Blame It on the Moon Read online

  I listened and agonized. If I could just remember what was happening that day.

  “Use your family gifts…weather, wishes.” Yeah, I wished I could just go back to that moment when I…

  I’d been at Phoebe’s earlier, looking for her, trying desperately to get a clue about my brother. I’d found the strange weather ball and the picture of that very special day when we’d still been a family, before Dutch had disappeared out of our lives. After Dutch returned and we rescued River, I realized the LIAB needed to be stored somewhere safe.

  I’d wondered if I was doing the right thing. I didn’t know what it was capable of in the wrong hands much less the right ones, so I decided to seal it with lightning. Then only I, or my mother would be able to open it. I’d closed my eyes and called menori. Power zinged through my body, polarizing the negative ions and exploded out as a hot blue spear. I let it go…the box disappeared…

  I blinked and I was back with Petre and Phoebe by the Forge. He pointed to the box at my feet, which was no longer sealed. I bent over and lifted the beautiful globe, captivated once again by the weather going on inside it.

  My mouth dropped open. “How?” I looked up into their faces and thought about what had just happened. “I did as you said. I remembered when I buried the LIAB.”

  Phoebe waited with an arched eyebrow. “And what else?”

  I closed my eyes as I brought my thoughts back into focus. My lids flew open. Cha-Ching! I grinned and felt like spinning around. “I wished to remember, and I did! But that can’t be—I don’t, I mean, well…” I grinned wider, “I guess I can.”

  Phoebe smiled, too. What did that mean? Was she satisfied, proud? I never knew what she was really thinking since the mindlink went away and she’d removed her consciousness from River and me. Was it too much to ask to have a relationship with my mother?

  We’ll talk about this later, Tempe.

  I nodded in agreement. She was right. “So what are you saying, Petre? If my wish helped me remember when I sealed it, that’s great, but how did it get unsealed?”

  His smile was serene and so kingly. “Your wish allowed me to find the box seconds before you sealed it. I merely intercepted you there and brought it here before you could.”

  Aurora said, “This is important, Tempe. Some of your abilities are returning. Don’t discount them. You’ll have to rely on all your strengths until Chaos is over.”

  “But I don’t know the rules. Wishes won’t do any good if I wish for myself, right?” I asked Phoebe, who was there the day River had done just that. On his fourteenth birthday, ten years after Dutch had died, River had wished our father would come back and we’d be a family again. My heart ached just remembering it.

  Phoebe’s gaze softened. So, she understood how her reaction on that day had hurt us. She said, “River’s wish was…untimely, and as it was a personal wish, it was not allowed. I’m sorry I reacted harshly, Tempe, but for good reason. His wish came true and even with the other measures we put in place, it set dangerous events in motion that nearly got him killed.”

  I couldn’t refute that. Again, I wanted to say, why couldn’t you just explain? Why couldn’t there have been a different plan? And why just me left in the dark? “Why use Dylan—”

  She looked off sharply toward the others. Something flashed across her eyes, but when she looked back at me they were normal.

  I glared at her knowing she held back. “What aren’t you telling me?”

  “Now is not the time.” She tried to give me another mothers know best so don’t ask look. Well, call me ungrateful but been there and it hadn’t worked out so well then either. “Spill it,” I said and I actually felt the wind spinning inside me in response to my aggravation. The LIAB in my hand sent a strong jolt against the glass.

  Aurora looked at Phoebe and shared knowledge passed between them. “Phoebe, I don’t believe keeping this a secret any longer is going to help Tempe or the situation we’re facing.”

  I narrowed my eyes and knew there were storm clouds brewing in them. Menori was definitely twitchy. Two things I was sure of—whatever they were hiding was serious. I wasn’t going to like it, and (three things—because that was an obvious understatement) I’d better be prepared to control my Tempestaerie so I didn’t kill anyone.

  They all looked at me as if they understood what was going on in my head. Maybe they did, they were all ancient. Mean, but true. I braced myself for the worst.

  I could not have imagined.

  Phoebe took a breath and the wind caused the moss and leaves and trees to bend in her direction as if she were a vortex pulling air from the four corners. Then she blew my world up. Again.

  “You and Dylan… were never lovers.”

  Even Jack would have been able to hear a leaf drop across the swamp.

  Before the storm hit.

  Chapter 24

  Jack

  “Is that…spider turds?”

  Where the hell was Conor? I patrolled the park with Smoke watching for more flying vipers. We’d just seen a tourist get knocked off her feet by a shmoo. She hadn’t seen what hit her so I made sure she got home and gave her the fake weather on the move story, advising her to stay inside.

  Tank and Slade were taking care of the shmoo but I knew there would be more. Peggy called me on my cell. “Someone put a picture on People Pages of a crawling green spider thing with a beak like a snapping turtle coming out of the water near the fairgrounds.”

  I checked the ground around me since Ridge’s property was close to the fairgrounds. Sure enough, one of the spider /turtles thingies was stomping toward us. Marching. Step, kick, step kick. And then another followed that one out of the swamp.

  “Gotta go.” I called to Smoke who was the closest, “Check that out.”

  It never stopped marching. Smoke stood on one side, me on the other inspecting its outer shell. It did look like an armored turtle shell with spider legs. It was up off the ground walking on sharp pointy claws. A pest control man had once told me a spider was hard to kill because their footprint was so small they essentially walked above the insecticide.

  This one had eyes that rolled round and round, to what purpose I couldn’t say because it passed right by Smoke and me like we were invisible and stomped away on its tippy toes. I saw an opening under its tail that didn’t appear to be for biological processes. As we watched, it widened, opening like a door, and then every five or six steps it ejected a five-inch green pod. Maybe I’d been wrong.

  Smoke looked at me and said in his low whispery voice, “Is that—spider turds?”

  Then one of the pods moved, and another, each one rocking back and forth like a grenade about to blow. Then the shaking stopped, legs popped out, unfolded, the limbs poked their claws into the ground and pushed up. In just a few seconds we’d watched the mother-ship expel more offspring. God, I was coming to hate that word.

  I pulled my gun, and Smoke did the same. “Where are the others?”

  “We had to split up. Lola saw some activity near the lake with her equipment.”

  “All right, let’s get to it.” Smoke hit one spider after another with his long semi-automatic gun. I shot six of the smaller ones but they didn’t blow apart from a mere .50 caliber shell. So, I settled for slowing them down while he turned his more powerful gun to finishing them off.

  I was scanning the bank for more when Smoke cried out, whirled and grabbed his leg, looking back toward the park. A wounded spider in its last dying quivers had managed to point a leg at Smoke, just before its eyes spun crazily and it toppled over. Part of its leg was sticking out of Smoke’s thigh, but he was still shooting as more tall green crabs appeared—more breeders. What I wouldn’t give for Tempe’s bolt throwing right now.

  “You alright?” I asked Smoke.

  He grunted, tugging on the barbed claw in his thigh. “Yeah, more of a nuisance than anything, but if they start shooting all at once…”

  “Maybe we should retreat and—” My phone rang. Not a go
od time. I blasted five more of the green nuisances and accepted the call.

  “Jack, it’s Ridge. Lola’s headed your way.” Something buzzed past my ear and I raised my gun.

  Smoke shouted, “Don’t shoot. Lola’s here!”

  While aiming at several more of the smaller spiders, I watched the three dark drones wiz around us. Then I saw Lola directing the action. “Stand back, Smoke,” she yelled.

  He jogged away and I followed. Immediately the sound of several short bursts of the drones’ weapons reached us. Spiders jumped, flipped and some responded, shooting darts at the drones which bounced off harmlessly.

  Smart move, Ridge. I could definitely see the advantage of nonhuman and bionic enhanced human soldiers. Which reminded me why Smoke hadn’t been affected by the hit to the leg—bionics and a very tough hide. Me, I’d better keep my butt behind these guys while they were around or Destiny would be looking for a new sheriff. Quit being fatalistic, Jack.

  More spiders exploded around me until finally there were no more marching out of the swamp. I called Tempe to see if the creatures were coming out on their side of the Forge.

  I didn’t get an answer. Just one more thing to worry about. Then all sound stopped around us. No birds, no action in the water.

  Everything was still.

  Jack

  They call it ‘Chaos’ because ‘Armageddon’ was already taken…

  “What’s happening?” asked Smoke, turning toward the Forge.

  I felt it. Absolute stillness, like the silence just before dawn. No movement, birdsong, not even stomping spider feet. Then the roar came. It built slowly, from a distance. I recognized it, but had no time to warn Smoke.

  The first boom coincided with a ground-shaking vibration, followed by another. Moss flew from the trees and rolled across the fairgrounds like desert tumbleweeds. The sky had darkened to a deep teal and the wind came out of nowhere. Another loud crash preceded the whistling wind and Smoke’s, “Look out!”

  He was fast. His yell almost simultaneous with his body slamming into mine, the branches of a tall pecan brushing us as it met the earth five feet away. The wind passed as quickly as it began, clouds moving swiftly, leaving a winter blue sky with innocuous white cumulus puffs.

  Smoke offered me one of his un-feelable hands. “Straight-line wind?”

  I looked to the west. Checked my watch. Could have been Tempe. If so, why? She isn’t taken to just creating storms for no reason. I took his hand. “I think there’s some multi-layered good news in that wind.” Smoke waited, ghost-like for further explanation.

  I smiled as the idea struck. “We need to get to the others. I believe the ground work for our distraction has just been laid.”

  I called Peggy. Now I didn’t have to lie because she would have seen the weather feature on her radar. I instructed her to put in a call to the Civil Defense office and get the emergency measures in place. There were no Louisiana underground bunkers or basements in south Louisiana because of the low water table, so Destiny had a shelter created from an old World War II bunker which could easily accommodate most of its citizens. It was for just this purpose.

  Then I called Ridge to cut the electrical power and block wireless transmissions so none of the social media hounds could record what was really happening. Hopefully, we could scare most of them into the shelter. That derecho, and some well placed bolts from Zeus’ favorite great great-granddaughter would take care of that. If she had her power back.

  Ridge gave me a ten-minute window to wrap up my end, so I called Tempe again. “What’s going on?” I asked when she finally answered.

  Her voice was strained when she said, “I’ll have to call you back.”

  And hung up.

  What? I raise the phone quickly and said, “Call. Tempe.” The voice recognition system said, I heard you say you’d like to call Debbie. Is this correct? I growled in frustration, dialing her number manually and let it ring until it went to voicemail. “Call me, dammit. I’ll be there in three minutes. It’s very important.”

  “If you want to ride—” I turned back toward Smoke but he and Lola were gone, probably on their way to Ridge. I heard the low wail of the siren downtown as I started my engine and drove toward Harmony as fast as I could.

  Chapter 25

  Conor

  There is a time for arrogance. This is not it.

  We sat on the bottom of the ocean somewhere between “Sin City” and Mobile, about two hundred kilometres out. I regulated my breathing so I wouldn’t drown. That should be obvious, water—fire. I could adapt under water for a short time, unlike most fire-breathers, but there were limitations. I had to control the fight-induced adrenalin so I didnae crush the smaller Vouivre cuddled in my claws. I wasn’t sure how I’d get her long hair untangled from around my feet. Her tail and hands reflexively pushed against my muscular dragon abs.

  Vivie had directed me to the spot where I would deposit her saying merely, “Home.” For the first time in our flight south, she’d looked at me with her bright green gaze, instead of the white-eyed look of terror she’d had for most of the trip. Seconds later a force exploded upward through the crusty bottom, dousing us both with silt and volcanic residue. She repeated the other word we’d been unable to translate, and fell into an exhausted sleep. “Mere”, French for Mother.

  Shite.

  Vivie’s mither glared at me through a brilliant red carbuncle the size of my head. Her giant fangs were easily three times longer than my own. She hissed. Dragons don’t get intimidated. Ach, arrogant maybe—or as Lang’s daughter, Jordie, would say, “Totally true.” They also aren’t stupid. It was obvious she was unhappy with me, her carbuncle pulsing. I decided not to release Vivie as I had previously planned, to avoid becoming mither’s next meal.

  Not only was that not a diplomatic solution—I always look for the diplomatic solution when faced with angry clansmen—it was downright ungrateful.

  Lady Vouivre was almost as big as me, and if this came to a confrontation or a wrestling match, I might lose, especially with my limitations underwater and this being her natural environment. And she could even call on her elemental power.

  Vivie cried in her sleep and the carbuncle aimed in my direction, flashed furiously. Suddenly, I understood. Vivie’s short spurts of language, communicating in emotions with Freddie; the only words she’d learned while drifting the waters in Storm Lake, were those she’d gathered from watching and listening to the natives and repeating the sounds.

  She was just a bairn. I reached for the only language I thought might reach her mother before I ended up Vouivre food. Je viens dans la paix—I come in peace, I thought. Did she believe me? Time was passing. I needed to find a solution, a peaceful one. An expedient one.

  The young cub pushed against my claws and the growls emitting from her mother’s teeth inspired me. To soothe Vivie on the flight south I’d sung the words to a lullaby my own mither sang to me when I was a bairn.

  “Can ye sing balulow until the bairn sleeps?

  Balulow lammie, Balulow dear

  Balulow lammie, thy mammie is here”

  It sounded a wee bit different, muffled by the water but she recognized it, or the soothing vibrations passing from my body to hers. She glanced to me, and then her mother. A good sign, I hoped.

  Vivie took it to the next level by rubbing the gem on her forehead against my ankles. Her mother’s reaction was instantaneous, though cautious. The slight tilt of her head and the change in the color of her carbuncle said she was reconsidering.

  I took a chance. Still humming (with my last reserves of air) I released Vivie to swim to the larger creature. The second she left my clutch she transformed into her dragon elemental form. There was a brief conversation, then her parent startled me by mind-speaking in the language of my own mither’s people. She explained that her “silly child” had given away much of her elemental power to boost the Forge before we’d left, as repayment for our kindness. She said it was “the Vouivre way”, a si
milar philosophy of my own ancestors.

  Quickly, my air nearly depleted, I asked if they would return below the ocean floor. After she nodded, I allowed her one chance to permit me to leave, because it was now or never. I didnae give away the particulars of my growing weakness, but told her the people who had saved her bairn were in danger. She took Vivie under one massive wing and bowed to the silky bottom. Her gem went as clear as a diamond as she purred her thanks and thought, “Vitesse de Dieu.” God speed.

  I took one extra second to acknowledge her gesture and shot toward the surface, gasping as I burst through like a great whale. Oxygen, finally.

  I toasted a flurry of shrimp scared up by my arrival, and fed. Needs must, for if I didnae eat, I’d lack the speed to back to Destiny. A short dive, several tuna, a smaller fish and two great sharks later I was speeding north.

  And I was going to be late.

  Chapter 26

  Jack

  I was going to war with a handyman, some barnyard animals and a scorpion.

  My speeding came to a halt three blocks from Harmony on Boggy Bayou Road. I pulled over to the side of the road when it became obvious I wasn’t going to be able to get around the debris. A microburst had blown huge oaks and pecans down on vehicles and roofs blocking the street. The path of destruction led straight to Harmony. Whatever had caused the straight-line wind, and my bet was on Tempe, it had been brief but powerful.

  Several garages had been damaged. A giant oak lay across the road, its limbs badly damaging two cars. Roof shingles and tin, bikes and toys littered the street. A basketball rolled toward me and I kicked it out of the way. There would be no moving forward by car.

  There was also no Conor, and no sign of Ridge or his men. It would be another couple of minutes before they arrived. Hopefully, I had a couple. Dark clouds were moving in on the horizon. I looked closer. Not clouds, a mass of shmoo or squonk, flying low, a couple hundred at least.