Invincible (The Aerling Series Book 3) (28 page)

Wrangling Tāwhiri’s power back under
my control, I don’t have to force it to seek out the bonds around the Father.
It’s as if the power is eager to help, to fix what it couldn’t before. The last
of the bonds holding the Father to the Aerling world, to this weird room, snap
in two and send everything into chaos.

The Father is incapable of directly
hurting any of us, thanks to the bonds, but they aren’t enough to contain his
power completely. I don’t know if anything will be. The loose power raging
around the room doesn’t have to be directed at us to do damage. One of the
Aerling soldiers is swept up in a gale and tossed out into the mists filling
the room. A second later, another one goes flying.

Sloane is knocked off her feet, but she
manages to throw up a shield before another Aerling soldier takes us both out.
She’s lost contact with me, her power dropping away in an instant. Not only do
I feel the loss immediately, I panic as the Father’s barrages increase to a
deafening level. He’s getting completely out of control! I don’t know how to
rein him back in. Without Sloane’s help, I know it’s impossible. I’m not strong
enough. Not even close!

Too afraid to take my eyes off the Father,
I reach behind me and grab hold of Sloane’s arm. Her power seeps into my hand,
but it’s not enough and too slow to have any real effect. My eyes completely
bug when I feel the bonds stretching, straining to keep hold of their prisoner.
I have to do something fast or we’ll lose this battle.

Scrambling for a way to boost my power and
Tāwhiri’s, I do the first thing I that pops into my head.

Sloane’s eyes snap open in surprise as my
lips crash against hers. Half my attention is still on the Father, but even
that starts to slip as Sloane forgets what she was doing and responds. Her
shield falls away, but neither one of us notices the increase in the winds. Her
desire to heal and help others reaches out to me. All the scars and aches left
behind from Levi and Olivia and everything we’ve been through draw her in. My
desire to see the truth and show others who they truly are and what strength
they possess consumes Sloane in a single breath.

In the middle of it all is Tāwhiri’s
power, begging for help. Sloane’s power wraps around mine in the most exquisite
way. It fills in all the places where pieces have been torn away.
Tāwhiri’s power sits patiently in between as mine rolls over Sloane’s to reassure
her. Even though she has lost everyone else she ever cared about and has been
passed over by the other Aerlings as inconsequential because her power is not
as outwardly eye-catching as everyone else’s, she is an amazing person who
deserves happiness and love.

This is what my power whispers to her as
it passes judgment. As is does, our power swells, soaking up every ounce of
power left in the room. The bonds holding the Father tighten, making him howl
in pain and rage until he has used up the last of his strength and will. When
everything is rung out of him, silence fills the space.

The vacuum of sounds and activity is
disturbing. I pull away from Sloane even though I’d rather stay there with her
until this is all over, and we both look behind us to where the Father is hunched
over, beaten, broken. I don’t need my power to tell me the fight is over for
good, but it reassures me anyway. I have never seen such an empty expression on
a person’s face as I see on the Father’s in this moment.

“He has nothing left,” Sloane whispers.
“Tāwhiri was the only person he cared about enough to make small
sacrifices for. He’s gone now, even the prison he created for him is gone, and
with it the last of his son’s power. He’s given up.”

It’s almost sad. Olivia told me how
captivated she was with him when she first saw him. His strength and beauty are
gone now. I get the feeling that his power is the only thing left to hold this
husk of a god together, and he knows even that won’t be there to sustain him
much longer. He is a god. One of the most powerful beings in this world, but
that is exactly what finally broke him.

Before we left, Sloane asked what we will
do with the power after Mason and Olivia take it away from those who are
abusing it. I still don’t know the answer to that question, but I know they
can’t keep it. If they do, they’ll end up just like this, consumed by it.

Chapter 30

Destroying Angel

(Olivia)

Snapping my power back to my body, I start
hyperventilating. I can’t control it. Panic wraps its sticky hands around my
throat and squeezes. Fighting against my seatbelt, I try to get my head down,
breath slower, something! The screech of tires and sudden deceleration of the
car only escalates my fear. I can’t even begin to process what’s happening
around me because my vision is starting to go black.

I think I might have screamed when my
hands are suddenly shoved over my mouth and nose if I could have taken a deep
breath, but a moment later Mason’s voice begins to quell the panic. “Breathe
into your hands, Olivia,” he begs. “You’ve got to calm down and tell me what
the hell just happened.”

Vaguely, I wonder how he knew to make me
put my hands over my face, but I’m more focused on the fact that it’s working.
Eventually, my breathing slows and my numb and tingly fingers begin to warm
from my breath and the blood finally reaching them again. It takes several
minutes, but I fall back against my seat a while later, thankfully still
conscious.

“Thanks,” I croak.

“You nearly scared me to death, Ollie!
What happened?” Mason demands.

It’s not his tone that nearly sends me
back into panic mode, but remembering what caused the attack in the first
place. “I got too close,” I say as my breathing begins to escalate again.

Mason jumps in right away and presses both
hands to my face. He pulls me in close, forcing me to focus. “Don’t freak out
again, okay?” He waits until I nod before continuing. “You got too close to
what?”

“The Mother.”

That elicits a response. Mason hangs onto
his control better than I did, but the sudden deflating of his body shows his
shock. “Okay. Okay. We knew this would happen eventually.”

“But Hayden and Sloane aren’t back yet!”
My head starts shaking back and forth, completely out of my control. “We can’t
face her yet. We can’t. I don’t…we aren’t. We just can’t!”

Mason runs his hands through his hair
slowly. “She may not come right away. We have no idea. She won’t run, though. I
don’t think she’ll run.”

“Why not?” I ask. “She’ll do anything to
save herself. We already know that.”

“Anything but lose a chance to gain more
power,” Mason says. Sitting back against his seat, he sighs, deep and heavy.
“She knows what Tū has been doing, what he’s planning. There’s no way
she’ll pass up a chance to take his twin’s power. Imagine what that would do to
Tū’s chance of defeating her.”

“There would be no chance for him,” I say.

“Exactly,” Mason says with another sigh.
Scrubbing his hands through his hair, he stops halfway through the motion and
pulls it in frustration. “She’s coming. We have to get ready, whether Sloane
and Hayden make it back in time or not.”

My stomach drops at the thought of facing
the Mother without them here. Not only do we need their moral support and the
added bonus of their power to help contain her in whatever way we can, I have
the feeling that we’re going to need the Father’s power if we have any hope of
defeating her. The combination of the twins’ power and the Aerling-Escort bond
will be more than I can even really wrap my head around, but the Mother has
been sitting here on Earth since almost the beginning of the world, stealing
Aerling children’s power as often as she can, drawing on the Earth’s power when
she couldn’t, and hoarding everything she takes.

The Father has been locked up in prison
for that same amount of time. There’s no chance that he’s more powerful than
her. Tū and Tāwhiri are less than her as well. She would have made
sure of that. The increases from the blood ties and bonds should be enough, but
we have no hope without everything falling into place at the right time.
Please, Hayden, get back here soon.

“We need to find a place to prepare,”
Mason says.

Looking out the window, I wonder where on
earth we are right now. While I was tracking the Mother, I was a little out of
the loop. The huge fields, bare in the cold weather, stretch out on either side
of the road. I’m not completely sure, but I think I recognize it as a stretch
of highway leading to Denver. We’ve been circling the location where I could
feel the Mother hiding since Hayden and Sloane left. I’m not exactly sure where
that spot is, but I’m pretty confident it’s in southern Utah, somewhere. Moab
if I had to take a guess based on my weird GPS and Evie’s research pointing at
red clay dirt being important. I think she’s been hiding out there since Mason
was brought to Earth as an infant.

The question now is, do we head straight
for her and hope Sloane and Hayden arrive in time, or hole up out here
somewhere and wait for her to show up? After everything Mason said, I’m
convinced she won’t sit around waiting much longer.

“Look at that group of fields over there,”
I say. “There isn’t a building anywhere in sight.”

“You want to stop there and wait?” he
asks.

Shrugging, I make it obvious that I don’t
know what to do. “Having Hayden and Sloane locate us while we’re moving around
was going to be difficult anyway. At least if we’re sitting still Hayden should
be able to bring them back pretty close to us. He’s not a Seeker, but our
connection is strong enough that he should be able to find us. I guess I’d
rather risk being caught like a sitting duck and have to fend the Mother off
for a while than risk Hayden ending up a state away with no way to get to us
when we need him.”

Mason nods his head as his eyes scope out
the fields I pointed toward. “As long as nobody comes to yell at us for
trespassing, it seems like as good a place as any.”

Putting the car back into drive, Mason’s
pulls out onto the mostly empty highway. It’s a short drive to the dirt road
sandwiched between two fields. My eyes are scanning every inch of the place as
we pull in, but there’s no one around. Mason goes about halfway down the road
to where a sparse stand of trees offers us a small amount of cover and turns
off the car.

“Well, I guess we just sit and…”

The crackle of lightning bursting out of a
clear sky sends us both scrambling back against our seats. I’m about ready to
dive headfirst back into another panic attack just from the lightning. The
flash of light that momentarily blinds us both clears a second before my vision
does, but I almost wish it hadn’t.

“Mason, Mason, Mason,” I start to babble
as my finger points at a figure through the windshield.

“Damn it,” Mason swears. His eyes are
glued to her, same as mine.

That’s all either of us can say or do.
Just like the Father, she is the most beautiful creature I have ever seen. Jet
black waves ripple down her back, tendrils falling over her shoulders so
perfectly you instantly know she must have arranged them there just for effect.
Her face is angelic, even if her catty smile is anything but.

A good fifteen feet in front of the car,
even through the windshield I can tell her skin is disgustingly perfect. I half
expect her to be wearing a white robe lashed to her trim body by gold cord like
some Greek goddess. Instead, she’s wearing a trendy pair of tight jeans tucked
into suede boots, the ensemble topped off by an elegant Bohemian top that looks
like it cost a fortune. Aside from the clothes, she’s the epitome of beauty.

All except the evil glint in her eye.

Shifting her stance, she motions for us to
get out of the car. Mason and I glance at her, but I think we’d both rather get
out on our own than by her forcing us. I have no doubt that she would. Slowly,
we reach for the door handles and push our doors open. The Mother’s eyebrows
quirk up in delight. I feel sick. I feel really, really sick. My hands are
shaking as I shove the door closed and wrap my arms around my body to fend off
the cold and the fear.

“Such obedient little children,” she
chirps. “How wonderful.”

Her sugary sweetness is so obviously
false, it makes the urge to puke double and I have to swallow down my disgust
to keep control. Mason’s fingers are twitching. I can feel his power rising
from here. I nearly choke on it when we finally reach each other in front of
the car. Facing the Mother, I’m too scared to pretend at being cool and
collected. I grab Mason’s hand and squeeze it as hard as I can.

“Aren’t you two just adorable?” The Mother
bunches up her shoulders as a fake smile is plastered across her face. “It
really almost makes me feel bad about having to kill you.” She smiles again and
shakes her head like she’s talking about having to toss out a burnt pan of
cookies. “Just almost, mind you. The fact that you’re holding my oldest son’s
power obviously means you’re in league with him, so, well, I have no other
choice. Can’t have the children revolting, now can we?”

I’m honestly too weirded out by this freak
to do anything more than stare at her. Seriously, what is her deal? If you’re
going to be a psychotic murderer, at least have the decency not to pretend
you’re something else. This lady talks like she should be working in Santa’s
workshop or a fifties era dress shop.

Luckily, Mason’s head isn’t shorting out
like mine seems to be. Squaring up to face her, he says, “If anyone has a
choice in this ridiculous mess, it’s you, Mother.”

“Oh good, you do know who I am,” she says.
Her wicked grin splits her face in two. “I do hate having to explain myself.”
She claps excitedly, like a three-year-old about to get candy. “We can just get
down to business now. Efficient. I like that.”

I’m sure her desire for efficiency has
more to do with her selfishness than any ounce of sympathy.

“I don’t think getting rid of us will be quite
as easy as you’re expecting,” Mason says drolly. He’s clearly disgusted with
her performance like I am, but he’s handling this whole situation with way more
calm than I can dredge up.

The Mother chuckles like he’s just said
the silliest thing she’s ever heard. “Why, my dear boy? Because you have
Tāwhiri’s power? Or is it because you and you little girlfriend are
Aerling and Escort?”

Mason stiffens at her accurate assessment
of us. I can feel it in the tension of his body next to mine, but the Mother
sees it as well.

“You poor things,” she says with false
sympathy. “You thought that would be enough?” She shakes her head back and
forth, the slow twitch of her shoulders pretending to feel disappointed for us.
“What a shame you came all the this way…that I came all this way to watch all
of this unfold, just to find myself faced with two children too weak and
incompetent to pose any real threat.”

“Came from where?” I ask. My voice sounds
like it came from a mouse, but it’s still better than I expected.

“Pardon?” the Mother asks.

Gulping down my mounting fear that she
might be right, I say, “Where did you come from?”

“Oh, well, I’m sure you knew what area
I’ve been calling home for the last several years while I watched you and Mason
grow up. Southern Utah is lovely. The red isn’t quite the same as it is back
home in New Zealand, but it’s always nice to have a change of scenery every few
centuries. You two have been quite amusing as well.”

“Glad we could provide you with some
entertainment,” Mason growls.

The Mother bats her eyelashes as she
chortles insincerely. “Oh, Mason, you’ve been splendid to keep an eye on. I was
quite surprised when you survived Tū’s original attack.” She flicks one of
her raven locks over her shoulder. “Of course, Tū and I both felt you
arrive the second you crossed the barrier. It would be impossible for either of
us not to recognize Tāwhiri’s power, even the little spec you had in the
beginning. As usual, Tū took off in a hurry, determined to capture you for
his
interesting
plans as soon as possible. He always was rather brash. I
prefer to take my time. No point in claiming little pseudo Aerlings before they
reach their full power. It’s just a waste otherwise.”

Part of me wants to keep her talking in
the hopes that Hayden and Sloane will make it back with the Father, but I’m
pretty sure Mason is going to lose it soon if she doesn’t shut up. I have no
idea what to say to her that will make any difference, so I just say the first
thing that pops into my mind. “This doesn’t have to turn into a fight.”

Wow, I think I’ve heard that line in about
a dozen movies. Mason gives me a strange look, but the Mother only looks down
her nose at me. All I can do is shrug, I’ve got nothing. “Oh, Olivia, it won’t
be a fight. I can assure you of that. You haven’t the power to make it more
than an inconvenience to me.”

My knees buckle a second later as a massive
disruption sends a blast of air crashing into me from behind. Mason’s keeps me
from falling, but I stand stock-still, too afraid to turn around. Silently, I’m
begging for it to be Hayden. As badly as he handles the trip between worlds, I
wouldn’t be surprised at a rough landing. My hopes are dashed when a voice
stings the air around us.

“Mother, how decidedly unlovely to see you
again,” Tū says with fake syrupiness he no doubt learned from her.