Our Planet has Crashed [COMPLETE]

eighty five - KOTLC

Keefe POV:

"No!" Keefe wasn't sure who said it. No, wait, he did know. He did. Everyone else was frozen, Biana included. Frozen as her wound spurted blood like a fountain.

Lady Gisela laughed as Keefe rushed to his friend, shouting words like "Unfreeze!" and "Un-stop!" and "Move!" until he found the right word to counteract his freezing spells. 

Yes, he was still afraid to speak. There was no way he was going to risk doing anything to Biana now. He motioned for the others to hurry over, but that was unnecessary. Fitz was the first to arrive, tears streaming down his face. Keefe had never seen his friend so helpless, even when Alden's mind was broken. 

"Biana!" another voice called, and Keefe turned to see Sophie, Tam, and Linh arriving. Marella, Maruca, Jensi, Dex, and Wylie were a step behind them, the last still with tears streaming steadily down his face. Keefe had seen what had happened to Cyrah.

The group huddled around Biana, and Sophie produced a bunch of Panakes petals, making Biana swallow them and pressing some gently into the wound. No one took out the dagger, though, because that would only cause more blood.

"Where's Elwin? Or Livvy? Or any physician! Someone save her right now!" Fitz yelled.

"We're trying," was Sophie's whispered reply. 

Keefe glanced around. There was no one else, much less a physician in sight. Where were they? Keefe knew they had survived, the Black Swan. The Neversee? No idea. Maruca's forcefield around the city had faltered the moment her panic from the approaching sun became too fierce, so all she had been able to do was shield them in a slightly smaller forcefield as the Sun hit. The rest of Eternalia had crumbled beside them, and even buildings inside the forcefield came down from the impact. Sophie's enhancing was the only reason Maruca was able to keep the shields up.

Time was running out. Biana was going to—nope, not going there. But she did need help. And fast. Where was everyone?

The only other person in sight was Lady Gisela. She was still laughing. Crazy much? Even before she hadn't been like this. What changed?

Keefe knew what changed. She hadn't been frozen when he'd said STOP. She had just kept on laughing, wheezing something like, "You really thought it would work on me?"

She had gone on a killing spree right before that, laughing as she murdered elf after elf after elf. Quite homicidal. 

Homicidal. That word . . . he remembered Sophie talking to him once, about something called architect magic or something. Or maybe it was animus? 

Either way, it was a dragon thing. But his mother—no, just some crazy woman he refused to acknowledge was related to him—had stolen it. And now she had the power to do anything except raise people from the dead. 

Is that what she did? Make herself invulnerable to her son's powers? After all, if she had the ability herself, wouldn't she not have gone through all the trouble to make a potentially (definitely, now) uncooperative son go through an icky process to get the ability. She'd have just done everything herself!

How had making herself invulnerable done this? Was the power so strong it needed a large amount of something as powerful as animus magic to counteract it? Keefe shuddered. He hoped that wasn't true. That would seriously be so terrifying. 

"Just . . . just leave me," Biana was saying.

"No! Never," Fitz said. 

"But . . . you could be killing Lady Gisela right now," she said, and tried pushing Tam's hand away as he reached to give her more Panakes petals. "Don't waste this on me," she told him, her voice raspy. "Save it for when you really need it."