The Gemini Age: Book One

[17-3] Stand as One - Part Three

    "Jade!"

    Marcus' voice wailed in the distance, a long way from the ringing noise crowding her every thought. The fractured lengths of rooftop edges amassed over her in silence like the leaf-spangled limbs of the oaks, elms, and countless other trees that she once watched from the forest floor. Then, as now, the sun had been reluctant to depart from its throne in the sky, articulating its defiance in bursts of volcanic oranges and pinks that shined brighter in their dusk-dark frame as they fought to stop time.

    Jade had always admired the sun's stubbornness in her childhood, and the reasoning behind many of her youthful barefoot wanderings through the forest had been to chase the last glimpse of sunlight before it fled the ongoing march of bedtime. The sunlight then was low and harsh, and it had provided no real help in navigating the shadowy ranks of the trees. She had come to appreciate the imposed darkness, though, when she had noticed and begun to follow the sprawling network of waterways dripping through the dirt, riding their cool confident streams from her home to the river. Sometimes she had gone further, such was the safety she had taken in the water's hold.

    She wished the air would cradle her like that, rather than letting her plummet as Laz's expressionless face watched on. Reaching out, Jade found the sun again and asked for it to grasp onto her final few dwindling seconds for a final defiant moment.

    Somehow, it worked. A booming uprush of air curved around Jade's shoulders and curtailed her swift descent. Her confusion cleared away when a solid yet measured force applied itself to her lower back, and she turned to see Marcus' face sharpened to a bleeding edge with concentration. His arm clutched her by her waist, though he winced as his other arm trailed behind them as they rose over the rooftops once again.

    Laz glared at Jade's return, so focused on her unharmed body that he missed the wave of air lashed onto his face from Marcus' passing flight. He wiped his face, his mouth open beneath his palm without any sound escaping, as Jade and Marcus rolled onto the safer side of the soot-stained rooftop. "Are you alright?" Marcus asked with his hand on a light cut on Jade's shoulder. He winced as he tried to straighten the joint in his other arm.

    "For now," she answered, watching Marcus strain. "Are you?"

    "It's my arm, I must have landed on it earlier." He gritted his teeth and rubbed a wave of pain away, then tried to light a flame with his sore arm before wincing.

    Jade shivered as Marcus released a grunt, placing her hand on his chest. "You can't stay here," she said, her voice shaking.

    "I'm fine, Jade. I can help. I want to help."

    "But how?" Jade asked, making eye contact with the councillors across the rooftop. They were bound and huddled in a group by the broken wall around the rooftop's edge, still closer to Laz than to her. By their side, Jade saw a crumbling tunnel into the corridors close to the heart of the Chambers. "Unless...do you think you can still make an air current?

    "Sure, but what for?"

    The Nomad's hand fell from his face, yet his eyes remained narrow and tense. With her lips parted, Jade stared down to the alleyway behind the building. "He can't do anything to stop your magic if I keep him busy," she announced, dusting herself off. "I'll lure him away while you carry the councillors back to the ground, okay?"

    Marcus' eyes widened. "Lure him away how? The guy wouldn't flinch if a building fell on him!"

    "I think I know what'll persuade him to move." She winked, then crossed in front of Marcus towards the open section of the rooftop, a short fall into a connecting corridor lined with red carpet. Cupping her mouth with both hands, she hung one foot over the edge of the opening. "Hey! I can get in here! It sure would be a shame if I snuck in and, I don't know, beat up Philemon Locke, wouldn't it? But I don't think there's anybody around to stop me! Guess I'll just head on in!"