Drenched: Elemental Warriors (A Sci-Fi Alien Warrior Paranormal Romance) Page 15

  He kept his posture straight and waited for his fellow warrior to get close.

  "Well, well," Jalal said. "What a surprise running into you here."

  Luther sighed internally. "I don't see how it is, considering you already knew I was on Earth and you came here specifically to see me."

  "Well. That is true. But maybe it's a surprise for you to see me here."

  "Not really."

  Something in Jalal's face faltered then, and Luther awarded himself mental points. He'd served alongside Jalal for long enough to know how he operated. He wanted to be the center of attention. He wanted to be the best. He wanted to show off and be admired, and if you took that away from him, he got desperate. This wouldn't be hard.

  "How did you know it was me?" Jalal asked, face going hard.

  "I didn't," Luther said. "But I'm not surprised that it is you. You always were too ambitious for your own good."

  "There's no such thing as being too ambitious," Jalal spat. "Ambition is what keeps the world turning. It's people like you who are the problem."

  Luther arched an eyebrow. "People like me? Tell me, Jalal, who are people like me?"

  "People who get complacent." He spat the word like it was something dirty. "Who are satisfied to stagnate. The queen says go dig up some old treasure and you hop to like a good little servant, and you don't even skim off the top."

  "That's what this is about?" Luther asked. "You have a problem with me not taking things?"

  "No!" he snapped. "I have a problem with all of it. We have power, Luther. Even you know that. We're a part of the sea itself just about, and we spend all our time running and fetching for the queen. And for what?"

  "So we can know where we came from."

  "Who cares about where we came from?" Jalal demanded. "We're not going back there, are we? Are we all suddenly going to start living underwater again if we figure out how to build a city? No. We're not. We're going to stay where we are and keep collecting old junk until we die. Or at least you will. I'm done with that life."

  Luther could understand his frustration. He was content with the way his life went, but someone like Jalal craved action. He'd been almost giddy when they had been attacked on a dive years ago, and—

  Wait.

  Something occurred to Luther just then, and he tilted his head, looking at Jalal. "That dive we were on together. The one where you got hurt when we came upon those bandits."

  "What about it?"

  "You know who they were, don't you?"

  Jalal looked surprised and then tried--and failed--to shut his face down before he gave anything else away. "I don't know what you're talking about," he said.

  Luther laughed, a short bark of mirthless laughter. "Oh, Jalal. They have sent the wrong person to do this, I think. You're lying. You know exactly what happened that day."

  "I don't know anything!"

  Anger boiled in him, and he closed his eyes. It was harder here, so far from the sea, to summon his power quickly, but even this water heeded his call, and he thrust his hand out, a thick jet of water splashing from his hand to hit Jalal right in the center of his chest.

  Jalal went sprawling back onto the ground, and Luther advanced on him. "Tell me the truth," he said, voice soft, even in anger.

  "Fine," Jalal spat. "Fine. I know what happened. They were there looking for the Heart of the Sea."

  And...that was not at all what Luther had been expecting him to say. In fact, Luther had no idea what that meant, even.

  "The what?"

  "The Heart of the Sea," Jalal repeated. "It's...I don't know what it is, but it's something they wanted. They think it's the source of our power."

  And suddenly, several things dropped into place. The orange man had said that his boss was a collector, and he wanted their power. This man thought that there were...hearts or something that granted them the gifts that they had.

  The 'Heart of the Sea' was quite possibly the most ridiculous name he had ever heard of before, and Luther couldn't help the true laugh that spilled out of him at that.

  "You're serious," he said. "You're working for people who think that there is some magical--what, crystal or something? That gives us our powers?"

  Jalal lifted one shoulder and slowly got to his feet, keeping a wary eye on Luther. "Well, it has to come from somewhere, doesn't it?"

  "It comes from the sea," Luther said. "The sea itself. We are extensions of it and nothing more. It's not something that they can take."

  "Maybe it is and maybe it isn't," Jalal said. "But either way, they want it."

  "So they sent you to come and take it?"

  "No," Jalal said. "I...I don't know why they sent me."

  Luther didn't think he'd ever seen the man look so confused before. Clearly he'd had some idea in his head about what was going to happen when he confronted Luther, and none of that was going according to plan. Luther almost felt sorry for him. Almost.

  "Let me tell you what I think, Jalal," he said. "I think that they sent you here because they wanted me to kill you. I think they know that you're useless to them now that they've used your information, and they want to get rid of you. They're hoping I'll do that for them."

  "That's not true. They want me to kill you. They have to. Once you're out of the way..." He trailed off.

  Luther laughed again. "Once I'm out of the way, what? What am I in the way of? You think this source of our power is here on Earth and that I'm defending it?"

  "Maybe," Jalal said. "Maybe you found it on a dive and the queen sent you here to hide it."

  "The queen sent me here to take Alanna home. Which the people you work for well know since they're the ones who sent her to Lin-Vayel in the first place." Jalal didn't seem to know what to say to that, so Luther sighed. "Let me tell you how this is going to go, Jalal. I'm not going to kill you. There's no reason for me to. You're no threat to me. What you are going to do is tell me where these people are and what their plan is. And then you're going to go home. You're going to throw yourself to the queen's mercy and hope she sees fit to spare you on the count of your idiocy."

  Jalal looked afraid for all of three seconds and then he started laughing. Something dark and dangerous filled his eyes, and Luther took an involuntary step back.

  "Oh, Luther," he said. "Luther, Luther, Luther. You see, that's always been your problem. You've always been this self righteous, play by the rules, 'yes, Your Majesty' little kiss up. You'll do whatever she tells you to do and never even question it, and that's your mistake. You think I don't know how the queen thinks by now?"

  "Seeing as no one knows how the queen thinks, I'd say you have no idea," Luther said.

  This was not going the way he'd expected it to go, and he was unsure of how to proceed from here.

  Jalal laughed again. "Please. She's easy. She's been sending us down there, looking for treasure for years, Luther. You think she cares about the history of our people? All she wants is power. She's ambitious, too. How could she not be, she's a queen. And she always thinks someone is trying to attack us. With the Heart of the Sea or whatever it's called in her hands, she could be unstoppable. So she sent you down there and you got it. But then, a human shows up and throws a problem in the plan. Someone had to send the human there, but who? And what do they want? She already knew what they wanted, and she knew the best way to keep it from them."

  "What?"

  "Oh, you think I don't know? If they attack Lin-Vayel looking for it, they won't find it. And why would they think to look here on this little nothing of a planet? Why would anything special or powerful ever be here? It wouldn't right? Except it is. Because you're hiding it. You're keeping it safe for the queen until she calls you back with it. But you're never going to make it back to Lin-Vayel, Luther. I'm going to kill you, and I'm going to take the Heart and take it back to my boss, and he'll reward me with everything I've ever wanted."

  "You're insane," Luther said. "I don't know who's been filling your head with these lies and stories, but you'
re crazy to believe them. There is no Heart, and the queen didn't send me here with anything. And you couldn't kill me if you tried."

  Perhaps not the smartest thing to say to someone already on the edge of madness, but Luther was angry now.

  "Oh, please, Luther. I could kill you right now if I wanted to. But I knew you weren't going to cooperate. I knew you'd be all noble about this, defending the queen's lies. So I have a backup plan."

  He walked back towards the shuttle and pressed his hand to a touch pad on the side of it. The tinted windows cleared, revealing the inside of the shuttle and--

  Luther saw red.

  There in the cockpit was Alanna, bound and gagged and spitting mad from the looks of it. She was struggling fiercely, and Luther could only imagine how upset she was to have been kidnapped a second time.

  "Let her go," he growled, and his tone brooked no argument.

  "No,” Jalal said. "Not until you give me the Heart. If she's so important to you, trade for it."

  "There is no Heart! You're stupid for ever believing there was one. Now let her go, or I will kill you."

  He didn't have his trident on him, but that was fine. He didn't need it for this. He was boiling mad, and the power was rising in him like steam in a kettle. The sea inside of him echoed his rage, and he knew that when he called the power, it would come to him, with all the force of his anger.

  "You can't kill me," Jalal said. "But I can kill her. Is being the queen's pet really more important than your precious human there? Hasn't she suffered enough?"

  And that was the final straw. Luther drew his arm back and made a fist before slamming it forward. A tide of water followed the motion, flowing down his arm to rush forward and slam Jalal against the side of the shuttle hard.

  Luther spared a glance for Alanna, who was watching with wide eyes. He hoped she wouldn't think less of him for this.

  He let Jalal get to his feet, eyes narrowed as he watched him.

  "You're not faster than me," Luther said.

  Jalal snorted and then lashed out with his own burst of water, which knocked Luther off of his feet. He took a moment to clear his eyes, and then Jalal was rushing him, dagger in hand.

  Luther knew this about Jalal already, though. He never took the time to wait and see how things were going to play out. He rushed in blindly, and he made mistakes.

  It was one of these mistakes that Luther planned to exploit.

  Jalal slashed at him with the dagger, and Luther tried to keep out of the way of it, using water to deflect and shield himself, not attacking, waiting.

  One lucky slash caught him on his arm, ripping through his shirt to the skin. It stung, but Luther ignored it in favor of watching Jalal. This wasn't the kind of fight he enjoyed, Luther knew that, and sooner or later, he would get bored with it.

  When it happened, Luther was ready. Jalal laughed and he took a step back. He held Luther's eyes, and then he melted.

  It was a foolish thing to do on this planet. In the pure sea water, it was hard enough to remember how to reform without help. Here, where there were all manner of runoffs and contaminants, it would be nearly impossible.

  They were on a hill, and below it was a road. It was mostly deserted, which was why they had chosen this place to meet, but Luther had been here long enough to know that even deserted roads had access to the sewer system.

  When Alanna had explained it to him, he'd found it disgusting to even contemplate the amount of dirty water underneath them, but it would be even worse to be one with it.

  Too bad for Jalal.

  He melted, and Luther acted. He directed the next burst of water at the puddle that was someone he had once fought alongside and called an ally.

  With one powerful jet, he sent the whole torrent of it streaking down the hill where gravity and momentum did the rest. He didn't look, but he could feel it as it was sluiced into the storm drain and then down into the sewer.

  Luther shuddered. What a waste.

  He knew what he'd done would weigh heavily on him, but for now there were more pressing matters to attend to. He had to contact the queen and let her know what had happened. They needed a plan of attack. They needed—

  An angry sounding thump from the shuttle caught his attention, and Luther swore when he remembered that Alanna was in there, still helpless and angry.

  He quickly went to remedy that.

  "Twice, Luther! That's twice now that I've been kidnapped and shoved into someone's space ship."

  "I know," Luther said, sounding weary. He had a headache, but Alanna had earned a bit of ranting, he thought. He felt guilty enough for letting her get taken, and was baffled that she probably actually would have been safer with him. “What happened? How did he get you?”

  She folded her arms, irritation in every line of her face. "I went to take the trash out, and he was waiting for me. I recognized him, and...I might have started laughing.”

  “Why were you laughing?” Luther asked, bewildered.

  “Because it was so absurd and completely unsurprising that he was the one who betrayed you,” Alanna replied, which Luther had to smile about because she was right. “I mean, of course it was him, he’s such a….” She trailed off and shrugged. “Anyway, what is it about me that just screams 'grab me and take me to space'?"

  "I don't know. Although, to be fair, Jalal wasn't going to take you to space."

  "Oh, no, you're right. He was just going to kill me if you didn't cooperate. He told me all about his stupid plan on the way to the meeting spot. Idiot. What happened to him?"

  Luther sighed. "He melted."

  "That thing where he turns to water?"

  He nodded.

  "And then you..."

  He could tell from the look on her face that she understood what he had done. "He isn't dead. He's just..."

  "Floating in the sewers."

  "Yes."

  She looked at him with no readable expression on her face, and for a terrible moment, Luther thought she was going to judge him for what he'd done. After a moment, she just shrugged. "He probably would have tried to do worse to you, and he kidnapped me, so. I'm not going to cry for him."

  "Good."

  "What did the queen have to say?"

  Luther winced at the memory. He'd called Queen Varen with the news while Alanna had been in the shower earlier. To say she had been upset was a very large understatement. Even Prinna had seemed concerned for how angry their queen was at the news that one of their own had betrayed them. And for something so foolish, at that.

  "She said many things," he said. "We know what they want now, but unfortunately, we are still in a rough position."

  "Because you don't know where they will strike?"

  He nodded. "Jalal was meant to find out whether or not I had this so called Heart of the Sea. Since he never reported back to them, I'm unsure what they will decide."

  Alanna bit her lip. "I don't want to be the downer here, but...if this guy is as desperate for the power as he seems, then don't you think..." She trailed off, looking unsure.

  "What, Alanna?"

  "Don't you think it'd be smarter to strike both places? I mean, say he assumes you have it. You're just one guy. They know from Jalal that Queen Varen only sent you to Earth, so they know you're here alone. It's not a big use of resources to send enough men to take you out and then send the bulk of their forces to Lin-Vayel."

  Luther swore. He'd been doing that a lot lately. "Curse it to the depths, you're probably right."

  "Does the queen have enough people to fight?"

  "Yes. Just because we aren't actively at war all the time doesn't mean we can't defend ourselves," Luther said, sounding snappish even to his own ears.

  "I didn't say it did," Alanna said.

  He sighed. "I'm sorry. Jalal just...nevermind. No, Lin-Vayel will be fine. The other leaders will send people to help if need be, and everything will be fine there."

  "And here?"

  Luther sighed. That was a very good ques
tion.

  "We can send warriors to you, Luther," Queen Varen said. "We will not leave you to fight alone."

  "It could be a waste of time, Your Majesty," Luther said.

  "A waste of time?" Alanna opined from next to him. "How is saving you a waste of time?"

  "Because the planet needs to be protected."

  "There are hundreds of warriors on this planet to defend it," Varen said. "There is no need for self-sacrifice, Luther."

  "I'm not being self-sacrificing," Luther argued. "I'm trying to be practical."

  "Practical?" Alanna asked, and her voice was high and incredulous. "How is this practical? What if they don't stop at threatening you? What if they come after the entire planet?"

  "They won't have enough people for that," Luther said. "Unless they have an army, and if they had an army, they wouldn't have needed to bother with sending Jalal."

  "Alanna does have a point," the queen said.

  "Your Majesty, I—”

  "Your queen is speaking, Luther," Varen said sharply, and Luther fell silent with a sigh. “I will send warriors to you,” she continued. “If they come for you there, then you will fend them off. Is that understood?”

  Luther could see that arguing with her was more than pointless, so he just nodded. “Yes, Your Majesty.”

  From there, things moved quickly. They didn't have a formal plan of attack, but they had enough of the bones of one to make due. The queen was sending warriors to Earth, and she sent out the call to the other leaders that their planet and way of life was being threatened. She would have plenty of back up if they wanted to take the fight to Lin-Vayel.

  Clio managed to trace the call that had come to Luther's communicator, and discovered that the orange man was on Earth.

  It was unsurprising, considering Jalal had been there, and no one would trust him with a solo mission on a different planet. They came to the conclusion that it was most likely that the main forces were on Earth.

  "What do they want with Earth?" Alanna had wanted to know.