Tiff turned, her Affinity for the Dead ringing in her body like a chime struck. "What is that?" she whispered her gaze locked with mine.
I felt like I was trying to breathe underwater and John left the border of the forest, moving toward me. "What?"
I gave a wheezing response, "The dead... they... they're everywhere but nowhere."
"They're broken!" Tiff said, feeling the tip of the iceberg compared to what resonated inside me.
"What the hell?" Jonesy ranted and Bry elbowed him to shut up.
Archer frowned and Mia drew closer. In a few seconds, the entire group of teens surrounded me where I stood, pegged by the call of the dead.
Finally, with John's psychic Null power dulling their screams, I was finally able to reply, "Tiff's right. They're... not together, their bodies are broken and chucked all over the place."
"Why?" Alex asked, casting a glance at the assembly of ragged fighters, filthy and fierce in their uniformity. Then he looked at the small band across the meadow from them. They looked like a different group entirely.
None of it looked good to me.
"War. There was some kind of... battle or something," I explained and Jade was careful not to touch my bare skin. She didn't want to share any part of the onslaught of this dead. They felt different than the dead of our world.
Tiff walked closer to where I stood. "Who did it, do ya think?"
My eyes absorbed the huge contingent, then the smaller. "I don't know. But it's a safe bet that the group over there was part of it." I said, jerking my chin in the direction of the Loser Faction. I had a random thought of Carson Hamilton fitting right in like peanut butter and jelly, as Gramps would say.
The sweat on my palms gelled and I wiped a trembling hand against my mouth, exchanging an uneasy look with Jade. Trouble followed our group no matter what. Landing our asses in a parallel world hadn't changed the group dynamic.
John watched as the larger group closed in around the smaller. The biggest male of the smaller group, clutched a woman that looked part wild against his body. It was when the leader of what looked to be a criminal group touched the woman's braid that the male holding her stiffened and all hell seemed to break loose.
A small faction of the losers grabbed the male, the lone female stood facing the leader. Even from a distance you could see her defiance.
Touch it.
I moved forward. As the big dude was held by several of the others, the leader raised his fist and struck her so hard she staggered back, falling to the ground, her golden head bent against the frozen backdrop of ice and snow.
I looked at my friends. Seeing the identical expression on their faces I decided for us all, "I was never much for chick beating."
"Me neither," Bry said, his hands clenching into fists.
"Yup, I'm in... let's tag their asses!" Jonesy shouted.
"I like it," Alex agreed, already moving into the openness of the meadow, the girls trailing behind.
Except Tiff, she came beside me. Tiff and I listened to the low drone of the dead at our feet, everywhere we stepped held the murmur of their discontent.
Nobody mentioned the odds of a handful of teenagers against seventy guys that looked seriously dangerous.
Courage is ignoring your fear.
CHAPTER 8
I turned when we were within four meters of the group, my heart lodged inside my throat like a heated, vibrating lump. They had seemed somehow less when we'd been near the tree line. But now... in the open meadow, they looked more.
Dirtier.
Scarier.
Larger.
Just more.
I moved forward just as another group broke into the meadow and Jonesy said, "Holy shit! Look at those guys!"
We did.
They weren't human. I was trying to quantify what the hell they were when Alex piped in with, "Those guys are Water World dudes."
John said, "Would you shut up? Kinda getting ready for something major and you're referencing classic movies?"
I stared at them. They all looked like Alex, but even bigger, taller.
And then there were the gills. They came toward us like a slow moving wall of muscle, flesh and weaponry.
Our whole group of teens backed away as they came. Somehow, they were scarier than the filthy group.
Jade whispered, "What are they?"
I shook his head, I didn't know.
"Well hell, this is turning into a clusterfuck!" Tiff said, snapping her gum.
"Shut up, Tiff," Bry said off-handedly.
*
The three groups converged in a loose triangle.
The girl with the fiery hair spoke first.
Caleb watched as she looked at the wild woman that lay at her feet, the leader of the Loser Group faced her, the big dude that had been with her in the beginning was held by Loser's minions.
Shaping up to be the mess I'd thought it'd be.
Yes indeedy.
I saw her look over her shoulder as a big dude with blue ice chips for eyes strode to stand behind her. His hands landed on her small shoulders in an obvious grip of possessive protection.
I recognized that stance right away.
She turned her face to look at our group and what a face it was, the light covering of filth didn't hide her delicate beauty. Luminous sea-kissed eyes overtook a creamy soft triangle of a face with a mass of red hair that was quite dark, not an ounce of the carrot color that John had. She stared as curiously at us as we did at her group. All the groups were stunned by our appearance.
A frozen moment settled over everyone. It was shattered when the tiny girl, who was actually a woman, said in a regal voice as smoothly confident as any I'd ever heard, "I am Clara, Queen of the Kingdom of Ohio." She looked at each of our faces that must seem foreign to her. "Who might you be?"
The leader of the creeper group stepped toward ours and my eyes flicked to his as I warned, "Stay there pal. You don't look like the friendly type."
The man scowled at me as he took our group in and I watched as a female warrior, gills included, slid off a humungous horse and walked to where the Queen stood, the flame of her hair lifted by the wind, tangling around the huge wrists of the man that stood behind her, his restless eyes challenging every space they landed.
More of the guys with gills came to stand in a loose, battle-ready position behind the Queen and her guy. One huge dude with coal black hair like Jade's but strange, amber-colored eyes went to the fallen woman with the gold hair, sticking his hand out in an offer of help.
A rumble of electricity pulsed once as their flesh connected and Jade sucked in a breath, her hand involuntarily going to her throat.
"What?" I asked.
"They're related!"
"Yeah?" I said, not understanding why that mattered.
"'Cuz they didn't know," she answered, looking at the two with shocked wonder.
I swung my face to theirs, the look of surprised pleasure identically expressed as they gazed at each other and embraced.
"No way," I said.
"Way," Jade whispered.
The man pulled away from the woman. I'd thought she was tall until she was in the circle of his arms and there she looked tiny. He leaned back from her, intense joy on his face and said, "Sister."
Jade looked at me and smiled. A tiny spot of happiness stolen in the middle of a field of misery and portentous war to come.
*
I had a bad feeling about this. I hadn't gotten a sense of what or even who all these different groups were but things were coming to a head, I could sense it when the Leader of the Losers spoke, "You trespass here, Traveler." His shifty eyes sweeping over his group of friends, lingering too long on the girls. I could feel my eyes narrow.
What was this Traveler bullshit?
Randi had come to stand beside me. "I think the chumps that came before us muddied the waters. We're gonna be real popular. Uh-huh," she whispered.
Tiff looked around, having heard that last. "Yup, better tune-up, Hart. Things are gonna go sideways."
Gee, ya think?
The leader's eyes narrowed on our group, then shifted to the dudes with gills. "This doesn't concern you of the Band."
I looked at the huge warriors he addressed. Ribbons of pink flesh wrapped their necks, flaring slightly with their breathing. They didn't look exactly thrilled with this jerk. My attention settled back on Mr. Pleasant. I considered his speech, an old-fashioned mash of modern and old, hard to understand.
My head jerked up with his next comment.
"Leave the women with us and we won't kill you." He threw a palm behind himself to indicate the men waiting at his back. "Our numbers are not to your advantage," he restated smugly.
K, it was official, I didn't like this asswipe. But there was something I wanted to get straight. "Hey!"
He swung a disfigured face towards me. A not too distant beating had maimed it in a disgusting mangle of flesh. "What do ya mean, 'leave the women'?"
But it was one of the big warriors who answered, the one that didn't wear a metal breastplate but somehow resembled the other humungous male.
He replied for the other big guys, the Band, "These men be of the fragment. Marauders that plunder, pillage and confiscate anything of value upon the spoils of their raids."
The woman with the gold hair that had been struck said, "Aye, 'tis true." The man who was her brother, his arms wrapped protectively around her body, gave the slightest nod in agreement.
My eyes went to the redhead who had first spoken, the Queen. She was unbelievably tiny, smaller even than Jade. I decided I'd ask her, "So these guys..." I indicated with a loose palm, what I now understood was the fragment, "rob everybody and take the women?"
The serious man at her back nodded. "We leave, and it will be your women as well."
Not on my watch it wouldn't.
I turned to my friends, my face speaking for me.
Jonesy said it best, "Eff that. You're not touching our chicks, or any of the other ones ya pervs!" He emphasized this by pounding a black fist in an open palm, his teeth flashing very white in the middle of the silent meadow.
It was pretty effective as war calls went.
The creeper scowled, taking our words in. I didn't think he needed a translator. He may not have understood everything word for word but he got our meaning.
Yeah buddy.
When I saw his mouth lift in a lopsided sneer, I was certain he had confidence in the outcome of a conflict with us. He thought we would lose, his numbers greater.
We'd just see, wouldn't we?
A smile formed on my face, we'd just see.
I turned as the Queen spoke, slicing the tension as effectively as if she used a knife. But it was her smooth statement that captured the attention of us all, "There are few females Outside. This group roams about in the happenstance that an unprotected one may be captured for exploit."
Our group assimilated her words quickly.
"Okay, just point out the bad guys and let's kick some ass!" Bry said, to which Jonesy stabbed a fist-pump in the air in agreement.
I began assessing the Queen and the warriors at her back. My count said around ten, the females useless. Except for the two that somehow looked alike. Both like female versions of the huge men. Finally, I shifted my gaze to the one that had his huge hands wrapped around her upper arms, his blue eyes like pieces of the sky.
As I looked, I recognized something familiar in them. The Queen was his Jade.
He'd die to protect her.
Well ditto, I thought, taking an instant liking to the warriors.
Parallel worlds, parallel principles.
I was totally rolling with that program.
"K, these ones are obviously the bad guys," I said and the men of the fragment unsheathed dirks from their hiding places.
Definitely meant business.
The guys in my group stood in front of the girls and Tiff came to stand at my side.
"How many?" she asked.
I turned, giving her a hard stare. "Living or dead?"
"Dead," Tiff responded.
I paused for a heartbeat... two. "Enough."
"K, let's round them up. Even up these odds."
"Caleb..." Jade began, sensing something.
I turned to her. "I think... I sense the dead are these guys," she gave a pointed look at the fragment.
I hesitated, thinking about her words. "Won't matter... " I paused, "... the dead are always the same."
"Daniel!" the Queen shouted as the men of the fragment began to move toward them and the man at her back dragged her behind the shield of his body.
Daniel responded, wrenching himself free from the guys that held him, unsheathing his long sword as he did.
"What do the young ones say?" I heard her yell in question.
Daniel responded with a translation even as he swung, "They will assist us in our defense!" he shouted over the beginnings of an unbeatable battle, the leader of the fragment moving straight for Queen Clara as the male of the Band pulled his lips away from his teeth in a smile of pure rage and vengeance.