by Kat Adams
Stace stood at the foot of the bed, Syd to her side. My mom had disappeared, which I’d started getting used to. Again. When I barged in, they both whipped around.
“Katy?” Stace gave me a once-over, concern swirling in her dark gaze. “What is it?”
“We’ve,” pant, “been looking,” pant, “at this,” pant, “all wrong.”
Syd blinked at me, surprise and shock in his expression. “What do you mean?”
“Leo isn’t sick,” I informed him with excitement. He looked at me skeptically.
I went on quickly. “He’s a duo. It’s been known to happen that duos grow into trios. I think he’s developing another power.”
Syd’s narrowed eyes darted to Stace, who mirrored the knowing expression. For several seconds, they just looked at each other in silence, having a complete eye conversation. Finally, Syd regarded me and shook his head, dismissing my rather brilliant idea.
My hope diminished, and my shoulders fell. “Why not?”
Stace answered. “I would have felt it at his tribunal. He’s only water and air. Nothing more.”
The room heated. I pulled in my fire before it got out of control. That was when I realized it wasn’t my fire turning the air in the room into a sauna. Syd couldn’t call fire, and Stace had too much control for her call to slip out like this.
I asked anyway. “Is that you?”
“No. You?”
I shook my head. We all turned to Leo. Could all the attacks on him this past year have given him fire? Could me attacking with my hellfire while remaining in contact with him have caused this? Or was this something else?
Syd rested his hand on Leo’s forehead. “He’s burning up again. I need to do something to get his fever down.”
“What if you don’t? What if you let it spike?” I thought about how my mom had used drugs to suppress my powers until my elements were too strong to be contained. If my powers had been allowed to grow when I was young, I wouldn’t be at such a disadvantage now as I struggled to learn everything I could about how to call, control, and conceal them.
“That could kill him, Katy. If you’re going to be a healer, you have to know when to take a risk and when to proceed with caution. Leo’s not developing fire.”
“Rob Emmett became a trio,” I pointed out, recalling the story he told me of when he first came to Clearwater. “He was a duo his first year and grew into a trio. He developed the ability to call water.”
“Which is why it took him three years to pass 3C.” Stace tapped her finger to her chin as she walked to the other side of the bed and glanced down at Leo. “And I sensed all three elements in him from day one.”
“When you tested him at his tribunal?”
She regarded me, frowning. “Yes.”
“Have you touched Leo recently, reconfirmed your original assessment?”
“What are you getting at?”
I regarded Syd. Did he know about Stace getting some of the primaries wrong? I didn’t want to out her, but I couldn’t think of any other way to say what I needed to say, so I outed myself first. “I can sense an elemental’s primary without touching them, without testing them. I can just sense it. That’s how I knew you got some of them wrong at the tribunals.”
She stiffened but didn’t deny it. “We already talked about the reasons behind those inaccurate placements. It’s the very reason the Council is here retesting the students instead of me. The dark magic pulsing through some of these kids is pushing elements to…the…surface…” She trailed off and dropped her attention to Leo.
With a deep breath, she placed her hands on his arm and closed her eyes. Her expression twisted right before she jerked her hands away and stumbled back. She shook her head as her mouth fell open. “Oh no.”
“What?” My heart was now firmly planted in my throat. “What is it?” When she continued to shake her head, I lost my shit. “Stace!”
She jumped at my outburst, but it worked and snapped her out of her trance. “Katy, I sense fire in him, but…” She glanced at Leo and then back at me. “Something’s not right. The fire… It’s not right. He’s not supposed to have fire within him.”
My entire world sank to the bottom of the ocean as I realized what she meant. This wasn’t good. It so wasn’t good. Magically enhanced elementals weren’t allowed at the academy. They were all sent to Carcerem. Then again, technically, I was a magically enhanced elemental and would be escorted away once the Council tested me for dark magic.
Magic.
My mom had sensed magic in Leo from the very beginning. Same with Bryan. She practically dismissed both Rob and Clay for not having magic in them. Did that make them insusceptible to dark magic? Could that be why some elementals were magically enhanced while others weren’t?
Was being magically enhanced really a bad thing? Or were we looking at this all wrong?
Only one way to find out.
15
Could magic be the answer?
I held up my hand and concentrated on the magic pulsing through me as I regarded both Stace and Syd. The golden glow was faint at first, but steadily grew until my entire palm became illuminated. “We all know what I have inside me, know what it did to me when I kept it to myself instead of come to you first. Spencer forced darkness into me, magically enhanced me. It wasn’t until you used my primary to heal me that we figured out how to control my new element. This could be the same thing. I could have forced fire into Leo when I touched him.”
“You do realize what you’re admitting to, don’t you? You’re saying you gave him the ability to call fire. You magically enhanced him.”
When she said it out loud, it sounded so much worse. “How else do you explain a water elemental surviving a direct hit of fire like that? And all the times Alec attacked us, he always used fire on Leo.” And when the darkness consumed me, I tried to boil his blood. It all had to be related.
Syd removed his glasses and cleaned them with his shirt. “Let me make sure I have this straight. Alec attacked Leo with fire more than once?”
“Several times. Just like he used ice on Rob, but since he already had the power to call water, it didn’t develop into another element. With Leo, it did, and when I concentrated my fire power, it basically gave the element enough juice to join the party. It’s possible, right?”
He replaced his glasses. “I suppose it makes sense.”
“No,” Stace protested. “It doesn’t make sense. Katy didn’t magically enhance Leo, so get that out of your head. Both of you.”
“But—”
“No!” She shut the subject down with her outburst, slicing her hand through the air. “Don’t you two understand? Something like this gets out and it could destroy everything. The academy. The Council. Our world.”
That was a bit overdramatic. “How so?”
“How would that look if the very person the Council decreed the protector of our world was, in fact, the very person foretold to destroy it? This, Katy. This right here could be the prophecy. Good and evil will be matched. Supremacy is certain. The entire prophecy could, in fact, be a single person battling herself.”
Holy sheep balls. I did not see that coming. Numbness didn’t even begin to describe the feeling now washing over me. The shock hit me so hard, so unexpectedly, I swayed and had to grab the wall to stop myself from collapsing to the floor. All this time, all my battles to defeat the dark elementals, might have been for nothing. The real battle had been inside me all along. “Are you saying I could be the one to destroy our world?”
“Or the one who stands in the way.”
I was going to be sick. My salivary glands activated, and I swallowed several times to keep the contents of my stomach from making an unwelcome encore.
Stace went on. “After the way you attacked Trina, the Council is questioning whether they made a mistake ever decreeing you the prophecy, that it may have driven you to the dark side, considering how much you question their authority.”
“Questioning them
makes me dark?”
“In some eyes, yes.”
Now, wouldn’t that just figure? Everything I’d done to protect our world, that I’d continue to do despite a bunch of old men in black giving my title to my mom, apparently meant nothing. As long as I challenged them, they’d threaten to label me dark.
No wonder they wanted to test me. It wasn’t to expose me as an enhanced elemental. It was a demonstration of what happened when someone spoke out against them. They planned to use me to set an example.
How stellarly awesome.
“Are they questioning my mom? Or am I the only one they’ve decreed the prophecy that’s suddenly dark for defending my boyfriend against a beyatch with a unibrow?” I didn’t know why I dragged my mom into this conversation. Maybe as a distraction. A divergence. Hell if I knew where my brain took me half the time. Well, most of the time, actually. I just went along for the ride. “Well?” I asked when Stace simply blinked at me.
“Why would they question her?” She would no longer look at me and found a sudden interest in picking at the nonexistent dirt underneath her nails.
“Why?” Did she really just ask me that, of all people? She still wouldn’t look at me. “Oh, I don’t know. Maybe because she’s the prophecy now? Maybe because when I was the prophecy, all the Council did was question me.”
“That’s the Council’s prerogative.”
“That’s a bullshit answer,” I fired back. “Stace? What’s really going on? What aren’t you telling me?”
“Telling us,” Syd jumped in, siding with me.
“If the Council has an agenda, please share it with the rest of the class.”
She bounced a nervous gaze back and forth between us. “I’m not really sure if my theory has any merit.”
“That’s never stopped me.” I rested my hand on my hip. “Spill. Tell us what you know.”
“It’s against the law for us to speak out against our governing body. I could be called in front of the Council.”
“And it goes against every grain of my being to volunteer to have a target on my back and protect a world I didn’t even belong to a year ago, and yet here we are. Come on, Stace. This is important. Leo’s life may depend on it.”
She dropped her attention to my blistered water elemental lying still in the bed, surrounded by machines and wires and tubes. “I do believe the prophecy is one person battling good and evil internally, one person willing to take a stand and protect their world by any means necessary.”
“I’m with you so far. How is what you just said speaking out against the Council?”
Stace studied me for several tense seconds before doing the same to Syd. “What I say here doesn’t leave this room. Is that understood?” Syd and I both nodded. She nodded in return. “I don’t support the Council’s interpretation of the prophecy. Albert Stephens is using fear of the unknown as a means to keep everyone in line. Look at what’s happening with all the magically enhanced elementals. The Council is purposely instilling fear in the entire community by testing everyone right out in the open, putting the battles on display, and then sending innocent people to Carcerem. Their methods are dividing us and creating even more fear and uncertainty. They believe the greater the fear, the more people are going to turn to their governing power for protection.”
Cressida had said the same thing. I repeated her words. “A governing power ruling by fear and separation has no power at all.”
“That’s exactly my point. Albert thinks he’s keeping order, when in fact he’s creating anarchy. Virgil Graves agrees.”
“What does he have to do with this?” I didn’t like the guy and definitely didn’t like his position in the Council or how he used it to better his daughter’s position at the school.
“Virgil is Albert’s right hand. He’s second-in-command at the Council.”
“So, Graves is like the vice president. If something ever happens to Stephens, he takes over the Council.” Like that made it any better. Exchange one old guy for another old guy.
“At least then, we’d stand united. Our world as we know it will be no longer if Albert continues to drive fear into the hearts of the people. It’s going to tear us apart.”
“A civil war.” God, I really hated it when I was right sometimes.
Stace looked at me solemnly. “The ultimate good versus evil.”
“Where both sides think they’re right. Supremacy is certain.”
“Only one stands in the way.” She nailed me with an intense look, uncertainty swirling in her dark gaze. “I don’t believe the prophecy will save us.”
“What?” I barely whimpered, not having the strength for anything more after that blow to my, well, everything. Stacey Layden had always been one of my biggest champions. My protector. My mentor. Having her doubt me destroyed me. “How can you say that? Especially after everything I’ve done to protect this world against dark elementals like Alec von Leer and Spencer Dalton?”
“You’re not the one currently holding the title.”
“You mean my mom? You think she’s the one who’ll destroy our world?” I had to take a pause and let that sink in. “Why do you think that?”
Stace crossed the room and folded her arms as she stared at a floral picture on the wall. “I don’t think she’s been truthful about her intentions. Who fakes her own death to escape the pressure of being the prophecy, only to return and demand to be the prophecy again?”
“She did it to protect me.” Even as I used that as a defense, and a very weak one at that, I didn’t believe it.
“I’m sure that’s it.” She turned back and smiled, though it seemed forced. Gone was the warmth that usually surfaced when she smiled. Gone was the shine in her eyes. She dropped her attention to Leo. “How about we focus on finding a way to heal the patient?”
Good idea. Something we all agreed on. Talking about my mom would never be a topic of conversation if we wanted to remain on speaking terms. Stace didn’t like her. I got it. I might not like her as a person, but she was my mom and I’d defend her because… Well, just because.
“I know you don’t want to admit it,” I said to her, “but we need to face the facts here. Whether I magically enhanced Leo or not, he’s got a new element inside him that needs an outlet. We need to stop fighting it and let it through in a controlled way. Rob said when he became a trio, it wasn’t until he stopped fighting the element that it finally started obeying his call.”
“There’s something you both need to know about how Rob became a trio.” Syd removed his glasses and cleaned them to stall for time. “I feel it’s only right that I set the record straight, knowing I can trust what I say doesn’t leave this room.”
I nodded quickly, anxious to hear what he was about to say. “Of course.”
“Good.” He took a seat in the chair next to the bed and studied Leo. “Rob came to me that first year, complaining about always being cold. He even called fire to keep himself warm, but it eventually drained him, and he had to come to me for help.”
“What did you do?”
“I kept him here, not understanding his condition. It wasn’t until the water elemental he’d been with came to me and told me what happened that I knew.”
“Been with?” I picked up on those very key words. “You mean…” Eww. Vanessa Graves, the beautiful brunette ice bitch I had to room with my first year. She’d made my life hell. I shuddered, hating the fact Rob had dated her before he’d been with me.
Syd nodded. “I’m sure I don’t have to go into detail.”
“Please don’t.”
“Apparently, she called her primary—water—and inadvertently transferred it to Rob. He didn’t know it at the time, and neither did I. It took another elemental calling water while touching Rob in a rather intimate way for him to fully receive his call.”
I immediately thought of the way Leo and I lip-locked right before his tribunal. The heat from our contact. The literal fire in his eyes. There had to be a connection. “Leo and I
kissed, like full-on totally eating each other’s faces, right before he teleported to the field.”
“He teleported?” both Stace and Syd said at the same time. It was no secret how much Leo hated to teleport.
“Voluntarily, but that’s not the point. We got really heated when we kissed, like really heated. I felt like I was going to burst into flames.”
“How did you dissipate the call?” He sat forward in his chair.
“Through my lips at first, but then it sort of radiated through my entire body.”
Syd tilted his head slightly. “And he didn’t complain about the heat?”
“No. In fact…” I paused and took in a breath, hating that I had to reveal secrets that were none of their business. “He seemed excited by it. And when he looked at me, I swear I saw flames dancing in his eyes.”
Syd launched to his feet. “Why haven’t you said anything until now?”
The heat from my embarrassment drained from my face. “I didn’t think it was important.”
“Every detail,” he lectured and motioned me to join him next to Leo, “is important. It’s our job to decide which details are vital, and which we tuck away for another day. Place your hands here.”
“What are we doing?”
“Saving Leo,” he answered, his voice the lightest I’d heard.
“Am I allowed to know what’s happening?” Stace asked. “Or is this some secret amongst you healers?” Her lisp went off the charts with that one.
“I know why Leo’s fever is out of control. Katy’s right. He’s developing into a trio. I don’t believe he’s magically enhanced at all. I believe he had a dormant element inside him all this time, one so faint, even you couldn’t sense it.”
“But I felt his fire,” Stace defended. “It’s out of place.”
“It’s not out of place. It’s unstable. If we don’t find a way to help him release the fire inside him, it’ll consume him. We have to hurry. I’ll need you to leave the room.”
She stepped up instead. “I can call fire.”
“That’s not why I need you to leave. I’ll have to call light to short out his other powers to allow the fire to escape. Light doesn’t affect Katy the way it affects you.”