by A. N. Sage
Her mind was racing. Why were the Elementals there? Why did they attack? She knew the boys were Earth house and the girl used Fire powers, but she hadn’t seen them around the resistance. What made them want to hurt all those people? She tried to divinate the answers from thin air which only made her worry more.
“Ruby?” Liam’s voice at the door shook her bones. She was both angry and relieved. Angry that his people did this to her friend, but relieved that he was there with her. There were questions on the tip of her tongue that only he had answers to, but now was not the time for interrogations.
“How did you find me?”
“I heard what happened on the news.” His expression told her there was more to that answer, “I called the bank, and they said there were a few people taken to the hospital. So, when you didn’t answer your phone, I came here immediately.”
“It’s Shay,” her voice filled with sadness. “She’s been like this since we got her out of the building. They said she broke a few ribs and has internal bleeding. The doctors don’t know when she’ll come to again.”
“Ruby, I’m so sorry.” He knelt next to her and put his arm around her shoulder. “I wish I had been there with you when it happened.”
What exactly had happened? She wanted to ask when she saw Jake’s hand reach between the two of them.
“Hi, and you are?” Jake stood there with his arm extended, ready to throw Liam out of the room.
“Oh. Sorry, man. I’m Liam.”
He shook Jake’s hand as if agreeing to a duel. Even without her visions, she could sense the tension between them. It didn’t help that her body started getting chills and her eyesight seemed to have become slightly blurry. She wanted to stand up and get in between them but there was little strength left in her legs.
“Sorry, Jake. Liam is a...” she still didn’t know the best way to introduce him, “a friend. He’s helping me on a project.”
“What project exactly?”
“Just for school. It’s not important.” She nodded at Shaylah, “We have other things to worry about, don’t you think?”
Jake shrugged and walked closer to the bed; his gaze trained on Liam. He was studying his every move and gesture. This wasn’t just dislike or possessiveness, something else was bothering him. Was he jealous?
“Hey, I know you want to stay longer, but when I asked the front desk where to find you, they kind of hinted at the fact that visiting hours are over.” Liam was back on the ground now, shielding her from Jake with his broad shoulders.
“I’m not leaving her here alone.” She said, annoyed that he would even imply that she would leave.
“Do you think maybe Jack can stay back for a bit? You’ve been through a lot today.”
“It’s Jake.” She whispered.
“Oh. Sorry. I’m bad with names.” Liam was lying through his teeth. He was great with names and she knew it. In fact, there was very little he was bad with, except reading this situation. His crazy world had put her in danger once again. Her friend was hurt and in order to help her, Ruby had to use her powers. If anyone had seen her, she had bigger problems than getting some rest.
“Rue, it’s fine. I’ll stay.” Jake said, “My dad is still finishing up downstairs with the cops. I’ll make sure we stay until her parents get here.”
“I don’t know. What good is it for me to go home right now?”
“What good is it for you to stay here? I’ll text as soon as they get here so you know she is safe. He’s right, you need to get some rest.”
She didn’t want to leave. If she could, she would move into the hospital room, chain herself to the bed, and strike until they let her stay. But they were both right, her staying here was not helping Shaylah. She needed to figure out why the attack happened so she could end her involvement with the Elementals once and for all. It was one thing for her life to be put in danger, but she was not going to put up with her friends being at risk. She knew there was only one person in the room she needed right now to make that happen.
“Walk me home?” Her hand reached for Liam to help her out of the chair. “I could use the fresh air right now.”
Chapter 22
Powers in front of humans
“So, are you going to tell me what happened today or are we just going to be quiet the whole way?” The hospital was not far from her apartment, but Ruby knew that she wasn’t looking for the silent treatment when she asked Liam to walk her home.
“What do you want to know?”
Well this is different, she thought, he’s usually a lot more defensive.
“How about we start with, oh, I don’t know… everything?” Snappy was not her strong suit, but everyone was keeping secrets and she was sick of it. “Why were the Elementals there?”
“The resistance got some information about the mayor orchestrating the attack on the subway. Turns out the house of Air is higher than we thought they were.”
“So that was, what? Payback?”
“I don’t think it was supposed to be payback. I think they went there to send a message. A ‘mess with us and we mess with you’ kind of thing.”
“So, they were resistance?”
“Yes, since they were kids.”
“And you knew about this?”
“No! Of course not!” He was angered by her assumption. “No one knew about this, Ruby! You actually think that after all of these years we would let someone just go rogue and jeopardize the entire mission?”
“You’re actually telling me that three Elementals from your resistance somehow destroyed an entire building, almost killed hundreds of people, and you all didn’t even know it was coming? That honestly seems pretty far-fetched.”
“Why? Do you know what everyone around you is doing?”
“I mean, if they were about to try and kill someone, I think I’d have a pretty good idea.”
“I don’t think they wanted to kill anyone. They just wanted to level the playing field. Show them that we’re not afraid. Look, I don’t agree with what they did, and Alice and the elders are already working on moving them out of the resistance, but you need to understand that my people are tired of fighting for their freedom. Some of them are restless and young. Not a good combination.”
My people. The words rang through her like razors through cloth. He was never going to trust her. As far as he was concerned, powers or not, she was an outsider. She should be happy, easier to cut their world off if she wasn’t a part of it. So why was she so hurt by his words?
“So, what about using powers in front of humans?”
“I don’t think that was on their minds at all, to be honest.” His eyes met hers and he stopped walking, “Why did you ask that?”
“Uhm. Nothing. It’s just, Shaylah almost died. She was going to die if I hadn’t helped her. I had to do something, so I...”
“Ruby, what did you do?”
“I might have somehow activated more Earth powers to save her.”
“What were you thinking? What if someone saw you?”
“What was I supposed to do? Let her die under a rock! Are you kidding me?” She slapped his arm and he stumbled sideways, shocked at her unexpected strength. “Besides, no one saw me. It was just me and her there when it happened, and she was pretty out of it.”
“You’re not staying alone tonight.”
“Yeah. Ok.” She laughed, convinced he was kidding. His eyes did not show a hint of a smile. “Wait, are you serious?”
“Of course, I’m serious. Your apartment was just broken into. You were threatened by someone who knows you can see Elementals, and today you used your powers in public. I am not leaving you alone for even a minute.”
She wanted to tell him to go home. To leave her alone. To stop pretending to care for her. Instead, she nodded and checked her pockets for the keys. Whether she liked it or not, she was in the middle of a war. With Shaylah in the hospital, it would be nice not to spend the night in the apartment alone. She reached for the familiarity of
his hand and pulled back quickly. Shocked at her own actions.
“Don’t worry, I’ll sleep on the couch.” He said, reading her mind as usual.
Chapter 23
I’m ready
Ruby’s hand is wrapped tightly around the Sword of Enuma. She can feel the weight of the metal pulling her arm down. The energy pulse through the sword and into her fingertips. She can feel its power trickle up her arm, creeping towards her chest. It is a strange feeling, unlike anything she had ever experienced. It is as if she is wrapped in a shadow, her body weightless and encased in darkness.
She does not know where she is. There is no identifying feature in the room to give her an idea of her location. The walls are dripping wet, and the ground is raw dirt beneath her bare feet. She is breathing in slow motion, and each breath out sends fog from her mouth. She feels like a dragon waking up from deep sleep, learning to breathe fire.
There are no exits here. Just wetness, and each of the four walls encasing her has symbols. Elemental houses glow all around her. She pulls the sword up to her chest, watching the gemstones twinkle in the dim light.
As she points the tip of the sword in the direction of the wall in front of her, the sapphire on the handle shines brighter.
Water House, she thinks and pulls the sword toward the wall on the left of her.
Earth House, she whispers as the emerald begins to light.
She does the same for the other two walls, each illuminating a different stone on the sword. Finishing the rotation, she lifts the sword as high as her thin arm allows and cries out from the heaviness of its weight. She can see all four gemstones gleam in unison. Her body is trembling. This is new power. Raw power. It is as if all of her Elemental abilities are intertwined, pushing their way through the tips of her fingers towards the blade.
As she looks up, a black fog races around the sword’s edge, leaving a trail of darkness in its path. She screams, unable to remove her burning fingers from the handle.
Ruby woke up in her bed still screaming. She was covered in sweat and her eyes were trying to quickly adjust to the light coming in from the streetlamp outside. Rubbing them roughly, she opened them again to find Liam standing in the doorway.
“What happened? Are you all right?”
“I’m fine. Just a bad dream. Go back to bed, it’s all right.”
“I’ll just lie down here if that’s all right with you.” He was already at the foot of the bed before she had a chance to answer.
They lay there in silence for what seemed like hours. Ruby tried to close her eyes, but sleep was not a friend of hers tonight. The dream had her mind in shambles. Even Liam’s breathing could not lull her to submission. She hadn’t felt that surge of power before, especially not in a dream. She could see the sword so clearly, and while no one had ever shown her any images of it, she knew that what she saw was the Sword of Enuma. There was something special about how it reacted to her in the dream, it was as if it had been waiting for her guidance.
She sat up abruptly in her bed. Suddenly clear headed and with a new realization of the dream’s meaning. She knew exactly what she had to do in order to put a stop to the Elemental war that was beginning to bring danger to innocent bystanders. She had to somehow unite the four houses. It seemed the only way to do so was to gain control of the sword. It was waiting for her and she had to possess it.
“Liam?” she said and watched him sit up on the floor next to her. “The dream I had, I think it was trying to tell me something.”
“You understood one of your dreams? That’s never happened before. What was it?”
“I saw the sword. In a room with walls dripping wet. I think I know who’s holding it.”
“Water house.” He caught up fast.
“Exactly.” Ruby did not go into the details of her plans for the sword, she knew that Liam’s passion for gaining control of it would not coincide with her pacifistic plans. “I need you to train me.”
“Train you how?”
“Everything you know. About combat.”
“Look, whatever ideas you have, you can forget about them. You’re not going to be with us when we finally make a play for the sword.”
“You can’t shelter me forever, Liam. If it’s true that I have all four houses’ powers, then I am your best bet at getting the sword. It also means that I am much stronger than you, so don’t test me!”
“Ok, warrior.” He smiled, “We can start training tomorrow. But if you’re going to awaken all of your powers, you need to be prepared. This won’t be easy.”
“Nothing in the last few weeks has been easy. I’m ready.”
Chapter 24
Walk to the resistance
The next week at the resistance was one of the most grueling weeks in Ruby’s life thus far. Liam was not kidding when he said that it wouldn't be easy. She felt like she was part of an Elemental bootcamp.
Every morning started with physical exercise. She ran never-ending laps around the facility, switched to weight training, and ended with a half hour of meditation. Liam said the morning routine was the most important part of her training because powers or not, if someone physically attacked her, she’d have to know how to defend herself. The meditation was the only part Ruby actually enjoyed, but she couldn’t deny the results; she was getting stronger daily.
After lunch, she spent an hour in the lobby going over old texts and trying to find out everything she could about the sword. Scouring pages of folklore and myth and separating fact from fiction in her notebooks, Zag often joined her for her studies since, outside of his time spent in the greenhouse, going over old texts was one of his favorite activities.
When her mind was tired from reading, Liam would pick her up, and they would make their way to the training rooms. Each day was assigned to a different Elemental house. Liam wanted to hone each of her powers separately so she could get a sense of how to control them better. Alice had actually recommended this approach based on Ruby’s emotional triggers. Since Ruby needed to get certain emotions to come to the surface in order to access her powers, it was best to concentrate on one emotion at a time. She couldn’t be certain, but she got the sense that they were afraid of what she could do if she combined her powers.
Their first attempt with this technique was with Fire powers. Liam wanted to start with something he knew inside and out in order to get the most out of the training session. They spent the day getting Ruby to feel angry, coaxing her to become a fire starter. They started with small pieces of paper again, but by the end of the day, if she was upset enough, Ruby was able to create flame out of thin air and even managed to throw a fireball at the wall next to Liam. He ducked out of the way so fast it made her laugh uncontrollably.
After Fire, came Water. The coffee trick Ruby pulled in the library was cute but would be completely useless in a fight, unless she was battling it out for a latte. Unfortunately, the emotional trigger for her Water powers was sadness and while trying to create precipitation in a temperature-controlled training area, Ruby had gotten herself so upset that she started hyperventilating. Liam suggested they cut the day short, but she was determined to learn everything she could and stayed until almost midnight trying to start storms in a ten by ten room.
Air and Earth were a breeze to get through. Pulling oxygen out of a room was still not on the menu, but Ruby effortlessly manifested fog and wind and was even able to move large boulders a foot off the ground by tapping into Earth powers. Being happy and hopeful to get her powers to manifest was a much easier task, since Liam brought out both emotions effortlessly.
Ruby walked home every night that week with him by her side. He insisted on sleeping on the couch while Shaylah was still in the hospital, and she was happy to have him there. They watched movies each night until she fell asleep on Liam’s shoulder, and every morning had coffee on the deck and listened to traffic dart by.
Their walk to the resistance was often filled with questions about each other. How they grew up, what their
childhood was like, their favorite movies. Anyone watching would assume that they were a young couple on a date.
She could live this life forever.
But her small joys had an expiration date. Each day it all ended as soon as the pawn shop’s doorway buzzed, and they made their way underground. With every step down, Ruby erased a portion of the night before and got ready for training. Every time her foot touched down on the floor of the resistance, she was no longer a girl getting to know a boy she just met. She was a fighter. A warrior without regard for her own life.
She was an Elemental.
Chapter 25
All of it
“You ready for today?” Liam asked, as they made their way towards the training room.
“I guess. I mean, the last time we tried Water I couldn’t do all that much.”
“Don’t be so hard on yourself, I don’t know what I would do if my powers depended on my emotions.”
“Well, you’re a guy, so you’d probably be powerless.” She laughed, “Just kidding.”
“Right.” He was smiling, but she could tell she might have hurt him a little with her comment.
“So, what’s the plan when we get in there?” she changed the subject.
“Alice said that since you’d had some success with the coffee cup, we should start there.”
Ruby was still careful about what she said in front of Alice. She was sure there was something she was hiding, and until she found out what it was, trust wasn’t on the menu. Despite her own feelings, she had to admit that when it came to Elemental powers, Alice was the one to talk to. If it wasn’t for her, Ruby would never have figured out that her emotions ran the show.