Penumbra (Spook Squad 3)

He wasn’t hurt. The fire could never hurt him. It was him—a part of his soul, a part of his being.

But it was his protection that was keeping her safe from the flames, and as that protection briefly flickered, then went out, the full force of the firestorm hit. Heat flowed over her, scalding her skin, her lungs.

She closed her eyes and called to the sky and the power of the storms. Wind swept in, buffeting the flames away, bringing with it the coolness of the night, giving her air to breathe that wouldn’t scorch her insides.

With the wind swirling around her, providing a buffer from the flames and the heat, she backtracked, running through the halls to the nursery area.

To discover hell itself.

Fire was a wall that ran on for as far as the eye could see—a seething, writhing mass of red, gold and white fury that crawled up the nursery walls and across the ceilings. It was hot and hungry and very, very deadly. Surely no one could survive in the fiery doom that the nursery had become.

And yet Mary’s scream rent the air, her voice high-pitched and filled with pain and terror.

A trap? Maybe. Probably.

But something inside wouldn’t let her walk away until she discovered the truth. The older woman had made the darkness of this place survivable in so many small ways. They owed her her life, at the very least.

A hand grabbed her arm, its touch cold and violent as it yanked her back. She knew without even looking that it wasn’t Josh.

That it was Lloyd.

Fear leapt, and her heart began to race. It was instinctive, that fear, bred into her from birth itself. And yet there were monsters far worse than Lloyd walking these halls. But neither those monsters nor Lloyd himself were going to stop he

r tonight. Not when the havoc Josh had created had finally given them the hope of freedom.

Energy crackled across her fingertips as she swung around, but she kept her fists low, out of sight. Lloyd wore a fire suit and breathing apparatus, and though the mask distorted much of his features, his fury was still evident in the glow of his eyes.

“Stop it, you little bitch.” He shook her violently enough to rattle her teeth. “Stop it now, or I’ll kill your brother.”

She reached into the pocket of her overalls and pulled out the small electronic device that would have injected the lethal poison into Josh’s skin. Josh had hers safely tucked away in his pocket. She had no idea why he wanted to keep them, but she obeyed his wishes, as she usually did.

“You mean with this?” She raised the device so that he could see it.

He swore and raised his hand, as if to hit her. But she gathered the energy that danced all around them and froze his blow in mid-motion. Surprise, then fear, flickered through his eyes. It felt good. So very good.

Never underestimate your enemy was a lesson drilled into them from babyhood, yet it was a lesson their controllers had never fully understood.

Or perhaps it was more a case of never fully understanding what they had created.

Either way, it had finally culminated in this moment, where she and Josh held the power.

“No more,” she said softly. She glanced down to where his fingers gripped her arm and telekinetically pulled them away one by one, snapping bone each time.

Sweat broke out across Lloyd’s forehead, but he didn’t utter a sound. And she wanted him to say something. Wanted him to scream, as she had screamed so many times.

She stepped back from him, keeping him still and in place as she raised her hand. Lightning arced between her fingertips, small flashes of fury that lit the smoky orange air with a pure white light. “Fire is not my element. It was never my element, but you people would never see that.”

He opened his mouth, but no sound came out. Probably just as well, as she had no doubt what he was trying to deliver was just more abuse or yet another threat. She smiled coldly and unleashed the lightning. It arced around him, playing with him like a cat with a mouse, touching, leaping away, then touching again. When it finally settled, he screamed.

She closed her eyes, breathing deep the sound. Again, it felt wonderful. But after a second or two, she picked him up telekinetically and threw him against the melting, bubbling metal wall. It melted his suit, his skin, and his screams reached a fever pitch before shutting off abruptly. He was dead before he hit the ground.

She studied his body for a second, feeling little—not even the pleasure she’d thought she’d feel. Damn it, she’d been dreaming of this moment for as long as she’d been able to form conscious thought, and yet now that it was here, there was nothing. But now was not the time to worry about such things. She spun to face the nursery.

The firestorm had grown, but Mary still screamed. Where the hell was she? There were few places that would provide shelter from such fury, not for this length of time, anyway. She bit her lip and half reached for the full power of the storms, then stopped. She couldn’t afford to douse the flames, not if she wanted to escape this place, and calling to the storms would do that. She might be able to call them, might be able to channel some of their power and some of their elements, but she wasn’t strong enough to control their full force, because control was something she was still teaching herself. The scientists thought she was earth and sun and that Josh was wind and water. They had it half right. She was earth and wind, and Josh was sun and water. She could call storms and quakes, Josh fire and floods. In the long, barren years of their childhood, she’d always sat in on Josh’s lessons, and him on hers, each learning what they could while continuing the lie, then practicing when they were alone and beyond the watchful eyes of the scientists. Though, to some extent, their abilities did overlap. If she called in the storms, he could control the water, and he would do so now because he wanted everyone dead. But she was also earth, and earth was the ruler of the other elements. She could stop him, but not without bringing the entire complex down and therefore destroying the one person she was trying to save.

She blew out a breath and directed some of the cold wind that swirled around her at the flames, forcing the heat and the fire away enough to form a corridor. Then she ran through.

The heat battered her, despite the swirling air. Sweat dribbled down her spine, her forehead. The smoke was fierce, a wall of darkness threatening to overwhelm her narrow corridor. She ran as fast as she could, following the screams and praying for a miracle.