was no telling where anyone might be hiding. We came to a door on the left. Terry opened it, peering in and checking for Angels. It was impossible to do this stealthily
.
The rusty door creaked and groaned loudly at the slightest movement.

“Nothing,” whispered Terry, pulling her head back out of the room. “Keep going.”

We came to a steep and narrow stairway that extended both up toward the higher decks and down into the hull.

“Down,” said Terry. “That’s where they’ll be.”

“The pyroid could still be above us,” I warned.

“We’ll deal with him when we meet him.”

Suddenly Terry jumped backwards, knocking Alia and me over. There was a brilliant flash of light. A fireball had hit the floor, sending bright orange sparks everywhere.

“I’ll take care of him,” said Terry, jumping to her feet. “Stay here.”

Before I could reply, Terry sprinted up the stairs and out of sight.

Pulling Alia to her feet, I took out my flashlight and turned it on.

I was about to lead my sister up the stairs when I heard Cindy’s voice echoing from somewhere below deck. “Is somebody there?” cried Cindy. “Help!”

I looked at Alia. She nodded slightly.

Terry was probably long gone, chasing the pyroid through the upper decks. Terry could take care of herself. Flashlight in hand, I headed down the stairs and into the hull of the towboat, Alia silently following a few steps behind me.

One deck down, I shined my light down the pitch-black corridor. There were doors lining one side of the corridor, but they were all closed.

“Help!” Cindy’s voice called again. “I’m in here!”

Cindy was still below us. Right next to the staircase we had come down, there was another flight of stairs going even deeper into the hull.

I couldn’t use my telekinesis while being drained by the metal flashlight, so I drew my pistol and flipped off the safety. Then I realized that I couldn’t hold the flashlight and the pistol at the same time without becoming so physically weak that I could barely walk.