“Our familiars,” I whispered shakily. They were out there protecting us. “We need to get out there!” I whisper-shouted at Xari who was behind me, one arm protectively around my waist.
“You can inflict pain. Can you do it from in here?” he whispered back. I focused on the one that seemed to be the most powerful.The next second, he was writhing around on the ground, screaming in pain. The others backed up and looked around frantically for whoever caused it. They wouldn’t be able to see us in the shadows, or at least I hoped not. “Good job, baby. Now try to see if you can reach more of them at once.” His hand began stroking my belly, helping me stay grounded as I mentally spread my magic to the others, too. I needed them to remain in my line of sight for it to keep working. But the idiots that they were, they bunched closer together, not knowing they were helping me out.
“We need to end them,” I said, surprising us both. But we did. They wouldn’t stop coming for us, and I couldn’t keep them in pain forever. “Are there others?” I asked, not wanting to take my eyes off the five men I had on the ground.
“Hmm, I can sense fear with no pain nearby, but only from one.” So the mage had to be close enough for Xari to sense them.
“Can you heighten their fear? Maybe add some loneliness so we can make them run to the others?”
“I’ll try.”
A few seconds later a man came running from the other side, falling into the men I still had writhing in pain together. I added himto the cluster, too, finding myself smiling. I had power enough to make six men scream. I should probably, and I meantprobably, have felt somewhat disgusted with myself over having that thought, but in reality, I fucking loved it.
“Snowflake,” I called calmly, knowing he would hear me wherever he was. “End them.”
There were so many screams. So many. If the camping site wasn’t deserted before, it was now. Snowflake and Leon were visible as they took care of the men. Thankfully for us, it looked exactly like the men had been killed by animals. Which they had. When whoever came here next saw their bodies, they would blame the mama bears.
“Shit,” I said, realizing something. “We need to check their pockets.”
“Shit,” Xari agreed.
“We can remove our footprints with magic,” I said, getting into my shoes. We only had our boxers on, but we wouldn’t be out there for long.
Xari jumped out before me, looking around for signs of further danger. When he deemed it safe enough, I got out and joined him.I grimaced at the sight before us. There was so much blood. But we had a job to do.
I moved closer, seeing Snowflake approach us to watch over me while I was out of the van. His white fur was now red and pink. How he could still look so cute covered in blood was a mystery, but maybe it came with the magic. You got power and a higher tolerance to seeing blood. Honestly, I hoped that was the case.
Xari and I started at either end of them, looking them over for anything they carried. They had phones but nothing else that would prove them to be not of this world. We placed all of the phones on the ground and then I burned them with my fire. We couldn’t access them anyway and feared they had some kind of tracking device on them. Burning them seemed to be our best option.
With Xari’s earth magic, he opened the ground, buried the phones deep down, placing lots of greenery on top to conceal the newly filled hole. We couldn’t be reckless and get arrested for murder.
“We should clean up,” Xari said, looking down at his bloody hands. I used my water magic to remove the blood from our hands and shoes. Then we dried off using his wind and my fire magic.
I turned to our familiars. “Thank you for protecting us. You can go now and we’ll call upon you when we’re at a new campsite.” They both disappeared. “Guess that answers if we can command someone else’s familiar, too,” I grinned.
He smiled at me, took my hand in his, and led me back into our van. “We need to change clothes and get on the road again. I’d like to drive further than the closest campsite, just to be sure. Please sleep while I drive.” I nodded. It would likely take me a while to relax enough to sleep, still running high on adrenaline. But I understood that we needed sleep and since he couldn’t while driving, I at least should.
“I’ll sleep next to you.” I didn’t want to be in the back with no way to reach him if anything happened.
“Like I would let you out of my sight,” he said, looking at me with those ice-blue eyes, full of seriousness and love.
Once we were on the road again, with the GPS set to a campsite five hours away, I dozed off. My last thought was that I hoped wherever we ended up next, Xari would be able to get some rest.
I was shaken awake gently and blinked my eyes open to see morning sunlight. We were parked in a forest again, but this time there were other campers.
“I couldn’t get completely away from other people, so this will have to do,” Xari said, jumping out of the van. I followed his steps, yawning as I joined him behind it.
“We need to call our familiars, but we can’t do it here with people watching,” I whispered. “Maybe we should go further into the forest and call them there? Then, when they’re invisible, we can move back so you can get some rest.”
“I like that plan,” he answered, taking my hand in his as he locked the van behind us. We didn’t follow a trail, wanting to steer clear from the usually used trails. When we were far enough away from other people, we called them. They were clean and blood free when they came back.
“Can you return invisible every time we call you?” I asked, knowing it would help us out immensely in the future. Snowflakenodded his head and I scratched behind his ear. I knew they could understand us, but it was super helpful to get a sort of answer back. “Please do that from now on, both of you.”
As soon as they were invisible, we moved back towards our van. I could do with some more sleep, too, but we hadn’t eaten and after using that much magic, we would also need food. Xari climbed in and began sleeping while I sat outside with the back open so Xari and I could see one another if needed. I had a one-use grill that I lit up and then took out some chicken sausages and buns. The sausages were from a can, not the most delicious treat, but we didn’t always have burgers andbanging wafflesnearby. I looked through our stuff and realized we only had mustard, which would have to do for now.
I filled a water bottle with my water magic, knowing it would be the best water we could get out here. Definitely the cleanest. When the sausages were done and the buns lightly toasted, I woke Xari up. The smell of grilled meat made it easier to get him to leave our warm bed. He pulled a blanket around his nearly naked body as we sat at the end of the van and swallowed the food, not really tasting it, but needing the energy it gave us.
I sighed with contentment, leaning against the wall as I felt how tired I was. Xari must’ve been exhausted if I was still feeling this sleepy. “Go back to sleep. I’ll clean this up and join you.” Xari gave me a quickthank youkiss and snuggled back into bed. I put the trash away in the trash cans and returned the few steps back to the van. As soon as I was inside and the door locked, I crawled into bed next to Xari and fell asleep, knowing our familiars were protecting us outside.
