Fan the Flame

by September Thomas

  A girl who’d done everything she could when faced with impossible odds.

  A girl who never gave up even when magic and energy had fled.

  A girl capable of saving the world.

  I was a fool for ever doubting that, even in the beginning.

  The wall of the tower blurred as I fell, the wind whipping around me. Even knowing I faced true death this time, I realized the element felt strangely wonderful. Too bad I’d never had a chance to…

  You are worthy of air, came a disembodied voice, a voice that had rattled through me twice before, at two incredibly pivotal moments of my life. I’d understood one of them when I’d finally embraced my given element of water. But unlocking my fire abilities had been more troubling, more… difficult to comprehend.

  However, I’d survived an impossible inferno, battling back something that would have killed a lesser person for who knows what reasons why.

  And I’d done it again somehow—unlocked a third element.

  Warmth oozed through my chest as I plunged, the healing power of my water magic surging as it embraced the energy, pulling sustenance from the newly discovered magic. Despite the fall, it felt as if I were moving in slow motion as the world around me collapsed, the enormity of what had happened catching me wildly unprepared. As the heat blazed and the scene of ozone filled my nose, I reached out… barely understanding how to use the gift I’d been given.

  The sharp stop in midair nearly gave me whiplash.

  I hovered there, suspended high above the battlefield as blue and red and green glass sprinkled down around me. I swallowed hard, my heart beating a fast and harsh tempo in my chest as I flung myself upward, through the falling steel and glass toward the flaming inferno that used to be the top story of the tower… now blown to smithereens.

  Half the roof had all but vaporized, the extent of the damage we’d caused was humbling.

  Among the ruin I found Geoffrey. He’d been flung backward and now lay slumped against the smoking remains of one wall. A large, sleek shard of glass impaled the center of his chest. I landed beside him, glass crunching beneath my boots as I knelt. His chest rose and fell. His strange, bi-colored eyes opened when I touched his shoulder.

  “You… survived,” he ground out.

  Kill him, Kaleal raged, and I rocked back, stunned. The intensity of her emotions was more powerful than ever before. Remember what he did? Remember who he killed? Remember what he’s taken from you?

  I clenched my fist, transfixed in the clarity I now found in Geoffrey’s eyes. For the first time in weeks, the glaze of hatred and insanity was gone. What remained was the man who’d first visited me in a dream, asking me if there was a way for hi to find me so he could learn more about who I was. I scanned his aura, finding only traces of the magic lingering around him.

  “You survived, too,” I pointed out. I glanced around, realizing I had no idea where my turquoise dagger was in all this mess, and drew the knife Phenex had given me instead. I pressed the point to his heart, my grip on the weapon steady.

  Why do you hesitate you worthless girl, Kaleal screamed, pushing at me, trying to shove me aside. I fought back and held my ground, barely resisting the waves of black anger radiating from her form. He’s abhorrent. The man is unhinged. He was going to kill you, remember that? He would have ripped you from this world without a single thought. Kill him!

  I tore myself away from her, everything inside me quaking with the tumultuousness of my emotions. Kaleal was right. I wanted to hate him. I wanted to destroy him in retribution for all the destruction for which he was responsible. But seeing him like this, seeing him free from the shackles of the magic that blinded him from both morals and good sense…

  I couldn’t.

  KILL HIM! KILL HIM NOW!

  I flung the knife away, flinching when it hit the wall. Geoffrey peered up at me in puzzlement, relief, amazement. I closed my eyes against it all, incapable of thinking with his focus on me, and slammed my hands to the sides of my head to keep it from exploding.

  You don’t command me, Kaleal, I snarled, gripping the front of her dress. You don’t tell me what to do. This is my body, this is my life, this is my destiny. I’m so sick and tired of everyone thinking they are in control of that!

  I flung her into the recesses of the shadows, throwing up bars as she rocked back, amethyst eyes huge with shock. That wouldn’t hold her for long, but I’d bought some time.

  “Why didn’t you do it?” Geoffrey asked when I blinked back into reality. I rocked back on my heels, biting my lip as I surveyed him. Blood soaked his shirt, pooling around the edges of the glass. With each inhale, he grew paler, but he still jumped when I pressed a hand to his chest and grabbed the glass, ignoring the way it sliced through my own skin.

  “This will hurt,” I warned. He screamed when I ripped the shard out. I chucked it away and forced magic into him, enough to prevent him from bleeding out. That little bit of magic was enough to bolster own, and it writhed like an injured octopus.

  “You should end it all,” he gasped, his voice a hair louder than a whisper. “You should end me. I’ve caused you so much pain. I didn’t want to, but the magic… it does something. It twists me, it twists my wants, and I can’t…”

  He stopped and struggled to find the words as he slumped again.

  Kaleal had said as much. Magic wasn’t meant for everyone.

  “I know,” I said, peering up at the crystal-clear sky. For the first time in a long time I savored the warmth of the sun on my shoulders, the softness of the breeze in my hair.

  I was alive.

  Somehow, I was still alive.

  “I want to hate you,” I admitted. “I want to end it all, end you for it all. But killing you does nothing. You pay for nothing. All it does is make you a twisted sort of martyr in the eyes of the rest of the world.” I looked down, surprised to see his green and gray eyes open, fixed on me intently.

  “You made sure of that, you know. Even insane, you knew how to drive us into a corner. So no, killing you isn’t the answer here.” I lifted my shoulders. “But I can’t let you continue going like this, unchecked. I don’t think you want to continue living that life, anyway.”

  “You can take my magic?” He phrased it like a question, but it was really a statement. A granting of permission.

  “Joseph figured out the details,” I admitted. “It’s basically a blood ceremony, but it’s easier if you’re willing.” He nodded as if he’d expected as much. “Unfortunately, I need the others here since you’re technically connected to us all.” I waved a hand at the magic snarled around him. It wouldn’t be long before it engulfed his good senses once more.

  “Then it’s a good thing we’re here.” Joseph’s voice came from one corner of the destroyed roof. He hopped down into the wreckage with an impressed whistle, then turned to help Pyra as Oron lowered her by the armpits. Her sharp face was washed out with pain and blood loss and she could scarcely bear her own weight. Once his arm was hooked steadily around her waist, Oron smoothly dropped beside the God of Air.

  The Earth God held his arm funny as if it hurt to move it and blood dripped from one tusk of his mask. His clothing was stained thickly with crimson and black, so much gore that even bleach wouldn’t get it out, but he held himself higher, stronger.

  Joseph, too, was covered in mottled bruises, as if he’d slammed into a brick wall and somehow pushed through it. I wondered if he’d gotten caught beneath falling rubble when the towers collapsed. His long hair was snarled and ratty, but his hazel eyes glimmered brightly.

  I glanced down at myself, at the dozens of healing cuts inflicted by the glass. My back still felt like a chef had smashed it repeatedly with a meat tenderizer, yet I was here.

  We all were.

  We’d won.

  Now we could start a new world, a world that began here, with a bit of mercy.

  “So you got him after all,” Pyra wheezed when they drew up next to me. Joseph lowered her and sat beside her. “A
nd yet he’s still alive.”

  I looked into the darkness behind Oron’s mask, unable to decipher anything from his stance. His hands didn’t offer any insight into his thoughts. Joseph nudged my shoulder, his face soft with sympathy. He alone understood what it took for me to do this, to hold myself back.

  “Yes, but he’ll never be the same again,” I told Pyra.

  The coals that were Pyra’s eyes burned into mine, and I forced every feeling of remorse and forgiveness and understanding into them as I could. Finally, her jaw set hard, she nodded, the motion short and choppy.

  “So how do we do this, then?” she asked, working one of her knives out her bandolier.

  “It starts with a prayer and some blood,” Joseph said.

  And together, as one, we entered the new world.

  Chapter 36

  “You’re stronger now. Why?” I demanded of the ancient God pacing the length of this small room. It was one I’d discovered inadvertently when I’d come looking for her in my dreams. On the gilded walls hung lush, colorful fabrics. The carpet was soft and dark. A dozen dresses of all designs hung from a rack beside a wide, four-poster bed.

  Whatever this room was actually meant for was a mystery to me, but clearly, Kaleal had made it her home within my mind.

  The God tossed a lancing glare at me but didn’t answer.

  Her figure was more substantial now, lacking the wispiness I’d grown used to. Turned out I was right, we were about the same height and build, but that’s where the similarities ended. She now possessed actual hair the color of chestnuts that hung to the middle of her back. Her nose was slender, her violet eyes oval, and her skin smooth.

  The God was beautiful in the vaguely unreal way that many fey seemed to have.

  “Is it because I have Air now?” I asked, folding my arms. “When I only had Water, you were more of an idea than a person. When I gained Fire, you started to acquire a shape. And now you’re here, kind of see-through, I guess, but you now look like a person. Is this what you looked like when you were alive?”

  Kaleal bared her teeth.

  She’d refused to speak to me since I’d asserted myself against her.

  “Why do I have Air anyway?” I asked, uncaring that I was basically talking to myself. “Why do I have Fire? Why do I keep gaining these abilities? What do they mean?”

  The God flung herself on the bed and draped herself with a glossy, silver scarf.

  “I know you know what’s going on. You’re too clever not to. And I know that it’s part of whatever twisted plan you have for me.” I moved to the door, which I’d left open. “But until you can tell me, don’t expect to come back out.”

  I slammed it shut and slumped against it, wondering if, despite my bravado, I would truly be able to keep that promise.

  Chapter 37

  Ryder squeezed my thigh as the engines of the jet fired. My hand found his, our fingers weaving together in a gesture that was quickly becoming a habit.

  “Are you flattered the head of the United Nations Security Council wants to meet you?” he asked, lips a whisper from my ear as our sides smashed together on the sofa. My stomach twisted as I gazed down at the dozens of buildings and hundreds of people that made up Order headquarters. Former Order headquarters, I reminded myself for the dozenth time.

  “I’ve put them off for a week,” I said, dodging the question. In front of me, a purple recliner swallowed Pyra’s tiny form as she flipped the glossy pages of a fashion magazine. She’d drawn her legs beneath her, her head resting on her open palm with straight, red hair spilling like blood between her fingers. She’d made a fully recovery, though she’d later warned me against healing her ever again. She and the pixies seemed to have similar sentiments regarding injuries.

  Across the aisle, Oron perched uncomfortably at the edge of his recliner, fingers curled around his knees. His bone mask and new, nondescript white attire remained a fixture he refused to leave behind.

  While only an eight-seater, this plane was yet another acquisition Ryder had called up with a favor and a moment’s notice. From the white leather seats to the champagne chilling in a refrigerator to the carpet so thick it left indentations of footsteps, everything about it screamed money. I idly wondered if he counted it among is fleet.

  “Yes, but they didn’t hesitate to draw you all up on war crimes, first, yeah?” Rose drawled from a bench seat where she played Black Jack with Briar. Beside them, a pixie with short, purple-tipped hair curled up against the armrest. A dribble of drool trickled from the corner of her mouth as she slumbered. “It was only after all that footage came out exonerating you that they finally pulled back on that plan.”

  Choosing to spare Geoffrey’s life had turned out to be a good idea in more ways than one. Immediately following the battle, and before the ambassadors and politicians from the Earth and Fire temples had arrived with supervisors and administrative assistants and peons in tow, we’d ransacked Geoffrey’s chambers in search of proof that we hadn’t been behind the crimes of which he accused us.

  I’d been particularly keen to be cleared of my parent’s deaths.

  After two days of searching, we’d come up with a big fat zero. That forced me to go to our former Hand in his jail cell in a tower at the top of the barracks that housed the soldiers. The battle and surviving his near-fatal injury had seemingly sapped Geoffrey of everything that had once made him so vibrant. His skin had taken on a grayish pallor and his eyes were bloodshot and vacant. As he’d perched on the edge of the thin mattress, he’d silently counted the bars across the front of the cell over and over again. My chest had tightened watching him rock back and forth, eyebrows drawn in confused agony.

  “I know why you’re here,” he’d said through lips that barely moved.

  “Did you destroy the evidence?” I’d asked, the bars chilled under my fingers.

  “In my office, there’s a bookshelf with a row of legal texts. They aren’t actually books. Inside you’ll find what you’re looking for.” He’d proceeded to rattle off a series of numbers I’d rushed to scribble on my palm. I’d left without another word.

  Sure enough, we’d found all the material we needed inside a concealed safe, and, with the strategic help of the temples, distributed evidence of Geoffrey’s deception to news networks from around the world. I hoped that people received it positively, while realizing that we still had two decades of deliberate misconceptions to overcome. We hadn’t had a chance to gauge the initial reaction of people before the second summons from the U.N. had come.

  The press of lips to my temple brought me back from my musings and I quirked a smile at Ryder as he drew back. To Rose, I said, “Think they’ll arrest us at the security checkpoint?”

  The pixie chuckled throatily and scratched at the bandage over her upper arm. A well-placed swing of one of the elves swords had nearly removed it.

  “I’d love to see them try,” she said. “We’d bust you out in no time flat.”

  “I am surprised you let Finn and Joseph stay,” Pyra piped up, tactlessly jabbing a sore spot of mine with a very sharp stick. “Between my people and Davos, there’s more than enough administrative oversight. They could have come with us.” She cast a hooded gaze at the shadows of her bodyguards that took up the remaining two seats at the back of the plane. “Then Lilo and Stitch could have stayed behind.”

  My grip on Ryder’s hand tightened to a point that must have been painful, but he didn’t complain and continued stroking the side of my hand with his thumb. Only when I was sure I wouldn’t break down sobbing did I open my mouth. I was pleased that my voice didn’t even crack.

  “Rebuilding the Order… or whatever they want to call it now… is something right up Joseph’s alley. He’s read so much about everything, he’s got all these opinions about how to do things right, it would have been cruel to bring him.”

  It was true, too. He’d chattered my ears off for days until the mere hint of his voice made a particularly annoying muscle in my eye twitch. �
��Finn’s agreed to go-between the two camps. I couldn’t leave Joseph alone there, could I?”

  I may have had a personal reason for leaving those two behind, as well. I wanted to know exactly what might become of their relationship if left alone for a while.

  Pyra’s eyebrows winged up and she tugged a silver box of cigarettes from her vest pocket. “Fire would have made sure Davos didn’t take advantage of him.”

  I bit my tongue and pressed my face to Ryder’s shoulder, inhaling his warm, cinnamony scent. Her promise was well and good, but I didn’t know Fire. I barely knew Davos. And I wasn’t about to send one of my best friends to the wolves, not until we had a better grasp on exactly what was happening in Geneva, anyway. At least Finn was loyal and well-versed with politics. He would be able to get him out of danger if necessary.

  No one else bothered to pick up Pyra’s barb-laced gauntlet and silence settled heavily around us. Ryder pulled his hand from mine gently and pressed it to the back of my head, adjusting me so I was cradled against his side. I sighed contentedly. It felt good to have someone look after me for a change.

  As his fingers carded through my hair, I snuggled into him and closed my eyes. Out of habit, I reached for the shadows at the back of my mind, relieved when I didn’t find Kaleal lurking.

  Chapter 38

  My heel tapped a sharp tempo on the waxed floors.

  “If you don’t stop fidgeting, I’ll be forced to find another way to get you to relax,” Ryder called from across the hall where he sat on a wooden bench. The illuminated face of his cell phone reflected off the Ray Bans he insisted on wearing for this single trip. They made him look weird. “I could use a jolt myself if you catch my drift.”

  My lip curled and, with real effort, I stopped the bouncing of my knees. I ran my hands over the black fabric of the dress covering my thighs. This morning, Rose had picked out everything from the six-inch, scarlet stilettos to the red, leather belt that wrapped from the top of my hips to the underside of my rib cage. She’d sliced a good six inches off my silvery hair and artfully crafted waves through the locks. However, the moment we’d slid behind the tinted windows of the limo, Ryder had mussed the entire effect by spiraling the strands into one of his increasingly complex braids.