by Tricia Barr
“I’m gonna go turn the damn water off,” the man grumbled. “And you…” He pointed at young Skylar. “…as punishment, you are gonna clean up this mess.” He stomped up the stairs, muttering to himself, “Don’t know how the hell we can afford to fix these damn pipes now…damn kids stealing my money.”
“Are you okay?” young Sebastian asked young Skylar just before the two boys faded away, along with the spurting water and all the other children who were watching.
The water that had soaked Phoenyx’s clothes and hair disappeared, too, leaving her once again dry, even though she knew that the feeling of being wet was just an illusion, as well.
“You made the pipes burst,” she said.
“I think maybe I did,” adult Sebastian answered. “I always just thought that maybe God or someone up there was doing us a favor. You say that you felt it when you started that fire. I think I felt something when those pipes burst. I was overwhelmed with anger, at the way they were about to hurt my only friend, and still at the fact that my parents were gone. I felt so helpless. I wanted to be strong, to be powerful, so I wouldn’t be stepped on anymore. That’s all what I felt when those pipes burst.”
“How old were you then?” she asked.
“Almost nine,” he said.
“Oh, you poor thing,” she said. “Poor Skylar too. Your foster parents were awful people. I wanted so much to beat the hell out of that man.”
“Trust me, I had that dream many times when I lived there.”
“That despicable little girl,” she sneered.
“Cynthia always caused us problems,” he said. “I think she had a crush on Skylar and wasn’t used to not getting what she wanted. Being the only natural child in a house full of foster kids is even worse than being just an only child, apparently.”
“What an awful place,” she said. “Did they ever hit you?”
“No, that was the only time he ever came close to hitting one of us. If he ever hit Skylar or me, I don’t know what I would have done but I wouldn’t have let him forget it.”
Overcome with affection and sympathy, she hugged him before she knew what she was doing. When she realized that her arms were touching the bare, wonderfully soft, yet firm skin of his back because his shirt was off, she removed herself, embarrassed.
“Sorry,” she said awkwardly.
“No problem,” he said, looking a little embarrassed himself but not dropping his hands from her waist.
Their eyes met for the first moment of silence that she enjoyed. All she wanted to do was put her arms around him again. But their moment was all too short.
A loud clank broke through the illusion and, too quickly, the illusion ripped away. They were back in their cells, the two of them pressed up against the bars that divided them. Skylar and Lily stood only a foot or so away from either of them, obviously interrupted from a conversation of their own.
The clank was followed by another and the door opened, demanding all their attention. Has Lucas returned to set us free? Phoenyx’s heart leapt with hope for an instant.
She dropped back down when she saw a different man enter. He held a cloth bag of some kind, maybe a pillow case, filled with something large and round, stained at the bottom and dripping something dark. He threw it at the cells and closed the door again.
Skylar instantly backed away and put his hand over his mouth, face turning pale.
Sebastian crawled to the edge of the cell and stuck his hand through the bars to inspect the strange package. He pulled the cloth away, revealing the single most horrifying thing Phoenyx had ever seen with her own eyes—Lucas’s severed head! The words “Nice Try” were written on his large forehead in black permanent marker.
Lily screamed at the top of her lungs and Skylar rushed to the toilet to puke.
Sebastian immediately moved to cover the head back up, then stuck his leg through the bars to kick it as far away from them as possible.
Lily’s screaming continued and turned into weeping. Skylar stayed hunched over the toilet with his head resting on one arm while the other wrapped around his stomach. Sebastian and Phoenyx only kept looking at each other because they didn’t want to look at anything else. She knew they were both thinking the same thing: they were screwed.
No one said anything in some time. No one could say anything. Lucas was their only hope to escape and, because of what she compelled him to do, this cult killed him—if only for the purpose of making a point to the four of them—that there was no way out. So that was yet another death on her hands. She was racking up quite a list, getting quite a few notches on her belt. At least she knew she didn’t have to feel as guilty for this one. If she hadn’t compelled him, he would have been perfectly content to see her and her friends die. Still, seeing that head meant these people were serious and twisted. She knew such acts of violence and brutality were possible, that they happened out in the world every day, but to actually see such an act committed was horrible—a truth she’d never forget.
In three days, they would die. Three days to suffer in this cell without food or water, three days to mourn the life about to be stolen from her and to mourn the people she was leaving behind. Her poor mom—first she lost her husband and now she would lose her daughter. She would be all alone in the world.
Sebastian slipped his hand through the bars and put it in hers. At least she would have three more days to spend with Sebastian. What a shame that she got to meet him now, like this, only to have him taken away. She knew she was falling for him; why bother denying it anymore? She felt a connection to him that first night they met, even before she remembered dreaming about him, before she knew anything about him. Knowing that fate brought them together, in this life and in who knows how many previous lives, was ruined by the thought that they would never meet in a future one ever again if the stupid ritual succeeded.
“You know what? No,” she said, suddenly inspired. “We are not going to die here. There’s got to be another way.”
They all came out of their ruminations to look at her.
“How?” Lily asked, voice dry. “These people are monsters.”
“Remember what Lucas said—that because of this solar storm our powers would get stronger?” Phoenyx said. “Let’s use that to our advantage. Let’s hone in on our abilities and strengthen them until we can use them as weapons. We have three days to practice.”
The other three exchanged looks, the tiniest spark of hope twinkling in their eyes.
“Come to think of it, I have felt a buzz all day,” Skylar said. “Like there’s a static current running through my whole body.”
“You know, it makes sense that you would feel the effects of the solar storm first,” Phoenyx said. “You’re Air, your element is closest to the sun.”
He pursed his lips and nodded. “That does make sense.”
“I’m sure the rest of us will feel it soon, too,” Phoenyx said.
“Okay, so how do you propose we solve the initial problem of getting out of this cell?” Sebastian asked.
“I think our best bet to do that is for Skylar to attempt to bend the bars with his telekinesis,” she said. “None of us is strong enough to do anything like that by hand, but air can be a powerful force. If you train, you might be able to do it. Like working out a muscle, it gets stronger the more you push it. It’s time to start working out that brain, Skylar.”
“All right, it’s a worth a try,” Skylar said.
“Then we just need to figure out how to get out of this room once we get out of these cells,” Phoenyx pondered.
“Oh, that’s simple,” Skylar said. “I can unlock the door with my mind from the inside. It’s a simple latch lock. I couldn’t do that with the cell door because it’s electronic.”
Phoenyx raised her brows in understanding and nodded. “Great! Takes care of that.”
“What about the rest of us?” Lily asked.
“Yeah,” Sebastian said. “What are we going to do?”
“Once we get
out of this room, we can put all of our abilities to use,” Phoenyx said. “Skylar can use his telekinesis to push people away from us or hurt them any way necessary. I’ll use my influence to compel people to help us or whatever opportunities I see along the way. Sebastian, you can use fear against them. Just like that story you told us, about your first time creating an illusion, make them see anything that will scare them off.”
“Okay, I can do that,” he said. “But that’s a very passive way to go about it. I’ll need a backup plan in case they don’t scare easily.”
“Then you can hone in on your water element,” she said.
His eyes wandered as he took a moment to think about it. “Hmm, I just don’t see how I can use water as a weapon…especially here, in a place like this. Sure, I can see how a whole dam filled with water would be a destructive force, but the only water we have access to is what’s left in our water bottles.”
“Actually, that’s not the only water,” she corrected. “Remember what you showed me earlier tonight? I’m sure there are pipes filled with running water all over this place. You just have to get creative. Since we will need the water bottles for drinking, you can practice with the one source of running water we have available.” She looked at the toilet.
He sighed loudly. “Okay, I’ll see what I can come up with.”
“What about me?” Lily asked. “None of my abilities can be used as a weapon. I’m pretty much exactly the opposite of a weapon.”
Phoenyx thought for a moment. “Maybe that’s exactly what we need you to be. You’re our protection. If one of us gets hurt, you’re our guarantee it won’t be permanent. You’re our guarantee we’ll all get out of here alive and in one piece.”
That perked Lily right up.
“I think you are forgetting our biggest weapon of all,” Sebastian said.
“What’s that?” Phoenyx asked.
“You,” he said.
“Me? No, I already said I could use my compulsion as a defense for us.”
“I’m not talking about your compulsion,” he said. “Phoenyx, you have the most destructive ability of all us. You can make fire. If you learn to master that ability—or at least control it—in the next three days, you’re the best chance we have of escaping.”
Everything he said brought back her fear. Her heart raced and the sweat broke out on her forehead.
She shook her head. “No, I can’t do that. Mm-hm. No.”
“He has a point,” Skylar said. “So far, our best hope is that I can make my telekinesis strong enough to hurt people. That may take some time. If you think about it in terms of elements, how fast does air have to be going to cause any damage? Like sixty miles an hour at least, which is rare. But fire is a destructive element because it can damage even in its weakest state. You barely spark a match and you’re destroying hundreds of molecules. We have to at least consider it.”
She kept shaking her head. “What if I hurt someone again? What if I hurt one of you by accident?”
Sebastian put both his hands on her shoulders. “I know you won’t.” He smiled encouragingly. “If, by some chance, another accident happens—like you said, we have Lily for protection.”
Lily nodded eagerly and Phoenyx let out a defeated laugh.
She had absolutely no faith in her so-called fire power. She had only just accepted its existence a few hours ago, and all she knew about it was that it was wild and out of control the one time she had ever used it. Could they risk letting it out again? If she hurt one of them, she would never forgive herself.
However, maybe they did have a point. Fire was definitely the most harmful thing in their arsenal. If they wanted a weapon out of the four elements, fire was the obvious choice. She had three days to learn to control it, and in here, three days was a long time. She couldn’t ask them to practice using their powers if she wasn’t willing to commit to the same thing.
“All right, I’ll try to get a handle on the whole fire thing,” she said. “Once I do, I will only use it as a last resort. I won’t…I won’t take another life if I don’t have to.”
“Okay,” the three of them chorused.
“Since we don’t know what time on the fourth day they plan to do the ritual, we should plan on making our escape attempt on the third day,” Skylar said.
“You’re right,” Phoenyx said. “So that means we really only have tomorrow and the next day to prepare ourselves. We have to make every second count.”
“I don’t know about you guys but, after seeing…” Lily looked sideways at the bag in the corner, “…that, I won’t be going to sleep any time soon.”
“Yeah, me either,” Skylar agreed, his face still tinted slightly green.
“I don’t think I’ll be able to sleep at all knowing I’m about to be killed,” Sebastian said. “So let’s start training now; although I’m not exactly sure how to start.”
Lily looked at the pile of wadded up paper bags, picked one up and tossed it to Phoenyx.
“You can try to light the paper on fire,” Lily said. “Paper is super flammable so that will be the best thing for you to practice with.”
Phoenyx looked at the brown paper wad in her hands. Why did this make her feel like she was just given the most harrowing homework assignment of her life?
“Okay,” she said as she exhaled. “Let’s take our stations. I got the paper. Sebastian, you got the toilet—”
“Yay,” he said unenthusiastically.
“Take your pick of the bars,” Phoenyx said to Skylar. She turned back to the wad in her hands. “Let’s get started.”
Phoenyx crossed her legs and tried to get comfortable. But, really, how comfortable can one get just after learning someone was killed because of them and in three days or so they will be next? Okay, focus. All you have to do is…start this piece of paper on fire with your mind. How hard can it be?
She stared at the paper and tried to put everything else out of her mind. Maybe she just had to visualize it. Like Sebastian’s ability, maybe she just had to picture the paper starting on fire. She imagined it once, then again more vividly. Nothing happened.
Hmm. Okay, maybe it was something more like Peter Pan, think happy thoughts. Happiness was a positive and powerful thing, right? She thought about how much she would love to have a full course meal right now. Oh, even better, how great a buffet would be. She could eat and eat and eat and make the hunger pains wish they never existed. Nope, that only made her stomach growl loudly.
That’s not going to work. All right, don’t think about superficial happiness, think about what would make you truly happy. To see Mom again. She thought of coming home to her mom, giving her a huge, very long hug and telling her all the things she never said, like what a great mom she was and how she did a great job raising her on her own for the past six years.
That made her think of her dad. Now to see him alive would make her extremely happy. She imagined him coming back into her life with open arms, telling her the one thing she would love to hear: that he forgave her.
Crap; that just brought the aching fear and guilt back.
She sighed, then looked around the room to see how the others were doing.
Lily sat in the corner staring at her last apple, probably quarreling with herself over whether to sate her hunger now or save it for when she really needed it. Skylar stared, no, scowled at the bars in front of him, looking like his eyes were about to pop out of his head. Sebastian was perched in a hover over the toilet, staring apathetically into the water.
He was so cute. He had his white button-down shirt just hanging on his shoulders, the buttons all unbuttoned so his shirt was open to reveal just a bit of his bare chest. He definitely had a swimmer’s chest. He looked like one of those surfer gods one sees running down a beach in slow motion on a TV show.
A new, warm feeling replaced the guilt and fear in her stomach, and she remembered something that should have been obvious right from the start. Her compulsion ability, it stemmed from sensuality. W
henever she made someone do something, she would feel the sensation of being turned on. If lust was what fueled that power, it only made sense that it would fuel her fire power, too!
“Duh,” she whispered.
“What?” Sebastian asked.
“Oh, uh, nothing,” she said.
While their gazes were on each other, he smiled at her.
Maybe it was time she stopped pushing away the thoughts that lay in wait all this time. She had so many reasons for fighting them off before—they just met, their lives were in danger, there were more important things to worry about, there were bars between them so there was no point in torturing herself with something she couldn’t have, etc. However, this might be her key to unlocking the Fire within her.
When he went back to concentrating on the water, she concentrated on him. God, he had such perfect lips—so pink and full and seemingly soft. She wanted to kiss them since the night they first talked. He was probably a great kisser. He was probably great at a lot of things. She let her eyes wander down his neck and to his open shirt. Now that she wasn’t fighting it, she could really enjoy his chest—just the right amount of muscles, not too buff and not too scrawny. He shifted his position where he sat and his shirt moved just enough to reveal one very perky, hard nipple. For the first time, she appreciated that it was cold in here. Yet, she was getting very warm.
Oh, to hell with it! She let herself fall into a fevered fantasy of what would happen if these bars didn’t separate them and Lily and Skylar weren’t here. She imagined crawling over to him and surprising him with a teasing kiss, only enough to let him know what she wanted, so that he would pull her against him and open his mouth to let his tongue do the talking. Oh, how amazing it would feel to kiss him passionately and hungrily!
She would pull his shirt all the way off and let her hands roam eagerly all over his naked back. He would pull hers up over her head, then snap her bra off with one flick of his fingers and toss it to the side. Then he would pull her up and cover one of her breasts with his hungry mouth while his hand playfully covered the other. She would run her fingers through his thick black hair, holding him against her. They would wrestle each other down to the floor and let their hands find what they really wanted—the buttons to each other’s pants. Oh, she blushed at the thought of what waited under that black polyester for her.