C’mon, Iolaire! We need to get ahead of her! Then we shift and slip down between the buildings! Caden suggested.
Iolaire agreed and hooted. The business district was not laid out in a nice grid, but instead consisted of buildings of every shape and size that sat so close to one another that it would be a tight squeeze for Caden to walk between them with his shoulders facing forward in places. No part of their Dragon form, except for the tip of their tail, could have made it between there.
They shot forward so that they would be at least a building’s length ahead of Landry or, at least, where they thought she went. The darkness between the buildings was deep and the roofs overhung many of the narrow passages between the buildings.
Here! Let’s shift! Caden told his Spirit.
And within half a second, they were in their human form and plummeting towards the ground. Caden could have touched the sides of the buildings if he had reached his arms out to the sides, but instead, he kept them tucked closely against his chest. He landed lightly with one leg bent and the other stretched out behind him. He immediately straightened and looked for Landry ahead of them. She had skidded to a halt the moment she saw him drop down from the sky and started to backtrack.
Oh, no, you don’t! Caden growled.
He started to run. The ground was wet and the fetid scent of garbage wafted all around them. There was broken glass and loose asphalt that bit into the soles of his feet. He felt the squish of rotting things between his toes. But Caden kept going. Landry dashed down a slightly wider alleyway between the backs of two buildings. It was narrow, but had room for the large trash bins. Caden raced after her. She was fast, but not as fast as him and Iolaire.
As he spun into the turn, he saw her just twenty feet away. She looked over her shoulder, eyes wide between the heavy bangs, just as he drew in a deep breath. She put more pep in her step before grabbing one of the large, green trash containers and wrenching it into his path. His breath painted the front of the trash bin an icy white. It also effectively blocked his way forward. But that didn’t stop him.
Caden launched himself up into the air onto the top of the trash bin and then jumped down on the other side. Landry had used that momentary distraction to give her time to grab one of the large metal bins by the bottom wheels and heft it over her head. Such a feat for a human would have been impossible. Caden was reminded of how easily Valerius and Esme had tossed around the dungeon’s door. Landry tossed the trash bin at him. He ducked.
It flew over his head and crashed into the bin that he had just leaped from. He was up again just in time for Landry to send another trash can flying towards him. He didn’t have time to duck. Instead, he brought both arms instinctively in front of his face and six inches away from him. The trash bin hit his forearms and wrapped around them and him like some kind of metal cloak. The impact didn’t even have him sliding back on the slick mush of rotten vegetables and who knew what else. There was no pain either. His forearms didn’t even sting from the impact. But he was stunned nonetheless. And that gave Landry the time she needed to wheel away from him once more.
He hefted himself over the second trash bin and was after her. She skidded around yet another corner. Her hair and the back of one leg was all he saw of her. He mimicked the running style of the Terminator with arms and legs pumping.
We need to catch her before she makes it to the wall! Caden cried.
Iolaire shifted its weight in his chest so its head was down and wings outstretched as if that would make him more aerodynamic. He wasn’t sure if it did have some effect, but he was running faster. Caden almost laughed with the joy of this incredible physicality that he had never known.
He flew around another corner and he saw that Landry was already at the end of the throughway between the two buildings--a furniture store on his left and a bookstore on his right if he remembered correctly--and about to cross the road to where the wall stretched up and up and up towards where High Reach sat.
She’s getting away, Iolaire!
His Spirit let out a breath of ice and Caden realized what he needed to do. He kept moving, but he sent a blast of icy breath, not at Landry’s back, but at her feet. Ice coated the cracked sidewalk that she’d burst out upon. Her feet went out from underneath her. She nearly spun in a circle before she hit the ground with a painful thud. Caden winced, but she immediately was trying to scrabble to her feet again and take off towards the wall.
He drew in another breath and coated her with an icy blanket that held her in place. Everything but her head was covered in ice. It was the same thing that he’d done to the bombers. But unlike them, she fought wildly and with the strength of a Hydra Shifter. He saw her head whipping back and forth. The ice creaked all around her. Caden sent another breath that added an additional ice layer, stopping the creaking.
He slowed nearly to a stop as he reached her. He walked calmly around her frozen form so that he could see her face. Her lips were writhed back from her teeth in a silent snarl. Her eyes were full of rageful nightshine. She hissed at him when she caught sight of him. He realized it wasn’t just a hiss when Iolaire hooted excitedly and a mist seethed through her clenched teeth. Caden hopped back a step and, like he had in the bedroom, blew the fear gas away. Landry’s hair also flew back and ice crystals formed on the strands.
“Don’t do that again! Or I’ll just put a nice little ice mask over your mouth!” Caden warned.
She glared at him, but no more gas left her now closed lips.
“Now that’s better,” he said. “That was a nice little game of cat and mouse we played there.”
He knew he should shift, snatch Landry off the sidewalk in her frozen cocoon and head back to Valerius and Illarion. But he wanted a minute to talk to her without her brothers there. He wanted to know if there was any part of Landry still inside of this body.
Please let there be!
“Landry? Landry? Can you hear me?” he asked, as he studied her eyes between the oily strands of hair.
Landry’s eyes changed from distrustful to wide and limpid. “C-Caden, is that you? Oh, my God! What’s going on? Where am I? Am I--I in ice?”
Iolaire let out a concerned hoot. It didn’t know if this really was Landry or not. Caden didn’t respond. He was looking into her eyes. The voice was right. Not like the other mocking voice she had used in the bedroom. But, then again, the Behemoth had been able to mimic her normal voice before switching to its own version.
“C-Caden, why aren’t you saying anything?! You have to help me out of here!” She cried and weakly struggled against the ice restraints. “I-I’m going to f-f-freeze!”
“I don’t think so,” Caden said softly. “Even if you were human you wouldn’t freeze, but you’re a Shifter now so I doubt you’d even feel the cold.”
“A-a Shifter? Caden, are you crazy?” Landry cried. “It’s me! Landry! I’m as human--as human as--”
“So you don’t remember going through the wall?” he asked.
