Fates Divided

by Jules Barnard

  It was no surprise Derek told her to leave. He’d been a bit of a jerk about it, but she couldn’t blame him for getting her out of there. Overnight, she’d gone from a budding chemist at the top of her class to a menace with lab equipment. Everything she knew about science was dissolving. If she could accidentally boil her solution, what else could she accidentally boil?

  Jesus—people were roughly sixty percent water. What if she boiled the liquids inside herself? Or inside someone else?

  She had to figure this out before something terrible happened.

  Elena breathed deeply, attempting to calm down, but it wasn’t working. Because as soon as she returned her attention to the professor, her heightened senses zeroed in on a door behind the podium that was the same color as the wall.

  A door she’d never seen before.

  Maybe it had been there all along. She could just be searching for things because she’d become an overanxious crazy person these last twenty-four hours.

  The door swung open.

  Dammit. And if that wasn’t enough to convince her the door was strange, another classroom lay beyond. A classroom that shouldn’t exist because it was physically impossible. Her physics auditorium filled the entire first floor of the building.

  Elena stared into the other room. Everything in there appeared larger: the people, the ornate desks spread farther apart than the stadium seating of her auditorium. It was like looking through a magnifying glass. What the hell?

  She wrapped her arms around her chest and clenched her elbows. Right now, sprawling farms and the single stoplight of her California hometown sounded nice.

  A tall blond guy in dark, fitted clothes sitting near the door in the strange classroom turned and looked right at her, a slow, knowing smile spreading across his face.

  Her back tensed. Why was he looking at her like that?

  Before she could consider it further, he rose and strolled out of sight, giving her a clear view of the rest of the students. A few of them had light brown hair, but most were blondes or redheads with smooth, pale skin. All of them were unnaturally attractive like the first guy, who could have been a Viking warrior with his height and broad shoulders.

  Dawson University was known for its diversity. This Norse group looked out of place.

  Elena glared at her physics professor, but the woman didn’t seem aware of the room behind her.

  She nudged the girl next to her, who was texting. “Do you see that?”

  The girl’s gaze went straight to the professor, as though the other room wasn’t important—or not there. Her long, side-swept bangs dropped over one eye. “See what?”

  Elena opened her mouth to say something, then shook her head. “Nothing, I—did they paint the wall a different color? Wasn’t it maroon?”

  Her neighbor edged to the far side of her seat. The girl’s body was angled away, but the screen of her phone was visible. She texted, Freak next to me in Phys 4.

  Great. A quick scan confirmed the rest of the auditorium wasn’t looking at the strangers in the other room either. Their attentions were focused on the PowerPoint images overhead, even though the room stuck out like Elena’s wavy hair on a humid day.

  Rubbing her temples, she faced forward—and her heart launched into her throat.

  The strangers beyond the wall had gathered into a semicircle. And they were all watching her.

  The physics professor clicked off her laser pointer and crossed the podium, showing zero signs that she noticed the people inches away. She flipped on the auditorium’s bright lights. Lecture over.

  Students emptied desks—Elena’s neighbor like a fire had been lit beneath her butt. The crowd blocked Elena’s view of the podium and wall for several minutes.

  By the time the last person moved out of the way, the door to the other classroom had closed, all evidence of the strangers gone.

  Elena shoved her laptop into her backpack and swung the bag over her shoulder. She strode to the front of the classroom. The professor was busy talking to students and didn’t seem to notice her. She hesitated for only a moment before reaching for the indentation of the hidden door.

  The surface was smooth, no grooves, but she could still see the edges. How was that possible?

  She peered from various angles and continued to feel around the wall, pressing in different places. That was when she saw the faint outline of a doorknob the same color as the wall halfway down.

  Elena reached for the knob. And her fingers slipped straight through as if it were air, her knuckles bumping the wall instead.

  She stepped back, shaking her head. The door had opened. It was real. She’d prove it.

  She ran out of the auditorium toward the end of the building where the other classroom should be.

  And came to a dead end.

  No doors. No creases in the wall. Nothing to indicate anything lay beyond.

  Elena kicked the surface hard with the tip of her sneaker, the impact reverberating up her leg. The wall was solid.

  Why was this happening? She sank to the ground and pressed her fingers to her eyelids. She tried to concentrate on what she knew—to piece it together and make sense of it all.

  Logically, the room couldn’t exist. She’d walked past the Physics Hall every day for the last two months. No buildings backed the structure, not even a temp, but the door and the classroom—the students—she’d seen them.

  Last night, she’d humiliated herself in front of Derek, could have injured both of them. Nothing should have happened with the chemicals she’d been using, but it had. And now her hearing was elevated and she was seeing things she couldn’t explain?

  She needed to see a doctor, because something was seriously wrong.

  Nothing in life had come easily. Her mother had left her and her father on Elena’s first birthday, and then the universe took away her father a few short years later. Those were things she couldn’t control and had never understood. But school made sense—science and chemistry, molecules and the predictable ways they reacted. She trusted it to be there for her.

  Now her foothold in life was failing her too.

  Her head pounding, Elena lumbered to her feet and started to run, her backpack slapping her spine, threatening to unbalance her.

  She rounded a corner, desperate for an exit—and slammed into a large body. Air burst from her lungs, stars flittering across her vision. And then the giant wall of a human she’d bounced into grabbed her and picked her up.

  “I wondered where you had gone.” The unfamiliar, melodic voice rumbled through the chest her face was plastered against.

  Elena couldn’t breathe and her arms were pinned. The man began to move, carrying her away.

  She angled her mouth past the thick fabric of his shirt and sucked in air. “Let me go. Help!” she yelled, but his grip tightened and the slight view she had revealed the hallways were empty.

  Her struggles grew frantic and she kicked her legs to free herself. The man shifted her body to the side, and that was when she saw his face.

  The Viking with the wry smile.

  She hadn’t imagined him…and now he was abducting her?

  Elena’s blood whooshed through her veins, the throbbing increasing the headache her heightened senses had triggered.

  Before she could figure out how to get away, the Viking opened a door and unceremoniously dropped her on her feet.

  She spun around, ready to dart in the opposite direction, and froze. Ornate desks, intricate plasterwork—it was the classroom that shouldn’t exist.

  Three adults sat behind a wide table like magistrates. A woman with silver, wavy hair and piercing blue eyes nodded to the Viking. “Thank you, Keen.” She regarded Elena. “Good morning.”

  Elena glanced behind her to find her kidnapper blocking the exit. “What’s this about? Where am I?”

  The woman’s smile was cold. “In due time. For now, all that matters is that we know about you, Elena Rosales.”

  Elena had never seen these people in
her life. “What do you mean, you know me?”

  A man and another woman sat there too. The man had a spray of gray at his temples and the other woman had short red hair, but all three of them had smooth, creamy skin. They wore fitted, dark clothing, like the Viking who’d grabbed her, and were slender and unusually tall, even while seated.

  It was the first time Elena had ever felt like the short person in the room.

  “We know who your mother is, why you were recruited by Dawson, and what you’ve done.”

  Elena had received a full-ride scholarship. It was more than she’d ever hoped for… Had that been intentional? “Wait—” She shook her head. “How do you know my mother? I don’t even know my mother.”

  The woman smiled that cold smile again. “No, you wouldn’t.”

  That’s all she was going to say? No explanation?

  “You’ve been using your magic.” This time the comment came from the man. His features were Nordic, like those of her captor, but sharper, more chiseled, with a longer nose and high cheekbones.

  Elena’s brain blew a fuse at his words. A long pause followed while she wrapped her head around it. “My magic?” The prickles along her skin returned full force. “I’m sorry—” She gestured to him.

  “Leo.”

  “—Leo. If you’re referring to the lab—ah, labs—that was an accident. Won’t happen again.” She hoped.

  Leo exchanged a look with the two women at his side.

  “Oh, but we want it to happen again,” the silver-haired woman said. “In fact, we count on it.”

  The red-haired lady with delicate features remained perfectly silent.

  Elena fought a shiver. The liquid disasters, these people with their strange doors and knowledge about her missing mother—there was something very, very wrong with this situation. Still, given the size of Keen behind her and how easily he’d deposited her here, she chose her next words cautiously. “I don’t know what happened in the labs.”

  “Don’t you?” the older woman asked. “I think you know exactly what you did, Elena Rosales.”

  The solutions had exploded, but there was something—something she’d ignored yesterday because it was insanity. Before the explosions, the shaking and tingling in her fingers had magnified…as if an energy simmered beneath her skin.

  This was nuts.

  The woman nodded. “I see from your expression that you agree.”

  Elena’s control slipped, panic tightening her chest. “Who are you?” she choked out, glancing around the room more thoroughly.

  A large map with odd land formations hung behind them, and there was state-of-the-art computer equipment below wavy-paned diamond glass windows. The contrast of old and new reminded her of Derek’s lab and the antique equipment next to modern devices.

  “You’ve already been introduced to Leo,” the silver-haired woman said. “I am Portia, and this is Deirdre.” She gestured to the silent redhead. Portia pursed her lips as though she’d tasted something sour. “They said you were bright for a human, but you are proving particularly dense.”

  “For a human?”

  Portia waved her hand to Keen and the others at the table. “We are Fae. And you are Halven—half Fae from your mother’s side.”

  4

  Elena held back a maniacal laugh. These people had lost their minds. “What do you mean you’re Fae? Like a fairy? Where are your wings? You’re not going to tell me vampires exist too, are you?” The last question was facetious, but she glanced around instinctively, searching for fanged creatures ready to pounce. It had been that kind of day.

  Portia sighed and met Leo’s gaze. “Vampires are a part of human make-believe. Again, your intelligence concerns us.”

  Maybe it wasn’t the best moment to allow the insult to bother her, but it did. She might not be a genius like Derek, but when she wasn’t boiling liquids with her hands, she was a damn good student.

  Given the events of yesterday and today, Elena wasn’t in the mood for this—whatever this was. “What do you want from me?” she asked bitterly.

  “Your assistance, of course,” Portia said. “To answer your earlier question about who we are, we must go back to an earlier time when angels still ventured into the human realm. There are those who refer to us as Nephilim, but Nephilim are a separate race. They were created by angels rejected from heaven who mated with humans. A mistake much like you, Elena, though you are at least descended from Fae, whose existence was ordained by God.” Her chin tilted up pompously. “God created us, and with our powers, we are the closest relation to angels.”

  Elena glared at her. “So Fae and Nephilim are both the result of angels mating with humans.” Portia was attempting to draw a distinction, but Elena was pissed and confused, and she wasn’t above annoying them to get the answers she needed.

  Portia’s eyes blazed and she leaned forward. Leo placed a hand on her arm, urging her to settle back in her seat. He studied Elena calmly. “Nephilim were created by disobedient angels mating with humans, while Fae were created by angels ordained by God to create a new race with powers and immortality. It is the difference between good and evil.”

  His words were myth and legend, but a part of her couldn’t entirely discredit them. She’d witnessed things science couldn’t explain. And these people touched on something else she’d never understood—the puzzle of her mother.

  No one knew why her mother had left on Elena’s first birthday. She’d been told her mother had simply disappeared—literally during the party. She was never heard from again.

  Did Portia and Leo know what happened to her mother?

  Portia grinned rigidly. “You are descended from the beloved Fae created by God. Is it any wonder you have come into your powers? On your eighteenth birthday, you reached your majority, a time when Halven present with abilities, if they possess them.”

  She had turned eighteen yesterday. “If this is true, why am I only now learning of it? If I’m part Fae, I’m one of God’s beloved,” she said half-mockingly, because dammit, these people waited until unexplainable things occurred before telling her she wasn’t human?

  Portia and Leo visibly stiffened, but Deirdre looked on with an expression of sadness. Something Elena had said apparently hit home.

  “No.” Portia leveled her with a look of disdain. “Halven are far from beloved. I suppose Halven may be perceived as a bit of disobedience on the part of a few willful Fae. But Halven are an abomination, much like the Nephilim.”

  Elena gritted her teeth. She was sick of the insults. “Then why am I standing here? I’ve got school and friends and better things to do than be kidnapped and verbally abused by you.”

  “There is nothing more important than the battle the Fae face,” Portia spat. “Abomination or not, you were sired from a powerful bloodline and possess an ability we need.” She looked away, as if exasperated.

  Leo’s hand once again came down on Portia’s arm. She glanced at his expression and let out a sharp breath. Plastering on a tight smile, she turned to Elena. “Are you up to the challenge we have to present to you?”

  The light tone of her voice after that anger could be nothing short of fake. Portia sucked at diplomacy. And a challenge? Hadn’t they dumped enough on her? “I doubt it,” Elena mumbled, her mind buzzing from the emotionally charged moment.

  Portia’s eyes narrowed. “Your mother and the rest of the Fae are in grave danger, and you stand here—”

  Elena’s head lifted. “My mother? Where is she?”

  “For now, she is safe, but she will not be for long. Unless you help us.”

  Elena stared in disbelief. “How do you expect me to help you?”

  “You may be a half-blood, but you are still Fae. Have you not noticed additional strength, healing, or sensory input, along with your abilities?”

  Elena swallowed. She had noticed some of those things.

  “The Fae have never been susceptible to disease in all the millennia of our existence. But someone managed to c
reate a virus that kills our kind. It will kill your mother as well.”

  “My mother left me,” Elena said, without thinking. Of course, she didn’t want people hurt, including her mother, but this was insane.

  “Elena,” Portia said in a voice filled with warning. “Consider your options very carefully. We may be injured as a race, but we are not weak. If what we believe about your particular ability is true, it makes you valuable to us. We are asking for your help. We will not ask again.”

  There was an eerie finality to her words. Elena looked to the others at the table. Leo’s expression was stoic, but Deirdre glanced away as though she was uncomfortable.

  “What do you want from me?”

  “We want you to build your powers and create a cure for the disease sweeping our land.”

  5

  Elena couldn’t deny the things she’d done and witnessed the last two days. Or that the Fae’s story provided an explanation for her mother’s absence, if not a highly unusual one. But how did they expect her to cure them of a deadly Fae disease?

  The atmosphere in the strange classroom had been charged from the moment Elena was thrust inside. With so much going on, she couldn’t dissect what the Fae had told her in a rational manner. Their question about her helping them had been more of an order than a request.

  “I’d like to go home before I answer,” she said.

  Portia shot her another tight smile. “You have one hour.”

  How would she figure anything out in an hour?

  Elena turned unsteadily. A little time was better than no time. She needed to process everything that had happened—needed the comfort of her apartment and Reese to figure out what was real and what wasn’t.

  She walked toward the door that led to the physics auditorium, her limbs heavy. Keen allowed her to pass, but she sensed him behind her while she exited the building.

  Elena glanced back. “You don’t need to follow me.”

  He stared straight ahead. “I am your guard while you work on the antidote. Until the disease is contained, I will ensure your safety.”