The 7th Relic, page 13
We move to the side so we can see what’s going on, keeping close to the wall.
Alorn puts out a hand. “Give me the map. Your blade—be ready.”
Haro takes out the silver knife he used earlier, holding it steadily in front of Mellis’s face, close to his eyes. Like a beacon, its silvery light flares outward, lighting the room at the same time the panswas go out. Alorn throws the map up in the air, but instead of it falling on Mellis it floats just above his head. The blanket now gathers around his waist and lap, leaving his upper body exposed. His body is rigid, his eyes focused on a vision somewhere in the distance. his irises gone. They are replaced by a green so deep it reminds me of the swamps of Omakei. When he opens his mouth it’s not his voice that speaks.
“Warrior,” comes not one, but a thousand voices, all female.
An Earth Spirit. Her visage wavers in and out with Mellis’s. She is similar to those in Omakei, but I must confess, she is the most beautiful I’ve come across. There is no denying her power and without realizing what she is doing, Grace moves to stand in front me, leaning back against my chest. Her actions are not her own; it’s the spirit channeling through Mellis. She’s a binding spirit, the most powerful of all Earth Spirits in any realm. Their mere presence affects those destined to be together, and this is the first time I’ve been affected by one. But then again, Grace was never around when I encountered these wondrous creatures in the past. I wrap my arms around her and she settles against me.
I concentrate on the scene before us. Haro has his eyes closed, concentrating on keeping the blade’s light on.
Alorn’s voice is deep, and quietly commanding. “I need your help, Janara.”
“What does the son of Bi’irea need from us?”
“Vilzen. His sister’s blood binds us to him. We need to find him.”
Janara/Mellis is quiet, her swamp-colored eyes distant, and Mellis tilts his head as if listening. With a suddenness that causes Grace to gasp, his head snaps backward, his body spasms and his muscles become rigid. Along the lines of his muscles, his veins strain against his skin, ready to burst. Green threads spread through his body. Ivy-like roots cover him, seeking an outlet and finding it through the top of his head, his fingers and his shoulders. They extend upward, growing thicker, like corded cables covered with thorns, hitting the center of the map. It obliterates the inked leather, then continues spreading upward and outward across the ceiling. The thick branch-like fingers disappear into the pine and we can hear the tree groan and creak, feel it buckle from the weight and the force of the Earth Spirit. We automatically duck at the sound, fearing it will crush us at any minute.
Mellis’s mouth is open, his jaw locked in a silent scream. His throat is so strained and corded my own body reacts to the excruciating pain he’s experiencing, wanting to stop what’s happening to him. I realize it’s affecting Reiko and Grace, too. Her blades are out and she’s holding onto them so tightly her knuckles look about to break. Reiko is ready to pounce, his wing blades out, wanting to free Mellis from his earthly prison. The only thing holding us back is an invisible force, some kind of shield, and it’s not coming from Haro.
As fast as it happened, it’s over. The room is silent and empty of the Earth Spirit and her spreading roots. Alorn catches Mellis as he collapses after his torturous ordeal. Every one of us, including Haro, is breathing hard, as if coming out of a major battle with the Skytes.
“Did you find him?” asks Alorn, holding Mellis with a tenderness I would have thought the “warrior” incapable of. There is definitely a strong bond between the cousins.
Mellis opens his eyes, a cocky smile on his lips, and tiredly whispers, “Yes.”
He may not have his cousin’s height and weight, but Mellis is still muscular and broad. And yet, Alorn picks him up with ease as if his cousin weighs no more than a small child. Haro’s blade may have lighted the way, the witch’s spit may have given him protection, but the shield I felt early on came from Alorn. It was his will that kept Mellis in place, kept him here and most likely kept him alive. Without a word, Alorn takes Mellis to a room beyond the kitchen.
The old man groans as he tries to rise. I rush over to help him up.
“I’m okay, Andu. This is nothing compared to what the young prince just went through. I need to tend to him.”
Grace reaches for Haro, taking his arm. “Maybe you should rest for a minute, to catch your breath.”
He shakes us off. “No. I’m fine.”
We step to one side to let him through. He slowly makes his way to a room that can’t possibly fit in this tree. A movement above our heads catches our attention and we watch as the Map of Souls slowly flutters downward. It lands on the table gently, spread out, wholly intact, with a drop of blood on it. I move in closer and note the bloodstained area. “Crap.”
“What?” asks Reiko, leaning over the map. “Crap,” he repeats.
“What? What is it?” asks Grace, stepping in between us to take a look.
“The north side,” I say. “Vilzen is in North Las Vegas.”
~ * ~
Chapter Twenty
~ Grace ~
As Mellis eases the SUV off the freeway, I continue to stare at the back of his head. I haven’t stopped staring since his re-emergence from the back room. At least I think it was a back room. I wasn’t able to see a door when Alorn took him and Haro followed. When they returned, Mellis looked a little worn and in need of a full day’s sleep, but he was walking on his own. Haro looked like he could use a week’s worth of sleep, but that wasn’t what caught our attention. He wasn’t wearing his skullcap. It wasn’t his lack of hair that astounded us, but his ears. Like Alorn and Mellis, Haro is an elf.
An hour later, Mellis parks along a street with a stretch of green grass and large trees on one side. On the other are dilapidated homes that don’t seem fit for any type of occupancy. The street seems to be a divider between two worlds; on one side, a well-lit street, clean and busy with Highway 95 behind it. The other, dark and foreboding, lined with broken-down homes. A gust of wind could blow them completely off their foundations.
Mellis shuts off the engine, then sits quietly while staring out into the night. I can see his eyes in the rearview mirror, distant and trance-like. If I didn’t know better I would think he’s asleep.
Reiko leans forward from behind me. “What are we waiting for?”
Mellis’s body jerks slightly, and he moves as if waking from a nap. He looks at Alorn and something passes between them. Mellis then turns to face us with that infectious smile of his. “Welcome to North Las Vegas.” He seems fully recovered from his earlier ordeal.
Alorn turns in his seat, eyes each of us before focusing on Andrew. “This is your ballgame. You call it.”
Andrew stares out the window, scanning the area. “What do you have?”
On cue, Mellis points in the same direction. “Two blocks over there are men with weapons, all hidden. I narrowed it down to three houses, very close together, all with activities going on. But I can’t tell if they’re connected. If there’s a shield, I didn’t sense it.”
I can hear Andrew’s mind spinning a plan, his concentration on the surrounding area evident on his face. Finally, he gives out his orders. “We move in two groups, twenty feet apart. Alorn, Mellis, you’re with me. We take the lead and move out first.” He turns to me. “I need someone to draw them out. There’s a reason why Vilzen is here, and whatever it is, it’s of great value to him. To keep up appearances, he’ll have humans protecting the place.”
“Why would he need them?” I ask. “If he’s as powerful as you say he is, why not just use his power to protect him and whatever it is he’s trying to keep safe?”
It’s Alorn who answers me. “The last thing Vilzen wants is to draw attention to himself. Attention from non-humans, like us, who would seek him out for one reason or another. Whatever he’s protecting can’t leave this place; otherwise he would be somewhere less…decrepit.”
“Are you up to it?” asks Andrew, his eyes on me intently.
I give him a determined nod. “Yes.”
“Good.” He turns to Haro and Reiko. “You two follow, give us five minutes. Fives minutes later, Grace will follow after. Keep to the shadows; all eyes on Gracie.”
As if on cue, the doors open and we load out quietly. By the time I make my way around the car, Andrew, Alorn and Mellis have already disappeared.
Alorn’s thought comes easily. “Remember, assume other eyes are on you at all times.” Although it’s happened several times since Konè, it still feels unnatural to hear him in my head like this.
Not more than five minutes later, Haro and Reiko set out. Haro quickly disappears into the darkness. Reiko follows, keeping to the shadows, as I remain behind the car and out of the light. I take a deep breath, calming my nerves and tell myself this is what Andrew spoke about earlier; about my training coming into play when I need it. I relax. Breathe in, breathe out.
I walk along the sidewalk, thinking the light from across the street is a threat, an element of exposure to unseen eyes. I turn a corner, staying on course to the next street over. The light posts here are all out, leaving the neighborhood in the dark. There are people in the street—not on the sidewalk, but in the street. And not homeless people either, but the kind looking for trouble, trouble like me.
I sense them before they slip out of the shadows, my hands itch to reach for my blades. The first is a big guy: dark-skinned, wearing baggy jeans and a long-sleeved Pendleton over a dark blue t-shirt with dirty high-tops. A Redskins beanie with a tasseled ball at the top is pulled over his ears. His round face is unshaven, his eyes bleary, and a cigarette hangs loosely from his thick lips. The guy next to him is his opposite: light-skinned and short, skinny with baggy black jeans, dark sneakers, a large, thick hoodie and a head full of long, kinky dreadlocks. His thin face is young, maybe late teens, early twenties. Wide dark brown eyes stare at me with a look of expectation and open hostility.
I ignore them as I keep track of Reiko and Haro only a few yards ahead of me.
“Grace,” calls Haro. “Don’t let them talk to you.”
Right, like I have any control over what they say or do.
“Grace,” calls Reiko. “You holding up okay?”
I’m not sure how it’s done, this whole talking in our heads thing, but I concentrate on Reiko’s words, knowing Haro is listening as he keeps our thoughts connected. “Yes, nothing to worry about.” I wait for a response. “Hello?”
“We heard you, Gracie,” answers Andrew. “We now know which house we’re looking for. Keep walking, I’m two blocks up. The others are in place..”
The two guys stand at the middle of the block, the chain-linked fence between them and me. I continue on, walking past while keeping my focus on where I know Haro waits. I can feel their eyes on me and the smaller one makes “kissing” sounds with thick lips, thicker than his huge friend. Like their eyes, I feel their breath on the back of my neck when I walk past them. When I reach the corner, I can still feel their eyes burrowing into my back. I cross the street and when I sense them moving back to the house they came from I relax. I continue on, making my way up the street as instructed. It finally dawns on me that everything, including my head, is quiet…too quiet.
Andrew appears from nowhere. “Good job,”
I try to cover how his sudden appearance caught me off guard. He looks behind me, causing me to look over my shoulder. Nothing. I turn to him. “What?”
His eyes still focus behind us, he pulls me forward, turning to lead us away. “Come on. The others are waiting.”
We walk up two more blocks, then turn down another street before backtracking. But on the way back, we jump a fence and skulk along a backyard until we make it back to the area where he waited for me. We continue backtracking and end up in the backyard of a house, our eyes on the house across the street—the same house the two guys came out of.
“It’s the house on the right.” Mellis’s thoughts come gently, but I am never going to get used to it.
Like those in the surrounding block, the house is no more than a shanty. The windows are boarded up with plywood, the door framed with iron bars. The yard is bare, with a splatter of dead grass and weeds, but surprisingly little debris. There are two cars parked on the street in front of it, with two cars in the driveway and one in the yard on cinderblocks. Despite the condition of the yard, there are trees close to the house, making it difficult to see into the backyard. A chain-link fence divides the properties, a flimsy defense from one neighbor’s yard to the next.
“There’s an opening in the back between this one and the house next door,” continues Mellis. He must have eyes like a hawk. “And dogs. They have five of them, sleeping.”
Oh, come on. His eyes can’t be that good. Unless…did he hear them?
“Which means they’re connected,” says Alorn.
“Is Vilzen being kept against his will here? I’m getting a bad vibe about this,” says Reiko, sharing my own doubts.
“No, he’s here,” answers Haro.
“How do you know?” asks Reiko.
“There,” points out Haro. “The house on the left, the large tree next to the garage.”
I stare at the tree, not sure what I’m looking at. Like the rest of the yard, the ground near it is bare, except for strange red flowers growing close around its trunk.
“Londias,” breathes Mellis. His thoughts comes like a gentle breeze rippling through my mind.
Before I can ask, Alorn explains. “Londias only grow in Velesi. Only a mage with Vilzen’s power can create and keep them alive in another realm. This is the place.”
An unexpected warning fills the air. The dogs start barking as they rush out from the back. They could easily jump the fence if not for the heavy chains around their thick necks.
Alorn seems oblivious to the surroundings, barely acknowledging the four-legged guards. His focus is on the tree. Without a word, he steps out of the shadows and walks up to the fence where the dogs continue to bark, bringing out not only my two friends from earlier, but several others with them. Alorn lifts a hand and seconds after, the dogs quiet with tails wagging, eager to be petted or stroked by the imposing figure before them. What did the Earth Spirit call him…warrior?
The half-dozen or so men spread out. I notice the guns in their hands, two of them with semi-automatics under their arms, muzzles pointing at the elf. The front door opens and the men part to let a small man walk through. He can’t be more than five foot four, clean cut with thick glasses. Unlike his men, he wears clean khakis that have been creased to sharp edges down the front, with a button-up shirt and dark loafers. He stops between his men and the pit bulls.
The dogs can’t make up their minds whom to run to, eager to please. The short guy looks at them, shaking his head in disappointment. Over his shoulder he says in a soft voice, “Take them back, please.” Someone yanks on the dogs’ chains, pulling them toward the backyard. “Now, what can I do for you?”
“Vilzen,” the elf greets him. “I am Alorn, the First Greaneth of the Oak Clan and Velesi. I am nephew to the All-Realm Mage.”
Vilzen laughs, glancing over his shoulder at the men behind him. “Nephew? I don’t recall a nephew by such a name.” His tone changes and his face grow suddenly hard. “Especially one arrogant enough to say he’s the First Greaneth of an entire realm.”
“What’s he talking about?” asks one of the large men behind him.
“You know me, Mage,” says Alorn.
“Can’t you just play along?” Vilzen snaps his fingers and it takes me a second to realize the men behind him are frozen in place. “Do you know what these guys will do to me if they know I’m not who they think I am?”
“I doubt they will do anything without your consent,” says Alorn.
“It’s all right,” says Mellis as he steps out of his hiding place. We follow him out into the street to stand behind Alorn. Andrew continues forward to stand next to him.
“How did you find me?” Vilzen takes off his glasses and drops them. He steps out of his shoe and hops on one leg to remove his sock, then repeats the process with the other.
Alorn’s blades are in his hands, as are Mellis’s. They have two weapons each, short blades that are different in style. We follow their lead, with Haro’s pouch in his hand, his lips moving, silently chanting. The new blades Andrew gave me are starting to feel familiar in my grip, but when this is all over I’ll make some adjustments to the weight and handles. Not sure what’s happening, I follow their lead.
“Tsk, tsk, warrior,” says Vilzen. “Really, is that any way to greet your elders?”
There’s something in the air, a slight breeze…? Not just a breeze, but a cold wind that picks up speed as it gathers around Vilzen. The transformation comes fast, too fast for us to catch our breath or believe our eyes. Vilzen’s foot transforms into a giant paw with sharp retractable claws. By the time his other foot lands, the hind legs of a lion develop, and the feline form continues until just below its chest plate. From there the transformation turns from pelt to feathers; eagle feathers explode from the once-small man. Its giant wings unfurl, spanning beyond the width of the house behind it. The eagle’s head shakes roughly as if coming awake, and the creature stands on its feline legs as its talons settle to the ground. The beast gives a final shake before pulling its wings in.
A gryphon!
I don’t know whether to kneel before its majesty or turn and run in fear of its fierceness. The warrior elf remains unfazed. I can see Reiko’s face, and it has to mirror my own: terrified and in awe. Haro looks like an archeologist viewing a new ancient discovery, but there is also dread and reverence in his eyes. Andrew stands next to Alorn and, like the warrior elf, he doesn’t show any sign of fear. As for Mellis, his face is lit with excitement. He takes a step as if to introduce himself, with not a hint of fear, but Alorn stops him with a hand at his young cousin’s chest.
