Kendra didn't want to be in this battle, valley, or place. She yearned to go home, finish her homework, play Blue Warrior with her friends, or sit in a bubble bath reading the latest Lisa Trow romance novel. Pretending to be the warrior battling the minions of evil with her handsome lover was not the same as real life. She'd already peed herself, and the dripping stain on Caicco's shorts said he wasn't fairing much better.
Stained underwear or not, she was here. Caicco may not be cover model material, but he is more of a dark, scrawny nerd than a dusky hunk, but he fits the rest of the trope. They were the heroes of their romance and couldn’t die in the first third of the story!
"Do you know who I am?" She wanted to shout, but her words came out in a whimper. "My mom is one of your officers, and my daddy is—"
"It doesn't matter, animal," said a woman in a blue smock. "You could be the spawn of Heim and Amekia and raised in the Palace. You became our property once the Sign of Elystria filled your chest."
"But my daddy is—"
"I don't care. Unless you have a helpful curse, you are livestock. If your Mommy and Daddy, or any other member of your family, try to claim you in defiance of the law, then we will line them up, put them down, and leave them to rot on your family's lawn. Don't worry, you'll be treated well."
Heaviness settled in Kendra's core. Bile rose in her throat as her vision blurred behind a veil of tears. This is it... they're going to strip me and lock me up like they did Lyra and Bree!
"Not going to happen," growled Caicco. His hands moved, and another spear of water burst from the lake and lanced into a red-shirted soldier. The woman dropped her rifle and clutched the wound, desperate to hold in the blood and bleeding bits that belonged inside her abdomen.
“Oh, gods,” said Caicco. He heaved, leaned forward, and emptied his stomach the old-fashioned way.
"Now, now, boy," cooed the blue-shirted woman, "don't create more work for our Healers." She leaned forward and pressed the weird black torus into Caicco's neck. He began to seize and thrash.
"Stop! You're hurting him!"
"Calm yourself, girl. Your turn is coming."
Kendra edged away, scooting until her bare back brushed against one of the obelisks of the Stoneshaper Temple. A web of energy lanced through her body. She screamed, then calmed. Power. She was alive, from the tips of her toes to the frizz in her hair! Every droui gland and speck of Azure in her body crackled and echoed through her skeleton. Elystria washed away her fear and replaced it with confidence and a blissfire high.
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The hurricane in her breasts needed out; the storm wanted to help, and she had a mind to set it free. Dense fog rose from the lake, moved on a fresh breeze, and engulfed the valley. "Get your cursed hands off of my man."
"Specialist Trope, shut her down," yelled CWO Ceallach. "Kill her if you must, but don't let her charge the fog!"
"Turn it off, little girl," hissed Specialist Trope. "It would be a waste to kill you."
"Back off," said Kendra, her voice deepening and growing in volume. She didn't have fancy armor or pretty underwear made from Azure. Still, her back rested against one of the pillars of the Stoneshaper's Temple, a well of Elystria. She pulled a stream of power into her body, and the storm within her breasts roiled.
Specialist Trope glared at Kendra as she commanded, "Stop her!"
Weapons leveled, and bolts clicked. Yet only two of the ten rifles were aimed at Kendra. The others fired in controlled volleys moments before a blond-haired velociraptor pounced, gutting two and raking pink-painted claws through the necks of two more. “No touch, my Kendra!”
Kendra locked eyes with Specialist Trope and pushed a small stream of power into the fog. The air crackled. A bullet passed through her arm. She screamed, panicked, and released all control, allowing the pillar's energy to flow through her unrestricted. It spiked out of her chest, arcing in hundreds of jagged dark blue lightning bolts, and into the fog.
CWO Ceallach screamed, “Ignore the beast. Kill the weather mage right now!”
Specialist Trope patted Caicco’s neck. “All done. Your turn, little girl. Now, stop your tantrum and join your boyfriend.”
“Let. Caicco. Go.”
“I don’t think so,” said Specialist Trope. A saccharine smile spread across her face and a new torus of dark power formed in her hand.
The wind spun and danced around Kendra, concentrating into a small tornado and lifting her from the ground. She spoke, low and powerful, every word the thump of a gavel. “In the name of my Father, I rebuke you. As a Hero, I condemn you, and with the power of my Daddy, I sentence you to death.”
Dark lightning lanced from each temple pillar, blasted through Specialist Trope, and thundered out of her back. The residual energy raced through the fog, flashing and buzzing as it touched everyone outside the temple, electrocuting some and jolting others as the power found paths to the ground.
The world darkened and fell away as Kendra dropped into her mother’s claws.