Chapter Seventeen
It was after dusk when the sages had prepared a chamber for the spirit's arrival, and Lin was sitting on the sidelines against the chamber walls with the others who had come with her to the village. Strong incense was burning, filling the room with a light haze. The sages all stood in a circle, waiting for the spirit to arrive. It was eerily quiet and it was making Lin feel uneasy.
"Should I be somewhere else to try to lure it in?" She asked the Shaman who was standing nearby.
"No, I sense something dark is already approaching. The cleansing ritual requires the spirit to be in the middle of the circle alone."
Lin then spotted a pair of red eyes far down the long corridor that led to the chamber.
"It's here!"
"We must act quickly!" The Shaman warned as the creature flew through the corridor at an inhuman speed towards them. Suddenly one of the sages cried out as he froze up. Lin's eyes widened as she realized he was already being bloodbent, even at a far distance. Lin tried to stand up, and Kya helped her as they knew what was coming. Mako, Jinora and Tenzin were already getting in fighting stances.
"Start the forms now! And get it into the circle!" Another one of the sages got in a stance and raised his arms, pulling walls of fire up around the spirit in an attempt to corral it into the circle. The creature's fangs were bared and it screeched loudly in anger as it was surrounded by fire. The sage in its bloodbending grip fell to the ground as it began to crush him, and Tenzin and Mako began to run along the outsides of the circle towards the creature as Kya and Jinora stood in front of Lin. Two other sages froze up as well and cried out, and the Shaman took a deep breath while raising her own arms and tried to maintain the firewalls herself.
"The circle is being broken! We may have to banish it instead of pacifying it!" She cried out.
"What the hell is the difference? Just kill it already!" Lin exclaimed over the roaring fires. Jinora quickly looked back at her.
"If we don't pacify the spirit, banishing it only means it will come back to the material world again! It will come back later!" The airbender warned. They heard a loud shout as Tenzin was tossed across the room.
"Dad!" Jinora cushioned his fall with her airbending but then she and Kya cried out as they came under the spirit's bloodbending grip along with the remaining sages.
"Kya! Jinora!" Lin yelled before she felt it as well. She grit her teeth and shakily fought to get in front of them as they shook under the creature's control. "Come and get me instead you bastard!" She screamed. The creature suddenly took interest in Lin and its eyes glinted brightly. Lin closed her eyes and took in one last labored breath before she knew it was going to crush her again, only to feel a large jet of heat fly past her. She heard screeching and looked up to see Mako jumping from one of the chamber's balconies, blasting the creature with his firebending. They all collapsed as they were suddenly free from the bloodbending grip, and they all covered their ears at the deafening noises the spirit made as the firebender scorched it. The creature had crawled back into a corner, and Mako showed absolutely no mercy as he continued pouring a steady stream of flames from his fist, and the whole room was filled with light and the awful smell of charred flesh and hair. He didn't stop until the Shaman walked up behind him and grabbed his arm.
"Enough! Before you burn this temple to the ground!" She said, extinguishing his flames with a downwards movement of her arms. Mako was shaking and panting hard.
"I'm sorry." He coughed out.
"Well, you did well in acting quickly my boy, but unfortunately that will not be the last this world sees of that spirit, I'm sure." The Shaman said before looking at her sages and the others.
Kya and Jinora shakily got up and Lin went over to them.
"Are you both alright?" She asked with concern lacing her voice.
"As far as I can tell we are. It didn't hold us for very long. We'll talk about you being stupid and not listening to my advice later." Kya said tiredly, pointing a finger at Lin. "But I'm glad it's over for now." Kya sat Lin down and checked her over quickly with her waterbending.
"You're lucky it was distracted with trying to hold all of us at once. You're going to need more healing later tonight but for now, you're looking ok." Kya gave Lin a tired smile and then examined the remaining sages on the ground, and healed what she could as Tenzin slowly got up as well. He stood next to Mako who was examining the now completely scorched corpse.
"This wasn't the outcome I hoped for, but given how powerful and dangerous it is, this is probably the best outcome we could have gotten." He stroked his beard. "The spirit will be back, but it won't be bloodbending anymore."
The Shaman also spoke next to them.
"I agree, I had hoped to be able to pacify it, but we underestimated it. For now, the darkness is gone." She said solemnly before helping Kya treat the sages who had been injured by the creature. Lin painfully walked over to Mako.
"I don't give compliments lightly, even if you've saved my ass multiple times. But you've outdone yourself in tracking this thing down and stopping it. I'm proud of you kid." She said, resting her hand on Mako's shoulder.
Mako looked surprised before looking relieved.
"Thanks, Chief. I learned from the best." He smiled softly at the metalbender.
"Don't mention it. Now let's help the sages get this cleaned up and call it a night."
Lin stared up at the tapestry hanging above the walnut posts of the bed. It was dark out with the exception of the moon, and a cool ocean breeze blew through the open doors of the bedroom balcony. She could feel Kya gently stroking her hair as they laid on the bed, the waterbender had her arms around her.
"You jumped up to face that thing when I told you not to." Kya murmured.
"Yeah, well, I couldn't let it kill you. And Jinora was there too. I wasn't about to let some monster crush her to death just to get to me."
"That's fair. You just scared me again. If it wasn't using so much energy holding us all down it would've killed you in a heartbeat." Kya sighed.
Lin rolled onto her side to face Kya more.
"Kya, you know how my job works. And yes, I know I'm on vacation, but this is one of the realities of my work, of what it means to be involved with me. There could be a night when I just don't come home again. No matter how careful I am, it's still dangerous." She murmured. Kya stayed silent but she understood. The waterbender adjusted them so she could hold Lin closer.
"I'm just glad you're with me now." She said, kissing Lin's forehead. Lin hummed and tilted her head up to kiss the waterbender on the lips. Kya returned the kiss, and it deepened as Lin sat up more. Kya pulled back as she felt the metalbender press against her with more urgency and gave Lin a knowing smile.
"Don't make things frustrating, you're in no state to be messing around." She teased while still giving Lin a firm look.
"Then you had better heal me faster, woman." Lin shot back playfully and Kya rolled her eyes.
"Oh, I'll heal you," Kya sat up and began slipping out of bed. "Come on. And get undressed"
Lin followed her to the bathroom and Kya began to fill the large black marble tub. Lin did as she was told and slipped out of her pajamas slowly, she was indeed still rather sore. The metal bender got in the large dark basin once it was full and she tried to relax as Kya began her routine healing session, feeling the waterbender's chi wash up and down her body. It was always a soothing sensation, and as funny as it was, Lin could feel the difference in energy in each healer she had encountered out in the field. Some healers felt too cold, some of them made her feel taught as their chi invaded her injuries, like how sensitive teeth stung after eating ice cream. Kya's healing always felt smooth and fluid around her body, almost like cool waves washing up around her nerves and tissues, gently numbing her and receding back.
Lin could feel Kya's glowing hand press against her chest below her collarbones as the healer checked her ribs slowly. Her hand traveled down in between her breasts and focused below them in a spot that still needed more localized healing.
"You are doing a lot better than you were a few days ago, I'll give you that." Kya murmured. "And your concussion seems almost healed as well." Lin took a deep breath.
"Do you think it's really over?" She asked, keeping her eyes closed as she tried to relax under Kya's touch as the waterbender got to a more tender area of her ribs.
"Before they left back to go back to the city, Jinora said that the spirit will likely come back to Republic City since that's where it resided before, but in a weakened state. The man died but the spirit was never pacified." Kya said, moving her hand down to Lin's abdomen to check for any remaining internal damage from the bloodbending. Kya continued going over little spots that still needed more attention.
"Well, I'm glad we still have a few days here then. I'm sick of that spirity mumbo jumbo." Lin mumbled. Kya smiled and helped Lin dry off and get out of the tub before the metalbender got back into bed. She climbed in next to her.
"So, despite all of it, was it still a good vacation?"
"Yes. It was." Lin replied, wrapping her arms around the waterbender as they settled down for the night.
Note: This is the last chapter. May or may not be working on a sequel/continuation. Stay tuned ;) Thank you for the reviews!