The Color Alchemist: The Complete Series

by Nina Walker

  Silence and thick hatred spread between us.

  “So be it,” he finally said, voice calmer than ever. “First thing tomorrow, you and I are going on a little trip.”

  I gulped. I didn’t need to ask what that meant.

  Once Reed got ahold of me, there was no telling what secrets would be revealed. I’d hidden so many in the dark for so long, the idea of them being exposed left me reeling.

  He studied me for a minute more, then turned for the door.

  “What about my husband?" I called after him. Saying the word husband felt like admitting just how much I loved Lucas.

  But Lucas’s father, his own flesh and blood, didn’t bother to reply or even glance back. He slammed the door with finality, rattling the doorframe, leaving me to my imagination.

  Lucas! I called out, homing in on our telepathic connection. Lucas, are you there? Is that you? I felt it, felt someone hovering on the other side of my thoughts. Tears pricked at my eyes. Hope flooded my heart. Hope and excitement.

  Lucas, I continued, it's me, Jessa.

  Jessa?

  His voice hit me like a gasp for air. I couldn’t breathe. My trembling hand slapped against my mouth, holding back the choking sobs. It was him. It was muffled, far off, but it was him. Hearing him was like coming up for air when I didn’t even know I was drowning.

  Oh, thank God. Are you okay?

  There was a long pause.

  This is Jessa? he asked, this time sounding somewhat confused.

  And that confused me. I blinked, unease settling in.

  Yes, of course, where are you? Are you okay?

  Another long pause was followed by a sharp reply. Go away. Get out of my head.

  I sputtered. What? What do you mean?

  Do I have to spell it out for you? I said, get out of my head! The connection slammed at me, as if he was forcing me out. But why? Why wouldn’t he want to talk to me? It made no sense. We hadn’t left on the best of terms, but we were closer than we’d been in weeks. He suddenly didn’t want anything to do with me? No. This wasn’t how this was supposed to go. It didn’t make sense.

  I won’t leave you alone until you tell me you’re all right! I challenged. You have no idea what I just went through, and what I am going to go through. Everyone thinks you’re dead, Lucas. I thought you were dead. Do you have any idea what that did to me? I came back to find out the truth!

  Finally, his voice replied. This time not angry, not calm, not confused, but also, not anything. He was completely devoid of any emotion at all. I’m sorry you had to suffer because of me, but you need to get out of my head right now.

  What? Why? What’s going on, Lucas?

  I don’t know you, okay! he shot back. This head injury has been tough enough as it is, and now I don’t need to start hearing voices. So, I would kindly ask you to leave me alone.

  I momentarily froze. Then I jolted from the bed. What was he talking about? He didn’t know me? What was that supposed to mean?

  Lucas, you’re scaring me.

  The feeling is mutual, Jessa. Whoever you are. Now get out! He slammed once again on the connection, this time severing it completely.

  I fell back onto the bed. Bile rose into the back of my throat. I rolled to my side, drew my knees in, and clenched my stomach.

  Lucas didn’t remember me.

  The realization of it crashed down, taking all my hopes for our future and turning them to dust. The room spun, and I closed my eyes. My body sank down into the bed, weightless and empty. The man I loved didn’t even know who I was. All of this, all I went through, was for nothing. How could that be?

  Except all wasn’t lost because Lucas wasn’t dead. I thanked whatever God was in heaven for that.

  Lucas wasn’t dead. But he had a head injury.

  Lucas wasn’t dead. But he also didn’t remember me.

  Not even a little bit.

  And if he’d forgotten me, what else had Prince Lucas forgotten?

  5

  Lucas

  “This is getting ridiculous.” I tugged at the IV in my arm. The nurse, Cathy, raised an eyebrow but injected something into my vein anyway. It burned all the way up my arm. “Come on, Cathy, you could have warned me.” I gritted my teeth but winked at her anyway.

  “I thought I did,” she mused, checking my vitals.

  “I need to get out of here. I need to talk to my parents. Where are they?”

  Three days. Three days of lying here in this bed. I was a prince and I felt fine, yet I was being treated like a child. And now my patience was wearing thin. Upon waking, I’d recognized the room as one not belonging to the palace or even a hospital, but to the orphanage Mom and I had organized a few years back. Once upon a time it was one of our royal estates, but now it belonged to orphaned children, which was better use in my opinion.

  But none of that answered the question: what in the world was I doing here?

  Doctor Lawson strolled in, white lab coat flowing behind him, a warm smile on his face. His calculating eyes looked me up and down from behind shiny glasses perched on the tip of his nose. “How’s my favorite patient doing today?”

  I rolled my eyes. “I’m your only patient.”

  It was true. It didn’t take a genius to gather that something had happened to me and this was where my parents had decided to whisk me away. What it apparently did take a genius to gather was the reason why? Why hide me like this? I had spent the last two days conjuring up every possible explanation for what could be going on back home and I was about ready to burst.

  “But why am I here?” I asked the doctor, noticing how he looked away.

  It was one of many questions I'd been asking lately. I never got any answers. “Where are my parents?” I continued, lowering my voice and trying to sound reasonable. “Look, I just need to talk to someone who knows what’s going on. The way I see it, I should’ve been placed in a real hospital, right? My parents have hidden me away and I want to know why.”

  Lawson and Cathy shared a pained look.

  The alchemist strolled into the room at that moment, a small smile on her round face. She was cute, with curly blonde hair and thick black glasses. Cute, in a nerdy kind of way. I usually went for the more polished type, but I could bend my rules for this one.

  “In a real hospital, you wouldn't have me,” she said. “So count yourself lucky your father sent you up here to heal.”

  I rolled my eyes again.

  “Thanks for listening in,” I smirked at her, even though, that part was true. Her name was Callie, and she’d apparently been a huge part in my healing since alchemy wasn’t something we did in hospitals. But that still didn’t explain why I was here. She could have just helped me at the palace. Or broken protocol and healed me at the hospital anyway.

  She shrugged, but I caught the pity in her eyes and as much as it killed me, decided to go with it.

  “I need answers,” I pressed, nodding toward her as if she were my only shot. “I’m not just going to sit around this place in the middle of nowhere while my parents are missing, maybe even hurt.” My voice trailed off and I cleared my throat. As much as I was trying to reach them through the heartstrings, it didn’t mean I wasn’t telling the truth. I was worried.

  The doctor fumbled with some paperwork, looking through his pages and pages of notes. I strained my eyes to get a peek, but his handwriting was atrocious. I fell back against the pillows and sighed heavily. Apparently, Doctor Lawson had decided to ignore me. Great.

  “Let’s go through these questions again, shall we?” he asked, voice clinical and never once looking up at me.

  Oh, here we go again.

  We’d gone through these questions every day since I’d woken, and my answers weren’t just suddenly going to change. This was getting weirder and weirder. I sucked in a breath of the stale air and counted backwards from three, trying to relax into this. Maybe if I answered his questions, he’d finally answer a few of mine.

  “What’s your name?” he ask
ed.

  “Lucas Heart.”

  “What’s the last thing you remember before waking up?”

  I sighed. “I remember eating dinner with my parents and going to bed. That’s it, nothing exciting.”

  “You don’t remember any kind of accident or maybe an attack?”

  Nurse Cathy, busy checking the heart rate monitor, stilled.

  Doctor Lawson was no longer studying his notes, but studying me. I eyed him scrupulously. This was a new question and the whole room buzzed with that fact. “I’ve told you, I have no idea how this happened to me. What do you mean an attack?”

  “And how old are you?” He returned back to his list.

  I sunk back into the bed, frustrated. “I just turned eighteen.” But that didn’t stop me from watching him intently, and when his nose quirked, I narrowed my eyes. “What?” I questioned. “Why did you make that face?”

  “I didn’t make a face.”

  I spun on the nurse. “You saw it, right? Did he make a face?”

  She shrugged and turned away.

  “See! You totally did. What is going on, Doc?”

  “I am not permitted to say anything until your father gets here.”

  “And where is my father?” I growled, finally losing my cool. “I woke up here, of all places. I’ve been sitting around for days with a constant pain in my head. And you keep telling me he’s coming but I don’t see anyone pulling up that drive, do you?” I motioned to the driveway outside the window, and the white-washed landscape beyond that. We were utterly alone out here.

  “And anyway,” I continued, “he can just call, can’t he? I want my slatebook.” I reached my hand out. “Or I can take yours. I’m sure you have one; it will have to do.”

  He bristled. “I’m sorry but I can’t do that.”

  “Trust me,” the alchemist girl, Callie, stepped forward. “You don’t want to see the newsfeeds right now.”

  “And why not?” I snapped. Her eyes widened, clearly caught in the crossfire.

  I threw my head back against the soft pillow, sighing loudly. “Sorry.” I rubbed my eyes, a dull ache forming behind them. “I feel like I’m going crazy. I just want to know why I can’t leave this room, why no one will tell me why I’m here.”

  The doctor shook his head, returning to his paperwork. “We have our orders.”

  “Can you at least tell me who Jessa is?”

  His head popped up, eyes turning into round orbs as he strode forward, shining a light in my pupil.

  I waved him off, only to find Callie’s smiling face and nurse Cathy sighing a huge breath of relief.

  “You remember Jessa?” doctor Lawson asked, a twinge of excitement in his tone.

  “I hate to break it to you, but no. That’s why I’m asking you guys who she is.” I gulped, rubbing my temples. Were these people even listening to me? “She’s been in my head or something … I don’t know.”

  “What do you mean she’s been in your head?” the doctor asked, his expression still hopeful. His eyes searched my face, no longer interested in the pages of notes he’d been using for cover earlier.

  But as much as I wanted to make progress, I wasn't about to tell the man I’d been hearing voices. I shrugged. “I don’t know how to explain it, just that I know that name is important somehow. So, who is she?”

  My eyes hopped between the three of them as they shared glances. A tension had gathered in the room; I’d hit a nerve.

  “I’m calling your father,” the doctor finally replied, breaking the tension and heading for the door. “This is a huge development. He needs to advise me on our next step.”

  Annoyance pulled at me like a string, tugging on my father and his unknown destination, ever the puppet master.

  “Tell my father to come visit his son!” I called after the doctor. The man didn’t pause as he left the room, didn’t even seem to hear me. I turned to the nurse. She stood by the window, her arms crossed and her head cocked, studying me with pitying eyes.

  “What?” I challenged.

  She shrugged, shaking her head. She knew she couldn’t say anything. We all knew it. But that didn’t make it right

  “How are you feeling today?” Callie held up her hands, a green stone centered in her palm. “Need another boost?”

  I grimaced. “You know what I really need.”

  Answers.

  Callie bit her lip, consideration flashing in her eyes. “You really don’t remember her?” When I shook my head she frowned, her honey eyes filling with deep concern, like she was somehow invested in all of this, too. “Poor Jessa,” she whispered.

  What was that supposed to mean? Poor Jessa? What about poor Lucas? I let out a frustrated laugh and a sharp pain reverberated from the back of my head. I winced, rubbing the spot as it returned to a dull ache.

  “You need to calm down.” The nurse motioned to the heart rate monitor, which had begun to speed up. “You’re aggravating the wound.”

  “What do you expect, given my situation? Am I just supposed to sleep and pretend I don’t have a whole lot of questions?”

  “The pain medicine will kick in any moment,” she talked over me. “And yes, I would like for you to get some rest and put the worry out of your mind for now. It’s important for your recovery.”

  She spun on her heel and hustled from the room.

  “You sure you don’t want some green alchemy before I go?” Callie asked.

  I didn’t answer. I just looked up to meet her stare. She had that same twisted expression from before, the one that told me she knew much more than she was letting on. I raised a hopeful eyebrow, wishing more than anything that I knew what she was thinking. Her eyes flashed once again. She felt sorry for me.

  This was my chance.

  “Please…”

  “I can’t say anything,” she whispered. “It’s my orders. If I break them I will get in so much trouble. So much. You don’t even know.”

  “I swear I won’t tell a soul. I just want to know what happened to me.”

  “I don’t know how it happened, only that you hit your head really hard. Lucas, you have some sort of amnesia. The doctor thinks it’s temporary, but it might be permanent.”

  I shook my head. Amnesia? But I remembered who I was. That didn’t make sense.

  “Are you messing with me?” I laughed, disbelieving.

  “You’ve forgotten practically a year of your life,” she finally relented.

  My body sank into the bed like it was made out of quicksand. I didn’t fight it, didn’t even know how to move. A year of my life? How was that possible?

  When I didn’t reply, she continued on, wringing her hands, regretful eyes trained on me. “It’s supposed to be temporary. I don’t know. I haven’t been able to reverse it with magic.” Her eyes filled with tears. “What if it’s not temporary? What will Jessa do?”

  I squinted, breathing in the scent of antiseptic. “Who is Jessa?”

  She twisted her lip between her teeth, studying me, searching for words.

  “Who is she?” I pressed.

  “I’m not supposed to say.” Her voice came out, barely a squeak.

  “Isn’t it a little late for that? Besides, I’m your prince. Consider it an order.”

  That was total crap, and my father pulled rank, but she needed an excuse to tell me the truth. From the torn expression on her face, she wanted me to know.

  “Just tell me.”

  She let out a slow breath. “Lucas, you’re married. Jessa is your wife.”

  I laughed. Now, that was ridiculous. Was I honestly supposed to believe I was married? Even if I had forgotten a year, I certainly wouldn’t have agreed to a marriage.

  “It’s true,” she whispered. “You’re madly in love with her. I’ve never seen anything like it, the way you look at her.”

  Confusion traveled through me, starting in my center and spreading to every inch of my body, of my memory, and of my life. “How is that possible? If I love her so much, then why ca
n't I remember her?”

  Her eyebrows drew in, and she glared. “Because you hit your head and forgot!” She strode to the door, locking it, then whipped out a slatebook from her back pocket. After few swipes, she turned the screen on me. “See!”

  A picture shone back, leaving me grasping at the truth. It was a photo of me. Wearing a tuxedo, I had a massive grin plastered on my face as I looked adoringly at the woman next to me. My arm was wrapped around her, and she was dressed in a white gown so beautiful, it was obvious she had to be a bride. My bride. Her dark hair was curled loosely down and around her shoulders, and she leaned into me, beaming at the camera, bright blue eyes shining like a clear sky. It was most definitely a wedding photograph, but one I had absolutely no recollection of, nor of the woman.

  I studied my expression, looking for a crack in the exterior, something to indicate this wasn’t real, but all I could see was a man very much in love.

  Heat poured over me. I finally let out a breath. Questions danced through my mind. What in the world was going on?

  “That’s my wife?” I asked. “Seriously?”

  “Yes,” Callie said, slipping the slatebook back into her pocket.

  “I love her?”

  “Yes.”

  “I’m assuming she loves me, too?”

  “I always thought so.”

  I squinted. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  She moved to the door faster than humanly possible, yellow alchemy at play. “I’ve said too much.”

  Before I could question her further, her small body, dressed head to toe in alchemist black, slid through the door. I debated going after her, demanding more answers and especially demanding she hand over that slatebook. But the IV was busy pumping fluids into my body and as much as I hated it, I couldn’t rip it out. I needed it. I didn’t really want to roll the thing around with me. My head pounded harder than ever and a sleepy fog was rolling into my mind, clouding all my thoughts.

  I knew what came next. Every single time I thought I felt better, thought I could leave this stupid mansion and go back to the palace, more pain would crash over me. Next thing, I’d be laid out in bed within the hour and fighting the pain, drifting into the drug-laced sleep.