Rootbound

“Loyal, not rebellious.” She tightened her hold on me.

Carefully, I opened myself to my connection to the earth first. It hummed around me, filling me with power before I called on it. Teeth gritted, I reached for my connection with Spirit.

The element writhed inside me, lashing to be let loose. “Damn it.”

The mountain rumbled and the stones around us hopped with the vibration. I swallowed hard and focused all my energy on what I was doing. Whatever balance I’d had was gone and the two elements within me seemed to know it.

The mountain shimmied again despite my efforts to keep it still.

Worm shit, this was going downhill faster than I’d thought possible. I only needed to find the Firewyrms. From there, I was sure they could help me find an entranceway that wasn’t guarded. At least not by Fiametta’s people. Spirit wove around Earth and my power sank into the mountain. I closed my eyes as a shudder rippled through me, not unlike the strange pleasure I’d felt in the graveyard when Talan had stared at me.

But this time, it was my own connection to Spirit that caught the edges of the unwelcome sensation. Muscles clenched, I pushed past it. Through the mountain I sent my power, searching for the creatures that lived alongside the Salamanders. Finally, in the deepest depths of the Pit, I touched on a soul I knew.

Scar. The first Firewyrm I’d ever met. Though he was older now, he lifted his head as my power rolled over him. I sent him a simple command.

Come to me.

In the depths, I felt him move toward us. I withdrew Spirit and Earth, bringing them back to heel easier than I’d thought was going to happen. Balance was what Talan said. What was it I’d done that was so different than before?

The answer was there, just at the edge of my mind, only I couldn’t quite reach it. Damn.

I stood and brushed my hands off. “Now we wait.”

“Why not just tunnel your way in?” Shazer asked.

“And end up inside the Pit because we took a wrong turn? I think not.” I folded my arms.

Minutes ticked by. Bella made a move as if to slide off Shazer. “No, stay there. Please.”

“I thought you were calling up a friend?” She frowned and I shrugged.

“People change. He was a friend, but it has been a lot of years.”

“Someone is coming.” Shazer snorted, and stamped a foot.

The section of mountain next to us crumbled and stones fell in a trickle around my knees, but I didn’t move. A flash of white scales behind the tumbling dirt caught my eye, and then Scar poked his head out of a hole twelve feet high and wide. He’d made a perfect circular opening, big enough that even Shazer would be able to pass with his wings tucked back.

“Larkspur?”

“Hello, Scar.”

His tongue flicked out and he looked past me to Shazer and Bella. “What are you doing here? And why aren’t you coming in through the front door?”

“I need a different way in, one Fiametta doesn’t know about. She’s not happy with me right now.” I looked around him. “This would do nicely, I think.”

He snorted and shook his head, the horns that curled back over his neck brushing against the top of the tunnel he’d made. “Then perhaps I should not let you in. The queen has been our champion since you left, keeping us safe. Allowing us to stay behind when you would call us to battle.”

His tongue snaked out again, and his eyes narrowed. I took a step. “The world was in danger, and you turned away. Don’t think I feel sorry for your scaly ass.”

So maybe that wasn’t the best way to deal with him when we needed his help, but when the Firewyrms had declined to stand with us in the battle against Orion and the demons, I’d been shocked. I’d saved them once, and as far as I was concerned, they owed me.

A snarl rolled out of him. “You know nothing, Elemental. When you left, our people were healthy, and we had a future ahead of us. When the demons were loosed, the sickness they spread,” he shook his head, “it wiped our numbers down to only a few. If we went to battle, we might have been completely wiped out.”

Shame flickered and died before it ever took root. I shook my head. “You mean like the rest of the supernaturals who fought when there were only a few left? There are species that are extinct now, and those who are on the cusp of it. Do not bemoan to me that you only had a few numbers. Everyone was in the same position, and yet they came. You did not.”

He hunched his shoulders and I raised my hand. “It is the past already. No more. Will you allow me to use this entrance?”

The pause was heavy and weighted with things unsaid.

“Please don’t bring the mountain down on us.”

“I would never—” I clamped my mouth shut, rephrased my words and tried again. “I will do my best.”

He snorted softly, but retreated, allowing us access to the opening. “I will let you in for the good you did before. If not for that, I would never allow you to step foot in here.”

I glanced at Bella and gave her a quick nod. She slid from Shazer’s back, and pointed a finger at me. “Do not even try to tell me to wait for you.”

“Would never dream of it.” I stepped into the tunnel. I knew when I could win an argument with her, and when I would have my reasoning handed back to me in pieces. This was one of the latter times.

Scar waited patiently, his scales lighting up the darkness like a giant firefly. I opened my mouth to ask him a question about the feel of the Pit and Fiametta’s current state of mind, and closed it just as swiftly. He was not the friend I remembered. I could almost see the change in him, as if it were imprinted on his scales.