by Kat Adams
“I’ll just have primary and Arts & Crafts.”
“At least I still get to see you in primary.” Clay lowered his hands now that Rob no longer had a fireball ready to hurl at Leo.
“About that.” I forced a smile when he lost his. “I’m changing houses.”
“To what?” he whined. I forced my smile wider, and his eyes rounded as he shook his head. Vehemently. “No. No way. You can’t move to Terrae. They all smell like dirt. Come on, Montana. Don’t do this to me.”
“I may be a quint, but my primary is earth. You know that.” Everyone knew earth was my primary. It was time for me to accept it as well.
“Traitor,” he grumbled.
“Clay, it’s where I belong.”
Bryan nodded. “Yeah, it is.”
Rose walked up and elbowed him in the ribs. “You don’t have to gloat.”
He rubbed his side where she’d jabbed him and colored to his ears. It had to be one of the cutest things I’d ever seen, a grown man minding his manners in front of his mom. It reminded me of something my dad used to say. “Watch how the guy treats his mom, Katy. If he’s good to her, he’ll be good to you.”
I’d met all the parental figures over the summer. Rob’s mom, Rachel, a small brunette with fierce control over five huge sons. He’d insisted on driving whenever we went somewhere so she wouldn’t have to. With my fire elemental, it was always about control.
Leo had been raised by his grandparents. His grandmother, Loretta, had the same crazy blond curls and piercing blue eyes as her grandson. He’d held the door for her as well as her chair and always offered his arm when we walked anywhere. So, it made sense why my water elemental always checked on me.
Clay’s mom, Maxine, her dancing emerald eyes behind square-rimmed glasses, a long brown braid down the center of her back. He’d never let her carry anything, always using his element to do it. My air elemental usually took my book bag and carried it for me. Now I knew why.
Bryan’s mom, Rose, with her kind eyes and propensity for hugging. He’d become the man of the house at an early age and was very protective. It took him most of the summer to warm up to Syd and even longer for him to warm up to the idea of Syd dating Rose.
Based on my dad’s theory about how guys treated their moms, I’d hit the lottery.
While Syd checked out each of the guys, even though they all insisted he start with me, I sat next to my mom, about a million and one questions on the tip of my tongue, me too chicken to ask any of them.
“Bryan?” Syd nodded for him to follow him into the next room. Rose joined them, leaving me staring at the floor to avoid my mom’s gaze.
“Where’ve you been?” I finally asked when I built up enough courage. I still kept my attention on the shiny linoleum. It was easier than looking her in the eye.
“Europe, mostly. I couldn’t risk one of the Council’s watchers spotting me. They aren’t scattered across the country to only babysit potential elementals. They also report anything out of the ordinary. Seeing someone who’d supposedly died would definitely be out of the ordinary.”
Fair point.
“Especially someone as famous as the prophecy,” she added, clearly proud of that fact. Being the prophecy didn’t make a person famous. I would know since I had firsthand experience in that department. Being the prophecy made you a target.
I dropped it, not wanting to start an argument within the first few hours since she’d returned. The tension between us was already awkward and uncomfortable. I didn’t need to add to it.
Bryan walked out with his mom and nodded for me. “He wants to see you next.”
I shook my head and motioned at Leo. “He’s the one with the knot on his noggin.”
“I know better than to argue with you.” He thumbed for Leo to head into the room he’d just vacated.
One by one, Syd examined the guys, each one walking out of the room and motioning for me to go next. And each time, I shook my head and made one of them go before me. I was fine. Well, aside from sitting next to the woman who’d given me life and struggling to make small talk. I barely knew more about her now after half an hour of conversation than I had when she’d left. She’d been hiding out in Europe. Thought about getting a dog but decided against it. Loved frogs and couldn’t stop herself from buying little figurines of them. This I already knew and had started picking them up myself. They reminded me of happier times, back when it’d been my dad, my mom, and me. Back when we’d been a family.
Finally, Syd walked out of his office with the last of the guys and nodded for me to join him. I pushed out of the chair and brushed hands with Leo as I passed him. It was all we needed, a little human contact to keep us sane.
“I’d tell you all to go back to your dorms and get some sleep, but I have a feeling none of you will leave until you all leave. You five definitely have this all-for-one-and-one-for-all thing going.” Syd removed his glasses and cleaned them on his shirt.
Brooks had already left. Apparently, the threat of Bryan going dark had passed. Or maybe it was the way Rose glared at him that made him leave. Either way, I didn’t mind the Hulk disappearing.
Stace, however, remained at the entrance to the waiting room. I’d caught her watching my mom on several occasions. Then again, I’d caught my mom doing the same to the professor. Something was going on between them, something tense and awkward, and I didn’t like it. I didn’t like the two most important women in my life at odds with each other.
I paused at the door leading into the other room and regarded my mom. “Did you want to come in with me?” It felt weird asking my mom to join me in the doctor’s office, but I put it out there anyway. Rose wouldn’t leave Bryan’s side, so I figured, just maybe…
“I’m good. You go ahead.” She pulled out her phone.
Steeling myself against the deflating disappointment that she’d once again chosen her phone over me, I stepped into the room without looking back.
Syd closed the door behind me and had me follow him through a door on the opposite side of the small office. Now this room was more what I expected to find in a doctor’s office. An examination table with crinkly paper across the top. A black stool on rollers. A sink where he now washed his hands.
“Have a seat on the table, if you would.”
“That’s not necessary. I’m fine.”
He glanced over his shoulder, then eyed the table. With a long-drawn-out sigh, I hopped up on the table, settling quickly so the noisy paper would stop crackling. “Do your worst, Doc.”
“Show me your hand.”
The request was so abrupt, it surprised me. And annoyed me. I knew why he asked, considering this past week and the fact I’d nearly killed multiple people thanks to the dark element Spencer inserted into me by accident when he’d failed to bind my powers. The gash in my palm had disappeared and left no scar, but the yellow glow that pulsed right below the surface reminded me that I had an extra element bouncing around inside me now thanks to Spencer’s botched spell. Joke was on him. Instead of it binding my powers, the incantation backfired and magically enhanced me by giving me the ability to call the darkest of all elements—darkness itself. Luckily, the glow only appeared when I was confronted by something dark.
Syd examined my hand, adjusting his glasses and leaning in. Finally, he straightened and released my wrist. “Looks like the cut didn’t reappear.”
“I would have told you if it had.” I rubbed my palm with the thumb of my opposite hand. “Like I said, I’m fine. How are the guys?”
“Rob’s got a nasty cut that’ll probably scar. The lump on Leo’s head should heal just fine without any noticeable mark. He’s got a bit of a fever we should watch since he’s a water elemental and fevers could be a sign of something else. Clay is fine. Bryan, however…”
“What?” Panic laced my tone. What was wrong with my earth elemental?
“He’s completely unscathed. I don’t understand.”
I released the breath I’d sucked in. �
�Why’s that weird? What’s not to understand? That’s a good thing.”
“No, I mean… He’s not affected by what happened. At all. Not even a shudder over being stuck in the void for hours. I’ve treated others who’d come back, and they’d been quite shaken.”
“My mom’s spell worked well, then.”
“Maybe too well.”
I didn’t like the sound of that, didn’t like that Syd too seemed to be challenging the great thing she did. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Rose asked him to describe what happened in detail. He couldn’t.”
“He couldn’t? Or he wouldn’t? Because he described it to us in pretty good detail.”
“That’s just it. He said he couldn’t remember, like it never happened.” He removed his glasses and set them on the counter by the sink before rubbing his eyes. “Between you and me, I’m worried he’s not okay. Not at all.”
And now I was worried about the same thing.
3
I returned to my dorm, fully prepared to introduce Bitch Barbie to my mom. To my extreme glee, Jess wasn’t there. Maybe she’d slept over at Vanessa’s. No doubt her tantrum that had destroyed the main dining hall after discovering Spencer Dalton was a dark leecher (a weak elemental who sucked power from other elementals) and had used an enchantment spell on her to get her to fall in love with him had exhausted her.
Or maybe she was home since the academy allowed the students to stay off-campus on weekends. Either way, she wasn’t here, which was a beautiful thing.
“Welcome to my humble abode.” I waved for my mom to take a look around. “Mi dorma es tu dorma.”
“The dorms don’t look any different from when I was a student.” She glanced around the room, walking slowly before stopping next to Jess’s bed. Even with the muted colors, it was still too gaudy for my taste. The furry throw pillows. The fancy pillowcases with multiple layers of ruffles. It was all a bit much. “Is this your side?”
I closed the door behind me and walked across the room, sat on my plain bed, and leaned back on my hands. “That would be my peachy roomie’s side. She’s a human Barbie doll. It’s very weird.”
“Sounds like the two of you get along about as well as I did with my roommate back in the day.” She sat at Jess’s desk and swung the chair around to face me. “How are your classes?”
I didn’t want to talk about my classes, or my roommate, or how the dorms hadn’t changed in twenty-plus years. I wanted to know why she’d disappeared. I deserved to know. “What happened to you?”
“What do you mean? I already told you.”
“No, Mom. You told me you hid out in Europe, probably eating bagels and drinking espresso or wine or whatever they drink in Europe. That sounds really rough. Meanwhile, I sometimes ate pancakes for dinner because Dad forgot to buy groceries. What happened? Why’d you leave? Really?”
She folded her hands on her lap and sighed. “You’re old enough to know the truth.”
I was old enough before she left. I kept that to myself and waited for her to explain.
“One week before your sixteenth birthday, the Council came to me and declared you the prophecy.”
“Me? Why?” I hadn’t even shown any signs of having elemental power back then.
“They claimed to sense something in you. What, they wouldn’t tell me. How, they wouldn’t tell me that either. They just insisted on taking you away. I couldn’t let them paint that kind of target on your back, so I made a trade.” She nailed me with an intense look. “My life for yours.”
I knew it. I fucking knew it. She’d disappeared because of me. Regardless of the reason, good or bad. Totally because of me. Guilt deflated my very existence. I stood and rubbed my palms against my uniform skirt, drying them and stalling for time to process the bomb she’d just dropped.
“You’re upset.”
Understatement of the goddamn year, Mom.
I whipped around. “You left because of me.”
“I left to protect you,” she corrected as she stood. “Katy, you have to understand. They were going to take you from me, declare you the prophecy. That would have been a death sentence for a fifteen-year-old who didn’t grow up in this world.”
“Instead, it was a death sentence for a fifteen-year-old’s mom who did, and it still didn’t stop them from declaring me the prophecy anyway.”
“Yeah, I’m not exactly happy about that. I battled the dark side over and over to protect this world. Every time I beat a dark elemental, another would pop up even more powerful than the last.”
I could relate to that one. Here I thought Alec was the grand poohbah of the dark elementals, when Spencer had more power with one hand tied behind his back, thanks to his ability as a leecher to steal other elementals’ powers. I had no idea how I was going to beat them now that they’d teamed up. If a third joined them, one even more powerful than Spencer, no way would I be able to defeat them.
“So when an exceptionally dark elemental challenged me, I let the Council believe I’d died fulfilling the prophecy and, in a way, they were right. My world as I knew it was no more. I couldn’t return home to you and Paul, or the Council would know I survived and force me to continue serving as the prophecy, fighting dark elemental after dark elemental, until one really did win.”
“Wait a second. I think I’m confused. If you lost, why didn’t the dark side take over? That’s the whole point of the prophecy, isn’t it?” And why I continued to put my life on the line each and every day. I didn’t want to live in a world of dystopian fantasy. I wanted to live my life, this life, in this world. I could live without all the dark elementals after my ass, but you couldn’t win them all.
“I didn’t lose. I let them believe I’d lost. That final battle changed everything. For me. For the dark elemental. I created a huge tornado that swallowed us both. We fought. God, how we fought. He was just about to overtake me with fire when I called earth and took him out with a giant rock. He teleported out, but I knew he’d never survive the head injury. So, I thought, why not disappear with him, let everyone believe we’d both died? I teleported out before I changed my mind. When the tornado lifted, we were both gone. Everyone had assumed we’d died.”
“Clearly you didn’t die, so chances are…”
“He didn’t die either.” She nodded. “I went into hiding, let everyone think I was dead, to protect you. And now I realize even that wasn’t enough.”
My knees gave out, and I melted onto the bed. I didn’t know whether to love her or hate her for her choice. Here I thought she’d died protecting our world, that she’d chosen the prophecy over me. In a way, that was exactly what she’d done. None of that crushed me as much as her being alive all these years and never letting me know.
“You could have told me. I wasn’t part of this world. I wouldn’t have said anything.”
She dropped her head and nodded reluctantly. “I know.”
“That’s it? No ‘I’m sorry for letting you think I was dead’ or ‘I should have never left’? No regrets at all?” Unbelievable. She just stood there, staring at the floor. “Say something.”
“What do you want me to say? I don’t regret it. Any of it. I sacrificed my freedom for you, for this world. It’s exactly how Cressida Clearwater fulfilled the original prophecy, and our world had peace for centuries.”
“No, she actually died. She sacrificed herself by becoming one with the academy. Her essence, combined with the protective wards, makes up the barrier that shields Clearwater from the dark elementals.” I stopped before revealing anything more. I didn’t know how much she already knew about Cressida and her ultimate gift to the elemental world.
“I thought I was doing the right thing.”
No, Mom. The right thing would have been to never leave. I inhaled sharply, biting back the emotions threatening to surface. “Then why’d you come back? Why not stay in Europe, hidden from the Council?” It was a shitty thing to say, but I had to know. If this was just a temporary visi
t, something to help her clear her conscience and make her feel better for deserting her family, I wanted to steel myself against her leaving again.
“There were rumors that the Council had once again invoked the prophecy, that they’d decreed a new elemental to fulfill it. I heard stories of battles between the prophecy and a powerful dark elemental I knew all too well.” She finally lifted her head and looked at me. “That same dark elemental was the one I let the Council believe had killed me.”
Holy cheese sneeze. That bomb shot me off the bed. “It was Alec von Leer?”
How many times was that guy going to intersect with my life?
“That’s when I knew the Council had gone back on their word and come for you. After everything I’d done to protect you, they still painted that target on your back, and the one person I wanted to hide you from was the first dark elemental to find you.” She joined me on the bed and patted my knee. Her touch was warm, soothing, and something I hadn’t realized how much I’d missed. Despite the turmoil coiling inside me, I leaned my head on her shoulder.
She leaned her head on mine. “I’m sorry you’ve had to go through this alone, Katybug. I’m sorry I left without saying good-bye. But most of all, I’m sorry what I did made you feel like you need four men in your life to make you whole.”
Where the hell did that come from? I pushed off the bed and took several steps away. “That’s not why I’m with them.” How could she say something like that? If she truly believed that, she didn’t know me at all.
“Why are you with them? Why not just one? Leo seems nice.”
“What is your fixation with him? You practically ignored the others.”
“That’s not true. I paid a great deal of attention to Bryan.”
I rolled my eyes. “I’m talking about Clay and Rob.”
“Were those their names?”
“Mom!”
She brought up her hands. “Sorry. As with any elemental with the power to cast spells, I’m drawn to magic. Leo and Bryan both have magic in them, so I’m naturally drawn to them.”