Copper Veins (18 page)

With that, Sadie and I followed our brother—a man of questionable sanity at best—toward the front of the crowd. I had expected this to be similar to the rally Max and I had attended for Mike Armstrong, with politicians in the crowd and people with signs. Instead, the audience here was downright cheerful, as if Mike—and Langston—had already been elected and this was a celebratory speech. It made me wonder if some Peacekeeper had distilled Aregonda's power of persuasion and released it as a gas.

Anyway, we stationed ourselves near the left side of the stage, about four rows back, my sister and I flanking Max. As I watched him staring at the stage,
I realized that not only did I have no idea what Aregonda and her people were doing, but I didn't know what Max had planned either.

“Hey,” I whispered to Sadie behind Max's back. She shook her head and jerked her chin—when I looked over my shoulder, I understood why.

“Hello, Jerome,” I greeted my Peacekeeper shadow. “What's up?”

“Here to help, nothing more,” he replied. “What's Max's plan?”

“You'll have to ask Max about that.”

I supposed Jerome would have asked him, but the loudspeakers crackled to life. After a few ear-splitting moments of feedback, some game-show announcer announced that Langston Phillips was about to take the stage.

That was when all hell broke loose.

The metal supports of the stage flew out from under the decking and twisted themselves into a horribly complex knot. Then the metal morphed into a giant hook and snatched Langston right off the collapsing stage.

I shrieked, demanding to know why Aregonda would orchestrate such a blatant display of Elemental abilities in the midst of a Peacekeeper rally, when the metal hooks dragged their quarry across the field and deposited it at Max's feet.

Oh. So my brother, not the wacky resistance, was
responsible for this chaos.

Awesome.

“Max,” I screamed against the wind. Where had this fricken' wind come from, anyway? “Max, what are you doing?”

“Giving him what he has coming,” Max said. The metal hooks dragged Langston onto his back and curled around his limbs, pinning him to the ground. “Not so smug when I'm not a prisoner, are you, pal?” Max demanded. “Different playing field, huh?”

“Still mad that she preferred me?” Langston sneered. “Me, a real man, as opposed to you?”

A band of metal clamped over Langston's mouth, yanking his head down into the dirt. Langston's face went red, then purple.

“Max, you're killing him,” I said, not that he was listening to me. “Max, you're better than this.”

“Am I?” Max asked, turning his wild eyes toward me.

“You are.”

Max and I both looked up and saw Juliana walking toward us. The supernatural wind tore at her hair and clothes, but she ignored it. In fact, as she approached us with her long dark hair whipping around her, she looked like some sort of pagan goddess. Mom would have approved.

Juliana knelt next to Langston, but she didn't comfort him. Instead, she looked up at Max. “Max,
don't do this,” she pleaded.

“Why not?” Max shot back. “He killed Greta, Galen, all of them! He deserves to die!”

“That he does,” Juliana murmured. “But you don't deserve to be a killer.” Juliana started pulling the metal restraints out of the ground. Amazingly, Max let her.

“Jules,” he began, but Juliana held up her hand.

“Go. Just go,” she said, then she pulled the last restraint free. Langston reached out to Juliana, but she evaded him. “Get up on your own,” she hissed. “I wasn't helping you.”

Langston attempted a laugh and ended up spitting bloody phlegm onto the grass. “Still can't manage to man up?” Langston croaked, glaring at Max.

“Yeah?” Max retorted, then he hit Langston so hard teeth and blood joined the phlegm on the grass. Before I could react, Juliana was standing between them.

“No, Max,” she said. “You're not a murderer. Langston is, but you're not.”

Sadie took Max's elbow and said, “She's right. Let's get out of here.”

Langston tried to get to his feet, only to stumble and fall in the mud. Max grabbed Langston by the hair, wrenching his head around before shoving his face into the phlegmy mud.

“I have not forgotten,” Max hissed. “I will never
forget.”

“You'll forget when you're dead,” Langston screeched, then his head lolled to the side. Behind him stood Aregonda, her scrunched face telling me that she was responsible for Langston's sudden stupor. So, she could do a bit more than persuade, and she didn't need contact to do it.

“He won't remember any of this,” Aregonda bit off. “Get to the truck.”

With that, she walked toward the parking area. Sadie and Jerome immediately followed, but I found myself staring at Juliana. Max was staring at her too, his expression a mixture of fury and confusion.

“What?” Juliana demanded. “Get out of here while you can.”

“And if we don't want to?” I countered, just to be a jerk.

“Listen, since your stunts at the Promenade, there's a reward out for you,” Juliana replied, her eyes darting between me and Max. “All of you. Get out of here, before some bounty hunter spots you and tries to cash in.”

“What is it with you?” I wondered aloud. “Are you evil or what?”

Juliana shrugged. “Depends on who you ask.” With that, she helped Langston to his feet and guided him toward the stage. For a moment I thought Max was going to follow, then he spat and walked off in the direction of the truck. I watched as Juliana
practically dragged the much-larger Langston along for another moment—no one stopped to help, which made me wonder if Langston wasn't as loved as the PR campaigns would have us believe. Or maybe his swollen, bloody face had made him unrecognizable. Then I turned and ran after my siblings. It was past time we left the Mundane world.

Leaving the rally was, in a word, interesting.

In more than one word, it was something along the lines of “holy crap, I think I might really die today.”

After Juliana had convinced my brother not to lower himself to Langston Phillips's standards, Max, Sadie, and I ran toward the parking area, intent on getting out of the ensuing commotion. Aregonda was less than pleased when we caught up to her.

“Why did you do that?” she shrieked at Max. “We planned this disruption for months!”

“Yeah, well, you never shared those plans, did you?” Max retorted. “I was forced to make my own plans.”

Aregonda's face turned from red to purple. “Regardless of if we shared them or not, you acted
out of turn!”

“Out of turn?” Sadie repeated. “Listen, woman—”

Aregonda made a grab for Sadie's arm. “Do not doubt your betters, child.”

I grabbed the back of Aregonda's shirt, lifting her up a bit. “Do not doubt the Inheritor, adult,” I said in Aregonda's ear. I released her shirt, letting her fall to her knees. Max jogged up beside me.

“Thanks,” he murmured. “What's the plan?”

“We get to the truck before Aregonda and Jerome, get out of here, then you tell us what the hell just went down with you and Langston,” I replied.

“I'm down with sixty-six percent of that,” Max replied. Based on our luck of late, those were damn good odds.

We ran toward the truck, dodging rally attendees and Peacekeepers alike. Somehow it had gone dark and it was almost impossible to see anything at a distance, but that midafternoon darkness made it easier for us to blend in with the freaked-out masses. By the time we reached the parking area it was choked with people running in all directions, screams for both Elemental rights and eradication competing for airspace.
Yeah, Max, great plan you had back there
. Suddenly, Jerome was in front of us.

“This way,” he shouted, and we followed him toward the edge of the field. He opened the door to a military truck, then hopped behind the wheel while we climbed into the back and he burned rubber out
of there. Finally, someone with a driving style I could appreciate.

“We need to get some space between us and them,” Jerome shouted over his shoulder. “If they—”

The world tilted, and we crashed against the roof.

Once the dust settled, I found a soft hand in mine. Sadie's hand. “You okay?” I croaked.

“Never better,” she replied in her best imitation of Max. “Let's go.”

I mentally assessed my body—sore shoulder and hip, but nothing seemed broken. “Going. Good.”

We found Max toward the rear of the truck, bleeding, but alive. Once we had him on his feet, the three of us extricated an unconscious Jerome from behind the wheel, then dragged him and ourselves out to the road. As we debated which way we should walk, floodlights flared to life.

“Scatter!” Max yelled.

I turned toward the trees, but flashlights were coming down the slope. Terrified, I tried to sprint across the road, but the floodlights blinded me. I heard Sadie screaming, but a helicopter was suddenly overhead, its propeller making so much noise I couldn't hear my own thoughts. The wind it generated was so strong I could hardly remain standing.

I ran, my shins aching as my feet struck the pavement, away from the noise and the wind. More Peacekeepers melted out of the trees, and suddenly the helicopter's searchlight was on me. I swerved
toward the woods, but the helicopter bore down, the wind from its propellers knocking me to the road. The last thing I remember was two sets of hands pulling me upright and a syringe piercing my neck.

I woke up in a cell.

Again.

This was getting old.

This time around, the insides of my eyelids felt like they had been coated in sand, my head pounded, my left shoulder and hip were screaming with pain, and my mouth was full of cotton. I rubbed the hard lump where the needle had punctured my neck, wondering if it had been loaded with tequila.

Groggily, painfully, I pushed myself up on my elbows. Gravity, the bitch, shoved me right back down. The floor, gritty and smelly and blessedly cool, seemed to be where I'd be staying for a while.

I felt a hand settle between my shoulder blades. I peeked over my shoulder and felt a new wave of
nausea. Jerome, the Peacekeeper of questionable intentions, was not only interred with me, but touching me.

“Max,” I croaked. “Sadie.”

“Max is still out,” Jerome murmured. “Sadie fell asleep a while ago.”

I nodded, my swollen brain not appreciating the movement. A moment later, Jerome pressed something cool into my hand.

“It's not drugged, as far as I can tell,” Jerome explained, when I looked dubiously at the water. “It takes a long time to dissolve the dampeners. Time these guys didn't have.”

Huh. So maybe we really
had
thrown the Peacekeepers for a loop. Maybe Jerome really was on our side. Maybe my head would just explode already and get me out of this nightmare.

I sipped the water, then pressed the plastic cup against my forehead. Why were they always chasing us, capturing us, drugging us? Were Peacekeepers really that terrified of Elemental abilities?

Wait—Sadie had fallen asleep?

“Sadie wasn't drugged?” I looked around the cell and saw my brother lying on the floor against the opposite wall, Sadie slumped beside him.

“No. Only you and Max were injected.” My eyes swiveled back to Jerome, my mind reeling. Why would Max and I be drugged, but not the Inheritor?

I gulped the rest of the water, pleased that it was
dissolving my mental fog. Jerome refilled my cup, then I dragged myself next to Max. I flicked water droplets onto his face until he sputtered awake. From the look of him, he'd gotten the killer dose.

“You and I were drugged,” I said, while he drank the water. “Not Sadie or Jerome.”

Max's eyes lit up, but that was his only acknowledgement. He looked to Sadie, reassuring himself that she was safe, then he held the cup out to Jerome.

“Fill it,” Max growled, when Jerome only stared. Jerome grabbed the cup and stalked off to what I now saw was a bucket in the corner. As if this second imprisonment wasn't bad enough, we were drinking standing water. While I willed my stomach to be calm, Max whispered, “The deadening drugs don't last very long. If they don't know we've woken up, we're good.”

“Deadening?” I repeated.

“Sleep of the dead,” Max explained.

As creepy as the name was, it was appropriate. You see, the dead don't dream, and that's exactly what I needed to do now. If they were drugging us to keep us from dreaming, it meant that the cell we now occupied wasn't warded against dreamwalking. Finally, I had a way to reach Micah.

“You ready?” I asked.

“You know it.” With that, Max grabbed my hand, and we fell into dreamland together.

While Peacekeepers and other government officials strut around implying that they're the biggest and the baddest in Pacifica, there are quite a few things they don't know about Elementals, specifically about Dreamwalkers like Max and myself. For instance, we can put ourselves to sleep at will.