Zonaton (24 page)

* * *

            Emmala dropped the blanket and hurried to stand at Zonaton's side, knife held out and ready, determined to slice anyone's hand or arm that reached for either of them. Her nudity no longer bothered her. In truth, she hoped it would provide a distraction.

            Hawse's claim was bogus, but the other villagers didn't seem to care. It was as if they needed somebody to blame for the destruction of their village. For the deaths of their loved ones. For their own pain and suffering. And she was the perfect scapegoat.

            She chanced glance sideways to tell Zonaton to run for safety, but realized before she opened her mouth that the man would not leave, no matter how much she begged. He would stay. He would try to protect her.

           
But he's powerless. There's nothing he can do! He doesn't even have a weapon!

           
Hawse walked straight for them. The others, including her mother, were right behind. Hawse noticed how they remained to his rear, and waved an arm to them.

            "Surround them! Come around on both sides to cut them off!"

            The villagers silently obeyed, lining up on both sides in case Emmala and Zonaton tried to run. Emmala noticed how her mother led the group aiming for her, and her grip tightened on her knife.

            She never expected Zonaton's next action. Crouching slightly, he suddenly surged forward to rush Hawse. Hawse registered the attack at the last second before Zonaton plowed into him, butting his head into Hawse's chest and upper belly. At the same time, he threw his arms around Hawse's waist, and both men crashed onto the rock floor.

            The hard jolt knocked the knife from Hawse's hand, but the young man was too busy trying to push Zonaton away to go after it. A balled fist caught him in the face, and Hawse yelled in anger.

            The villagers paused to watch the fight, certain that Hawse would dominate. Sadly, Emmala believed it, too. In his new form, Zonaton didn't have a chance. It wasn't that he wasn't strong enough, but that Hawse was more sure in his body. And undoubtedly well-practiced in beating the crap out of anyone who got in his way. She regretted ever allowing the man to touch her in the first place.

            There was a soft crunch, and she heard Zonaton grunt in pain from the contact. Hawse managed to shove Zonaton away and get to his feet as Zonaton struggled to stand. The man lunged toward him, hoping to trap him beneath his own body weight.

            "Watch out!"

            Her scream went unheard. Zonaton managed to roll out of the way before Hawse landed on the floor, missing him by inches. Both men got to their feet, both of them breathing heavily.

            "You're outnumbered, lover boy. Might as well surrender," Hawse taunted. He glanced to the side, and Emmala looked down. The man had spotted his knife. So had Zonaton.

            Hawse was mere feet away as the two men sized each other up. When Hawse moved, presenting his back to her, Emmala's next decision was automatic, and she leaped toward the villager, her knife raised and ready. Jumping onto his back, she plunged the blade into his shoulder. Hawse screamed and tried to shake her off.

            Immediately, many pairs of hands grabbed her and jerked her off of him. Hawse whirled around, backhanding Emmala across the cheek. Pain lanced through her face, forcing her to cry out.

            She didn't see Zonaton rush the villager and throw himself against Hawse. The two fell sideways and rolled several feet across the floor. They stopped by the edge of the pool where Hawse ended up on top.

            He began pounding Zonaton in the face and head. Zonaton tried to fight him off, holding up his hands and arms in a vain attempt to deflect the blows. One fist went wide, and Hawse yelped when it connected with the floor. Zonaton gave a hard push, and Hawse slipped sideways, off of him.

            Emmala struggled against the people holding her. Tears blurred her vision, and she shook her head to clear it. When Zonaton rolled away to try and put some distance between him and Hawse, she saw the bright pink blood streaking his face and neck, and the dark marks on his skin.

           
Pink blood.
She blinked, but her mind refused to register the implication.

            Hawse threw out a hand and managed to wrap his fingers around Zonaton's ankle. He jerked, and Zonaton fell onto his knees, grunting in pain. A second later, Hawse began dragging him toward him.

            Zonaton kicked. His heel caught Hawse in the face, and there was a soggy crunch as heel met nose. Hawse yelled so loudly, it rang inside the cavern, but his fingers relaxed enough to allow Zonaton to scramble out of range.

            Slowly, gradually, Hawse rose to his feet. Blood poured from the wound in his shoulder, rolling down his arm until the redness dripped from the tips of his fingers. He reached behind him with his uninjured arm and tried to reach the knife to pull it out, but without luck.

            "Torvar! Get this gut sticker out of me!" he ordered one of the villagers. Pointing a finger at Zonaton, he growled. "You, blond boy, you're going to pay for this."

            One of the men in the crowd made his way over to pull the blade out of Hawse's shoulder. Emmala took advantage of the moment as everyone's attention was on Hawse's condition. Instead of trying to jerk her arms out of the crowd's grasp, she dropped to their feet. They weren't expecting her to make the move, and she broke free from their grip. Rather than get to her feet, she scrambled on hands and feet toward Zonaton until she reached his side.

            He gave her a brief but sad smile and waved her behind him. "They have us outnumbered," she whispered over his shoulder. He nodded but didn't reply.

            Hawse laughed to see the couple now trapped in the far rear corner of the cave. Sunlight behind the crowd streamed into the cavern, highlighting the two naked people who remained defiant and on guard.

            He wiped blood from his nose. "Why do you continue to fight us? Why don't you give up? You know you can't win. Even if you get lucky enough to get the best of me, which you won't, there's more of us, and we'll eventually take you into custody."

            "Leave us alone," Emmala called out. "We had nothing to do with the attack. And you're crazy if you think we did!"

            Hawse didn't respond. Instead, he casually strolled over to the opposite side of the cave. Too late, she realized he had gone there to retrieve his knife from the floor.         Straightening, Hawse kept his head bowed, his face averted, and flipped the knife over and over in his good hand—blade, handle, blade, handle, blade.

            The knife came straight at them, thrown without forewarning of what he was going to do. The blade slammed into Zonaton's chest, and he was knocked backwards from the force.

            Emmala screamed a split-second before the knife found its target. When Zonaton fell against her, she slipped and tumbled sideways, and he landed across her legs.

            "
Zonaton! Zonaton, no!
" She fought to free her legs so she could go to him. It couldn't be happening again! It couldn't happen again! He didn't have a third life. This was his last one, and if he died, she would lose him forever.

            Crying, she somehow managed to crawl out from underneath his unconscious weight and threw herself over him, vaguely aware of the crowd advancing toward them until a voice noncommittally said, "Why the fuck are you calling him by that crazy-ass name?"

            Anger, black and thick and filled with impossible pain, ballooned inside her. Emmala shrieked in fury, and rose up on her knees, the blade from Zonaton's chest in her hand. Turning, she plunged it to the hilt into the only part of Hawse she could reach at that level.

            His groin.

            The man screamed and his body went rigid. Emmala moved away and tried to return to Zonaton, but his body had moved. In shock, she stared into his crystalline eyes, now a bright, burning red.

            He sat up, pushing her away from him, shoving her behind him and out of the reach of the villagers, who had momentarily turned their attention away from the couple to the young man cupping himself, who stood squealing at the top of his lungs as copious amounts of blood gushing from his genitals.

            Slowly, inexplicably, Zonaton got to his feet as his own bright pink blood oozed from the knife wound, but not as fast or as much as the wound Emmala had inflicted on their tormentor. "Go. Leave us. Go now," he ordered them in a thick, deep voice. A voice that sounded nothing like himself.

            Kell looked at the man and her daughter. "Forget it. We won't. Not now. Not after you've done this to him," she tersely replied and glanced at Emmala. "You'll keep killing. You'll keep destroying. And you'll keep sending those damn gerons to keep us in line as long as you live.
You don't deserve a trial! You don't deserve to live!
" The woman yelled and pointed a bloodied hand toward the couple. "
Get them!
"

            The crowd started to surge toward Zonaton in an attempt overtake them both by sheer force and numbers, when Zonaton suddenly stiffened. His body jerked to an unnatural stance, and his arms rose outward, until they were perpendicular to his body. His fiery red eyes widened, and some people in the crowd halted, shrieking and pointing overhead.

            Stunned, afraid, and confused, Emmala chanced a glance behind her to see what they were pointing at. There, on the wall, an immense shadow grew larger until it seemed to fill the cavern. Once it reached the ceiling, the dark mass gradually lifted its serpentine neck, and its wings opened, spreading up and outward to shadow the cave from entrance to pool. The serpentine-like tail whipped back and forth with growing frenzy.

            Emmala looked back at Zonaton, then again at the shadow. His posture matched the shadow exactly, which couldn't happen. He wasn't a geron anymore. How was it possible?

            He hiccupped, opening his mouth slightly. Lowering his chin, he belched. And then, lifting his chin, he opened his mouth as wide as he could.

            The stream of pure white heat shot from his throat, hitting Hawse and several of the villagers. Hawse's screams of pain were abruptly cut off as he and the others exploded into flames.

            The villagers scattered, running for the cave entrance in terror. Emmala watched as one man, his entire back from his head to his feet lit with white flames, careened into her mother. The woman tried to avoid him, but he nearly trampled her. A split-second later, both the burning man and her mother were swept outside with the crowd as they tried to escape.

            Emmala backed away, too horrified at what was happening, but Zonaton didn't let go with a second spout of fire. Instead, he carefully lowered his arms, until his body finally slumped to his knees. Behind him, the shadow on the wall slowly shrank until it vanished altogether. Then, he pitched forward and fell onto the rock face first.

Chapter Thirty-Four

The Future

            Emmala ran to him. She knew he was dead. She knew that for the second time, for the final time, he had given his life to save hers. Her heart was caving in, squeezing out all the blood left in her body, leaving her cold as ice.

            Tears momentarily blurred her eyes as she reached for him with trembling hands, and somehow managed to roll him onto his back. His expression was serene, despite the cuts and abrasions on his face. One cheekbone was already puffing up and going dark, threatening to cut off sight from that eye. The slit in his chest continued to bleed, but it didn't appear to be oozing as much blood as it had.  

            Leaning over him, she wrapped her arms around his neck, pressing her face to his, and sobbed. "This can't be happening. I can't lose you twice! Zonaton, why? Why did you do such a stupid thing? Again! You did it again! And I will hate you for the rest of my life for leaving me alone."

            Distraught and lost in her grief, she was unaware of the movement, oblivious to the of feel her hair being lifted until it repeated. Gasping, she turned her face to see his hand where it rested on the floor and lightly threaded its fingers through the long locks covering it.

            Emmala sat up to stare into his one good eye, now a bright blue. She sniffed, and tried to wipe her face on her arms.

            "You need...to wipe your...nose," he softly told her. The effort cost him, and he winced, clutching his chest with the same hand that had been stroking her.

            "Oh, God!" She pressed her cheek to his bloodied and scratched one, too overwhelmed to believe what was happening. "I don't understand, Zon. What did I see? What did you do? I thought you were human."

            A sound, a movement behind them distracted her. She reared back to see four bodies still burning in the sunlight. One shifted slightly as the fire continued to eat away at the corpse. Ignoring them, she got to her feet to retrieve the blanket and her clothing, dipping her shirt into the pool first to wet it before returning to where Zonaton remained sprawled on the floor.

            After covering him with the blanket, she blew her nose on her pants legs, tossing it away, then used her wet top to being cleaning the blood and dirt from his face and chest, taking care to bypass the knife wound. "Are you dying?" she ventured to ask in a soft voice.

            "I am in intense pain, and it will take me some time to recover, but no, Emmala. I am not dying."

            The admission was enough to make her burst out crying again. Burying her face in the blanket, she sobbed as the horror from the past half hour drained out of her. All the while, Zonaton continued to caress her hair, her shoulder, and her arm.

            When she was able to regain some self-control, she looked back at him, and laid her hand to his bruised jaw. "I love you."