Wind Warrior (18 page)

She sobbed loudly and collapsed onto the
dais’ staircase. Burying her face in her arms, she let the tears
flow until she was certain she could risk standing again.

Sammy dusted herself off and hastily wiped
at her eyes. Clearing her throat, she walked as confidently as
possible toward the throne room doors. No one had met her when she
emerged from the secret passage but she knew it was only a matter
of time before she had to confront the elder Fire Warriors.

She pushed on the throne room doors and
exited. The two guards were still at their post and nodded politely
to her as she walked past them. Neither tried to stop her, nor did
anyone else emerge to confront her.

Sammy maintained her composure until she
reached her room. When the door clicked closed behind her, Sammy’s
knees went weak and she slid down to the floor.

Something was definitely controlling her
father, she realized with horror. Only it was far more terrifying
than she would have ever believed. Whatever it was, she and the
Wind Warriors now had one more horrifying thing to worry about.

Xander parried Thea’s downward swing. She
quickly stepped back, far quicker than Xander would have believe
possible from an older woman, and dropped into a sweeping kick. He
leapt into the air and caught an updraft that launched him over her
head. He landed gracefully behind her and spun in a swing that
should have connected his wooden training sword with the side of
her head.

Instead, his sword cut through empty space
as Thea dropped into a crouch. She drove her own training sword
forward and jabbed him in the gut with the blunted tip.

Xander exhaled loudly and doubled over. His
sword tumbled from his limp hand and clattered onto the tiled floor
seconds before he joined it.

“
Are you okay?” Thea asked,
though Xander doubted she really much cared.

He held up a finger and begged her to wait a
moment as he regained his breath. When he could finally catch a
breath through his deflated diaphragm, he pushed himself up onto
his knees and blinked away the tears in his eyes.

“
Are you okay?” she
repeated.

“
Yeah, great,” he
groaned.

He stood against his body’s protests. His
legs felt like jelly, not just from the sparring he’d been doing
with Thea but also from the flight lessons with Giovanni, the wind
sculpting with Alicia, and the defensive techniques with Patrick.
His training was nonstop, leaving little time for rest. Most
opportunities to sleep were stolen from him with thoughts of Sammy,
Sean, and his family.

“
What’s the point of
learning to swing a sword?” he asked as he rubbed the spreading
bruise on his stomach. “We’re Wind Warriors. Shouldn’t I be
learning another skill involving wind?”

“
This is a lesson that
involves your power. The biggest difficulty when learning to
swordfight is being able to keep a clear mind and think through
your parries and counterattacks. What you’re learning with the
others is important but it won’t keep you calm in a fight. If you
can’t keep your thoughts straight when fighting for your life then
it won’t matter how many wind skills you’ve mastered.”

Xander sighed but she shook her head
unapologetically.

“
Again,” she
demanded.

He snuck away in between his lessons and
slipped into the middle dome of the island. The dimly lit interior
was cool compared to the sunbaked exterior. The marble outside
reflected the bright sunlight, which left the exterior of the
buildings hot but left the interiors comfortably cool.

Xander paused in the entryway and let his
eyes adjust to the dim light. As the room came into focus, he could
see his grandfather moving around a seated figure. The man in the
middle of the room had a beard that reached past his knees as he
sat. His hair was long and unkempt, though his grandfather
affectionately brushed out some of the knots that had formed. Gray
streaked the man’s hair and his skin was wrinkled and peppered with
liver spots.

He hadn’t realized anyone in the clan was
older than his grandfather until he met Robert. As far as Xander
could tell, he never left the chair and probably hadn’t seen the
sun in years. It was his power alone that kept the island afloat
and the waterspout concealing their location.

The energy in the air was palpable. He could
practically taste the electric charge as he moved toward the two
elder men.

His grandfather looked up as he came close
and the old man flashed a smile to his grandson.

“
How is your training
going?”

Xander shook his head and laughed to
himself. The simple chuckle hurt his body. “It’s going well.
Brutal, but good.”

His grandfather looked down as he pulled the
brush through Robert’s hair once again. “You look worried.”

“
I guess I am,” Xander
said. He walked over to one of the crates nearby and sat down with
a grimace. “I’m worried about my mom and dad. I just wish I knew
they were okay.”

His grandfather nodded. “Bart’s been
watching them closely. If they were in trouble, he’d let us know
right away.”

Xander didn’t seem relieved.

“
Would you like me to bring
Bart back and let you know they’re still safe?”

“
No,” Xander admitted. “I’m
glad we have someone taking care of them. It’s just… well, a month
ago I was a normal, unmotivated college student. I couldn’t even
decide what to do with my life. Now I’m thrust into the middle of
an ages-old war between elemental powers. It’s just a little
daunting.”

“
I wish I could say it’s
going to get easier.”

He nodded. Looking over, he gestured toward
the seated warrior. “Can he hear us?”

His grandfather looked down as he pulled the
brush through Robert’s long hair. “Of course. He’s deep in
concentration but he still knows what’s going on around him.”

“
What if he stopped
concentrating?”

His grandfather arched an eyebrow. “I guess
the island would crash into the sea and everyone who couldn’t fly
would be killed.”

Xander swallowed hard.

“
It’s a good thing everyone
on the island can fly, huh?” his grandfather joked.

Xander stood and walked back toward the
door, squinting as he emerged into the light. He looked back over
his shoulder into the cool depths of the room.

“
I’m glad you’re here with
me, Grandpa.”

“
I’m glad I’m here with you
too.”

Smiling, he turned back toward his next Wind
Warrior trainer.

Sammy and General Abraxas emerged from the
chasm in the rock face and looked out on the barren landscape. The
glaring desert sun beat down on them but neither Fire Warrior
minded the intense heat.

Abraxas raised a hand to block the sunlight
as he scanned the horizon. The California desert was empty as far
as he could see.

“
This is what they’re
willing to die to defend?” the General grumbled. “It doesn’t look
like much.”

Sammy looked toward the General. His
clean-shaven head was marred by a series of clan tattoos. His beady
dark eyes looked down the length of a hawk-like nose. The point of
his nose was mirrored in the downturned points of his mouth,
perpetually frozen in a disapproving frown.

“
This is the desert,” Sammy
tried to explain. “The residential areas look quite a bit
different.”

General Abraxas huffed in displeasure.
“Let’s complete our mission and be done with this place. The next
time I look on the surface, it should be at the head of a
conquering army.”

Sammy nodded but didn’t reply. Her mind spun
with her memories of the horrifying eye deep in the cavern. She
tried to rationalize what she had seen, that it had been part of
her paranoia as she searched the hidden passage, but she couldn’t
get the memory of that roaring voice out of her mind.

“
Find us a mode of
transportation,” Abraxas demanded.

“
Excuse me?” Sammy said as
she tried to brush aside the disturbing memory.

“
I told you to find us a
mode of transportation.”

Sammy looked around the empty desert and
sighed. It would be a long walk before she could find a car but at
least it would give her a chance to think in peace. Aside from the
monster in the cavern, she still had a maddening swirl of thoughts
about Xander bouncing around in her mind. She almost welcomed the
chance to be left with her thoughts, far away from General
Abraxas.

With a sigh, she began jogging out into the
empty desert.

When she was far out of sight, Abraxas
motioned back into the cavern and a squad of masked Fire Warriors
emerged.

“
You know your mission,” he
said to the lead warrior. “Find the rest of the Wind Warriors and
kill them all.”

The Fire Warriors nodded in unison before
turning the opposite direction Sammy ran and disappearing quickly
into the expansive desert.

A few hours later, the pair was driving down
Interstate 40 on their way out of California. Sammy sat behind the
wheel and let the wind from the open window whip through her long
blonde braid that hung over her shoulder. She set her arm on the
windowsill and let her hand catch the wind as it blew past the car.
The metal on the windowsill was incredibly hot and she heard the
sizzle on her skin but she didn’t remove her arm. Fire Warriors
were incredibly resistant to the heat but they were far from immune
to the flames that they wielded. She just taught her mind to ignore
the pain until it became unbearable.

“
This was the best vehicle
you could get?” Abraxas asked. He frowned as he looked around the
interior of the 1985 Buick.

“
Beggars can’t be
choosers.”

“
And you killed the owner
so we couldn’t be traced?”

Sammy’s frown matched that of Abraxas. She
could have told him the truth—that she had merely stolen the car
when it was left unattended—but he wouldn’t have approved of
leaving potential witnesses.

“
Where are we going?” she
asked, avoiding his question altogether.

“
Don’t concern yourself
with that.”

“
I am concerned and you
should be too. Unless you suddenly learned how to drive in that
cave of yours, I’m going to be driving us the whole way. I’d like
to know where we’re going.”

General Abraxas turned toward her and
smiled. His pointed teeth made his smile look more like a predatory
sneer.

“
East,” he said
finally.