elemental 04 - cyclone (6 page)

One of the elders rang a bell, signaling the beginning of the battle. Aira called the wind to her, inhaling and exhaling, visualizing the air as a thing of physical substance. She quickly formed a shield around herself, a vortex of wind of which she was the center. True to her suspicions, Aurion turned his attention to her first, followed by Solana. Solana was murmuring a spell, and Aira strained to listen, to determine what she was trying to do. She realized the other woman was trying to subvert her control of the wind. In the meantime, Aurion was crafting darts out of air energy. Asher was calling birds into the room—his target at the moment unclear.

Aira kept up her shield, blocking the darts that Aurion hurled at her. She turned part of her attention onto Solana and began to murmur a spell to herself. It would block out any attempts from another elemental to subvert her ability, buying her a little time to make an offensive. 

“Aira!” Asher called out. She finished the spell, holding the shield in place with effort. Asher was surrounded by various birds of prey, along with a few smaller birds, and Aira raised an eyebrow; his defenders or attackers—she wasn’t sure which—were hovering around him, and she wondered just what he wanted. 

“Two on one seems a bit unfair, wouldn’t you say?” he asked with a faint smile. Aira laughed.

“Well, I suppose I am asking for it. What did you have in mind?” 

Aurion was still throwing darts, but Solana had not yet realized that her spell was not going to work. 

“I take Aurion off your hands, you get Solana? And then we switch?” 

Aira laughed again. “What about me? I’m still a threat to you.” 

Asher shrugged. “We can work that out later!” 

Aira held eye contact with the other elemental; she knew well enough to know not to put her guard down around Asher. Air-aligned charm was strong, but fickle. She grinned at him. “Burn that bridge when we come to it? Okay, I’m game.” 

Asher whistled sharply and the birds stopped hovering, flitting through the air at Aurion. The other elemental had to stop throwing his darts at Aira, instead aiming them at the flocking birds that descended upon him. Aira knew Aurion didn’t have the ability to communicate with the birds, not like Asher, so he wouldn’t be able to command them to stop. 

Solana was casting energy-based spells, trying to get through Aira’s shield. Aira decided to confront the other woman on closer terms. She intensified the winds around her, closing her eyes and rising slowly but steadily into the air under the propulsion of the wind. She cleared the line of birds darting and swooping around Aurion, bringing herself down a few feet away from Solana. She glanced over her shoulder to make sure neither Aurion nor Asher was in a position to take advantage of her inattentiveness. Asher was calling more birds, while Aurion was trying to create a sword out of elemental energy. It would be difficult to maintain a stable, workable sword with the kind of energy air was made of—a knife would work better, but Aira could understand that Aurion didn’t want the reach disadvantage that a knife or dagger would have with it.

Aira landed solidly on the ground, turning her attention fully on Solana. She made eye contact, pushing her will out. She knew persuasion was Solana’s weak spot—she didn’t have the ability, which made her more susceptible to it. Aira knew she had successfully used the talent on Alex and Dolores as well as on Aiden and Dylan, and pushed out with her mind, bringing her will to bear. “Stop casting spells,” she said brusquely, lashing out against the woman’s will, against her mind. She felt Solana attempt to resist, and reinforced her persuasion, pushing out as firmly as she could with her thoughts. “Stop,” she said again, holding the eye contact. Solana’s dark eyes clouded with confusion, and she looked away from Aira’s face, shaking her head slightly as the words stopped spilling from her lips. She tried to start again but couldn’t, as Aira caught her gaze and repeated the command one last time. She brought all of her will to bear on Solana, disrupting the woman’s thoughts with her persuasive ability until she was completely confused.

“Look out!” Asher called. Aira turned on her heel in time to see Aurion taking a pot shot at her. She brought up a gust of wind, deflecting the dart he had thrown her way. She heard it clatter to the floor; a thing so fully realized that it was almost substance. It began to dissolve the moment it hit the ground. Aira decided that, with Solana at least temporarily out of commission, she could turn her attention onto Aurion. For safety, she edged to the side so she could see the other woman in the corner of her vision while she began to form a bow with her hands, calling up the energy from inside of herself and focusing it into arrows. She had practiced this particular skill several times—with her grandmother and again with Aiden—and had acquired the ability to form the bow quickly. It didn’t need to be as fully realized as Aurion’s darts, or his sword; the arrows were trickier, needing to have some substance to them.

Aira kept her wind tunnel up with part of her mind, knowing she would have to change it once she was ready to begin shooting. She’d be partially vulnerable, but she knew if she moved quickly enough she could minimize the opening either man had. Her control over the wind itself was better than either of theirs, Aira knew that. She decided to take to the air again, to give herself the best vantage. She rose steadily, dodging the retreats of a few hawks and several mocking birds. Aira could see what Asher was doing, what his strategy was. He was using the smaller birds to create openings in Aurion’s defenses, distracting and harrying him, while the larger birds made dives meant to actually wound. Some had succeeded. Aurion bore scratches and bite marks on his arms, and his face wasn’t totally unscathed either. 

“You already put Solana out of business?” Asher called up to her. 

Aira glanced at him and shrugged. 

“Well done!” 

Aira thought that if he was going to betray her, it would be then. Her mind was moving a million miles per hour, trying to find the openings Asher’s birds were missing. She didn’t want to kill Aurion—only maim him sufficiently to take him out. Asher called the birds around himself, pulling back from Aurion. Aurion paused, noticing the change. 

“We agreed that two on one was unfair,” he said, as the birds hovered protectively around him. “I’ll take winner.” Aira thought it shrewd in the other elemental; he would have the winner—who would be weakened by the other contender. “And keep an eye on Solana, too.” That at least was somewhat in keeping with their original agreement. Aira nodded shortly, drawing her bowstring. 

Aurion began to fashion darts again, looking up at Aira within her vortex. He knew she would have to lower the wind directly in front of her in order to be able to shoot, Aira could tell. She would have to be very fast to get her shot. She smiled slowly to herself; she could up her odds a little bit—Aurion didn’t have her command of the wind, according to Dylan. She held her bowstring taught until the muscles in her arms began to tremble with the effort; in spite of the fact that it was made from energy, it provided resistance that couldn’t be matched by any actual bow in existence. She waited until she had her precise target. Changing the winds around her, Aira dropped the wind in front of her away, pulling it up through the vortex and using it to give more power to her shot as she let the arrow fly. 

She brought the wind back up around her the moment the arrow cleared her vortex, deflecting Aurion’s attempt to shoot a dart at her at the last possible moment. Her arrow hit square in his shoulder. He shouted in pain and anger, faltering slightly. Aira took her second shot quickly, taking advantage of his brief distraction to fire it off, aiming for his thigh. It hit and Aurion shouted out again, staggering where he stood. He threw a dart at her ineffectually, the missile falling to the floor well short of the target. Aurion crumpled to the floor in pain, and Aira held herself back for a moment, waiting to see if he would rally.

When he didn’t, she wheeled around midair, turning to face Asher. The other elemental was still surrounded by birds; Solana was coming out of her persuaded trance. Aira brought the wind vortex that surrounded her down and shot cleanly at Solana, catching her in the back of the shoulder before she brought her wind-based shield back up once more. 

“You had to figure this would be the outcome,” she said wryly. 

Asher grinned. “I rather thought it would.” 

Aira suddenly understood the play Asher had made. He had wanted to go for her all along, but knew she would be the more difficult opponent to take out. If he attacked her immediately, he would have still been left with Solana and Aurion. If he hung back and let her take care of the other two, he could hope to deplete her focus or her energy and have her vulnerable as well as not have to deal with either of the other opponents in a serious fashion. Aira wondered how much Asher knew about her. She let out a piercing whistle, a trill, and then a raucous cry, momentarily distracting the birds around her opponent. She couldn’t hold them completely—she knew that. Asher had the better control over them. But she could confuse them just enough to keep them from harrying her the way they had Aurion.

“You might be their bestie,” she called to Asher, “But I do speak their language.” 

Asher chuckled.

“Come down then, and we’ll dispense with birds and arrows both.” 

Aira wondered what the other elemental had up his sleeve. She knew from Aiden and Dylan that he had persuasive abilities. Was he counting on using them, the way she had used her own ability to compel Solana? Aira considered, as she slowly descended to the floor, that Asher might just be her match, at least when it came to strategy and intellectual ability. He had certainly gotten his way pretty squarely. She maintained the vortex around her but absorbed the energy of the bow back into her body, watching it disappear. Asher gave a series of calls, dismissing his birds—true to his word. Aira stood, fighting the urge to fidget, knowing he was playing a psychological game. He wanted her to be the one to make the first move. If she could cause him to attack first, she could see what other skills he might have, skills that Dylan and Aiden might not know about. She tried to think of what she might be able to do that would surprise the other elemental.

Slowly, Aira smiled to herself. The deep well of water energy within her gave her the answer. She couldn’t do the things her grandmother could do, but the energy flowing through her, her grandmother’s potent watery essence, was coming to the forefront. She glanced up at the ceiling. She wouldn’t be able to manage as potent a storm as she had made with Dylan, but it could give her an edge. She pushed out with her mind, calling up the watery energy reserve she had within her and combining it with the tumultuous, tempestuous air energy. A heavy, angry-looking cloud began to form above. She began to inhale and exhale, blowing a growing wind through the room. Aira watched the gale forming, the cloud beginning to become so heavy that it would have to expel its contents in rain. There was not enough energy in her, or water in the room, to create a truly magnificent storm, but in the next instant it began to rain, and Aira turned her attention back onto the wind. 

She looked at Asher, meeting his gaze. She felt his will pressing against her mind. She knew what he was going to do next—he would attempt to persuade her, to compel her using that facet of his abilities. 

“We should call it off right now,” he said, projecting his will and his voice across the vaulting room. Aira clamped down on her mind, fighting the penetration of his presence. She remembered the feeling of Alex’s compulsions, the way he had wormed his way into her mind.

“We can’t do that,” she replied firmly. “They haven’t rung the bell. It’s not over.” 

Asher made one last attempt, pressing his will against her mind, and Aira imagined her body as a gust of wind, immaterial, a force of nature that could not be moved by him, a self-willed unstoppable energy. She called up the wind more strongly, exhaling a steady gust that she directed with her hands. Asher was pushed back slowly but steadily, driven along the floor by the force of her gales. Aira shaped a vortex with her hands and pushed the full force of her energy into it, pulling it even out of the clouds and steadily pushing Asher away from her. He was pressed against the wall, trapped by the wind tunnel she had formed, and Aira held him there, not sure of what she should do to put an end to the fight, to conclusively win. 

The bell rang through the air, overcoming even the howling of the wind, and Aira stopped immediately, bringing her hands down at her sides and inhaling sharply, calling the wind back into herself. She staggered, the energy flowing into her so quickly that she was overwhelmed by it. Asher slumped to the floor, his legs giving out without the push of the wind holding him up. 

“The battle is over,” the elder in charge called out. Aira watched as one of the other elementals, an air elemental, used his abilities to push the storm cloud out, dissolving the energy that formed it and dispersing it through the room. “Solana and Aurion, you are out of contention,” another elder said. “Asher and Aira, you are still in the running to be the ruler of the element of air. You will face off separately against the other two contenders on another occasion.” 

Aira felt tingling running up and down her limbs, the energy surge rushing through her body. She nodded, thinking she had to get out of the building before she lost her ability to control her own element and the wind began to respond to her without her conscious will directing it. 

“You will both return for the next session.” The elders turned almost as one and left the gallery, and Aira slumped to the floor, feeling too weak and all too powerful all at once. She looked up and saw Dylan and Aiden smiling down at her, Dylan with a thumbs-up to indicate how well she had done. She gathered herself and made for the door she had entered from.

C
HAPTER
8

DYLAN FELT AS THOUGH HE was continually waiting for the other shoe to drop. Preparing Aira for the first of her trials to become the ruler of her element had been relatively straightforward – he and Aiden had simply sparred with her and shared what they knew about the weaknesses and strengths of the elementals she would be up against. He had been impressed—not quite surprised—at the display of power Aira had shown in her first battle. Dylan knew his brother had been particularly pleased to see Aira handling herself so well. The way she had handled being attacked by two other elementals at once, and then strategizing until she was at the very end against Asher, boded very well for her indeed. He had been surprised by the display of pure power that came with the storm she had created in the middle of the arena. It reminded him more of her grandmother than something he would have thought she could do on her own. When he asked her about that particular trick, she had told him about her grandmother’s transfer of her vital energy and how it had come into play in that particular moment. Clearly, Lorene had anticipated it might come in handy, not just to steady her granddaughter, but also for her own survival.