The Breakers Ultimatum (YA Urban Fantasy) (Fixed Points Book 3) (23 page)

“I burned them,” I said, thinking back. “Along with all our other stuff.”

“Of course you did,” he answered. “You guys were just awash in good decisions back then, weren’t you? Anyway, the point is, I was flipping through this magazine in the dentist office one day, and I saw this ad.” He pointed to the feet. “And, though I don’t know why, it reminded me of you. And for a minute, it was like we had never stopped off at Weathersby. It was like, in some world on some strange dimension, Casper and Cresta just kept driving. And we were okay, and we were happy, and cars drove on roads, the way that they should. And I promised that, if I ever saw you again, I would let you see it. But now I want to do one better. I want you to keep it. Because, while you are that badass Blood Moon boogeyman that Royce was talking about, you’re also this,” he pointed to the shirt. “You’re also this girl, and I don’t want you to forget it.” He shrugged a little as moisture glinted in his eyes. “So, no. I don’t think you’ll lose yourself. And, on the off-chance that you do, I’ll always be here to remind you. No bitch-baby, prophecy about some half-ass planet turning red will change is gonna tell me who my friend is!”

I took the shirt from him and slipped it on over the Blood Moon one. It was loose and baggy, but it was also a perfect fit. Duct tape and all...

“I love you, Casper Rhodes,” I said, taking his hand.

“What’s not to love?” He said. And, turning his attention to the sky, he added,” So are you gonna break the moon or not?”

Following his gaze, I looked up. It was easier than it had been before, tapping into the Essence. Still, its effects were no less traumatic. I jerked and pushed as it jerked and pushed. Moving the flashing lines, I felt the pull of the entire world, all that was, is, or ever could be, was at my fingertips. But I also felt Casper, standing right beside me as he promised he would. I held onto that, onto him, when it felt like it was going to be too much. And, in the end, when I was finished, my mind felt like melted butter. It took a few hazy-minded minutes, but in the end, the sky was red, and the Blood Moon had risen.

Owen

Before I could formulate a response to ‘Your girlfriend just ended the world’, the Breakers with Chant approached us. Grabbing each of us by the arm, they began to shuffle us out of the room.

“What’s going on?” I heard Merrin say from behind me and felt, not only her confusion, but also a spike of fear shot through her chest.

“You’re being moved to a secure location until such a time that the Dragon can be made of use,” Chant said as we were whisked past him and ushered into the spiraling staircase that led, not only back down to the Council’s chambers, but also to that awful room where I had been held right after I was captured.

“Of use?” I asked, and immediately knew that I shouldn’t have. There was only one use the Council could have for the Dragon, especially at a time like this. And asking a question like that would only serve to illustrate how apprehensive I still was about being what the Council considered useful. Merrin knew that, too. I felt the uneasiness creep up inside of her.

“It’s just the moon,” Merrin said, trying to defuse the situation. “I’ve studied the prophecies, especially the end times scrolls, there’s no way turning the moon red one day before it was scheduled to happen will throw the world into Armageddon.”

“You know nothing of these things, child,” Chant said. He was moving down the spiral stairs at a pace much slower than ours and, as such, his voice was now projecting itself into our heads. And I seriously hated that. “Do you truly believe that every aspect of whom we are, that every piece of what we know of the end times, or even of the times in which we currently live, are in scrolls that are open for the entire world to see? Certainly you would not be so foolish.”

I felt shame blossom in Merrin’s gut and I wanted to stem it. But what could I do? She hated me. Being inside of her in this way didn’t change that.

“I didn’t think-”

“And therein lays the problem for your entire troublesome generation. You don’t think,” Chant cut her off. “Really, it should be no surprise that the end would come from a group of Breakers as inconsiderate and ill prepared as yours.”

“And under a watch as corrupt as yours!” I broke in. Merrin might have to be submissive to the Council, but I sure didn’t.

“I’d tell you to watch your tongue, Dragon. But it hardly matters at this point.” He appeared in front of me, though I knew it was nothing more than an illusion. And the weird part about it was that it flickered off and on. The image of Chant, floating backward as we descended the staircase, went in and out of focus; the way an illusion might if it was made by a youngling who was just learning to use his abilities. But Chant wasn’t a youngling. He was a Council member. And this sort of thing was far from normal for someone like him.

“The moon is messing with the anchors,” I said, piecing all of  it together. “It’s distorting things.”

“Our abilities are connected to the Earth, to the Earth’s balance,” Chant said. “Throwing the Earth out of balance, especially with an astronomical abnormality as strong as the Blood Moon, is nothing less than devastating for us.”

“So our powers don’t work the right way for a few hours,” I said. “Where’s the harm in that?”  I was trying to sound nonchalant, but I knew better. Balance was one of the most vital principals to the Breaker way of life. If Cresta was messing with that, then the consequences could be severe.

“You know better than that, Dragon. Our abilities are connected to anchors which hold us; the anchors which we’ve put down through time as Breakers.”

“Fate above,” Merrin gasped, understanding what was going on.

“The imbalance is breaking anchors all over the world, Dragon. Not just within the Hourglass,” Chant told me. “If this abomination isn’t undone, if it isn’t fixed, then all the work Breakers have done throughout history will be destroyed. All the chaos that we’ve fought and died to keep at bay will roar back into existence. And you know what that means, Dragon.”

My heart plummeted, and I wondered if Merrin could feel just how devastated I was. If all the work that we as Breakers did was undone, then the world- the world-”

“Say it,” Chant said. “Say it out loud so that you know how true it is. If Cresta Karr isn’t made to pull the Blood Moon from the sky, tell me what she will do.”

I stammered, still being pulled down the spiral staircase. “She’ll end the world.”

*******

The room they moved us into was much bigger than the one I was held in before. Or at least it looked bigger. For all I knew, this was the exact same room, and what I was seeing was shade; if the shade even worked now that Cresta had brought the Blood Moon into the sky.

Chant was a few moments behind us, the door slamming shut after he inched his way in, cane in hand.

“To the window,” he croaked out. The Breakers who had manhandled us into this room in the first place approached Merrin and me again.

“That won’t be necessary,” I said, raising a hand to stop them. I nodded at Merrin and she followed me to the far end of the room, where a bay window looked out onto the Main Square. Chant shuffled up behind us, passing the wealth of fresh fruit, pastries, and wine that had been laid out in an attempt to make us feel like this locked room wasn’t a prison. 

“Could you get her some clothes?” I asked, motioning to the sheerness of Merrin’s current outfit.

Grinning, Chant snapped his fingers and one of his guards came scurrying up with a robe. “Here you go, Mrs. Lightfoot,” he said.

The sound of that, of him calling her Mrs. Lightfoot sent something of a shock through me. Merrin’s eyes cut over, feeling what I was feeling.

“It’s just-it’s new, is all,” I muttered.

“Whatever,” she said, cinching the red robe at her waist.

“Look,” Chant sad, settling beside us and motioning to the window. “Look at what that girl of yours has wrought.”

Merrin’s gasp filled my ears and her panic filled my chest before I even had a chance to look out the window. As my eyes settled on the tinted glass and the streets that lay behind it, what I saw made me shiver.

While Merrin and I had been battling our carnal instincts, war broke out in our home. Breakers converged on the streets, throwing punches at each other, taking blades to each other, hurting each other in ways that I didn’t think was even possible within our little community.

“Owen…” Merrin gasped, taking all of it in.

“What’s going on?” I asked Chant, witnessing a Breaker on the street strangle another Breaker to death with his bare hands. “This is madness.”

“This is war, Dragon,” Chant answered. “This is the war that precedes the end. It’s Breaker versus Breaker in a way that hasn’t occurred since the dark days of the Great Conflicts.”

“But why are they attacking each other?” Merrin asked, her hand covering her gaping mouth.

“The end is here,” Chant said. “The proverbial clock is striking midnight and, as such, all the masks are coming off. Half those people you see are traitors. They’re the people Allister Leeman placed here, the ones who were turned and used for vital information and other nefarious means. They are the failures that have made this moment possible. And they will be made to pay. But not before Cresta Karr is.”

“How do I know that what I’m seeing is real?” I asked, my eyes pinned to the chaos below. “The war, the Blood Moon itself, it could all be shade. This could all be a huge trick.”

“Misguided until the end, I see,” Chant circled me, barring my view of the streets. “I have no reason to lie to you, Dragon. What you believe is of no interest to me. All that matters to me is that which matters to the world. And all that matters to the world is that you do your duty as the Dragon. Before the Blood Moon rose, we were given valuable Intel on the whereabouts of Cresta and her band of traitors. A young Breaker gave his life to deliver that information, but his sacrifice was not in vain. We now know the Blood Moon’s location, and have sent a virtual army of Breakers to retrieve and bring her here.” His ancient eyes narrowed at me. “She will be delivered here, and you will fulfill your piece of the prophecy. Tonight the Blood Moon will be devoured by the Dragon. Tonight, you will kill Cresta Karr.”

It took all of thirty seconds after Chant left the room, taking his guards with him and sealing us shut inside, for panic to set in.

“Calm down,” Merrin said drolly. And it wasn’t just the fact that my hands were clutching at my hair or that I was practically pacing a groove into the floor that told her how nervous I was. She could feel it welling up inside of me. And I could feel how much that fact was upsetting her.

“I can’t calm down, Merrin. You heard him. They’re collecting Cresta now. Right now! And they want me to kill her tonight!”

“It’s not a perfect situation. I’ll give you that much,” she answered, her eyes still glued to the carnage going on outside.

“Perfect?!” I yelled. This time I wasn’t shy about the fact that she was going to feel my outrage. I wanted her to. “Is this a joke to you, Merrin? Are you still mad enough- No, are you petty enough to want her dead just because of what I did to you?”

“Are you even paying attention?” She answered, turning to me with her arms crossed under her breasts. “This isn’t about you and me. It isn’t even about her at this point. Look at what’s going on down there, Owen. Look at all the damage that’s been done. By morning, our home will be gone. Even if these traitors are beaten back, things will never be the same. The assumed safety that we had is gone. The thing that made this place special; it’s gone forever, Owen. She did that, and I’m not sure it was an accident.”

“She wouldn’t do this. And besides, she’d have no idea of the ramifications of bringing forth the Blood Moon,” I said through gritted teeth.

“You don’t know that,” Merrin answered. “She’s been through a lot, and she’s likely been through much more than that in the time since the two of you have been parted. She lost her mother, she lost that Neanderthal, and she lost you. The only people left to her are those who helped her escape, and we know next to nothing about them.”

“She has Echo and Dahlia.”

“Perhaps,” Merrin answered. “Or perhaps they were killed by traitors. All we know for sure is that we haven’t heard from them, and that the Council has yet to been able to pull anything out of that invisible redhead’s mind.”

“Her name is Flora,” I said.

“I don’t care what her name is. She’s allowing this to happen with her inactivity. So are you.” She took my hand, which made me feel vulnerable at first. I wanted to pull away, but I also felt how much she wanted me to listen, to pay attention. So I did. “I know what you think, but I don’t hate Cresta. The time I spent in her mind was an eye opening experience. Not only did I see how she felt about you. I saw how she felt about everything. She’s not a bad person. I’d go as far as to say she’s a good one, maybe a great one. But intention has nothing to do with it at this point. This has happened. The Hourglass is crumbling down around us and the world will be next if she’s not stopped. You know what good the Breakers have done in the world, Owen. Our anchors have averted Neanderthal war. They’ve hidden natural truths that would send the Earth into a panic. They’ve quieted social storms that would have pulled apart the moral fiber of every culture on the planet. If those anchors are allowed to be destroyed, how long before the world is destroyed with them?”

She touched my face. “I know you love her, Owen. But this is how the world ends. You’re a Breaker. This is more than a job. It’s more than a life. It’s a vow. It’s a promise you made by being born, and you have to make good on it. It isn’t fair that you’re the one who has to deal with this. Just like it isn’t fair that Cresta had to be the one to do it. But fair doesn’t matter right now. The world is being cut open. The only thing that matters is that we stop the bleeding.” She looked up at me again. “By any means necessary.”

I took her hand from my face; a hand that held the same ancient markings that mine did now, and kissed it. None of this was fair for me or Cresta. But it wasn’t fair for Merrin, either. All she had ever wanted was the life she had been promised, the life she every right to expect when she was growing up. This; me being who I was, Cresta being who she was, and the way we felt about each other, were truths that Merrin never could have seen coming. And the way she suffered as a result of those truths was something I would have given anything to change. But I couldn’t change it. I couldn’t change any of it. Not even if the world was ending.

“I won’t kill her, Merrin. I just won’t.”

Her heart fell in both our chests and she dropped her gaze.

“I don’t think you’ll have a choice,” she said. “They’ll have her here soon. My guess is, if you don’t comply with what the Council wants, then you’ll be made to do it forcibly. One way or another, your hands will end her life tonight.”

“But it doesn’t have to be that way,” I answered. “She doesn’t have to die. If she knew what was going on, if she knew what screwing with the Blood Moon was doing, I’m sure she’d undo it.”

“If she even could, you know like I do that Cresta’s never had much control over abilities. Something like this, like changing something as huge as the Blood Moon, is supposed to be an impossibility for even the strongest of Breakers. And even if you somehow managed to convince her to bring down the Blood Moon, she’s still too dangerous to be allowed to live. At least that’s how the Council will see it. If she doesn’t get out of the Hourglass tonight, then she dies. And if she does get out, then it’s very likely that the rest of the world will.”

“Then we have to find a way around it,” I answered, pulling away from her. “We have to get her out of the Hourglass and get the Blood Moon down.”

“How?” Merrin asked, shaking her head. “The anchors are only weakened while the Blood Moon is in the sky. Taking it down would trap her here again. And if the Blood Moon is allowed to stay up for much longer-”

“I know!” I shouted, looking back down at the streets. Buildings were on fire now. Fate’s hand, Merrin was right. If we didn’t act quickly, then this entire place will be ablaze, both literally and figuratively. My mind wandered back to the last time the Council had me captive, to the day they let me go. This fire was so much like my own, like the fire that poured from me that day. It lit up everything, burned up everything; everything except for me. If only everything was like me, burned but not damaged. If only every fire was like my fire, searing but under my control. If only-

And that was when it came to me.

“Merrin,” I said, piecing everything together in my mind. I had wondered why my powers were changing. And I still didn’t know. No one could say. But at least now, I knew that it wasn’t an accident. I knew that fate had her reasons; her reasons and a plan.

“I know what to do. I know how to stop this.”