Descendant (Secrets of the Makai) (6 page)

Donovan withdrew the sword and severed the vine-like roots winding up his legs. How he managed without slicing into himself or his clothing was a mystery. "If you don't end this, I will," he said.

Tristan watched in dazed amazement, never having seen a real sword in action. More roots rose from the hole. Before he could blink, Donovan's sword slashed toward the side of his head, only to be caught and redirected by a root erupting from the wall above his shoulder. The root grew around the blade and retreated, pulling the weapon with it.

"All right," Donovan spat, giving up his sword. "Leave at once before you destroy the castle."

The rumbling ground froze. So did Tristan. "Wh-what?"

"Get out of my sight before I change my mind." The disarmed swordsman waved his hand toward a narrow path of unbroken floor. "Landon, see that he makes it to the front door."

"But, if these are roots, don't you think being outside will be a bit of a disadvantage?"

"We let him go in peace."

Tristan stared with his mouth hanging open, startled by the sudden change of events. The man had to be bluffing. "I want that folded piece of paper back."

"Of course." Donovan pulled the page from an inside pocket of his jacket and handed it over. "Now go, before the building collapses."

Tristan got to his knees, weak and clumsily, waiting for Landon to make his way around.

"What if it attacks us?" Tristan whispered to Landon, accepting the help up.

"If it does, I'll do what I can to save you."

Donovan nodded his approval, as if the statement was a request for permission.

The complete shift in behavior sent chills down his spine. There's no way they'd just let him walk. Not after everything that had happened. He knew too much. He didn't know enough.

Landon half-pulled Tristan around the gaping hole, out of the kitchen and down the long, darkened hall.

"I feel it moving in the floor." Tristan blinked hard in the echoing silence, hoping the slur in his words wasn't as bad as it sounded. What was he supposed to do once he got outside?

"It'll be okay," Landon said.

"Tell me what's happening." They came to a thick wooden door. Landon lifted a bar and pushed it open. Bright sunlight filled the hall and his knees buckled.

"Come on, we're almost out."

Tristan leaned more heavily on Landon as he took in the forest surrounding them. Half the trees had fallen. The ground looked freshly plowed and dust hovered like swarms of insects. "I don't have anything to do with this. You know that, right?"

"I know."

"He knows I won't live long enough to get away," Tristan said, descending the cobble stairs. "Is that why he's letting me go?"

"He just wants what you want."

Tristan glanced over his shoulder, instantly disoriented by the tiny shack of a building in place of what he'd assumed to be a massive castle. It looked abandoned and ready to cave in on itself. The cobble stairs were now made of rotting wood.

Alpheus, Donovan, Victor, and the woman watched him from the disintegrating porch while Landon helped him to the center of the clearing.

"What do you want now?" Landon asked.

"To lay down," Tristan mumbled, then regretted it. He should be running to get as far as he could. But he'd seen the view from the window. There was nowhere to run. A steep hillside perhaps, but nowhere to hide. Maybe there was something worth running toward on the side he hadn't gotten a good look at.

Landon lowered him to the ground.

The instant Tristan's head touched the dirt, tendrils of grass began sprouting. They tickled the back of his neck and the sides of his face. Small purple flowers bloomed around him. The vibration seemed smoother on the bare earth, almost soothing, lulling him to sleep.

The peace didn't last. Exhausted muscles seized up as the ground shifted beneath him, mounding in a line to stop Donovan's approach. He hadn't noticed the man coming toward him until now.

"Analysis," Donovan said.

"He's in tune with whatever it is, but I don't think he's causing it on purpose." Landon put the palm of his hand on Tristan's chest. "He's more afraid than defensive."

"Tristan," Donovan said from his side of the mounded dirt. "I'd prefer you understand this."

Tristan kept his eyes open, wanting nothing more than to break contact with the ground.

"I can't let you go back to civilization. There's too much at stake if this power over the plants is a dragon trait you can't control."

Nearby trees crashed and the ground rumbled. Fresh clouds of dust filled the air as roots rushed toward the center of the clearing. "I don't have dragon traits and I'm not doing this!" Tristan rolled to his side, his body folding into a tight ball.

"Get him off the ground," Donovan shouted, facing the root that shot upward.

Tristan felt an arm on his back, but instead of helping him up, it held him tight to the dirt. Panic raced in his throat. He sank into the earth as the ground beneath him swirled. Interlocking roots weaved around him like a casket. He put all his strength in keeping hold of Landon's hand.

"Break the connection!" Donovan roared. Roots around them burst into flames, then withered to the ground with crying hisses. More roots erupted in a seemingly endless supply, shooting up through the flames of the fallen.

Tristan locked eyes with Landon, struck by more paralyzing fear.

Victor appeared at Landon's side and pried at Tristan's grip. "Let him go. You're going to get him killed!"

"I'm not—" Tristan bit off his words, blinking away the dirt from his eyes. He could barely see through the thickening mesh of roots over his head.

"He's an empath," Victor explained. "That means he feels what you feel, and you're scaring him to death. Take my hand instead."

Tristan was about to comply when flames shot from Victor's offered hand, incinerating a root that had wrapped itself around Landon's arm, leaving a dark scorch mark on Landon's flesh. Victor's hand didn't seem blackened at all.

"What are you?" Tristan asked, too afraid to let go of the only thing that seemed real.

Victor flashed a bright smile and winked. "I'm a lot of things, and a pyromancer. If you take my hand, I can be the one that gets us all out alive."

5

-
S
LAVES OF THE
C
AVE -

DORIAN TOSSED SHARDS of glass from the dustpan to the wastebasket, unable to face Gram. Why couldn't she send her to her room? Lecture her about being responsible? Force her to dig a root cellar by hand? Maybe Oliver could scold her properly and she'd feel better—he should be arriving at any second, according to the trees who were tracking his progress across the island.

Pounding thuds vibrated through the floorboards as he stomped his boots on the mat outside.

Dorian squared her shoulders, determined to take any punishment without argument, as Oliver scrunched his neck to get through the doorway, heedless of the dirt still crumbling from his shoes.

"There's nothing out there," Oliver grumbled. He hung his flannel jacket on a hook by the door.

Dorian stopped herself from commenting. She already knew there was no one out there, but figured Oliver would need to convince himself at least two more times. "I'm really sorry."

"Are you sure he didn't hurt you?" Oliver rounded the central workspace counter in four steps and lifted her chin to peer into her eyes. "You don't remember a name?"

"It's not that I don't remember. He just didn't tell me."

Oliver let go of her chin and stomped off to wash his hands. "First the cave, now this. I've called a meeting. We have to do something more about security. This the second time someone has gotten through—that we know of. The village should be united before anything else goes wrong."

Silver bells on the front door chimed and Dorian glanced up to see Alice, the village seamstress, then shot a look at Gram. "Do you remember hearing the bell when he came in?"

Gram shook her head. "I don't even recall seeing the man."

Alice removed her sunflower hat as she entered the front of the store and froze when she saw Oliver.

"Wait," Oliver said, stopping her before she could retreat. "I know you don't want to believe anything bad of your aunt, but we found something." He stuffed his hand in his pocket and pulled out a long golden chain.

Dorian recognized the charm at once.

"My aunt was…is not a traitor. She had no part of this." Alice's eyes welled with tears as she stared at the copper, Celtic charm. "She's in Europe, leading a bike tour. Flynn and I were with her when it started. She's still there."

"We feel this necklace identifies her as being one of the bodies," Oliver said gently. "It doesn't mean she was a traitor, it just means she was there when they broke in."

Oliver and his team found seven decomposing skeletons in the cave, some with bludgeoned skulls. The DNA was so scrambled, none of the bodies could be identified. They couldn't even be confirmed as human. But the team found a necklace, a gold pocket watch, and various other metal objects.

"What about your father?" Oliver asked Alice. "Have you heard from him yet?"

Dorian cringed. Only three people knew the cave existed before it was broken into several months ago: Alice's aunt, Alice's father, and Gram. The cave itself had reached out to Gram, showing her the bodies in a dream. She had told Oliver. Now, everyone knew.

"He's not a part of this either." Alice glared. "It's not unusual for him to be unreachable."

"Yes, well…." Oliver scowled. "I've called a meeting for tonight, if you could tell Flynn."

"That's why I'm here." Alice glanced at Dorian, biting her lower lip. "He seems to be doing better, and I'd like to keep giving him the same medications. Maybe a tad stronger if you'll permit it?"

Gram nodded at Dorian and led Oliver out the back door.

* * *

That afternoon, Dorian and Alice walked to the sacred cave together. "I don't know where Flynn could be," Alice said, wringing her pale hands. They'd searched the most likely places on the island, but the man was nowhere. "Maybe he ran off to get things done before this meeting. The stress is never ending."

Dorian shrugged to hide the shudder of unease that crept through her bones. She stared at the cave's entrance: a makeshift hole in the ground, dug by the thieves, barely wide enough for Oliver to squeeze into. At the bottom of the hole, there was a rough tunnel that lead into the sacred part of the cave.

The plants behind her chatted amongst themselves while the trees cloaked in vines surrounding the original entrance remained silent. Sentinel. No matter how much Dorian apologized for never noticing them, they refused to acknowledge her.

She took a step back and let Alice descend the ladder, doing her best to pay attention to the non-stop concerns regarding her husband, Flynn. The poor man probably needed a vacation. Guilt ate at her conscience as Alice disappeared into darkness.

"I'm sorry," Dorian said, waiting for Alice to reach the bottom before coming down herself. "But really, I think Flynn will be fine. Gram would've been able to tell if he was seriously ill and like you said, it sounds like he's just...overly worked. Doesn't he own the business? Can't he take a vacation?"

Dorian shut her eyes on the way down, dreading the descent. Unlike other caves, this one hummed with a life she couldn't see nor hear. Nothing grew in the cave, not even algae or fungi.

If it hadn't been for the break-in, Gram might never have told her she'd been born in this cave, then born again to the surface when she was old enough to walk out on her own. After that, the cave entrance collapsed and the area was quarantined, due to some sort of toxic radiation.

Her parents, who'd spent the entire pregnancy and nearly a year being supported by the cave, couldn't adjust to the surface when they got out. But she did.

"Dorian?"

Dorian let go of the ladder and spotted Alice, silhouetted by the golden torchlight from main cave. Between them, along the tunneling path leading into the cave, roots hung from the misshapen walls and ceiling, mostly tolerant of the air but still seeking refuge. "Just letting my eyes adjust."

"I said I'm going to hurry along and see if Flynn's here."

"Sure. Fine."

Alice looked like she wanted to say more, but spun in her skirts and hurried away.

A chill spread through Dorian's shoulders as she made her way around clumps of clay and rock. The walls shifted from hardpan to solid stone as she stepped from the recently made tunnel to the original cave. The temperature, despite the flaming torches every few feet, continued to drop as the trail snaked downward.

What if the declining power started not with the break-in, but when she was 'born to the surface' as Gram called it? What if the cave's source of energy, a dragon fang or whatever, was not stolen, but used up by her and her parents? Maybe it was finally bad enough to be noticeable. And why on Earth would her parents want to have a baby in the bones of dragons?

Dorian shuddered at the thought, and wondered what effect the bone dust had on the boy who needed the antidote. The glittering sand made a glowing trail along the left of the tunnel, pushed toward the main cavern by a crystal-clear stream. Maybe it was the temperature of water that changed the sand's behavior? She bit her lip, wishing she'd had time to test the theory before declaring it a cure for that man.