chair was all that lay between us, and Joaquin feinted first to one side, then the other; he was testing us, teasing, trying to draw us forward. Ian whimpered behind me, and I patted him reassuringly. Unfortunately there was no one to do the same for me.
Body tense, I followed Joaquin with my eyes. Neither he nor I had a conduit, but he still had an advantage. If he touched a hair on Ian’s head, I’d lose this contest. More, I was sure I’d knocked into more walls than he had, and the energy loss had made me shaky. I wasn’t as agile as normal, and it felt like the entire world was shuddering under my feet as I sidestepped first one way, then the other, an unwilling snake to Joaquin’s flute.
“Run!” I yelled at Ian as I launched myself over the seat of the chair and tackled Joaquin from above. We skidded across the room, and Ian leaped awkwardly over us to clear the entry. Joaquin, struggling and swearing beneath me, managed to lift a hand and grab the other man’s ankle. This time Ian didn’t squeal, but stomped down hard on Joaquin’s arm, twice, while I pummeled him from the top. Joaquin let go with a murderous howl, and as Ian escaped, turned the full force of that rage on me.
This time we were more evenly matched. I was grown now, my warrior skills honed first as a mortal and now as a heroine of Light. The passage into the center of the maze had taken a toll on both of us, though, and neither of us were throwing our best blows. I reached up to his greased head, fisted my hand, and pummeled his skull into the ground. My body was pressed so firmly against his that the reverberations sounded in my breast.
It sounded like a choir of angels.
Joaquin bucked beneath me, scrambling for purchase against the ground, my body, the nearby chair. What he found was an invisible wall. Unfortunately, the maze didn’t discriminate between bodies locked so closely together, and raw power shot into me, exploding in my brain in a shower of stars and pretty lights. I flew backward and crumpled against the bolted chair, head torqued awkwardly.
Joaquin, though, had taken the brunt of the blow. I rose first; grasping the base of the seat, I heaved with everything left in me. Biceps straining, lungs aching, I was rewarded only by a faint creak. I glanced back. Now he’d found an elbow and was propped up, almost sitting. I strained against the base again, and the cement ruptured beneath my feet. But the fucking chair held.
If I’d been fresh, this wouldn’t have been a problem, and I wondered if the Tulpa was enjoying all the new power my stolen energy was allowing him. All that kept me on my feet was knowing he’d zapped quite a bit of Joaquin’s as well, and I strained again, groaning with it, and this time was rewarded with a resounding crack. My cry turned victorious, and I steadied myself, pivoted, and sent the chair plowing into Joaquin’s face.
Or where his face should’ve been. A hand locked on to a chair leg, then another. I pushed, but Joaquin was quicker, a forward kick catching me in the sternum beneath my makeshift weapon. Tumbling backward, doubling over, I anticipated the chair cracking over my back.
Anticipation didn’t make the reality any less painful. The breath flew from my body as I ate cement, and I could’ve sworn I heard vertebrae collapsing in my spine. Sprawled, the line of agony concentrated in my core before burning itself out in my limbs, I screamed in pain and frustration as my hands and feet went numb and useless.
I heard the chair clatter, then crackle as it sparked against a wall, then Joaquin was on me, flipping me over.
“This is familiar,” he taunted, and though he didn’t exactly look fresh, he was straddling me, propping his weight on the center of my spine, bearing down. When I’d finished screaming-and that only because there was no more breath left in my lungs-he spoke, words liquid and smooth, his face glazed over in satisfaction. “Look at you. You’re exhausted. Burned so badly your skin is peeling…probably sensitive to the touch.”
He plowed his fingertips into the burns along my neck, but this time I couldn’t even spare the breath to scream. Pain was a constant, but so was the rapid thudding of my heart. Which meant I was alive.
“You don’t look…any…better,” I told him, and he whipped his hand across my face so hard, my cheek ricocheted off the cement.
He propped himself up on my waist, sitting so straight I could’ve toppled him if I’d still had the use of my limbs. Instead I had to wait until I recovered, or thought of something better. Nothing was coming to me right now. “I’ll never understand why you guys do that,” he said, running his hand through his hair, smoothing all the ends back into place. “Expending all your excess energy protecting a mere mortal. You might’ve had me if not for that. And now”-he shook his head in mock sadness-“you’re my victim again.”
“No. This was my choice,” I said, almost at peace with that. Funny, but I felt more centered and relaxed now that it was almost over. Staring Joaquin in the face was easier than avoiding him in my dreams and thoughts, the way I had all these years past. That had been a useless expenditure of energy, I knew now. And just as debilitating as the Tulpa’s maze.
But that wasn’t the only reason I remained still. I had one more choice available to me, something actually learned in my endless lessons with Tekla. True, I’d never been able to knock walls down with my mind, but I had become somewhat adept at building them up. Therefore, as sweat seeped down my back, I fought to imagine a single, solid wall into existence, hoping my strength would be enough to manage that much. Fortunately Joaquin was busy shooting off at the mouth, and as the air five feet to his left began to ripple, he noticed nothing.
“Ah, yes. The
“
He rose, nearing the wall solidifying on his left, and I’d have cursed myself for building it too close if I had the time or energy to do so. And maybe if he hadn’t kicked me in the kidney. I curled into the fetal position, my concentration snapped, but after a moment was able to take the pain and my will and center it back into the wall. Sweat began to form on my forehead, sliding along my cheeks and jawline, though I didn’t dare wipe it away. If I did, Joaquin would know I was doing more than recovering from his blow. I had to keep him talking.
“I should’ve killed you at the swingers’ ball,” I said, angling myself so he was again in front of me. A second wall began to shimmer to his right.
“And I should’ve killed you as soon as Regan told me of your new identity.” He laughed at my surprised expression, and I had to refocus as my second wall bobbled. “She did, you know. Right after she ambushed you at the aquarium. I didn’t believe her, of course. It was too obvious, too risky…totally out of character for the agents of Light.”
“And because she was just an initiate,” I added, because that’s what I’d thought too.
“There was that,” he conceded, dropping back down on my waist, gently wrapping his fingers around my neck. He didn’t squeeze, just held them there, thumbs soft on my windpipe. “For some reason she seems to hate you even more than I do.” He quirked his head as if considering that while his fingers played gently over the row of vertebrae in my neck. “Of course, I don’t really hate you. I desire you…but I’m still going to kill you.”
The second wall was solidifying strangely, an amalgamation of Tekla’s mirrored practice walls and the Tulpa’s invisible barriers. Though I doubted they possessed the same energetic sting as the maze surrounding us, it was amazing what the mind could do once it knew what was possible. I couldn’t overthink it, though, because just then Joaquin’s fingers tensed, then stilled as a popping sounded from behind me, also within. The pain was momentary, the nausea fleeting. And the paralysis was immediate. Fear flooded my brain, and the third wall I was erecting behind Joaquin disintegrated. I had to refocus-I couldn’t be broken or killed this way; Joaquin knew it, he was just fucking with me-but more than the physical abuse, his words had crept into my mind, and questions now warred with my concentration. I shook my head to clear it of these thoughts, the only movement left to me, but Joaquin stilled the movement with only a slight press of his thumbs.
“Regan got a real kick out of setting you up,” he told me, his own nerves giving a strained lilt to his voice. He was getting excited now. “She loved that she got you to watch those fireworks, to infect your friends, chase me, lose your place in the troop.” He released his hold on my neck and rose to his knees, inches from the wall on his
