Ertale

 

Despair tore sound from his throat. For the first time in a thousand years, he cried. The walls of the caldera echoed his pain. The voices of his brothers joined his anguish as they raced towards the tower.

Ertale had no time to wait for them. He threw himself at the doorway, battering the stone until it admitted him. She was screaming. Lucie was screaming for help. She was not alone. His heartstone burned with pure terror.

A flash and bang and the tower trembled. Stone fell around him but he felt nothing. He threw up his arm, shield deflecting. He moved up the stairs, aware that the metal trembled and then folded, plunging him back down.

Heavy stone piled on his shield. Both arms held the shield in place while the tower collapsed around him.

He couldn’t hear Lucie. Not her cries. Not her breaths. Not her heartbeat.

Dust filled the air.

His heartstone still pulsed. Faintly. She was still alive.

He shifted enough stones to turn himself in her direction, then he dug. Every stone he shifted sent a cascade of smaller pebbles and dust falling down. Larger chunks required careful consideration. He needed to free himself, but he also needed the stones to stay put, to not hurt Lucie further.

A large slab covered his head, blocking his path. The slab rested on a precarious pile that looked ready to fall over if he nudged it the wrong way. Tunneling under the slab was the safest option, but that would take additional time.

The slab glowed faintly and then wavered. A small opening appeared and a charcoal shaded hand poked through. “Ertale?”

He touched the hand.

“Thank the fires.” Ertale could hear Asche’s sigh of relief. “I’m working to get you out but it’s not going to be fast.”

He grabbed Asche’s hand and pushed it up the hole, wishing he had a way to tell his triad brother to forget him and find Lucie.

“Don’t be stubborn. This isn’t a misguided sentiment of love. We need every pair of hands to move rock.” Asche always understood how Ertale’s mind worked. He tapped Asche’s hand. “This is rather complicated to do when I can’t see the target, so be still.”

Rubble shifted slower than Ertale would like, but he kept still to avoid jostling precariously balanced stones. He pushed when directed and lifted the large slab, sliding it to one side. Eventually, they made a hole large enough for him to crawl through. Sarsen and Asche grabbed an arm, hauling him out.

Partially standing, the tower was a broken, jagged mess. The stairs stopped in mid air, sheared away. Stones, crushed glass panels from the dome and broken machinery stretched further than Ertale could comprehend. Lucie was in there. Somewhere.

He closed his eyes, listening closely for her heartbeat. Faint, like the rain falling over the caldera but never making it in, just the whisper of movement in the air.

There.

Ertale pointed in the correct direction. The valos dug.

 

Sarsen

 

They uncovered the first human. It was male. Ertale dragged the limp, bloody body clear of the rubble and dropped it on the ground. He immediately went back to finding their Lucie.

The sun slipped beyond the rim of the caldera. The half-light of dusk settled over the city. Light from the sunstones refracted on the dust lingering in the air.

Sarsen recognized the male. The strange human fur covered his face but could not disguise his thin, almost starving, look. Enough of the male remained the same that Sarsen identified him as the male who’d attacked Lucie in the Forge. The same male that Lucie hit in the head and sacrificed his blood to open the vault.

A new emotion settled in the pit of his stomach. It was heavier than dread. Colder than guilt.

Responsibility.

This was his fault.

Sarsen allowed himself to be distracted by the vault and the heartstone, by the intriguing female who offered so much, and by the thawing of his own numbed emotions.

He should have disposed of the male who dared to harm Lucie. Even not knowing her significance at the time, it was wrong to allow a Creator to come to harm. He knew what the male did was wrong at the time, but Sarsen did nothing.

How many warnings did he have that something was amiss in the city? How many times did he catch a strange scent and ignore it, explaining it away as Lucie trying his patience? How many times did he catch Ertale scanning the empty levels, searching for an unseen threat? That should have been his first clue.

“I’m sorry I ignored your warning, brother,” Sarsen said. “I will do better.” If Sonhadra allowed him to have his mate back, he would strive to listen and understand the messages in silence.

The male did not breathe. Good. Sarsen would not have to pretend to be upset that he executed a living person.

He manifested his sword, the fiery edge glowing in the dusk. Without ceremony or bidding the male’s spirit a peaceful crossing to the next plain, he plunged the blade into the male’s gut. Sarsen held the blade in place, the flesh glowing brighter and brighter until it burst into flame. The male burned quickly and was reduced to ash in moments.

“Was that entirely necessary?” Asche asked as Sarsen pushed by, heading back to the rubble.

They found Lucie in moments. The yellow fabric of her dress poked through the stones. Sarsen worked with his brothers to shift the stones and dig out their mate. He worked until his fingers went raw and while he did not have blood, his fires leaked and smeared. Finally, they lifted Lucie from the rubble.

Battered, the vivid red blood of human life trickled down her head and matted her hair. The amount of things, just basic knowledge, that he did not have about humans threatened to overwhelm him. If a wound soured, became gangrenous and a limb had to be removed, could it regrow? Did human bones break? Lucie was so light, so fragile in his hands, that Sarsen had to imagine that every precious bone of hers broke. Could those bones heal?

Asche removed the tattered dress and Sarsen took inventory of every scrape, cut and newly formed bruise. Shallow breaths rattled painfully in her chest. An arm hung at an odd angle. That couldn’t be good.             

“We don’t know enough about human anatomy,” Sarsen said at length. They could guess at what was wrong and guess at how to fix the injuries. Even if they understood how humans worked, none of them were healers.

“The humans in the forest—”

“Are useless to us.”

“They can help us,” Asche insisted.

“If any of them were healers, would they be sick and dying? No. They cannot even help themselves.” Sarsen brushed back the hair from Lucie’s face, hair stiff with dried blood. Residual fluid from his renewing fires smeared across her skin. It glistened before being absorbed.

“The medicine… Something in the bag Lucie gave them could help.” Asche rose to his feet, ready to run all night and retrieve medicine that may or may not work.

“There is no time.”

“We can’t not do anything!” The male paced. “I have to try.”

Sarsen ignored Asche and manifested a small dagger. He held it over his hand. “Are you crazy!” Asche batted at Sarsen’s hands, but he managed to slice his own fingertips as planned. Probing the matted mess of Lucie’s hair, he found the gash. His renewing fire covered the wound, absorbing into the skin.

Intrigued, Asche peered closely at the gash. “It’s closing.”

“Our fires did not burn her,” Sarsen said. In fact, the old scars glowed as she accepted their fires.

Ertale sliced his own palm and copied Sarsen’s actions. Laying on hands, they covered her wounds with their fires until every inch of skin glistened. The internal injuries remained difficult to reach.

Sarsen bit down on his tongue, letting the fires flood his mouth. He tilted his mate’s head back and kissed her deeply. She did not respond. He forced open her mouth, jamming his tongue inside. His shared his fires and hoped it would be enough to stabilize her. He kissed her until his mouth went dry and he grew weak.

“Is it enough?” Asche asked.

“No.” Bones remained broken and he had no means to assess internal damage. Judging by her skin, her organs had to be squishy and pliable, which was just asking for trouble. Sarsen gathered her limp form in his arms. He could only think of one possible solution. “We have to bring her to the renewing fires.”

Ertale laid a hand on his shoulder.

“I don’t like it either, but can you think of a better option?” Sarsen refused to look at his brother as he walked. He didn’t need to see the worry and concern. He had his own to deal with.

In the Forge, Sarsen lowered her next to the pool. The renewing fires bubbled and boiled, timeless and serene. Asche handed him the material for a splint to set the fracture arm.

Sarsen ran a hand down the unbroken arm, trying to tease out how human bones should be aligned. Satisfied that he would be able to feel the solid bone under the soft flesh, he ran his hands down the damaged arm. The fracture was not complicated as he eased it back into position. If he was correct about the renewing fires, the bone would heal, but it needed to be set. Satisfied, he tied the splints around the arm. Lucie would not need to wear them for long, but the bone needed to stay in place until he could submerge her in the fires.

“I don’t like this,” Asche said.

No. Sarsen didn’t like it either. It was a terrible idea. “Our fires do not burn her. They made her stronger. If we bring her to the source—”

“We could incinerate her.”

Yes. That was a possibility. “We do nothing, we lose her. If we set her in the renewing fires, she may be healed,” Sarsen said.

“Or incinerated.”

“We have to try.”

Ertale motioned for them to stop talking. He crouched at their mate’s side and placed an ear to her belly. After a moment, he pulled away and held up two fingers.

Asche and Sarsen exchanged confused looks.

Ertale placed a hand on Lucie’s chest, then moved the hand to her stomach. He gave his brothers a meaningful look.

“Did you get that?” Sarsen asked.

“I was going to ask you the same,” Asche replied.

The big male sighed loudly, as if frustrated. He picked up Lucie, cradling her form to his chest. He stepped into the pool.

His frame trembling as the renewing fires worked on him. Slowly, he lowered the precious bundle near the molten liquid. Her feet dangled in. Asche shouted a warning but Ertale had already raised her feet.

They were unharmed. In fact, they were perfectly smooth and pink on the bottom.

“Your stupid idea just might work,” Asche said.

“She’d be proud of us working together instead of fighting.”

“I’m going to kick your ass when this is over.”

“You can try.”

Now they could only wait.