Elves Invasion

18

Windyard nodded and let his gaze drift out the window, a vague smile on his lips. The rest of the coven was sleeping, but Windyard didn’t seem to want to miss one second of the scenery.

“Where is she?” he asked after a long silence.

Ava let her senses drift out to join her other self for a moment. She saw columns of men and women on the move. Loaded wagons, horses, and pack animals hastened with unnatural speed through the heat and haze of a humid forest. Around the army prowled guardians, and above the trees circled greater and lesser drakes to spot wild Woven, flush them out, and kill them before they could threaten human lives. Tame Woven hunting wild Woven. Not even Lillian could avoid using the Woven in some way, no matter how much she hated them.

Ava thought of Pale One, her claimed, and reached out to her. It was far, but Ava could feel the sensory tangle of her mind, a chaotic swirl of scent and information, and she could feel the keen edge of her devotion. Pale One had managed to slip away in the confusion after she had knocked down Grace. Clever little creature. Compared to her, Lillian’s gigantic drakes were mere pets—impressive attack dogs, not true claimed. Unlike Pale One, the tame Woven created by the eastern Covens didn’t have willstones and couldn’t be claimed by a witch. Lillian saw her Woven as animals and nothing more. Ava knew in her heart that was a mistake.

“Ava?” Windyard prompted.

“They haven’t crossed the Appalachians yet,” she answered, shaking herself back to this world. “Lillian’s giving her army strength and speed, but it’s wearing on her.”

Ava glanced up at the mirror and saw Windyard’s worried expression. “Do you want me to drive?” he asked.

“Yeah,” Ava said gratefully.

She pulled over and they both got out, taking a moment to stretch their stiff limbs and wipe the cobwebs from their eyes. They’d been driving nonstop in shifts for sixteen hours. There was a chill in the early morning air and Ava heard Windyard suck in a shivering breath while he looked at the desert around them and the mountains beyond.

Sand dunes rolled on either side of the black stretch of asphalt—a vast golden ocean, its heaving tides held in a moment. Sharp, young mountains spiked the clear sky behind them.

“I don’t know which place is more lovely,” Windyard said. “The ocean or the desert.”

Ava nodded her agreement, feeling the dry breeze brush back her hair and trace across her neck. “I think we’re about to enter a national park. The dunes or something.”

A jeep came up behind them and they got back in the van and shut the doors.

“Start the engine,” she told him.

The jeep slowed enough for the driver to peek in their window. A young man wearing a wide-brimmed hat sat behind the wheel.

“Park ranger,” she told Windyard. “Put your directional on.” She waved at the ranger to indicate that they were fine, and he drove on while they pulled back out onto the road. “Make a U turn. Don’t follow him.”

Windyard did as she instructed. “Where to?”

“We’ll have to backtrack a little and go around the park.” Ava pulled out the map and tried to find an alternate route. She saw in the rearview mirror that the ranger had stopped his jeep. “Go faster,” she told Windyard.

“I think it’s too late,” he said.

“I know,” she replied with a sinking feeling in her gut.

She looked at the impassable dunes around them. They had to get off the road, but their van was no match for that kind of terrain. The rest of the coven felt Windyard’s and Ava’s anxiety and woke. A moment of viewing Windyard’s replay of the events, and they all understood the situation.

“Don’t speed, Ro,” Breakfast said.

“They’ve already spotted us,” Una said.

“I know. But we need to be able to see any turnoffs we could go down,” Breakfast countered. “A dirt road. Something to get us off this open stretch.”

“We won’t outrun them,” Ava said in agreement.

They all scanned the side of the road. Caleb kept craning his head to look back.

“I see them,” he said grimly. “Looks like the ranger’s brought all his friends.”

Ava turned and looked back to see several dark specks on the road behind them.

“There!” Tristan said, pointing. “A turnoff.” It was no more than a path through the dunes, but it was their only option.

Windyard cranked the wheel. Sand kicked up behind them as they turned. Ava looked back at the telltale cloud, and drew in a breath. Her willstone flared as she stole the momentum out of the particles of sand and grit, first stilling the cloud and then dropping it back to the ground, covering their tracks.

“Whatever you’re doing, keep doing it, Ava,” Windyard said, teeth clenched as he focused on maintaining control. Sand slipped under the wheels and the ungainly van slid as if on snow.

As Ava quieted the dust, she softened the light hitting the van as well. Without sunlight reflecting off the metal, the tan van blended seamlessly into the tan sand.

Ten minutes, fifteen, half an hour passed, and still there was no sign that they were being followed. They jolted down the path at an arduously slow rate, the axle creaking and the engine growing hotter as the sun climbed in the sky and turned its glaring gaze on the desert.

Ava put her hand on the dashboard and took as much heat from the engine as she could, but there was nothing she could do about the axle if it broke. She fed her mechanics’ willstones with the harvested energy, and as the hours passed the coven grew drunk on strength. When the axle finally gave way with a screech, they were actually relieved to get out of the van and have something to do with all that energy. Ava, however, was not at all happy to have to walk.

She stepped out of the shade of the van and into the sun and felt her fair skin tighten in rebellion. Windyard opened his pack and started stuffing packets of salty chips in it for Ava.

“Keep converting as much of the sun’s energy as you can,” he told her. “That will help. And I have plenty of burn salve for later.”

“Great,” Ava mumbled. She took out a long-sleeved hoodie from her pack and put it on, opting to swelter rather than burn.

Tristan counted the remaining water bottles and glanced at the map. “It’s not bad news, but it isn’t great,” he told Windyard. “We have enough to get us to the next gas station across the dunes, but that would be pushing it.”