Mark of Four

by Tamara Shoemaker

  She tapped her pen on the podium. “So we will start with one element per day. Those with a talent in that area will find it easier to accomplish the day’s task. Others may have to work harder. No matter what, I expect success. Failure is not an option.”

  The doors at the side of the room opened, and seventy-five bowls of water traveled in, landing on the desk of each student. “Today’s lesson, creating a whirlpool.”

  Marysa leaned close to Alayne. “This should be a cinch for you.”

  Alayne shook her head. “I don’t know, I’ve never done a whirlpool before.”

  Professor Brinks’ gaze speared her. “No talking, please, Miss Worth.” A moment later, she glanced around the classroom. “Does everyone have a bowl? Wonderful. Each student will please insert one finger into the liquid. Concentrate on the feel of the water, break it down into pieces in your mind, and then send those pieces into circles.” She walked to the aisle and began a measured tread up the steps, watching the students on either side of her. “Oh, nicely done, Mr. Ryman, it looks like your water is moving a bit. No, no, Miss Pryor, it doesn’t count if you move your finger.”

  Alayne concentrated on the water element that sent currents up her arm. She honed her attention on it, feeling its mass and weight, pulling it apart, twining it together, rolling it to get its feel. Then she nudged it into a counter-clockwise circle where it spun faster and faster. The edge of the water in her bowl rose as a spiral shot straight to the bottom. The water no longer touched her skin, but she continued to control the water element, and the whirlpool grew larger.

  “Why, Miss Worth!” Professor Brinks’s voice came from the aisle on the other side of Jayme.

  Alayne jumped. The water in her bowl collapsed back into the middle and splashed across the side of her face.

  “Well, that was just—on the first day, too—I don’t think I’ve ever—that was amazing!”

  Alayne looked carefully at her desk, intensely aware that every eye was on her. She wiped her finger on her jeans and then dabbed at her face with her shirt.

  Professor Brinks seemed to recover. “Class, let’s give Miss Worth a hand for so successfully completing the project.”

  A smattering of applause echoed through the room. Alayne refused to look up.

  The rest of the class period, Alayne watched Jayme and Marysa in their efforts to create a whirlpool. Marysa managed to get her water moving pretty well. It made a small dent in the middle of the bowl, but never left her finger. Jayme only managed ripples. He muttered under his breath after a while before he saw Alayne watching him. “Sorry,” he said sheepishly. “Wish I was as good at it as you are.”

  “You’re doing really well. I’ll see what it’s like when it’s time to try Air.”

  He grinned and went back to concentrating on the water.

  Alayne felt some drops of water splash across her neck beside her braid. She twisted in her chair.

  Daymon Houser sat on the next tier up, three chairs farther down the row. Cornelia and the brown-haired boy from the commissary sat on either side of him. “Oh no, Alayne, it’s raining in here. Can you make it stop, please?” He laughed, and the students around him snickered. He flicked some more water. “Uh oh, we’re getting wet.”

  “Mr. Houser.” Professor Brinks’s voice lashed from the podium. “You will please return your attention to your own bowl and concentrate on passing my class this semester.”

  Daymon dropped his gaze back to his bowl and stuck his finger in the liquid, but when Alayne glanced back a few moments later, she caught him staring at her, a sneer twisting his lips.

  * * *

  History of Elements went just about as Alayne could have predicted. It didn’t differ much from her history classes at Basic School in Skyden, except that it included information about lots of famous Elementals who had changed the world throughout history.

  She flipped restlessly through her textbook as Professor Manderly Manders droned on and on. She found three whole chapters dedicated to the subject of the Great Deluge. A new insert at the back of the book described the Elemental Alliance; Simeon Malachi’s name caught her attention near the bottom of the page. Alayne leaned closer to scan the insert.

  She hadn’t heard much about the Elemental Alliance. Reading about it now, her lips curled in disgust. She gathered that the Alliance was a group of Elemental Supremacists—Elementals who believed that Natural Humans should be eradicated, as they dirtied the genetics of true Elementals.

  According to the paper, Simeon Malachi had been their spokesman for years until he’d moved into the realms of Shadow-Casting, garnering followers along the way. At first, Malachi and his Shadow-Casters had been content to be a loud voice of dissent in the balconies of the High Court, but as time wore on, the Alliance darkened. New leaders replaced old. Malachi increased his group’s activities, and people fled in terror from the Casters. That was all before their arrest.

  Alayne thought about the events of the last week, and Malachi’s attempted takeover of the High Court. He was looking for the legendary Vale. She glanced back at the paper and wondered if Malachi still cast his lot beneath the Alliance flag. If the Alliance got hold of the Vale, the wielder of all four Elements, the power of all powers...

  Alayne swallowed hard. Her parents would be dead, Leesha, too, and many of her friends from Basic School. Because they carried the status of Natural Humans, the Alliance would kill them. Already they’d shown themselves to be lethal in their attempts for control. How much more deadly would they be if they got hold of the Vale?

  I wonder what the Vale looks like. The words of the leaflet swam in front of her as she stared at it. Marysa leaned close and whispered, “I think it’s all a myth, the stuff of legend. I told you I don’t think there’s any such thing as the Vale.” Her friend nodded at the page where Alayne had been staring. The Vale was mentioned several times.

  Alayne nodded hazily as Marysa returned to her work. Propping her elbow on the table, she rested her chin on her hand as she continued reading. Exhaustion from her restless night caught up with her; the words blurred on the page, and her eyelids drifted shut.

  She woke up when Marysa’s sharp elbow stabbed her ribs. She sat up with a jerk, wiping the drool from her cheek and the open history book that had been her pillow.

  “Miss Worth, you will remain after class to discuss your apparent lack of sleep. Everyone, please turn to page eleven in your textbooks.”

  Cheeks flaming, Alayne quickly flipped back through the pages.

  Someone stage-whispered behind her. “Why are her cheeks always wet? The first time, it was water, now it’s drool. You’d think for a Water-Wielder, she’d have better control.”

  Alayne stared straight ahead at the teacher, determined to ignore the snickers. Marysa had no such inhibitions. She whirled around. “Here’s an idea, Corn. If you think a wet face is so funny, go stick your head in a toilet and give yourself a swirly. I’m sure all your little friends will get a good laugh.”

  Professor Manders’s voice snapped from the front of the room. “Miss Blakely, you will remain after class as well. Eyes on your work, class.”

  At long last, the gong sounded. Alayne and Marysa closed their books but stayed seated. Jayme slung his bag over his back, throwing them a sympathetic glance. “I’ll wait out in the hall,” he whispered.

  Professor Manders approached the girls’ table, seating himself on it. “Miss Worth, do you have narcolepsy, by any chance?”

  “No, sir.”

  “Are you on medication of any kind that would induce a sleepy state?”

  “No, sir.”

  “Are you having trouble sleeping in the dormitories, then?”

  Alayne couldn’t meet the professor’s eyes. “Maybe a little, sir.”

  The professor sighed. “I realize, Miss Worth, that while history is not always the most scintillating of subjects, it is still necessary to provide a thorough knowledge of your craft. Do please endeavor to stay awake from now on. Do
you think you’ll be able to do that?”

  “Yes, sir.” Alayne risked a quick glance at the professor. His gray eyes twinkled kindly at her from behind his glasses before he turned to Marysa.

  “There will be no more outbursts of any kind from you, Miss Blakely. Do I make myself clear? If I see anything like that again, you will serve detention for a full week.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Good. Get going now, or you’ll be late for your next class.”

  As the girls met Jayme in the hallway, Alayne turned to Marysa. “Why didn’t you explain? He’d have understood that you were just standing up for me.”

  Marysa shrugged. “With people like Corn and Daymon, they’ll show their true colors soon enough. I don’t need to get labeled as a tattletale in the meantime.”

  * * *

  Though Water-Currents had sounded interesting during Alayne’s visit to the registrar, she was quickly disappointed. Professor Cyrus Blake instructed the students to drag their fingers through a bowl of water in front of them and then try to guess how the currents were moving based on the feel of the water. To Alayne it was nearly second nature to sift through the water element and test its direction. She sighed deeply as she trailed her index finger through the liquid, glancing around the classroom.

  Neither Marysa nor Jayme were in this one. She wondered how they were enjoying their own classes. When the gong sounded, she drew a breath of relief and sent up a fervent prayer that the rest of the semester wouldn’t be as boring.

  Throw-Casting started immediately after Water-Currents, and it was also the last class before lunch. Professor Laela Grace was a bouncy, light-hearted individual, and Alayne immediately liked her.

  As soon as Professor Grace walked into the classroom, she motioned for everyone to rise. “In the corners of the room, you will see tables of items that we will be using in this class. In that corner,” she pointed, “are plates filled with strips of sod. This one over here,” she pointed again, “has pitchers of water. Over there, I’ve got packaged bundles of dry hemlock twigs, and in the last corner, you’ll see just one object—a bubble machine.” She tapped her pointer on her desk. “Now all of you will please line up along both sides of the room.”

  In the bustle that followed, Alayne lost sight of Jayme and Marysa. When everyone had lined up, Jayme stood across the room from her, and Marysa was over in the corner next to the water pitchers.

  “Throw-Casting, class, is the art of ‘casting’ your element at a distance. This morning in Elementary Elementals, I believe you practiced how to work your art by touching an element and commanding it to bend. In this class, we will attempt to bend the elements through space. For instance, please watch.”

  Professor Grace leveled her gaze at the corner of the room where the strips of sod lay on their plates. As the class watched, one of the sod strips neatly and swiftly folded an end of itself on top of the other, leaving a square dirt block on the plate.

  Professor Grace smiled, pleased. “There. Who are my Earth-Movers?”

  About six students raised their hands.

  “That’s it? Well, that’s not many, is it? You’ll have to work extra hard to make up for your lack of numbers. Water-Wielders, let me see your hands.”

  Alayne raised her hand, as did the boy next to her. About twenty-five others in the class raised their hands, too.

  The professor nodded. “Good. I think we should have enough water pitchers. Be creative, everyone. You don’t have to do what I did. I’d like to see your creativity at work.” Then as an afterthought, she added, “Within reason, of course.”

  She looked around the room. “Air-Masters?” Jayme and sixteen other students, including Daymon and Cornelia, raised their hands. “You all will attempt to move the bubbles into whatever shapes you desire. And Fire-Breathers?”

  Marysa’s hand went up along with nine others.

  “Another small group. You all have the dry twigs in the corner. Your assignment is to light your particular bundle of twigs and then create whatever you can out of your resulting flames. If you can’t manage to create something from the flames, that’s okay. If you light the twigs, you will receive passing marks.” She clapped her hands together. “Okay, everyone. Go take one item from your assigned corner and bring it back to your spot. Place it approximately five feet in front of you on the floor. Then we’ll see how this goes.”

  Again, mass confusion reigned, but eventually the students returned to their places, items on the floor in front of them.

  Alayne rested her pitcher on the floor and returned to the wall. The boy next to her had already settled his in place. He studied it, the tip of his tongue wedged between his lips as he concentrated. When he caught her looking at him, he flushed clear up to the blonde roots of his hair. A lightning grin lit his freckled face. “Sorry. I was trying to see if I could make water move by looking at it.” He laughed. “I was really impressed with your whirlpool this morning.”

  “Thanks.” Alayne shrugged uncomfortably. “It wasn’t much.”

  “This sounds kind of fun, though. I bet you’ll be good at it. You seem like you’ve got a real talent when it comes to water.”

  “It does sound like fun. But I don’t even know where to start. It’s not like touching the water.”

  “True.” He held out his hand. He was the same height as Alayne, and when he smiled, his whole face joined in. “By the way, I’m Kyle Pence.”

  “Alayne...”

  “Worth,” Kyle finished as he shook her hand. “I know. Good to meet you.”

  Professor Grace hadn't called the class back to order yet, so Alayne asked, “Where are you from, Kyle?”

  A shadow crossed Kyle's face as he answered, surprising Alayne. “The Capital.” His voice lost some of its eagerness.

  “Do you not like it there?” Alayne asked. Another thought occurred to her. “Were you anywhere close to the square when Simeon Malachi Shadow-Casted the High Court?”

  Kyle shifted uncomfortably. “I wasn't far away, but I wasn't right in the square that day. It—it was hard to get anywhere close; people were running, panicked. A little girl was nearly trampled. I got her safely out of the crowd, but it was the worst situation I've ever seen.” He glanced at his bowl of water. “I still have nightmares about it.”

  “Wow,” breathed Alayne, “it sounds terrifying. We only watched it on our MIU, but it was still large as life and nearly kept my parents from allowing me to come to Clayborne.”

  Kyle was silent for a moment as he lowered his gaze. “My parents didn't care one way or the other when I left for school.”

  “Seriously?” Alayne thought of her mother's fears and her father's quiet protection. Sometimes it was overbearing, but she'd rather have that than parents who didn't care at all. “Still, they had to be proud of you for saving that little girl from trampling. You were a hero that day.”

  Alayne noticed the heavy flush rise up his neck, the sudden blaze of emotion in his blue eyes, and she felt self-consciousness sweep over her. Perhaps Kyle had taken her comment with a little more feeling than she'd intended.

  Professor Grace pulled Alayne's attention back to the front of the room. “Okay, class, listen up!” She tapped her pointer on her desk. “As you learned in Elementary Elementals, you need to break up the elements to bend them. Begin your assignment today by separating the elements, breaking them into manageable pieces, and then try to throw them away from you. If you need to start by touching your element today, that’s okay, but by the end of the class, I want you to have some space between you and your element, even if it’s only a little bit. Please begin.”

  Alayne reached out her hand, searching tentatively for any sense of liquid element. To her surprise, she could feel the tingling in her fingertips, coming from the direction of her water pitcher. Testing, she moved her hand to the side, and the feeling faded. Moving her hand back, the impulses leaped through her nerves again. She flicked her finger. A drop of water in her pitcher jumped, falling b
ack down with a splash.

  Excitement stirred in Alayne. She could control water from a distance! This was a new experience. She’d always before touched the liquid element as she’d shaped it. The only exception was this morning when the whirlpool of water had moved so quickly that it had left her finger, but Alayne had assumed that was due to momentum.

  Moving her fingers around the element, she pulled a long strand of water from the pitcher and lifted it into the air. Casting from a distance was a bit like pushing on the end of a lever. She didn’t have direct contact with what was on the other end, but she could feel the resistance and weight.

  On the side of the strand, she flattened out a piece and shaped it, curling it into a leaf. Then at the top, she molded together some water, fashioning it into a pistil and stamen, and then created clear petals. When she was done, a liquid lily rested gently across the top of the pitcher.

  Kyle was making it rain over his pitcher. A small gray cloud floated just above it, and a smattering of raindrops splashed into the surface of his water. When he saw Alayne’s lily, his blue eyes widened. The cloud fell into his pitcher with a plop.

  Professor Grace passed by them. “Well done, Mr. Pence, Miss Worth. Top scores for today’s class.”

  Alayne watched Jayme as he worked with bubbles. He’d managed to line ten bubbles vertically, but they kept popping. The bubble machine spit out more bubbles, and he’d do it again. At one point, the bubbles stayed around long enough that he managed to pack the smaller bubbles inside the larger ones before making them burst outward like fireworks. Professor Grace saw that one and nodded approvingly. Alayne watched him sigh with relief. She smiled as she caught his eye.

  Marysa’s tongue stuck out as she concentrated on her stack of twigs. A plume of smoke rose from the middle, but as yet, no flames. After a moment, Alayne could see an orange flicker from the middle that rose into a tongue of fire. It stayed small until her bundle was nearly burned out. At the last minute, Marysa turned the top of the flame sideways, and it became a flag flapping in the wind. That was the end of her twigs. The whole thing went out in a puff of smoke and ash.