Wind-Scarred (The Will of the Elements, Book 1)

  Chapter 52

  There's No Lair Like Home

  “Lair, huh?” Sarah looked around the little cave skeptically. “I bet Seb made you call it that, didn't he, Gal?”

  Sebastian had been drinking from a shallow pool in the floor when he heard them enter the room, letting out a laugh of joy and sweeping Sarah into a hug before energetically pumping Mat and Ezra's hands. “I thought we were lost out here, and now here you guys are, sneaking in at the dead of night. You have no idea how happy I am to see you all.”

  “Seb,” Gal said gently, “they're not the rescue team.”

  “Oh... well, if you can't be with the ones you want, want the ones you're with, right?” He chuckled then shot Ezra and Gal a mock-serious glare. “Except you two. What are the blighted odds of that.”

  “Oh man,” Mat exclaimed excitedly. “You guys still have a power generator!”

  “Yeah,” Seb glanced over his shoulder to where the battered generator was humming away over by the cave's wall. “What about it?”

  “Ezra, the wormhole controller! Get us out of here, man!” Mat was grinning from ear to ear.

  Seb gave Ezra a dumbfounded look as Gal nearly tackled him in another hug. He smiled broadly and reached into his jacket... and found nothing.

  He frantically patted at his jacket, then groaned in disbelief. “We used it to find the portal back to Sanctuary. It was on the skiff when...” There was no way the delicate piece of machinery had survived the crash.

  “Can you build another one?” Sebastian asked eagerly.

  Ezra gave him an incredulous look. “You don't have to answer that, Hawkins,” Sarah drawled. “We all know Seb's an idiot.”

  “But we could try to go back for it,” Mat said quietly. Ezra looked Mat in the eyes and saw a reflection of his own thoughts, but nodded anyways. What they needed right now was hope, and it was shaped like the wormhole controller.

  “I don't know,” Gal said with a frown. “It won't be safe to wander out there just yet. They've been hunting us for a few days now, and they got pretty close out there with the skiff.”

  “We could get help from town,” Sarah said. “Lou owes me a good turn from the last time-”

  Sebastion shook his head sadly. “Lou's dead, Sarah. There's no-one left to help. The blighted thunder-struck got them all.”

  “What?” Sarah's face went pale. “Everyone? How could they have...” She suddenly whipped her head around, scanning the cave. “Where's Xavier?” Gal and Sebastion remained silent, staring at the floor. “What happened?”

  “Five days ago,” Sebastion began slowly. “God, has it already been five days? We were sent out here looking for a fire-kissed. Figured that the Besmirched had run out of iron or something and had come back for more. So we got here and I set up as spotter but, I mean... it didn't seem like we needed one. It's Faringway, for thunder's sake,” he spat.

  “Xavier and I went in, doing the traveling performers bit,” Gal continued softly. “I was juggling and he was tumbling. They all started clapping and circled around us...”

  “Everything looked fine,” Seb said bitterly. “We couldn't have known.”

  Gal nodded. “They went from appreciative audience to angry mob in a heartbeat... I got lucky. It turns out big, burly men aren't so tough when you nut 'em with a flaming torch.”

  Mat and Ezra both flinched a little and Seb laughed darkly. “Our little Doe was a regular whirling dervish; they were only too glad to let her go. I covered her as she made it out. Then our skiff went offline and I heard my railgun begin to hum... I remembered the talk Blair gave us about using them when a thunder-struck was around, and threw the strucking thing as hard as I could.” He chuckled to himself. “I think it blinded the elementalist bastard who was sneaking up behind me when the capacitors went up. I slit his throat and ran like hell.”

  “We met up at our secondary spotting point,” Gal picked up the story. “Took inventory, then got close enough to town to see what we could do for Xavier.” She shook her head. “They had him tied to a stake, and a thunder-struck was standing over him, giving this speech about how soon Lightning would smite the unfaithful, that the days of the Forbidden City were numbered. Then he told Xavier to repent.” The corners of her mouth turned up in a sad little smile. “And oh, he repented. He repented for doing the thunder-struck's mom nine ways from Sunday in excruciating detail. He asked if anyone had a sister, so he could repent about them too. He leered up at the sparky prick, just daring him to do it, and the blighted struck called lightning down on his head...”

  Sebastian laughed mirthlessly. “...and blew himself and half the town to kingdom come. Xavier used to complain about how it wasn't fair that they all got to blow up when they died, while we had to eat it quietly like normal people. The lunatic must've been packing some serious volatiles, and while he was tumbling too. The blast left a crater in the town inches deep. After that, we ran. The portal was already blown, so we went to ground. Gal found us this cave, with a bunch of nice metal deposits running throughout it that should limit what a struck can throw around without grounding himself out.” He nodded to the little pond. “Fresh water, too, fed by an underground current. We scavenged what we could from our skiff the next night; apparently no-one out there was willing to go near it. I set up a potential power grid like you showed me, Mat, to power the lights and listen for friendly chatter.”

  “And the crème de la crème,” Gal announced with a flourish. “Enough explosives to bring down the mouth of the tunnel leading in, with a remote trigger. The cave system behind us is massive, but we found an exit under a bunch of foliage next to a little river, in case we need to rabbit.” She smiled broadly. “Better than home.”

  “We should really get back to the skiff,” Ezra said softly, looking around. “The sooner the better. We have... information that needs to get back to Sanctuary right away... and that controller is our only practical way out of this. If it's there, and they take it or destroy it...”

  Sebastian looked at Gal. “I'd rather wait until tomorrow night, but if we're going to do this, we better do it now,” she said. “We won't have a chance in broad daylight, and we'll be pushing dawn as it is.”

  Ezra nodded. “Let's get moving then.”

  ==

  “It shouldn't have been this easy,” Gal whispered as they crawled to the edge of the crater. The sky was just beginning to brighten with early morning sunlight, making the shadows of the crater all that much darker. “There's no way they'd just let us have this thing.”

  “Even thunder-struck have to sleep sometimes.” Sebastian pushed himself into a crouch. “Don't borrow trouble, Doe.”

  Sarah checked her bolt-thrower. “Okay, here's the plan: Mat and Seb make a run for the skiff. Gal and I will cover you from here. Ezra, stay out of the way.”

  “I'll need to disconnect the wormhole controller if it's intact,” Ezra whispered urgently. “If there's a power surge and it isn't disconnected properly, it could short something out. We do not want to go messing around with wormholes using a damaged system.”

  “Ugh, fine. Ezra you can go along with them–”

  “I'm going too,” Gal said resolutely. “Seb's a better shot anyways.”

  Sebastian looked like he was about to argue, then shook his head, holding out his hand for the weapon. “Fine. You better keep them in one piece, Doe.”

  “Even Mat?” she protested.

  “Just try to keep up, Doe-girl,” Mat teased.

  “On my mark,” Sarah was already scanning the area, weapon held ready. “Three.”

  “Sword,” Gal demanded, holding a hand out to Ezra.

  He blinked at her. “But I–”

  “Two.” Sarah sounded slightly amused. Gal cleared her throat and looked expectantly at Ezra. He grumbled, but unsheathed his sword and handed it over.

  “One.” Gal flicked the sword through a few rapid figures, testing the balance. Ezra's body tensed, eyes focused on the crashed skiff.

&nb
sp; “Mark.”