By the day of the attack, the tension at camp was almost unbearable.
The elders all had some experience with combat. Forty years ago, several Ohio clans had skirmished over territory, and the elders had either been involved in that conflict, or were old enough to remember it. But nothing like that had happened since, so Riley’s roommates were all experiencing their first taste of war. And the effect on them was profound.
Darren and Belman were excited about the upcoming conflict. It was a chance to prove themselves and use powers that they were normally forbidden to use. They were manic, boastful and aggressive.
Violet and Perry, on the other hand, seemed terrified at the prospect of their refuge being under attack. They were hesitant, stayed close to their friends, and kept as far away as possible from weapons and loud noises.
Riley was also terrified. After failing to come up with a better idea, the Colonel had approved her plan to carry a team to the site and to speak with Tsali herself. During that confrontation, she would be responsible for the safety of twenty-two other people — mostly elders — who’d be concealed in her shell with her. Both they and the rest of the clan were now depending on her to barter for their future security. Riley knew she was doing right, but her course of action was greatly at odds with her turtle instincts, and she had to fight every moment she was awake to keep herself from retreating into her shell. It was exhausting.
She spent the week practicing both her abilities, and the negotiation itself, over and over again. She walked to the site invisibly as a turtle to time the trip, and she moved her assigned team around the field, also invisibly, so they could get used to the feeling of being within her shell.
In addition, she dyed her hair.
“I look way too much like Jack,” she told Colonel Matthew. “My face, my hair and my light are all exactly the same as his. I can’t take the chance that Tsali will spot our similarity. I have to change something.”
“But they saw you on the trail,” the Colonel argued. “If they already know you’re a blonde—”
“My hair was up that day. I was wearing a ball cap.”
Alley agreed. “Her hair was hidden, sir. They have no idea what color it is.”
“Okay, then. Go for it!”
The girls decided Riley’s hair would look best red. “As white as you are, you could pull off red perfectly,” Katrina insisted, and the others agreed. Alley dyed it, and she did a fabulous job. It did look natural.
When Riley walked out into the lounge to show the guys, reactions were mixed.
Gabe’s jaw dropped. “Wow. I... wow. That is sexy.”
“What the hell have you done to your hair?” Reed demanded.
“I dyed it. Why are you always swearing?”
Reed backed as far away from Riley as he could, looking way more disturbed than he should have looked about hair dye. “Red hair, blue light, and a frown on your face. You look like Ivan!”
Several people chuckled.
“But I don’t look like Jack,” Riley pointed out gently. “And that is the point.”
He frowned deeper, then gave her a reluctant nod.
Riley was pleased to have done something to protect Jack, who was working so hard to protect her. Still, looking down and seeing red curls instead of blond was another unnerving reminder of the conflict to come. She knew she wouldn’t relax again until the battle was over.
The young warriors had been divided into five teams for the upcoming confrontation.
Riley would work with Darren, who would be her bodyguard. He was to remain at her side throughout the confrontation. When things got hot enough that she decided to make the team of elders inside her shell visible, Darren’s job was to attack anyone who tried to hurt Riley or who simply got too close for his comfort.
Xander and Katrina were another team. They, too, would be on the front lines, defending the eastern perimeter near the water. This was the area that they believed the Poxinosa would use for any ambush they might have planned. Xander and Katrina were the only two Greenwoods assigned to that space. And with no one to back them up, if any enemy warriors appeared in their area, they had the most dangerous assignment.
Team three was Gabe, Celia, and Perry. Their job was ground destabilization. Celia had identified two underground streams that ran through the hills where Reed said the Poxinosa were going to stand when they confronted Greenwood. She had mapped them out for Gabe, and with her help he’d taught himself to feel the water that was in them while touching the lake. Working safely from the levee, if their team was told to strike, Gabe would use his power to force the water that was beneath where the Poxinosa would be standing up through the ground. And as soon as Gabe exploded the water upward, Perry was to create an earthquake that would further unsettle the land beneath the feet of the would-be attackers. Celia would watch the battlefield through the water to monitor the reaction of the Poxinosa, and the three of them would repeat the process as many times as needed. The biggest challenge they faced would be to make their "geysers" look like a spontaneous response rather than a planned attack that Reed could get blamed for later.
The fourth team — Violet, Belman, Alley and Owen Reese — had been ordered to stay at the rear of the battlefield. Violet would stay indoors, hidden in the Elder Lodge, unless Nenexsa became a problem; Belman was her bodyguard. And Alley and Owen were to move any injured Greenwood fighters to safety for Jane and her helpers to tend.
The final team consisted of all the fliers, who would be under the command of Peter Hawk. Reed, Ivan and Susanna, as well as several elder clan members, would engage all enemy fliers they encountered, but their main focus was stopping anyone who tried to drop objects down onto the Greenwoods below.
Reed had, of course, been given two sets of battle instructions, and he spent several hours on Thursday holed up with the Colonel and Peter Hawk working out a way for him to meet all of the demands that had been placed upon him. Riley was scared to death for him, but Jack was confident that the fact that the Greenwood clan wasn’t bringing in outside clan members for the fight would be enough to protect Reed from any accusations.
“They think you’re terrified of them,” Jack told the Colonel that morning on their conference call. “Tsali expects your whole clan to show up in full battle gear if you’ve been tipped off. So if it’s only the people who live there, and you come running out in your pajamas, Reed is going to be fine.”
“What if you’re wrong?” Riley asked.
“If I’m wrong, he moves in with you full time. Please don’t worry about Reed right now, sweetie. You’ll be staring Tsali in the face tonight… Reed is the least of your worries! Now, walk me through as much of your plan as possible. What can Will and I do to help you stay safe?”
Colonel Matthew shared most of their strategy with Jack, including where not to stand so they wouldn’t get hit by any of Gabe’s explosions.
“Not an issue,” Jack assured him. “The less Tsali trusts you, the farther away from him you stand. All us hired guys will be on the periphery somewhere, or we’ll be assigned to watch and patrol. Will and I won’t be anywhere near him.”
“Perfect. Are you bringing both of your, eh, incarnations to the fight?”
“No,” Jack informed him. “My other self will be well away from Greenwood. And that means I can be killed if necessary. Please do not hesitate to attack me with deadly force, sir, if you think it will protect my sister and brother.”
Tears filled Riley’s eyes. I may have to watch Jack die tonight!
After discussing more specific strategy with the Colonel, Jack said, “Riley… please be safe. We need you to come through this okay. Nothing else matters if you don’t.”
She wiped her eyes. “I’ll be safe, Jackie. Tsali doesn’t really want to hurt me, but even if he did, no one here would let him.”
“No matter how many men are fighting for you, Riley, it would only take one man to bring you down. That’s why this is such a bad idea. If you must do it, then follow your orders to the letter. Will and I will keep an eye out for you from our side.”
“I promise.” She hesitated, then asked, “Will, are you there?”
“Yes,” he said quietly, his tone strained.
Riley wasn’t sure what she wanted to say. I just needed to hear his voice, she acknowledged. “You be careful too, okay?”
“Don’t go through with this, Riley.” Will’s voice was thick with emotion. “Please don’t go out onto that field.”
Riley felt Xander put a hand on her shoulder and she covered it with her own. “I said I’d face him, and I will. I won’t let people I love die when I have a chance to stop it,” Riley said, her voice shaking. “And neither would you.”
“Colonel, how many fliers will be working with Reed?” Jack asked. “By my count, Tsali will have nine men in the air. Is Reed going to have enough air support on your end? Will can freeze the air if you need him to, but that would affect everyone who isn’t a duck, and…”
Jack continued, and the Colonel replied, and Riley sat beside the phone in a stupor. Jack had cut off her conversation with Will in part to diffuse their emotion, she knew, but Riley wasn’t ready to stop talking to Will, or to stop hearing his voice. She missed it. She missed him.
It isn’t enough to speak to Will every few days for a few minutes. I want him IN MY LIFE. But I have Gabe now, so what would Will be? A friend? That’s impossible.
This whole situation is impossible!
* * *
Because there was still a risk of remote observation, the young warriors had been instructed to get ready for bed that night as if it were any other night. Riley was wearing two fleece tops and a pair of Jack’s old flannel pants. Her normal sleeping attire.
To meet a killer.
The Lodge was completely dark except for the fire in the big stone fireplace and the glow of her Unveiled roommates. But that was the only routine thing about the evening. Animal spirits notwithstanding, the place was a zoo. Riley was trying to focus on her upcoming tasks, but was finding it hard to concentrate in such pandemonium.
She closed her eyes and pictured Tsali who, since she had no clue what he looked like, always ended up looking like the knife guy. We believe I will stand about ten feet away from him. She backed ten feet away from the wall and frowned at the distance. That’s not much room to maneuver in. What if he decides to… oh my word, is Belman YODELING? Riley looked around.
Violet was on the couch, shaking hard and staring at the ground. She’d been like that for hours. Celia and Perry were on either side of her, holding her hands and whispering to her. Riley hadn’t yet seen her respond to either of them.
Reed was pacing the floor in silence, frowning alternately at Riley and at the trio on the couch. He’s uncomfortable with Violet’s stress level… whenever I’m like that, it agitates him.
Everyone else was bouncing off the walls.
Belman wasn’t yodeling, it turned out. He was doing a war dance, and the accompanying chant was horrifically off pitch. The cats didn’t like it either. Periodically one of them would object with a hiss or a deep feline growl. His response to each such objection was to grin and chant a little louder.
Darren’s unparalleled ability to make a bad situation worse was also on full display. In the absence of Poxinosa clan members, he was practicing his darts on whomever was walking by too slowly to avoid him.
No one was amused.
“Do you want me to kick your ass right before the big fight?” Ivan snapped when he caught a dart.
Darren chuckled. “I’d love to see you try.” Grinning, he then turned and shot at Gabe, but missed by an inch and hit Riley.
“Ow!”
Darren was immediately contrite. “I’m sorry Riley. I am. I meant to hit Gabe.”
“You asshole!” Gabe yelled. “You hurt her.”
“Asshole? I didn’t hit her that hard.”
“I’m all right, Gabe. It just stings.” Riley rubbed her arm where she’d been hit. I wish I could protect my arm with my turtle shell. He’d never hit me through that.
“Riley, what are you doing to your arm?” Celia asked.
“Huh? Rubbing it.” Riley looked down at her arm, where Celia was staring.
It was bright blue. Neon, put your eye out, several-times-brighter-than-the-rest-of-her blue.
“What the...?” Gabe rubbed his hand over the bright spot on her arm.
And Riley didn’t feel a thing.
She gasped. I protected my arm with my turtle shell just by thinking about it when I touched it!
Xander entered the Lodge. “Half an hour left. Riley, take Darren and go get...” He trailed off as he got a good look at her. “What is that on your arm?”
“A shield.” Riley closed her eyes and thought, I want to protect all of my skin with my turtle shell. When she opened her eyes again, she was bright blue all over.
“I applied my turtle shell’s protection directly to my skin!”
Everyone stared at her in uncomprehending confusion.
Riley grabbed Gabe’s arm and rubbed. It glowed bright blue as well, his orange glow beneath it giving the shield a brownish cast. “Give me a minute,” she said, “and I think I can protect everyone else—”
“It’s too late for that,” Xander said.
“Let me get Violet, at least!”
“Riley, our timetable doesn’t have any room for error!” he shouted. “Take Darren and go!”
Riley gave Violet — who looked shocked — an apologetic glance and went to the door with Darren close behind her. “Stay safe, everyone,” she called out softly before she made herself and Darren invisible.
“You seriously think that’s a shield?” Darren asked Riley as they crossed the porch, looking down at her neon skin.
“I’m sure.” She put her hand on Darren’s arm and thought about her turtle protecting him. And suddenly his body was glowing blue over orange, like Gabe’s arm.
He touched his arm and laughed. “I can’t feel a thing! Awesome,” he sang. “This is going to be SO! AWESOME!”
She nibbled her lip as they walked up the hill. What if we actually manage to pull this off?
Comments (1)
See all