Illuminate

by Tracy Clark

  I’d love her until the day I died.

  Claire watched me from across the room with her strange and perceptive eyes, and I felt a pang of guilt. For necessary reasons, I’d had to leave her a lot. She’d handled the enormous changes and new people with maturity uncharacteristic for her age. I was proud of her. I joined her in the kitchen and helped her put cookies in the oven. “I want to take them to everyone tomorrow,” she told me. “To make friends.”

  “That’s nice of you, Claire.”

  Her small shoulders shrugged. “I don’t know if it will make a difference.”

  Taken aback, I hugged her. “I’m sorry you feel their fear. I suppose they don’t know what to make of such a smart, pretty little girl.”

  Claire pulled back and cocked her head sideways, grinning like she’d caught a politician in his spin. “That’s not it and you know it. It’s because they don’t think I’m normal.”

  “The Scintilla are the ones who aren’t normal. Anyway, standing out is always better than fitting in,” I said, remembering overhearing a woman say that once to her daughter on a street corner in Barcelona. It was a sweet sentiment, meant to tell the girl not to want to be like everyone else. I liked the saying, but it wasn’t how I felt most of my life. I’d only wanted to fit in, to not be so different, even if I was the only one who could see just how different I was. Standing out meant death.

  This was a community of my kind. I belonged somewhere for the first time since my parents were taken from me. Now, my daughter was the outsider, and I just wanted her to be accepted.

  We cleaned up the cookie mess, and I took extra time to settle Claire into her new sleeping place on the floor next to my bed. It was where she felt safe and it was just as well, as Mami Tulke’s small home would have to accommodate, at least for tonight, the addition of Faye and Janelle. A new idea formed and I decided to ask Mami Tulke about it first thing in the morning. We should be down in the village with the other Scintilla. They needed to spend more time with us to accept us as family. With the group’s acceptance would come their allegiance.

  I pulled out the list and added more people and sortileges that Adrian had told me about while we were assessing the weapons. Tomorrow I’d also speak with the guys about retrieving those weapons and beginning training. Adrian said he’d schedule volunteers to keep watch at each end of the river gorge to alert us to suspicious arrivals. We couldn’t police a public road or stop people from entering the valley, but we could do our best to be forewarned if danger was snaking its way toward us.

  With Janelle’s arrival, and hopefully Cora’s, it surely wouldn’t be too long before the rest of the world came knocking, including the Arrazi.

  Mami Tulke was fine with my request for Claire and me to move to one of the empty huts in the village, though I felt nervous to solo parent without Mami Tulke’s nudges. That must be what pilots feel like the first time they get to take the plane for a spin without an instructor. “It’s good to join them,” she said. “There is one of the rectangular buildings with a small loft for Claire to use for sleeping.” She reminded me that it was also important to begin contributing to the varied communal duties of the group. “Side by side,” she said, slapping her fist into rounds of dough she was preparing to bake.

  “We have cookies…” I said, half joking.

  “A bit of sweet to go with your bitter?” She gave me the number of the “hut” and the keys to the golf cart. “Take Claire. Go see.”

  Claire and I didn’t have many belongings. Because the “cover” for the village was as a renowned stargazing locale and a New Age spirituality center, each hut was already supplied with hotel-like amenities. Beds, towels, blankets—basic needs. Claire and I had collected a patchwork of necessities from Ireland before we left, from my recent trip to Santiago, and from kind Scintilla who, despite their misgivings about us, had recognized we had little but the clothes on our backs.

  The teenage twins, Cooper and Gavin, came by out of curiosity but offered good company while we settled in. They were a funny pair and entertaining, eager to show their Brazilian fighting dance, capoeira. They spun and kicked and swirled around each other in a dizzying display. Cooper made Claire squeal when, at the end of the dance, he poured water in his hand and created the illusion of two miniature bodies made of water, performing the very same martial art upon his palm. It was an impressive sortilege, which he obviously practiced a lot.

  Moving had been a great distraction from my wound-up, hopeful anticipation of Cora’s arrival. My body buzzed with nerves. It took every mental effort not to imagine an Arrazi attacking her, leaving her dead in an airplane seat, or outside of the airport, or following her here. I’d already placed a gun behind a potted plant on a high shelf in the hut.

  Let one come. Let them all come.

  I worked to stay calm. Not only could Cora see my every emotion reflected in my aura, but she had an advantage many other Scintilla who’d always seen auras didn’t have…the subtle ways of sensing, because she’d grown up not knowing what she was. I doubted that Cora missed a flicker of the eye, the subtle variation of a voice, or even breaths. She watched everything, and it had the effect of making me feel incredibly exposed. And understood.

  Only once had I deceived her. Every day, I regretted not telling Cora about my arrangement with Dr. M. By keeping anything from her, I broke the fragile trust she placed in me. I think more than hating me for my omission, she hated herself for not sensing it.

  Our connection was real from the moment we’d met at the airport. I swear I wanted to kiss her full, wet lips on that bus. Certainly, we’d had beauty in our growing bond and passion in those fleeting moments at Dr. M’s, when magic wound around us in the blissful cradle of time. Though it began as a planned deception to fool Dr. M, all of that fell away even before we kissed and touched. We became two people allowing ourselves to reach for the other. She felt love for me; I could see it and feel it. She carried a torch for Finn, but in those moments with me, she had laid it down.

  My blood ran hot with my runaway thoughts. I had to get some air, but the air outside wasn’t any cooler. Maya intercepted me on the path to my door with a potted plant and a wary smile. “There’s a meeting tonight,” she said. “Raimondo asked for a vote on fighting. He’s against it.”

  “Majority rules?” I asked, incensed. What did I expect, that just because Raimondo was Italian like me and knew my parents, he’d be on my side? What had the clairvoyant seen to make him oppose standing our ground and defending ourselves?

  She held out the plant. “That is generally how we settle big things.”

  “And what will happen if I refuse to play? I’ve lived my life alone, Maya. I don’t play by others’ rules.” A man I hadn’t yet met strolled up and inserted himself into our discussion.

  “Some don’t believe that trouble is coming. That maybe you are the trouble, with your talk of weapons and your strange…”

  He didn’t finish, but I wanted to hit him for what I knew he was about to say: my strange child.

  “Maya,” I implored, “you saw what was happening in Santiago. Madness. Mami Tulke’s granddaughter is coming and—”

  The man threw up his hands. “Maybe she shouldn’t come.”

  “What?”

  “If her coming is dangerous,” he said, “then for the greater good, she should stay away.”

  My shoulders bunched up, my jaw tightened. “Her grandmother has sheltered you for how long? And you would turn away her family? Even if she didn’t come, they know who she is and will find her grandmother, fool.” I could barely contain my anger. The conversation was ridiculous. “They will find you. Cora is coming,” I said, reassuring myself more than anything. “She deserves the same protection you’ve sat around on your asses enjoying all this time. After what she’s been through, Cora deserves everything…good…and…everything…”

  Uncharacteristically, I’d lost control. God, these people were in for a rude awakening. Maya and the man both looked
at me like I was unstable. I barely registered the sound of footsteps approaching.

  “G?”

  Chapter Forty

  Cora

  Giovanni’s head whipped toward me when I called to him. I was full of nerves and self-consciousness and heard it in my own trembling voice when I’d called out to him. One slow blink from him made me wonder if he recognized me, but I was swept from the ground as easily as a leaf is picked up by the wind and propelled into his arms.

  I heard the surprised gasp of the two people who’d been standing with him and was totally shocked to realize both were Scintilla. Giovanni’s arms encircled my waist, and I’d been lifted so high by his sortilege that mine curled around his head, my fingers recalling the waves of his hair. I bent my head down and cried into them. He walked us toward one of the strange block houses I’d seen from the road. I don’t know who the Scintilla were who were there one moment but gone the next. I only knew that I’d made it. I knew relief. And I knew tenderness.

  When Giovanni slid me slowly down, my hands brushed his face, and his tears wetted my fingers. “I made it,” I said, to reassure both of us that it was real.

  The barest hint of a smile curved his lips as he brushed his palm over my cropped hair. I braced myself, but no snarky remark came, just gentle touch with light fingers over my cheekbones and my marked jaw. He traced each circle slowly, one by one, lighting my skin with sparks. Who can breathe when someone familiar, cherished, has your face in the palms of his hands and is looking at you like his lost treasure?

  Closing in, lips parting like they were anticipating cake, I suddenly felt an unruly urge to bite his lip, to pull this free-floating desire over the hull of the boat and steer it. That flame of aggression surprised me. I thought that side of me only showed up with Finn, or that Finn somehow made me fiercer. For the first time, I recognized that what showed itself with Finn in the redwoods was my own strength. Mine. No man’s gift to me.

  Aggravated that I couldn’t seem to divide thoughts of Finn from my experiences with Giovanni, I clutched his neck and looked deeply into his eyes. This strong me, the one who knew life was precious and could be too brief, wanted his lips on mine. Now.

  “Cora?” a little voice squealed. Giovanni and I broke apart as Claire bounded into the room. She looked up at me and said, “I like your hair.”

  “Thanks,” I said, laughing. “I’m so glad to see you again.”

  “It’s a disguise, right?”

  “Yes.” A laugh fizzed up. “You’re very clever. It is.”

  “I still knew who you were.”

  I looked at Giovanni, whose cheeks were flushed, making his blue eyes even brighter. He was saying a million things with them, things that would have to wait. “She is so your daughter,” I said.

  “Did you just get here? Where are the others?” he asked.

  I knew he was still under the assumption that Finn was with me. Why hadn’t I corrected him? “About an hour ago.”

  “Who else helped you get here?”

  “Come with me up to the house, and I’ll show you.”

  Giovanni didn’t ask me too many questions on the way. Everything was a question, including us. Being in Chile was one big exhale. I’d made it this far. In a world where the ground was constantly shifting beneath my feet, I could only take things one step at a time.

  “What are you doing?” I asked Edmund as we pulled the golf cart up to the front of the house. He had a camera with a large microphone attached to it, pointing at Giovanni and me. From the look on his face, Giovanni didn’t appreciate the sudden appearance of someone who looked like paparazzi. “Giovanni, meet author and television personality and self-proclaimed expert on all things crazy, Edmund Nustber.”

  “You’re Scintilla, too?” Edmund asked eagerly, to which Giovanni nodded. The glee on Edmund’s face was almost cute. “Get used to the camera,” Edmund said. “I’ll be filming random bits to piece together for the documentary.”

  “How did our interview become a documentary?” I asked.

  Giovanni touched my elbow. “Interview? Cora, what’s going on?”

  “Edmund helped us get out of Rome. He’s the reason I was able to fly here. We made a deal.”

  “I actually like the idea,” Giovanni said, surprising me. “We’ve got to get some kind of control of the media storm around you. You must realize what a worldwide phenomenon your story is right now.”

  “Spectacle is more like it. I’d like a chance to do the one thing they’ve tried to stop us from doing—telling the truth.”

  “You can tell it, but the question is, will anyone believe it? We have no proof.”

  “Giovanni, can you tell me how you know each other?” Edmund asked in his interview voice.

  “I thought I might be one of the only ones left.” He lifted my hand and kissed it. “Until I found her.”

  I rolled my eyes. “Cheeseball.”

  “You’re the guy from the Dublin airport video!” Edmund exclaimed. His flip-out-o-meter was going to tilt.

  We went inside where Mami Tulke, Janelle, and Faye were embroiled in an intense conversation. I’d been shocked to see my stepmom and Faye at my grandmother’s. Shocked but so happy. Dun listened to them talk, looking interested but exhausted. He jumped up when he saw us walk in and gave Giovanni a slap on the back before pulling him into a man-hug. Giovanni was clearly surprised, and questions filled his eyes when he looked at me.

  “They don’t want humanity to believe in their own godliness,” Faye was saying to Mami Tulke. “Organized religion tells humanity to believe that divinity is something that only they can dispense, like candy. Go to them, give them your money and the power that comes with that. In turn they, acting as interpreter for ‘the voice of God,’ will give you absolution.”

  Mami Tulke rested her chin on a temple of her fingers. “When people are afraid, they look to their governments and their churches for help. That’s not a bad thing in and of itself. But neither institution can fathom or will admit that the Scintilla exist, let alone that we might be a source of healing for the mysterious deaths. To allow the world to know we have supernatural powers would be to share God’s sandbox. They won’t allow that.”

  “I couldn’t agree more,” Edmund said, camera still recording.

  “Why is this relevant?” Giovanni asked.

  I grabbed one of my grandmother’s savory empanadas and put it on a plate. There was really only one answer to Giovanni’s question. “Our existence is a threat to the world’s systems.”

  Running underneath our conversation, an ever-constant current, was the television news, which Mami Tulke had kept on so that we might be forewarned when the media traced us here. Everyone shushed when breaking news came on. Dun turned up the sound.

  A shocking new revelation in the Vatican Miracle. Two of the affected children’s families have come forward claiming that their children were left with visible proof of the young woman’s miracle healing. A picture flashed up of the sternum of the little boy, Caleb. It appears to be spirals, three of them. Experts have compared this picture to photographs of the ancient megalithic site in Ireland and have concluded that the pattern is identical. While many contend that this is a hoax manufactured by two colluding families, others believe it to be a stigmata of some kind—evidence of their supernatural healing.

  We all exchanged glances. Stigmata? Could the news agency have picked a more inflammatory word? They might as well hang meat around my neck. I changed the subject. “I didn’t get a chance to meet them, but I saw two Scintilla when I went down to find Giovanni,” I said to Mami Tulke. “Why didn’t you tell me? It’s so exciting. There are five of us.”

  “Oh, there’re many more than that,” Giovanni said, his eyes glinting.

  “Really? How dumb of me. I should have realized,” I said. “In my mother’s journal she wrote of discovering what we were called; she said it meant there were others like her. I thought she meant in the past. This is so much more than I’d ever ho
ped.” Wonder filled me. We three weren’t the only ones left. Wonder was soon replaced by dread. I didn’t want them to be found.

  “Your abuela has been a rescuer and protector of more than sixty Scintilla.”

  “Soon to be sixty-one,” a voice said from the doorway. A young American man smiled at me. “My wife Maya here is expecting.”

  I stepped forward. “I saw you a while ago,” I said, holding out my hand to Maya, but she wouldn’t take it. I frowned. “Why be cold to me? I didn’t expect to find my own kind here, and I’m so happy to know that we aren’t the last.”

  “Please,” she said, her deep brown eyes imploring. “Don’t take it for rudeness. I—I try not to touch people.”

  “Ah.” I nodded. “A sortilege issue. I so get that.” I wondered what hers was. “I try not to touch things,” I said, hoping to set her at ease. I pointed to my hands, neck, and forehead. “Does this to me.” The couple smiled but with questions in their eyes. “Psychometry is my sortilege, but it leaves its trace.”

  “Maya told you about the meeting, Giovanni,” Will said with a sideways look at Maya. “You know I’m already with you. I just wanted you to know that lots of others are, too. After dinner, we’ll hold the vote.”

  “Vote?” I asked. “What, you going to elect Mayor of Scintilla-town?”

  Mami Tulke harrumphed behind me as she slipped empanadas off cooling racks and onto platters. “Giovanni wasn’t here a day before his talk of ‘war’ began. He has acquired weapons and wants the Scintilla to prepare to fight for their lives.”

  My eyes snapped to Giovanni, who wore a rebellious expression. Like most things he did, he was sure he was right. I could imagine that he’d been pretty domineering about it and that might not sit well with this established community of Scintilla. I still couldn’t believe there were so many. It gave me hope and a desperate desire to protect them. I could see both sides of the war debate as I’d had the argument with myself. “Well then,” I said, not meeting his eyes, “tonight we vote.”