The Elements Trilogy: The Primaries

Chapter 24: Air

It was chaos. As soon as Troy had gotten Evie out of battle mode, and we started to walk back, we all fell over unconscious. When we woke up, we were all tied to trees, 3 men in gray camo pants, with buzz cuts and swirls of air tattooed on their wrists standing in front of us.

They were taunting Troy and Evie with plans of how to kill me, and how they were going to do it as slowly and as painfully as possible. After listening for a few horrified seconds, I tuned them out.

I concentrated on killing them instead. On fighting. I needed to be in battle mode. I thought and thought about killing them, and torturing them, and then suddenly, my brain went THWUMP.

My head snapped straight up; adrenaline coursed through my body, and my muscles burned. I struggled against my bonds, and I heard myself snarl like an animal. My vision was crystal clear, and things seemed slowed down. I saw the three men turn towards me, and one of them took a step back out of fear.

Suddenly, the ropes holding me back broke, and I shot forward, exhaling sharply. A rush of air flung them backwards, and they all landed with a thud. One of them scrambled up, and I did a backflip, sending him flying backwards into a tree with a loud crack. He didn't move.

Another one, held up his hunting knife, and grinned like a maniac at me. "C'mon, whirlwind." He taunted me. "Come at get me."

I spun around just as the last one crept up on me. I thrust my hands forward and he flew backwards like the other one. Just then, as I was making sure he wouldn't get up, I heard Evie shout my name.

My concentration momentarily slipped from battle mode, and I lost it completely. That was when the hunting knife of the other guy sunk deep into my back.

I heard Troy scream, and felt a blast of heat as Evie fried the guy. The next thing I knew, I was lying on the ground, Troy furiously fighting against the restraining ropes while was Evie sobbing her heart out, screaming my name. My back felt like it was on fire, and the last thing I remember was Skylar running up to me, and kneeling on the ground, face white as snow.

** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** ** **

Pain. That's the only thing I was aware of. It was everywhere. It was almost dark out when I finally woke, and I was lying on a mattress, Troy sitting in a chair by the bed, sound asleep, gripping my axe.

His eyes popped open as I involuntarily cried out in pain. "Eva!" He jumped out of the chair, and knelt beside the bed. "Eva, it's okay. I'm here."

A wave of pain washed over me, and I struggled to talk without my voice cracking. "What happened? What's going on? Where is everyone?"

Troy held my hand in both his giant steel ones. "Eva, you were stabbed by an assassin in the back. He nearly got your spinal cord. I thought-" his voice choked up. "I thought you were going to die." He squeezed his eyes shut and shook his head.

"How long was I out?"

Troy looked up at me. "You were hurt two days ago. We've been here at the cabin in the campground ever since."

"You stayed at the cabins, what the hell is the matter with you guys? That's a good way to get killed, why didn't you keep moving?"

"Because you would have died!" Troy said. "And there is no way in hell I am letting that happen." He said murderously.

I put my hand up to his cheek. "Where is everyone?"

"Out in town, buying more food and water." He answered softly. He then leaned over and gently kissed me on the lips. "How are you feeling?"

"Like I've been run over by a truck." I grumbled. My back was all tingly. Then, a horrifying crunching noise happened. I grabbed for Troy's hand and struggled to speak as more and more pain radiated from my back. "What the hell is going on?"

He looked at me nervously. "That would be the bone healing. The knife did some pretty bad damage."

"It was a knife!" I spat out through gritted teeth.

"It was Spanish steel, much stronger than regular stuff..." His voice trailed off as I gave him a nasty look.

I heard someone shouting and making horrible noises, but when I saw the look on Troy's face, I realized it was me. The pain of the bone reattaching and connecting back together was so intense, I saw black spots appear around the corners of my vision. "Oh shit, oh shit!"

"What, Evalynn? What is it?" He said frantically.

I tried to tell him to keep me conscious so I could heal, but I only managed to mumble out, "keep me," before the darkness over took me and I went into a painless bliss.

All through out the night, I would wake up every few hours, and when the accelerated healing kicked in, the pain was so intense I would black out again. There were times I would float on the edge of consciousness, and hear tidbits of arguments between people, but I was never awake enough to state my opinion or for the accelerated healing to start. So it was useless.

"We need to wake her up!" Someone said.

"She'll just black out again, wait till she wakes on her own!"

"We don't know when that will be! We need to wake her now, she could die at anytime from blood loss!"

"It's not your choice! Skylar's the leader, she should decide!" I heard a new voice join the argument, probably Jamie.

"No way, Evalynn is Evie's sister, she needs to decide!" I heard Troy bud in.

"I think Evie should decide." A new voice said. "If that helps at all."

"Ha."

"Jamie, don't be snide." The voice, Skylar I'm guessing, said angrily. "Evie?"

Silence. Wake me up, I silently pleaded. Please, just wake me up.

"Wake her up." I heard my twin say.

I heard a female voice snort in irritation, Diamond, I'm assuming had been arguing with Evie.

"How?" Troy suddenly said.

"Like this." A voice I couldn't place said. Suddenly, a sharp pain shot through my cheek, and I was brought to fully conscious. Evie was standing over me, hand frozen in mid-air.

"Good to see you alive, sissy." She said, voice sounding strange. Then she collapsed on the ground, arms resting on the bed, head in her arms, sobbing. "Please, please, please, don't die." She sobbed.

I reached out, and put my hand on her arm. "I'll do my best."