Rocked: Elemental Warriors Read online

  She closed her eyes and tried not to hate her life.

  But she knew her mother would be watching her anxiously, waiting for her to eat something. She knew that if she turned her nose up at this meal, her mother would fret and then offer to go home and make her something else (as if stopping at the McDonald’s down the street was out of the question), and then Silvia would feel worse than she already did.

  So she let out a breath, opened her eyes, and picked up the plastic fork and knife to start sawing through the hockey puck masquerading as steak on her plate.

  Her mother relaxed and eased herself into the chair on the other side of the room.

  Silvia was fifteen years old, and she had spent the majority of the last four years in the hospital. A weak immune system and a habit of catching anything and everything that was possible to be caught had her sick every other day it seemed like, and her parents were paranoid and had too much money, so she got checked into the hospital every time she was sick for more than a couple of days.

  Sometimes it was worth it, sometimes she needed to be there, and sometimes she definitely did not.

  Unfortunately, this wasn’t one of the times she needed to be hospitalized. The doctor had been concerned about her white count and some kind of rash she’d had, so she had already been here for three days with no sign of being discharged yet.

  Everyone else was out there living their lives, and she was trapped in here. Her best friend tried to keep her up on what was going on, but she missed so many days of school that it wasn’t like she could go to public school anyway.

  All Silvia wanted was to be normal. All she wanted was to feel like she was just like any other fifteen year old girl. But instead she got this. It made her angry and frustrated, but she tried not to show that to her parents. They had enough to worry about.

  Two years later, and she was staring down the barrel of a gun shaped cigarette lighter. Silvia held up a hand and pushed it out of her face.

  "No, thanks."

  "Aww, come on," her friend Katya was saying. "Are you afraid of a little smoke?"

  "Considering it might put me back in the hospital with lung issues, yeah," Silvia deadpanned. She wasn't intimidated by Katya and her friends, no matter how cool they tried to pretend like they were. They were the same age as she was, and she wasn't impressed by their whole 'we're bad and dangerous' vibe.

  Katya just rolled her eyes. "Whatever. Anyway, are you coming with us tonight?"

  Sil hadn't decided yet. She did desperately want to go to this party. It seemed like one of those things that people would talk about for years, a kegger thrown at some rich kid's house while his parents were out of town. She'd seen it in countless movies, and it was one of those experiences that she would have missed out on if she was in the hospital.

  Her parents had eased up a bit when it came to the worrying about her health, but not enough that they wouldn't put her right back in an uncomfortable bed and a hospital gown if anything happened to her at this party. So it would probably be safer to bow out and tell them that she couldn't make it.

  But she didn't want to do that. For once, she wanted to be a normal teenager, and that meant keggers and proms staying out past her curfew. Her parents thought she was spending the night at Katya's house, anyway, which wasn't technically a lie. Technically. They would be together, just...not at Kat's house.

  "Yeah," she said, making a snap decision. "Yeah, I'm going."

  The music was blaring when they pulled up to Bobby Henderson's house. 'Rich' didn't quite seem to cover it when it came to how much money his parents had. The sprawling lawns were well manicured, and there was a fountain in the middle of them, where several people were already gathered, leaning against the stone and smoking.

  The noise was incredible, and as they got out of the car, Sil could feel the bass from the music inside the house thumping through her shoes. It was chaos, and she could see people she'd never met before all over the place, dancing, touching, groping, smoking, drinking, laughing, living.

  It was amazing.

  She smoothed down her leather jacket (genuine leather, a hand me down from her father who had decided he was too old for such things), and hoped her hair was still in the messy ponytail she'd spent an hour constructing that afternoon.

  Silvia knew she'd never be able to pull off the glamorous look that some of the other girls were going for. With their short skirts and low cut blouses, make up on their faces drawing attention to their eyes. She wasn't pretty like that, even if she did have a nice figure and an okay face.

  Her hair was long and dark, a muddy brown that she wanted to dye as soon as she could. She was average height, with above average boobs and decent hips. Katya had told her all of this, of course. Silvia wasn't vain enough to spend that much time staring at her reflection and trying to come up with some kind of description for her body.

  "You look fine," Kat said, smiling at someone who whizzed by them on a skateboard. "Stop fidgeting."

  "I'm not fidgeting," Sil hissed back. "I just don't know any of these people." She probably would have known them if she'd gone to school with them, but since she didn't, she was the stranger in the midst.

  "That's for the best, trust me," Katya said. "No one knows you. You're like a blank slate. You can be whoever you want to them. This is your night to make yourself, Sil."

  It was surprisingly inspirational from Kat, and Silvia sighed. Still sounded easier said than done, but she was willing to try.

  "Okay," she said, letting out a breath. "Let's do this."

  They made their way up the ridiculously long driveway and got a better view of the house.

  Mansion was a better word for it, honestly. It was all white stone and glass, and shining lights from the inside spilling out onto the lawn. The sight of it took her breath away for a moment, and she wondered what Bobby’s parents had to do to make this much money.

  “Kat!” someone cried, and Kat laughed and waved at a tall boy with wavy hair.

  “Come meet everyone,” Kat said to her, tugging on her arm before she could argue. “Hey, losers,” Kat said as they joined a circle of people in the kitchen. There were six of them in all, four guys and two girls, both blonde and tall. Silvia fought the urge to hunch into her jacket.

  “Hey, Kat,” said one of the girls, smiling thinly. She glanced over at Silvia and arched an eyebrow. “Who’s this?”

  “This is my friend Sil,” Katya said. “Sil, this is Darren, Kris with a K, Chris with a C, Eve, Charlie, and Alan.” She pointed to each of them in turn. Kris with a K was one of the blondes, and she smirked at Silvia when she was introduced.

  “Silvia,” Sil said. “Nice to meet you.”

  “Where’re you from, then?” Darren, the one who had called them over, asked. “Haven’t seen you before.”

  “I’m home schooled, technically,” Silvia replied, shrugging a shoulder. “And I don’t get out much.”

  “Juvenile detention?” Kris with a K asked, smiling innocently.

  “Nothing that exciting,” Silvia fired back.

  “Behave, Kris,” Charlie said. “Any friend of Kat’s is a friend of ours. Can I get you a drink, Sil?”

  She could hear her mother’s voice in her head, warning her of the dangers of accepting drinks from strangers. Roofies for one thing, and think of the germs! She sighed internally and smiled. “Yeah, sure. Whatever’s fine.”

  Smooth. Definitely best to pretend like she did this all the time and knew what people drank at keggers. Beer, she was assuming. She could handle that.

  She could not handle that.

  Beer was disgusting. It tasted like medicine and grass mixed together into some horrible, fizzy drink that she was supposed to like. Charlie had brought her a red plastic cup filled to the brim with the frothy liquid, and she’d downed half of it like she saw everyone else doing, before the taste caught up to her.

  Then she’d coughed and spluttered and asked where the bathroom was while Kat’s friends had laughed.


  “She must be new,” Kris with a K said as she walked off in the direction she’d been pointed in.

  “Must be,” Silvia mumbled under her breath. The bathroom was blessedly empty and she locked herself in and dumped the rest of her beer down the sink before filling the plastic cup with water from the tap and chugging it. The horrible taste still lingered, though and she shuddered and then sighed, plopping down on the closed toilet lid.

  Maybe she wasn’t cut out for this. It had been less than half an hour, and already she was tired. Her head hurt from the music, beer was vile, and the only thing she’d seen by way of food was bowl after bowl of chips and cheesy snacks.

  “I would kill for some pizza,” she mumbled under her breath.

  “Um,” said a voice from behind the shower curtain. “I can help with that.”

  Silvia screeched and was on her feet in a second, wrenching back the tastefully floral patterned shower curtain to find a boy sitting in the otherwise empty tub, fully dressed.

  “What are you doing?” she demanded. “Trying to spy on people in the bathroom?”

  “No, no!” the boy said, holding his hands up. “I was just hiding in here. I was going to say something but I couldn’t decide if it was creepier to say something while you were already in here or just wait for you to finish. I was going to keep the curtain closed.”

  That didn’t really sound better to Sil, and she huffed, stepping back. “Why are you hiding in the bathroom?” she asked. “Why come to a party at all if you’re just going to hide?”

  “It’s my party.”

  Oh. Well, then. Silvia hadn’t realized she was shouting at Bobby Henderson himself.

  “Oh,” she said out loud. “Well, then why throw a party if you’re just going to hide?”

  Bobby sighed. “It wasn’t my idea. You know how it is. One of your friends hears your parents are going to be gone and mentions it to someone else, and then all of a sudden you’ve got four football players in your face talking about how rad it would be if you threw a kegger because keggers are rad. And then before you know it the whole school is on your front lawn and probably some other people besides, because I don’t think I’ve ever seen you before, and I’d remember.”

  Silvia blinked, trying to catch up with that tirade. “So you got peer pressured into having party.”

  He nodded. “Is it rad? The party?”

  She shrugged. “I wouldn’t know. This is the first one I’ve ever been to.”

  “Oh.” Bobby frowned and then looked up at her again. “So...pizza?”

  And that was how she found herself sitting in the bathtub eating an extra large ham and pineapple pizza with Bobby Henderson of recent house party fame. He was nice enough, and they talked for hours while the party went on around them.

  Once the pizza was gone, Silvia sighed. “I should probably go find my friend. We came here together, and I don’t think she’d leave without me, but knowing her, she’s probably passed out drunk somewhere.”

  Bobby groaned. “I need to figure out how to get all these people out of my house.”

  “Should have thought about that before you threw a house party,” Silvia teased.

  He rolled his eyes and got up to help her out of the tub. “Yeah, yeah. Next time they’re doing this at someone else’s house. I don’t care how rad it would be.”

  “What does that even mean?” Sil had to ask.

  Bobby shrugged a shoulder. “I don’t even know.”

  They looked at each other for a long moment and then dissolved into laughter. “Well, I had a pretty good time,” Silvia said. “So that has to count for something, right?”

  “Right. So uh. This might be a really dumb idea considering you apparently don’t even go to our school, but would you wanna do this again sometime?”

  “What, eat pizza in a bathtub?”

  “Well, the pizza part. Maybe without the bathtub.”

  Silvia smiled. “I dunno, that part seems pretty important.” She shrugged a shoulder, going for nonchalance. “Sure. Sounds like fun, though.”

  When they emerged from the bathroom it was to find Katya slumped in the hallway. “Silvia!” she cried, slurring the word and trying to stand up. “‘Found you!”

  “You definitely did,” Sil said, shaking her head. “And you’re in no state to drive, of course. Where are your keys?”

  “Bowl.”

  “What?”

  “Bowl,” Kat said. “Downstairs. Chris took them and put ‘em in a bowl.”

  “With a C or with a K?”

  “With a B,” Kat said, looking confused. “For bowl.”

  Silvia rolled her eyes. “Never mind, Kat. Let’s just get you home.”

  It hadn’t been the wild night she’d been expecting, but as she listened to Bobby try to convince people to leave his parents’ bedroom, she had to admit that it had been fun.

  Chapter One: The Edict

  The hard soles of Kain’s boots made an impatient and harried tap tap tap sound as he hurried down the corridor of the palace that led to the Prince’s audience chamber. He knew this route in the dark with his eyes closed by now, having traveled it so many times over the last four movements. He was, however, late for his meeting with the Prince, hence his haste.

  “I’m never listening to Ama again,” Kain muttered under his breath as he walked.

  The man had no concept of timeliness, and his assurance that they could make it to the next town over for lunch and back before Kain's meeting had ended up being completely wrong, as Kain had known it would. But he'd gone anyway, so clearly he was the one with the brain problems of the two of them.

  He sighed and smoothed down his uniform once he reached his destination before pressing his hand to the sensor on the door and stepping into the room when he was admitted.

  Prince Comman was seated in the large, plush chair at the head of the room, eyes glued to the tablet in his lap, one leg crossed over the other. His hair was loose today, and he was the picture of relaxation.

  "You're late," he said, without even looking up.

  "I know, I know," Kain grumbled before he drew himself up and affected a bow. The Prince didn't have time for ceremony. Kain had learned that in the time he'd been a member of his guard. He didn't want people bowing and scraping and wasting time with needless pomp. Most of the time he let Kain call him by his name, and he talked to Kain like he was an equal, rather than a subordinate.

  It was hardly what Kain had been expecting when he'd joined the Prince's Guard four movements ago, but he liked it. He got to fight, to protect his people and his Prince, and he didn't work for a tyrant. It was a good way to live.

  "I'm sure you have some excuse," Comman said, finally glancing at him with amused dark eyes.

  "I do, but it involves Ama and a serving girl over in Holda, so I'm not sure you want to hear it."

  Comman made a face. "I'll pass, if it's all the same to you. Come have a seat." He gestured to one of the many other chairs in the room, spread out around the long, stone hewn table in the center of the room. It was highly polished and reflected the light in the room, casting pretty reflections on the walls that weren't inlaid with holo screens.

  The people of Jontira were not the most high tech out there. They still liked to build things by hand and to craft things out of stone and gems, unlike some of those who shared a quadrant with them. Their tech was serviceable, and did what they needed it to do, but they didn't have mechanical servants or solar powered hover vehicles like some of the others out there.

  The Prince's meeting room was probably the fanciest and most high tech place on their planet, as the Prince needed to be able to communicate quickly with those far and wide. The Prince himself had a tablet that worked to read files and as a comm device, and each of his guard members had one as well so that the Prince could get in contact with them whenever necessary.

  Kain sat, and Comman rose from his chair, tapping his fingers over the screen of his sleek, silver tablet. "I'm sending you a cop
y of the communications I've been having with several other leaders in the area," he said. "What do you know about Earth?"

  It was, by all reckoning, a complete non-sequitur, but Kain had been in enough meetings with the Prince to know that he would tie his thoughts together eventually, if given the chance.

  "Not much," Kain admitted. "Only what we're taught in classes." Which was only enough to know that it was considered a primitive planet by all accounts and that the people there didn't seem to care much about their planet's health or the others of their kind.

  "I figured as much," Comman said. "What isn't often talked about is that Earth is seen as something of a haven by those who don't live there."

  Kain frowned. "Why? Isn't it full of pollution and death?"

  A smile flickered over Comman's lips, and he inclined his head at that. "The pollution I'll grant you, but there's no more death there than there is here or anywhere else. And it usually only applies to those who already live there. For years, races from other planets have been using Earth as a sort of neutral ground to hold peace talks and sign treaties."

  “Seems like a strange place to plan peace,” Kain said. “Why not do it on your own planet?”

  “No one wants to be seen as having an advantage when it comes to peace talks,” Comman explained. “By meeting on neutral ground, no one is more important than anyone else. It levels things.”

  That made sense to Kain, but he was still trying to work out why they were talking about this at all. As per usual, Comman wasn’t leaping to explain, and Kain figured he was probably hoping that Kain would be able to figure it out himself. It always made the Prince happy when he didn’t have to spend too much time explaining things to his guard. Kain usually picked up on things quickly, which was why he was one of Comman’s favorites.

  So. The Earth was neutral ground, and Comman had been communicating with other leaders. “You’re having peace talks?” he asked as it all started to make sense in his head.