Equites : Book 4 of the Heku Series (2 page)

“
Separate Emily and Allen?”
Kyle asked.

Chevalier shut his eyes and nodded,
“Yes, we need to separate the Winchester bloodline. Allen may not
have Emily’s powers, but he’s young. We won’t know for sure the
affects the ancient blood has on him until he’s older.

“
Yes, Sir. Where shall they
take her?” Kyle asked.

Chevalier sighed, “This Council does
not want to know.”

Kyle nodded, clearly upset, and
blurred from the room.

“
Now what?” Quinn
asked.

“
Now we wait,” Chevalier
said, sitting back in his chair.

An hour passed with no word as the
Council went over strategies and tactics for surviving this
skirmish. Finally, Kyle came back into the room.

“
They accepted Vaughn, but
are still threatening to attack in two hours if we don’t hand Emily
over to them,” Kyle reported.

“
Tell them she is no longer
here,” Quinn said.

“
I would… but we can’t find
her. I have three units searching for her. If I pull any more, it
will leave our defenses short.”

“
How can a mortal elude a
natural predator?” Damon growled.

“
You try to find her,” Kyle
said. “We’ve had this problem before, and it’s not as easy as it
sounds.”

“
I will find her,” Damon
said, and blurred from the room.

“
We’ve had four more covens
arrive, ready to fight. We’re still not even close to being even
for protecting the city,” Kyle said angrily. “I suggest we evacuate
the Council.”

Maleth nodded, “We will in two hours
if there is no other solution.”

“
And if we find Emily,
otherwise I’m not leaving,” Chevalier said.

Quinn smiled, “Damon will find
her.”

***

“
I smell you, mortal. You
can’t hide from and ‘old one’,” Damon said from inside the
kitchen.

Emily stood up beside the oven she had
been hiding behind, “You know I’m right.”

“
It’s not my place to
question what the Elders have ordered. Which means you’re to be put
on a helicopter out,” he said, taking her arm.

“
Let me fight,
Damon.”

“
I can’t, that would be
against a direct order.”

“
Listen to me. Everyone in
this city is going to die unless you let me go. You know I can do
it,” she said, pleading.

“
I wish I could. I’d love
to see you take on the Valle, but I have my orders,” Damon
said.

“
I won’t tell if you let me
go. Just tell them you couldn’t find me.”

“
Lie to the
Council?”

“
Yes”

“
No,” Damon said, and began
to drag her from the kitchen.

Emily reached out and grabbed
something from the counter and touched it to Damon’s neck. He fell
with a loud thud and she took off running. She ran out of the
palace toward the stables. Damon caught up with her just outside
the door, and took the cattle prod from her as he picked her
up.

“
Let me go, Damon,” she
screamed, and kicked as he cradled her in his arms and held her
tightly. He walked her into the council chambers and dropped her
onto her butt on the floor.

“
Damon!” Chevalier
growled.

“
She hit me with this!” he
said, holding the cattle prod out to the Elders. Emily scrambled to
her feet, grabbed it, and touched his arm just as he reached to
grab it back from her. Damon again fell to the ground.

“
Emily, stop,” Maleth said,
frustrated.

Damon got to his feet, grabbed the
cattle prod, and raised his hand to hit her.

“
Damon!” Chevalier hissed.
He lowered his hand slowly, but watched her angrily.

“
Touch me with that again,
and even an Elder won’t be able to stop me,” he told her,
seething.

“
You don’t scare me,” she
growled at him.

“
Want me to change that?”
he glared.

“
Stop it, now,” Quinn
ordered, and both Emily and Damon looked up at him
suddenly.

Damon took his seat back with the
Council.

“
I’m not going with Mark
and Frank,” Emily said, crossing her arms.

“
Yes, you are,” Chevalier
told her.

Mark and Frank walked in behind her.
She glanced at them and then back to the Council.

“
Don’t make me ash them,”
she glared. Emily turned and screamed when she felt a pinch in her
arm. She barely had time to see Kyle standing behind her with a
needle before the darkness overwhelmed her.

Kyle caught her as she fell, and then
handed her to Mark. Mark nodded and left with Emily cradled gently
in his arms, her body hanging limply. Frank blurred out with them,
and the door shut behind them.

“
One more hour to go. They
still won’t agree to a cease-fire without Emily,” Kyle said,
turning to them.

Damon was chuckling.

“
Will that hurt the baby?”
Maleth frowned.

Kyle shook his head, “No, I got it
from the doctor.”

“
Yeah but will that hurt
you?” Chevalier sighed.

Kyle grinned slightly, “I’m thinking
probably so.”

“
That’s it then… a war in
Council City,” Quinn said, his hands balling into fists.

“
Over a mortal,” Damon
scowled.

“
You have to think of what
would happen if they got their hands on Emily, Damon,” Maleth said.
“It would put a deadly weapon in the hands of the
enemy.”

Chevalier growled. He hated when they
spoke about his wife like she was a pawn. He shut his eyes and
sighed when the noise of the helicopter leaving sounded from
overhead.

“
We need to evacuate the
Council,” Kyle said urgently.

“
I don’t want to abandon
the army when they need help,” Chevalier said.

Quinn nodded, “Neither do I. I say we
stay.”

“
Send Maleth away with the
rest of the Council then. Quinn and I will stay and fight,”
Chevalier told them.

“
I don’t want to leave
either,” Damon said, irritated.

“
Fine then, you can stay.
The rest of you need to go,” Chevalier told them.

Maleth stood, he had no choice but to
leave. If the unspeakable happened, he would be all that was left
of the Equites Elders, and the nine council members would serve to
bring up the rest of the leadership. As the council members stood
to leave, they looked at the council members that decided to stay,
and bowed.

“
Take care of Emily and
Allen for me,” Chevalier said to Maleth, his eyes full of pain.
“She won’t understand this.”

“
I will,” Maleth said
softly, and headed up to the last helicopter, followed by the nine
council members and Sam, who was carrying Allen.

Damon turned to Quinn and Chevalier,
“Let’s go kill us some Valle.”

Chevalier blurred out of the council
chambers and felt the exhilaration of battle. He could feel the
tension building as he neared the front lines. Now he was able to
turn his emotions over to the primal instincts that were so
carefully tucked away. He stopped, and then advanced slowly to the
front line. A malicious shroud had fallen over his features, and
his predatory eyes scanned the enemy faction.

Sotomar stepped forward, “Have you
come to stop this?”

“
We sent Emily away. She’s
not here to give,” Quinn said with such command that some of the
Valle stepped further back.

“
Yes I know. Frank is one
of ours,” Sotomar said, smiling.

Chevalier’s face fell. He sent Emily
away with a Valle. Damon growled and blurred forward, knocking
Sotomar flat onto his back. The Valle moved in and met the Equites
forces, the battle had begun.

Chevalier saw Damon and Sotomar
clawing at each other, and he turned to the side. There was an
Encala to his left, poised over an injured Equites. He jumped at
him and quickly ripped his head off, growling loudly as the blood
from the Encala saturated his clothing. Dodging an errant sword
strike, he lunged at a Valle guard and tore a limb off, the first
thing he could grab.

A loud trumpet sounded from the
distance and Chevalier stood, panting, as he watched the Encala and
Valle Armies fall back. The wounded were left beside the feet of
the Equites.

“
Why are they leaving?”
Damon asked.

“
I don’t know,” Chevalier
answered.

Quinn appeared by their side, “They
called a retreat. Does that mean they have her?”

Chevalier looked around for any sign
of Exavior.

“
Do we follow them?” Damon
asked.

“
We don’t have the forces
to defeat them,” Chevalier said, turning back to the other council
members.

“
Then we let them go,”
Damon scowled.

“
Keep the line strong until
we can determine why they retreated,” Chevalier ordered, and headed
back for the palace.

Chevalier, Damon, and Quinn all
appeared in the control room at the same time.

“
Base to Equites 2,”
Chevalier called over the radio.

“
Base to Equites 2,” he
repeated.

He growled, “Base to Equites
1.”

“
Equites 1
here.”

“
Can you contact Equites
2?” Chevalier asked.

“
Equites 1 to Equites 2,”
the pilot asked.

“
Equites 2, do you read
me?”

“
Base, no answer from
Equites 2,” the pilot replied.

“
Return to base, Equites
1,” Damon said, when Chevalier didn’t answer.

“
They have her,” Chevalier
whispered, looking out over the palace roof.

***

Emily opened her eyes slowly, blinking
a few times at the bright light shining in her eyes. She tried to
move, but felt a crushing force on her chest, holding her down. She
tried to remember where she was. She could smell the strong scent
of fuel, but there was no noise.

As the fog over her mind began to
clear, she could feel pain start in her leg and arm, her back was
aching, and her head throbbed. She shivered in the cold as the wind
bit at her, painfully. She remembered being in the council
chambers, and the look of guilt on Kyle’s face after he gave her an
injection.

The more clear things became, the more
she began to panic. Her eyes adjusted to the blinding light, and
she looked around at the twisted metal and shattered wood. There
was a piece of metal holding her to the ground, and she saw that
her left arm was covered in blood. She pushed against the metal on
top of her with her right hand, but it only moved an inch or
so.

Emily jerked her head up when she
heard a radio, “Base to Equites 2, answer me, damnit.”

It was Chevalier’s voice.

“
Hello?” Emily yelled as
loudly as she could. The metal was lying against her chest, and she
found it hard to take a deep enough breath to scream.

Emily reached to her right and pushed
a broken seat out of her way. Just beyond it was a mass of flesh
and blood. She could feel her clothing become wet as the snow under
her melted, but the cold wind swept harshly over her.

“
Anybody?” she yelled
again.

“
Equites 2, are you out
there?” she heard Chevalier call out angrily.

“
Mark?” she yelled, looking
around as best she could. With piles of warped metal in her way,
she wasn’t able to see much around her.

“
Frank?” she called out,
but there was no answer and the injured heku off to her right
didn’t seem to be healing. She wondered if the damage was too great
for him to repair.

***

“
No word yet?” Damon asked
from the tower.

“
Nothing,” Chevalier said,
holding the microphone in his hand.

“
Maleth called a
conference, let’s go,” Damon said, taking the microphone from
Chevalier and hanging it up.

Chevalier nodded and followed Damon
into the Council’s conference room. He sat down quietly while the
others watched him.

“
Quinn filled us in about
Frank,” Maleth said.

Chevalier’s hands balled into
fists.

“
Mark was there though.
He’s one of our elite,” Quinn said to Chevalier.

Damon growled when he heard the
request for an audience made by the Valle, “What do they
want?”

“
Let’s go find out,” Maleth
said, standing. The Council walked into the council chambers, and
sat in their seats. As requested, Kyle was also in the council
chambers, but down in the trial area.

Sotomar, Exavior, and four Valle
guards entered.

“
What now?” Quinn asked
bluntly.

Exavior stepped forward, “We are still
demanding the mortal be turned over to us.”