Defy (10 page)

Of course, Luvania might not have lived long
enough to give anyone a description of her attackers. In which
case, the Waresti wouldn’t necessarily think to address this
particular group of Mercesti males. As long as the males kept their
activities quiet and weren’t targeting Corgloresti forms or similar
activities, the Waresti would have little reason to pursue
them.

Zachariah shook his head. It was really none
of his business, he thought. He had no obligation to find those
males.

As soon as he purged the last of Nyx’s toxin
from his system and regained his energy, he would change his course
and be on his way.

Climbing was remarkably challenging in the
dark.

Tiege came to this cheery conclusion about
halfway down the cliff face. It had been years since Tate last
dragged him down this cliff with her to explore the caves. The path
they had used hadn’t changed much since then, he was pleased to
note. But a fully grown male didn’t have quite as many sturdy
handholds as a younger one.

At the moment, he sat on a small ledge
considering the best way to get down the rest of the way. Out of
the corner of his eye, he saw flashes of silver and blue-green.

Damn. He’d been spotted. He should have used
his second power, but he hadn’t wanted to expend the energy any
more than he already had.

Trying to hurry to get away would have been
foolish. Wings were much faster and he’d probably just end up
slipping and falling onto the jagged rocks. So he watched as C.K.
and Ini-herit approached, followed very closely by Quincy carrying
Sophia.

“What are you doing out here, Tiege?” C.K.
asked. She hovered a few feet away with a concerned expression on
her face. When Quincy flew up beside her, she glanced over with
surprise. “Hi, Quincy. Soph.”

All eyes turned to Tiege. He shrugged. “Just
out for a climb.”

C.K. snorted. “Tate was always a better liar
than you,” she said. “That’s why you always let her do the talking
when you two got into trouble.”

There was a heavy pause as everyone focused
on her words. Intentionally keeping his tone casual, he said, “Tate
doesn’t let anyone else do the talking if she has a say in it.”

“You speak of your sister as though she is
still alive,” Ini-herit said.

Tiege blinked over the other male’s
perception. He couldn’t tell them where he was going. As an elder,
Ini-herit shared thoughts with Uncle Gabriel, who shared thoughts
with his father. This venture would be over before it began, and he
had to get to Tate.

“What’s going on, Tiege?” Sophia asked then.
“You’ve got a waterskin and a bag that appears to have some food
and clothing. You’re wearing your kamas. Something’s up.”

He looked again at Ini-herit. C.K. caught the
glance. “Don’t worry about him,” she said, giving Ini-herit a firm
look. “He’ll keep his thoughts to himself.”

Somehow, Tiege wasn’t convinced. But the
longer he sat there chatting with them, the longer it would take
him to get to Tate. “Okay,” he said, looking between C.K. and
Sophia. “Tate’s alive and I’m going to get her.”

As he had expected, his cousins exchanged
concerned and dubious glances. Quincy looked equally troubled.
Ini-herit, however, was the elder of a class based on faith.

“How do you know this?” he asked.

“I experienced some kind of connection with
her earlier. She’s in pain and in a dark place. She called out to
me for help.”

“Then you should be acquiring assistance from
your parents and not out here alone.”

Frowning, Tiege replied, “My dad doesn’t
believe me. He forbade me from discussing it with my mom or my
uncles. He thinks I had a nightmare resulting from the trauma of
Tate’s death.”

Again, his cousins and Quincy exchanged
looks. But Ini-herit just studied him with his placid gaze and
said, “That would certainly be the human explanation for such an
experience.”

Tiege couldn’t deny the deflating effect of
the words.

“However,” Ini-herit continued, “I think they
are incorrect.”

Amazed, Tiege found himself unbelievably
grateful to this male he barely knew. He caught C.K.’s thoughtful
gaze as she looked between him and Ini-herit. She nodded.

“Okay,” she said. “You think Tate’s still
alive and Ini-herit has faith in you. That’s enough for me.”

“You’ll help me get to her?” Tiege asked.

“We can go to our parents,” she said, but
stopped when Tiege shook his head.

“No, you can’t. They’ll communicate with my
dad, and besides, they’ll all feel the same way he does. They won’t
believe me.”

“You can’t know that,” Quincy said. “We
should try.”

“Did you believe me?”

Quincy didn’t reply. It was enough of an
answer to Tiege’s thinking.

“Look, you’re all keeping me from my sister.
So either get on board and help me out, or let me keep climbing,
okay?” When they all exchanged looks, he continued in a quieter
voice, “You didn’t feel her pain. She’s frightened and alone. I can
somehow feel her pulling me to her. I have to get to her.”

“Quincy and I are coming with you,” Sophia
declared. When Quincy’s eyebrows shot up and he started to reply,
she looked at him and said, “I can’t fly yet unless I shift. I need
you to carry me. And you and I harbor the same guilt over what
happened on that cliff. Doing this will help us both as much as
Tiege.”

His mouth closed without issuing a word. He
held her gaze and nodded.

Tiege turned to look at C.K. She raised one
corner of her mouth. “You can’t fly. You’ll need someone to carry
you.”

“You are not strong enough to carry him while
flying,” Ini-herit pointed out. “Not very far, anyway.”

“You’re right,” she said. “That’s why you’ll
be coming with us.”

“I think not.”

“Come here,” she said, grabbing his arm and
prompting him to fly with her a brief distance away.

Tiege watched, fascinated, as she talked with
the elder. She spoke in a low voice as the wind blew her wavy,
shoulder-length hair around her head. The effect added to the
obvious emotion behind her words as she gestured and stared
Ini-herit down. Whatever she said had him inching away from her as
though to escape. She followed him.

Finally, they returned. Ini-herit’s
expression hadn’t changed, but he said, “It appears I will be
traveling with you.”

“We’ll need flight harnesses for you and
Soph,” C.K. said to Tiege.

“I have some at my cottage,” Quincy responded
in a resigned voice. He flew forward and passed Sophia to
Ini-herit. “I’lal be right back.”

“Good.” C.K. said as he flew off. Then she
caught Tiege’s gaze. “If we’re going to get any kind of head start
before they chase us down, you’ll have to do your thing.”

Tiege understood. Nodding, he focused on
opening up his second power…the power of illusion. He’d already
done so at home to keep his parents from catching him, but he
needed to extend it to include those who would now be traveling
with him. Sweat broke out on his brow as he concentrated. Quincy
returned with the flight harnesses and his satchel before he
finished.

When Tiege was done, he returned his focus to
those around him. “Okay. We’re covered.”

“If we leave now,” Quincy said, “there’s no
turning back.”

They all exchanged looks. Tiege sat tensely
as they came to their individual decisions. In the end, C.K. took a
harness from Quincy and tossed it to Ini-herit.

“Buckle up,” she said. “We’re going to get
Tate.”

The cave had been entirely underground, Tate
realized as she began to explore the area. The exterior was little
more than a ten-foot hump in the ground leading to the large cave
entrance. That hump was liberally covered by foliage. She wouldn’t
have even known the cave was there if she hadn’t emerged from it
herself.

Getting away from the cloying darkness of the
cave was both a relief and absolutely terrifying. Her father’s
warning of her being too young and not having enough experience to
venture away from home resounded in her head.

I’m sorry, Daddy
, she thought, though
it did her little good now.

In an effort to give herself more confidence
as she made her away on unsteady legs into the forest, she clutched
her nunchucks in her hands. Every noise made her start. Since she
wore her torn skirt as a sort of cloak around her neck to keep it
handy, the fluffy fabric billowed up with every jerky movement. She
knew she looked ridiculous, but that was hardly an issue right
then.

She decided to venture to the left of the
cave, as the trees were less dense in that direction. Although she
had the ability to create water using her elemental power, she
couldn’t create much more than enough to drink, which she had
already done. She wanted to find enough water to bathe in and wash
her clothes.

The desire to be clean wasn’t just a vanity,
though that had a little to do with it. She knew very well that
animals and other predators would scent her more if she reeked. So,
as she walked, she scanned the forest for possible aid.

To say her Aunt Olivia and Uncle James were
nature enthusiasts was like saying Tate currently found herself in
a little predicament. Her relatives loved the outdoors. Their home
was surrounded by trees with a shrub-lined path leading to the
central training paddock. In fact, their powers were
nature-based.

Since her Aunt Olivia had been her primary
teacher growing up, Tate learned a great many things about plants
and wildlife. So when she reached a large clearing and spotted some
lemon balm plants, she almost shrieked with joy.

Bending down, she picked as many of the
lemon-scented leaves as she could stuff into her pants pockets. She
had to be careful when she stood up not to lose her pants, which
were currently being held up by her weapons harness in an impromptu
belt. It wouldn’t be comfortable for long, but she just needed to
get to water.

She got even luckier about an hour later. As
the sun began lightening the sky, she found a small grove of
Sapindus Mukorossi trees. Their yellowish-brown fruit, known as
soap nuts, were ideal for creating cleansers. She added those to
her pockets with the leaves.

Although she shifted her eyes in every
direction, she failed to find anything edible as she walked. At the
moment, her lingering body aches overrode any hunger pangs, but she
knew she’d soon need food. Unfortunately, she was moving so slowly
that even had she been armed with a sharp blade, she wouldn’t have
been able to successfully hunt for meat. Thus, she prayed for
edible plants or berries.

The sun continued to rise and cross the sky
as she plodded on. In almost direct opposition, Tate’s spirits
sank. Exhausted, she stumbled through yet another clearing. Then
she heard a sound that gave her enough energy to run. When she
broke through the trees, a huge smile lit her face.

A hot spring.

Almost giddy, Tate started undressing. She
considered tossing aside her useless bra and panties since they
were both torn beyond repair, but then she figured she might need
the cloth for something and decided she’d just carry them in her
pants pockets. So she added them to the pile with the rest of her
clothes.

She removed the lemon balm leaves and set
them to the side in a pile. Then she filled each of her socks with
some soap nuts, using a rock to crush them. After a brief hunt, she
found a slightly rounded piece of bark about the size of a serving
platter and filled it with some of the steaming water from the
spring. Securing the end of the sock containing the crushed soap
nuts, she set it in the bark-bowl to steep. She then took the other
soap nuts a short distance away to a shallow part of the hot
spring. Once there, she got to work scrubbing her clothes.

Thirty minutes later, when she decided the
clothes were as clean and unscented as they could get, she had a
whole new appreciation for the Lekwuesti and their abilities. Her
arms ached and sweat dripped down her face.

She laid her clothes on a large rock so they
could dry. Leaning against the rock as the sky began softening in
color with the sunset, she removed the beads and feathers she wore
in her hair. One by one, she set each hair decoration in a divot on
the rock’s surface, making sure the beads weighed the feathers
down. It took her several minutes to get everything out, but she
had to wash her hair. Shaking out her curls once they were free of
adornment, she walked over to gather some of the lemon balm leaves
and the bowl containing her crushed soap nut mixture.

The bath was the best she’d ever had. Pushing
aside the fear and anxiety that served as her companion, she soaked
in the hot spring and washed and shampooed herself with the lemon
balm and soap nut liquid she had created. To be extra sure the bad
smell and the grime was completely cleansed away, she washed her
hair and body twice.

She floated in the water until her skin
pruned. Finally, she got out and made her way over to her
still-damp clothes, placing the leftover soap nuts and lemon balm
leaves in a couple of pockets for future use. Then she decided she
had to create a more functional outfit.

The pants were easy enough since the length
of both legs had largely been spared by whatever had torn the rest
of her clothes. Using a strip of fabric torn from her many-layered
skirt, she created a belt. It worked pretty well. She realized she
had somehow managed to lose weight, as her pants—which hadn’t been
very high-waisted in the first place—slid lower on her hips than
they used to and her hip bones were more prominent than usual.
Wondering just how long she had been in that cave, she shrugged it
off and got to work tearing the rest of the seams of her purple,
lavender, dark blue and lime green-swirled tank top.