Ashes (Fire Within Series Book 3)

by Ella M. Lee

  When I took a break, I realized I was breathing hard, as though I’d spent this whole time sprinting for my life.

  Ryan was now seated at his worktable, curling gold wire into small springs with tiny pliers. He offered me a sympathetic grimace.

  “Remember,” he said. “What is it that you need?”

  I returned to the couch, sitting heavily.

  I needed a lot of things. I needed to not be wasting my morning on this, because I had better things to do. I needed to figure this out so that I didn’t kill myself the next time I touched an unrestricted container of lightning magic.

  So much for Water magic being less dangerous than Flame magic. What a joke.

  I need to not die, I told the marble. I can’t die. I can’t leave Nicolas, and Daniel needs me. I promised him I wouldn’t die. I need to learn this. Please, please, please.

  I tugged again, trying to make a connection with the marble.

  Very faintly, I felt a click. My eyes snapped open, but nothing had happened. The marble lay still and dormant in my hands, full of magic, unchanged.

  But I had definitely felt something.

  Please, I thought again, settling myself back into a focused state. I need to be able to help my family. I need to be able to control my magic. I need to not be afraid anymore. Please. I can’t die touching lightning. That would be stupid—that magic is my best friend’s magic. I should be able to handle it.

  I thought about how wild Dan’s lightning was, how different it was from Water, different even from Flame. Its crackling beauty usually awed me, but right now I was afraid, and I needed to not be afraid.

  Click.

  There it was again. Distant, unreachable. Where? It wasn’t coming from Nicolas’s marble. Nicolas’s magic wasn’t reacting to me at all.

  I centered myself again and started over, letting myself feel every inch of space around me.

  I need this to work because I need to not be afraid.

  Click.

  Ah-ha! There it was in my vision, glowing, yearning, reaching out to me.

  Daniel’s marble.

  I replaced Nicolas’s marble in the case. Hesitantly, I reached for Dan’s marble. When I touched it, its magic sang to me, ringing in my mind. Dan’s magic was always so raw and pulsing and alive.

  Hi, I whispered silently. I want to not be afraid of you. I want to love you. Show me that’s possible, please?

  I pressed it between my palms, tapping my magic against it gently, like a knock of permission, and then tugging.

  Click.

  In a smooth rush, the tiny bit of lightning magic flooded into me, dissipating through my fingers, leaving them tingling. I was so shocked that I dropped the marble.

  My eyes snapped up to meet Ryan’s. He was smiling broadly.

  “Wow,” I said, studying my hands.

  “Excellent,” Ryan said. “How was that?”

  “Weird. Awesome. Exciting. But I’m not sure I know how I did it.”

  “That’s to be expected,” Ryan said. “As I mentioned, transference is innate. You almost always try it before learning more about the theory and structure.” He came over to sit next to me. “May I see that marble?”

  I picked up and handed him Dan’s now-empty marble. His eyes flicked between it and the other marbles in the case, his expression thoughtful.

  “Try Irina’s,” he said.

  I took it between my palms and repeated my pleas and prayers and begging and knocks and tugs. Nothing happened.

  I studied it, forlorn. My brief pride at transferring Dan’s magic was now melting into confusion.

  “Never mind that one,” Ryan said. “Try your own marble.”

  I swapped them, feeling the echo of my own shimmery, bright magic in the marble. I rubbed it between my palms, focusing, letting every distraction in my mind still into nothingness.

  This should be easy, I thought. This is mine, my fire, and I need it back.

  I tugged.

  Click.

  I gasped. Once again, the magic emptied into my palms in a rush, joining with its source.

  I looked up at Ryan with wide eyes.

  “Yes, I thought so,” he said. “I imagined we might discover something like this.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “It will require more testing to be certain, but I have a theory about you,” he said. “I believe you can only use transference on transmuted magic. That’s why you managed to pull out Dan’s magic and your own magic, yet you struggle with Nicolas’s and Irina’s. I think transferring pure Water magic will always be unreachable for you.”

  “That’s… plausible,” I said.

  “You know, Fiona, there are no current Water magicians with both transference and transmutation abilities. I had to go back seventy-five years in the member archive before I found someone with both—a woman originally from Sky who could transmute to it and also transfer, but she could only transfer Sky magic. You seem to be a little more flexible.”

  “Maybe,” I said. “Or maybe it’s because Dan’s lightning is somehow close to fire.”

  “Perhaps that is the case,” Ryan said. “Now that we know something about your triggers and you’ve made the first connection, you can learn to control it.”

  “I’m unique,” I said, laughing slightly. “I suppose Nicolas will love me even more now.”

  Ryan gave me a warm smile. “I am not sure that is possible. I think he loves you with all of himself.” Ryan laughed. “But he will enjoy this. He loves any developments that make us stronger.”

  “You know,” I said, placing the marble back in the case, “this seems insane. Nicolas collects unique skills that are pivotal to the creation of a new clan, and it just so happens that he finds me with my helpful transmutation and transference skills? Seems unlikely.”

  “Does it really, though?” Ryan asked. “Remember what we talked about. Magic is born of need. Perhaps this is just our strong need to finish Shatterfall coming through.”

  “I feel like if simply needing something willed magic into existence, the world would be a very different place.”

  “Magic comes in many forms,” Ryan said, “and varying amounts of willpower produce their own miracles, large and small. This is just another part of that. Our world is magnificent, wouldn’t you agree?”

  And of course, I did. And now it felt a little bigger.

  Nicolas was thrilled to hear about my transference. When we called him and Daniel over to Ryan’s apartment to do some explaining and experimenting, he’d given me a look similar to a man seeing water while dying in the desert. I could do nothing but blush and look away, smiling, my heart feeling like it would beat out of my chest.

  Daniel’s reaction had been exuberant, leaping at me and pulling me into a crushing hug, but I preferred Nicolas’s quiet admiration.

  We didn’t have a lot of time to test my ability before our meeting with Mark, but we were able to do some preliminary exercises in order for Ryan to get an understanding of how quickly I could pick up concepts.

  “Now that you’ve made your first connection, we need to refine your skills,” Ryan said. “Currently, you are an open channel, which is very dangerous. Transferrers usually keep their ability in one of two states: associated or dissociated. Association is that clicking you feel, the connection that lets you give or take magic, that moment of engaging with it. Dissociation is when you close off that connection and disengage. We need to teach you dissociation, otherwise you could accidentally hurt yourself again.”

  “Will I need to actively hold the connection closed forever?” I asked. That sounded difficult and exhausting.

  “No, you can train it to be your default state. You build up a barrier, and you keep it strong and taut, like a muscle. Similar to how you learn to keep your eyes open until you want them closed or keep your mouth shut until you want to speak.” He paused. “For now, be careful of unrestricted magic. Pure Water magic should be okay, but don’t touch Daniel when he’s actively usi
ng his lightning transmutation, and stay away from any Flame or Meteor magic until we figure out a way to test whether those are affected by your skill.”

  “Sure,” I said.

  That wouldn’t be a problem. I didn’t deal with magic other than my own on a daily basis. I was too busy arranging research and group tasks, I never went on operations that involved a lot of magic use, and Daniel didn’t actually use his transmutation all that much. His Water magic was normally in a resting state and wouldn’t harm me.

  “Do you understand, Daniel?” Nicolas asked. “Be careful with Fiona.”

  Dan gave Nicolas a withering look. “I understand English and basic transference concepts, yeah.”

  I frowned and caught Ryan’s eye. He shook his head slightly and held a hand up to me. I knew what he was saying: They will sort it out themselves.

  Nicolas and Daniel disagreed more than I originally thought when I first arrived at Water, and usually their issues blew over quickly as they settled into some sort of compromise or balance. Nicolas was simply stressed out right now, and Daniel didn’t enjoy being treated like an idiot. A little time and distraction would likely fix this without any additional work.

  I held up my hands. “Maybe I should get myself some cool black gloves, like Teng. I can have them warded with restrictive magic.”

  Daniel and Nicolas turned to stare at me.

  “Maybe our whole group should wear black gloves,” I went on. “Wouldn’t that be neat? It could be our thing. If I’m ever a commander, I think I’ll make my group have a dress code.”

  A moment passed in stunned silence before we all laughed. Nicolas gave me a look that said he knew what I was doing, but I didn’t care—I needed us to stop bickering, to be united in the face of all these annoying changes.

  And my distraction worked, at least for the time being.

  I studied the pictures and layout of the warehouse for the twentieth time as I watched Nicolas and Irina confer quietly over the supplies in his bag. The plan was to make a quick trip to gather data before returning here. Mark and Evie would wait for us in Singapore, and we would return in a day or two with a plan to fix him—probably with Irina and Ryan’s help.

  This operation was one of those unfortunate situations where Nicolas was absolutely necessary, so we didn’t have a good idea of what might happen while we were there. Because of that, we were taking precautions and bringing Daniel along.

  Dan was like having our own personal army. His magic was some of the most powerful and versatile in all of Water, and he was an impeccably trained fighter. He and Nicolas made an unstoppable team that could crush practically any threat, and none of us were willing to take a risk after what had happened to Nicolas.

  All of us were armed and dressed for a fight. I had insisted upon it. I didn’t trust my snake of a brother, who had faked his death and hidden for all these years in Meteor. Nicolas didn’t trust him either, but Nicolas didn’t trust anyone. I could tell from his taut muscles and intense expression that he was prepared for anything that might come his way. His knife was in easy reach. He had several, but I had seen him carry this one most often. It was a deadly thing, long and black and serrated down one side. Made for killing, as Athena and Chandra said.

  Nicolas had set up a plan similar to our first meeting with Mark. Keisha would port us to the warehouse. We would meet with Mark. She would reopen the portal exactly one hour later so that we could return to Hong Kong.

  We all had our phones, and Nicolas had one of Ryan’s magical triggers so that we could call for help if needed. Nicolas kept repeating the plan to us: get in, get samples and data, get out. Don’t linger, don’t take risks, don’t let ourselves be goaded into a fight. We didn’t need any more distractions in our lives.

  Chapter 14

  The warehouse was almost three stories in height, with half-constructed temporary blank walls and huge metal doors—currently closed—at either end. It was completely empty, the concrete floor blindingly bright in the morning sun.

  Keisha’s portal had put us out near the northern end of the warehouse. We made our way across the empty space to the huge cargo door at the southern wall, Daniel and I flanking Nicolas. There was a flimsy normal-sized door next to it, which Nicolas threw open.

  Mark and Evie waited on the other side. Nicolas invited them in with a sweep of his hand and shut the door firmly behind them.

  Mark did indeed look like he was dying. His eyes had dark shadows under them, and his skin was thin and gaunt. His jaw shook slightly, and his magic was a mess—slowly being torn apart by the virus.

  Evie was a mess, too. Her red hair was loose and tangled, her eyes grim. She hovered around Mark, her hands stretched out as though poised to catch him at any moment.

  “Nicolas,” Mark said, nodding in greeting. He turned his gaze toward me. “Hey, Fi. And you brought Badass with you. How nice.” He eyed Daniel, and his smile was smug and taunting.

  “Knock it off,” I said to him.

  “Come over here into the light,” Nicolas said, beckoning into the warehouse. We followed him into the gargantuan space, where the light filtering in from the glassless windows was stronger.

  “I’m going to need some blood and tissue samples,” Nicolas said, opening his bag. “I’m also going to need to run a couple of scanners over you. That should give us enough information to start.”

  Mark stuffed his hands into his sweatshirt pockets nervously, his shoulders hunched.

  Nicolas was on edge, tenser than usual, completely focused. “Sit,” he told Mark.

  Mark sat cross-legged on the floor. Evie sat next to him, clutching Mark’s arm while Nicolas kneeled before him.

  “How are you, Fi?” Mark asked as Nicolas prepped vials and needles.

  I rolled my eyes.

  “Not even a single kind word?” he prodded. “I’m dying.”

  “Well, die faster,” I said and turned to stare at the far end of the warehouse.

  “How do you deal with her, Badass?” Mark asked Daniel. “Stubborn as a mule, like always.”

  I spun to face him, my jaw trembling in anger. “You don’t know me. Don’t pretend like you do.”

  “I know that’s it’s very unlikely you have changed,” Mark said, watching Nicolas draw blood from his arm. “If Meteor couldn’t change me, I doubt Flame changed you.”

  “The Mark I knew could never have become a commander in Meteor,” I said.

  He shrugged. “I’m still the same kid who got sick and threw up in your shoes, and ran up behind your horse and scared him so you fell off, and told Mom you kissed Jimmy Walsh after school.”

  “Yeah?” I asked. “That’s all a far cry from kidnapping my boyfriend, watching him suffer while he slowly died, and then trying to kill me when I came to rescue him. Meteor didn’t change you? Bullshit.”

  “I didn’t try to kill you,” he said. “I was only going to knock you out.”

  “Yeah, so that you could finish murdering my boyfriend. That somehow makes you less of an asshole?”

  He laughed. “Christ, you really are insufferable. How do either of them deal with you?”

  “Will both of you shut up?” Nicolas asked, placing vials now filled with blood into his bag. He took out a larger medical device. “This will sting.”

  Mark didn’t say anything else as Nicolas took tissue samples, but he eyed me balefully. I turned to Daniel and rolled my eyes.

  “Nothing shows you what love and hate are quite like an older sister,” Mark mused as Nicolas put all his medical tools away and brushed his hair out of his eyes.

  “No love anymore,” I said. “Just hate.”

  He tilted his head at me. “You can’t have one without the other, Fiona.”

  “When exactly did you become the philosophical one?” I asked.

  “I learned it from you. Seriously, could you not tell I wanted to be just like you? Perfect Fiona, with the amazing grades and the pretty gardens and the writing competitions and the figure skating. Is t
here anything you suck at? Mom obviously loved you the most. You were growing up to be a spitting image of her.”

  “Wow, this is incredible,” I said, throwing up my hands. I took a step closer to him, shaking. “I did all that stuff because I was bored. Because Mom and Dad were too busy with you. Mark, who did everything he could to get attention. How many times was I alone because you were throwing another temper tantrum? ‘Fiona, not now,’ I’d hear again and again. That got old so fucking fast. Shocking that you ended up in Meteor—home to the biggest drama whores of them all.”

  Mark gave me a deadly look. “Because Flame is so very chill, right?”

  “I only ended up there because of you, you moron,” I said. “I was looking for information on your death!”

  “That was exactly what I didn’t want you to do, dumbass!” he said.

  I stopped, stunned. “What do you mean?”

  “Duh, Fi,” he said. “I faked my death because I knew you would never just let me go!”

  He was breathing hard, his jaw clenched tightly in annoyance. This was like every other fight we’d had—except I had no intention of hugging him and forgiving him later just because he slipped a note and cute drawing under my bedroom door.

  Everyone standing in our awkward circle was staring at me and Mark warily. Evie’s eyes were wide. Nicolas looked like he wanted to say something. Dan’s hand was poised to reach out toward me.

  “I wanted to keep you out of Meteor,” Mark said. “I didn’t want you to get hurt. If I just disappeared, you would have never stopped looking for me. I didn’t want that to be your life, so I tried to make it more final.”

  I looked away from Mark’s blazing eyes. My gaze landed on Nicolas. He was watching the two of us carefully, his expression slightly pained.

  “Well, great,” I said, shaking my head and closing my eyes. “Just fucking great. Do I seriously seem like I need protection?”

  I looked at Nicolas. He met my gaze and didn’t flinch, but the tense way he held his hands up told me that he was wary now that I’d turned my anger on him. “Do I?” I demanded of him.