excerpt: Seven Devils

[salamandher]

Title: Seven Devils
Who: Kara Makenna and The Undine (Madison Rayne)
What: FIGHT FIGHT FIGHT - what happens when two opposing Elemental hosts call each other out.

 

In retrospect, a day of rain, a day of wind and cold, was not the best day for this confrontation. Not that it was her choice. When you got called out by your own kind, albeit the first you'd ever met, there was no choice at all, really. Something primal, old as the stars and the air pulled the agreement from her lips, sealed the deal. Bound the two of them to the meeting surer than a welding torch.

So here she was, standing in a park in heavy, damp twilight, watching the warm lights of the city wink on across the grass. Hearing the soft chug of ships on the river behind her. Waiting.

Until the pale figure stepped from a car, movements easy, flowing. As if they were swimming instead of walking. One step after another, feet bare in the wet grass, skin so white it looked blue – looked like the skin of the dead. The figure stopped beneath a streetlamp, the yellow light casting wan shadows across a face with a drowned woman's lips. Her clothing was haphazard – a nightgown over form-fitting jeans, arms and shoulders bare to the rain. Dark hair slicked back to her head. Eyes as cold and empty and glittering as glacial seas.

And yet, still, somehow, Kara felt under-dressed in her own denim and biker jacket, heavy leather shedding the moisture clinging to the other woman's dead colored skin. She fidgeted with the zipper, drawing it all the way to her chin, closing the jacket's collar around her neck.

The woman smiled, the chill little expression doing nothing to change the impression you were looking at an animated corpse.

“Hello, lizard,” she murmured. The words rushing and burbling in a way no human throat could possibly mimic. “It's been so long.”

Cars hissed by on the street, and wind sighed around them. They were the only two people in this world. No one else was going to answer the issued challenge of a greeting. She took a deep breath, drawing herself up a few more inches in her battered sneakers. “You look, uh. Decayed.”

Definitely needed to work on the witty retorts there. The other woman didn't flinch, didn't react. She just kept staring at Kara with those cold, empty eyes. The silence, cut only by oddly muted city sounds, stretched – a yawning, clawing thing with teeth made from the unflinching stare of the woman before her.

Names have power. Use her name. Call the woman out from the monster.

Great advice. It made sense. She'd had to use it herself, to drag her own inner demon into submission more than once. Other times, it called her back to herself. Reminded her of her place. Of who she was. Knowing the name of the creature sealed to her body and soul gave her a power over it, in return. It balanced the scales. Theoretically, it should work here, provided all this Elemental nonsense came from the same corner of the cosmos or wherever it was they originated from.

… except you don't know her name, do you, dummy?

And there was the problem. Jacob hadn't been able to turn up any information on the woman's name, or anything else about her. Not like they had with poor Hunter. And by then, it had been too late to help the kid at all.

“Does it always speak for you?” the woman was asking. “Your vessel has poor manners.”

Irritation flared. This batty dead chick was saying she had bad manners? At least she could dress herself for god's sake. Somewhere inside, the Salamander stirred, roused to waking by the emotion. She felt heat crawling up her spine, speeding more quickly as it realized its opponent, the enemy, had drawn so close. Little whispers, like the soft pop and hiss of candle flame danced through her brain, and it was all she could do to shove it down with the thought of the creature's Name. But not before that quiet, crackling voice could whisper one in return, the syllables hot and scalding with hatred.

U N D I N E

Across the park, the woman laughed. The sound burbled and flowed as if bouncing off invisible rocks. She lifted her hands, spreading long, blue-white fingers wrinkled by submersion. “So you do remember,” she purred. “There's no need to draw this out then, sweet lizard. You remember your place. Your purpose...”

Her hands lowered, fingertips running along her sides, down to her abdomen. Pausing. With the rain plastering her dress to her skin, it was fairly easy to see the slight swell there. The realization sent cold shocks through Kara, reaching through the Salamander's warmth to settle in her bones.

Oh, crap.

When the other woman looked back up, there was something too hot in her eyes. Something proud and rotten all at once.

“Lady, I'm really not sure what that's supposed to mean,” Kara called out, trying to keep the confusion off her face. Not to mention the unease. You really didn't want to see someone who looked like an extra from the Walking Dead touching themselves like that. Or think of what it could mean. She was all too aware of why these creatures were here. What would happen if one of them succeeded in their task.

And this one had been hanging around with the most violent, most dangerous wizard the planet currently hosted. Bad news with capital letters.

“But if you're just here to... do that...” she went on, waving an impetuous hand toward the other. “I'm done. I'm not into girls. Bye.”

“Silence!” the woman snarled, all trace of pleasure gone from her voice. Her face contorting into a twisted, emaciated parody of itself. Teeth sharpened, mouth gaping, and her skin seemed to crack as the word echoed across the park. “You are nothing! Only a vessel! Nothing more than a place to store the child! Sit and be quiet as your lizard should have made you!”

Both Kara and the Salamander reacted as one. Her stance shifted, the Salamander's fire kindling to life across her skin. Its voice joined hers in a dull, throaty roar in answer.

“We are ONE. Fool.”

The woman – no, the Undine – laughed again. All sudden joy and childish eagerness. She actually clapped her hands, dancing lightly on her toes. “So good!” she cheered, voice still burbling. “I have the child, and the pleasure of destroying you!”

All she did was cant her head to the side. A simple, subtle motion. And every drop of water on the grassy lawn lifted, swirling about her body in a liquid tornado. Kara and her Salamander barely had a moment to register the notion of – oh fuck – before it came flying toward her. Smashing into her with the collective weight of gallons of water. Like being hit by dozens upon dozens of water balloons fired from a batting cage ball launcher.

More fire blazed to life, and the water hissed into harmless steam. Well, harmless to someone attached to a fire elemental, anyway. It scalded the grass to blackened ash, scorched the pavement. And left Kara in the center of it, grasping a little, her hands held up in an unconscious warding gesture – something she'd picked up from her own wizard.

The Undine snarled something, and tried again, collecting raindrops in her hands to fling at her opponent. Again, Kara's flames managed to stop the barrage. And again. And again. Over and over until she was gasping for breath, the scorched patch of grass around her widened to the size of an SUV.

Backup was coming, she told herself. She wasn't going to be alone in this. The others had promised they'd help somehow. She just had to stay focused, had to keep the flames high, to keep herself from being pushed back across the park, back into the cold, chugging depths of the river lurking behind her.

No wonder the Undine picked this place. She should have been more careful. Or, at the very least, more aware of geography.

The onslaught stopped. She looked up, fire still framing her face, dancing along her limbs. The sight before her made the bottom promptly dropped out of her stomach.

Up on the hill, the Undine had changed. The drowned-looking human form replaced with something liquid, rippling. As if someone had turned marble to water. Her arms raised over her head, her empty eyes cast up to the sky, expression dark, deadly. The mismatched clothing had vanished entirely, water flowing around her instead, draping like a cloak and gown. Those hands twisted, twirled, motions like waves on a shore.

And every drop of rain stopped. Every bit of water on every tree, every remaining blade of grass, rose into the air. Pipes groaned somewhere in the earth, until jets of water fountained upward. Windows smashed outward as more water flowed from the buildings behind them.

“Okay,” Kara panted, feeling her eyes go a little wide under the protection of her fire. “That's. Going to be harder.”

Thunder sounded in her ears. The klaxon screams of boat horns joined in, echoing behind her. Slowly, she turned her head, mentally preparing herself for some sort of deep sea horror pulling itself free of the river. Because that would just be perfect.

Instead, the river itself rose from its bed. A dark, swirling wall of water spiraling forward to join in the never-ending flood from the rain, from the buildings, the pipelines. People began to scream, somewhere in the city. It all flowed around her, conducted by the Undine's slowly circling fingertips.

The Undine lowered her gaze, her mouth parted in a slow, fevered expression of ecstasy, her voice raised to the silvery clarion of a pounding waterfall.

“Now, drown.”

Water smashed down.

There were no words for the feeling. The disorientation as her feet swept up to the sky, her head tossed into the grass. Water wrapped around every limb, into her nose, her eyes, her ears. Choking, cloying cold. It doused the flames instantly, without even a wisp of steam or ash remaining behind. The Salamander screamed, somewhere, a teakettle screech of anguish and pain. She felt herself reaching out, as if to grasp it. To pull it back to herself, but the rush of water knocked her hand back.

And it just kept coming. More and more. There was no chance of fighting back. Even starting to try and swim upward was met with more water, more current. Her limbs pressed to her sides, her feet bound by invisible tides.

Her lungs began screaming almost immediately, fighting to inhale, to take a breath. It was all right – it wouldn't hurt. Just one breath and then... then no more watching the world change. Watching people fall apart and age. No more hiding. No more flames, no more creature in her mind, in her body, no more of the wretched purpose it held. Just this cold.

It really sounded pretty great, all things considered. She hadn't wanted any of this anyway. Honestly, she should have died a long time ago. It probably would have been better. Nothing to worry about. No more nightmares, too. Or worrying about whether or not That Man would come back and …

--ison Rayne--

Wait.

Someone was shouting. A man's voice. Shouting a name. She couldn't quite make it out. But it wasn't hers. No reason to pay attention. Just let herself keep slipping into dark waters.

Madison Rayne!

It came again. Clearer. Calling out to someone else. Not her...

But the pressure on her arms started to ease. Started slackening enough to where she could move again. To where her heart began hammering desperately in her chest again. Names. Names were important. There was power in a name. That was important.

Madison Rayne! Hear and listen!

The last breath of air slipped out in a dull repetition of the words. Though it wasn't the woman's name on her lips. A softer name. One made of the crackling of a campfire's coals. The hiss of steam from wet logs and the dull roar of the inferno.

Hear and listen.

I HEAR YOU.

Warmth flooded into her limbs. Shockingly hot against the cold of the water. More heat wrapped around her body, across her chest, her shaking, desperate lungs and struggling heart. Beneath the endless pounding water, her eyes flooded with orange firelight.

I HEAR AND OBEY. WE ARE ONE.

Then get me out of here.

Flames burst skyward. As thick around as a city bus, the fire widened slowly, swirling in counterpoint to the water flowing around it. Scorching it to steam in great, billowing clouds. Burning a hole straight through the clouds and rain covering the city. It didn't stop until it cleared a broad circle in the watery prison. Until both the Undine and the figure swathed in flames stood across from each other once more.

Bare, fire-coated feet touched down on grass now as dry and brown as in the height of summer. No rain fell upon the figure, upon the woman made of flames, the woman stepping calmly from the raging inferno behind her. Pacing a slow, steady stride across the hillside. Heading for the Undine with unerring steps. Her gaze was shrouded in the fire, the flames ringing her head like a halo, but it never once moved itself from the Undine.

Somewhere beyond the circle of water and fire, a man's voice continued calling out the other woman's true name. Paralyzing her, and the creature holding her body and soul. Kara wanted to feel bad. She wanted to tell this Madison it was going to be all right, that Jacob or Charlie or whoever it was up there calling her name would be able to fix this. But she knew it wouldn't happen.

After all, they hadn't been able to fix her.

The Undine was frozen in her pose of summoning. Her damp, dead skin scalded by steam, blistered in places. Her eyes had changed, the flat, empty things replaced with something more human, more frightened. And she was shaking from fatigue. From pain. Up close, she was a tall woman, a head taller than Kara. But she sank to her knees as the Salamander and its vessel approached.

Kara reached forward. Grasped the trembling creature's chin in her hand. The other rested gently atop the other's head, atop steaming, scorched hair, almost in benediction. A voice sobbed – a real, human voice – in something like utter relief.

“Sorry, Madison.”

And fire roared from between her hands.

The Undine didn't scream. It simply died. Blackened and withered, on the little hill in the city park.