The Color Alchemist: The Complete Series

by Nina Walker

  I peered over at Jessa. She sat inadvertently close now, her face twisted in fear, a faraway look in her eyes. I knew she hated this place, but I loved having her here. Once we were married, we’d have the option to move into my bedroom or takeover a different suite. We’d move, of course. I’d let her decorate it however she wanted, and we’d only have to see Richard when necessary.

  You really think that’s going to happen? Get real…

  “What do you believe happened?” she asked.

  “Something isn’t adding up,” I finally said. “I don’t know if West America is truly behind these attacks.”

  “Maybe you could go question that couple?” She shrugged, pulling the elastic from her hair and letting the locks loose. Curls tumbled around her shoulders, and when she ran her fingers through them, I had to look away. My gaze inadvertently flickered to the bed beyond her and I closed my eyes, pushing my emotions down. “You know the ones Faulk brought in a few weeks ago? They might know something,” she continued.

  I racked my brain, annoyed with my lack of focus. “Remind me?”

  “The ones that Faulk used for one of my alchemy tests, remember? Did you ever know about them? It was a man and woman that had something to do with the attack at your Mom’s funeral. Well, at least, I think they were closely related to the gunman. And they definitely had something to hide because the orange alchemy amplified that tenfold. I’m pretty sure Faulk has them locked up somewhere.”

  How has nobody told me about this? This could be the key.

  “Help me,” I said, grimacing at what I was about to ask. “Use your red alchemy and come interrogate them with me.”

  She leaned back, her brow furrowed.

  “No way.” She stood and lifted up her hands in protest. “The second I start doing something like that, it’s over. Richard is going to be using my red alchemy left and right.”

  “That logic makes no sense. You already did it on Sasha before she broke out. Plus, you know it’s only a matter of time before he makes you use it again. At least this could help save my life. And who’s to say you won’t be interrogating them tomorrow anyway. At least this way we can learn what we need to know together.”

  She bit her lip. “It’ll become an endless cycle. That’s my logic. Once I start doing it, I won’t be able to say no. I’ll just keep doing it.” She turned away and walked to the window, quiet for a moment. Then she looked at me, shame pulling at her lips. “Part of me likes doing it and I don’t want to feed into that.”

  The guilt tore at me. I strode toward her, stopping inches away.

  “Please, Jessa,” I pleaded. “I really need your help. My life is at stake here. I know you’re angry with me. I know you don’t want to be with me anymore. But please, at least help me find out who’s trying to kill me.”

  She looked into my eyes, her resolve softening. I reached out and grabbed her hand, placing it on my heart so she could feel what I felt. It raced underneath my skin. For fear of death. And for her closeness.

  “Fine,” she relented, sighing and biting her lip again. She did that all the time and I always noticed. My heart raced faster, and I dropped her hand. “But let’s go now while Faulk is gone and before I chicken out.”

  “Deal,” I said. “We’ll go down to the prison and I’ll get the guards to tell me where they are. Once we’re in there, we’ll make it quick, in and out. I just have to know if that gunman was really working for West America or if it was someone else.”

  She was pale now and looked like she was about ready to be sick, but she nodded, heading for the door. “Okay, Lucas,” she said. “I really hope we don’t regret this.”

  We descended the stairs to the prison quickly. The palace was crawling with guards and officers tonight. Since Sasha’s escape and my own near-assassination, they seemed to have multiplied again. With that in mind, I expected the prison guards to put up some kind of fight. I tucked Jessa’s arm through mine when we entered the dim corridor.

  “Where is the married couple located?” I asked the nearest guard. He stared at me, mouth hanging open.

  “What? Do I have food in my teeth or something?” I joked.

  “Oh, sorry.” He bowed. I didn’t recognize him and wondered if he was one of the new guys.

  “Your father said to let you do whatever you want,” he said, then shrugged and pointed toward a steel door.

  Interesting. Whatever I want and report back to him, most likely.

  “There’s only one couple here. They’re in there.”

  With the rustling of keys, he opened the door and stepped aside.

  The couple sat close together on a cot that was pushed against the far wall of the cell. Beat down and tired, they didn’t seem the least bit fazed by me, but a flash of interest lit in the woman’s eyes when they ran across Jessa.

  The man glared up with a sullen expression. “What do you want?”

  “We don’t have anything left to say,” the woman added and leaned against her husband, exhaustion stretched across her face. Their hair was ratty, and their limbs looked skinny in their prison garb.

  “Let’s be quick about this.” Jessa and I walked closer to the couple. I couldn’t help noting the bruises along their arms. I inspected them for the best place to poke them with the needle that was hidden in my hand. We didn’t need much. Jessa could use a drop of blood and it could be enough to use her alchemy.

  I rolled the needle between my thumb and forefinger. It glistened in the dim light as I stepped forward and poked the man first, right in his upper-arm.

  “What was that?” He balked and jumped up, crazed eyes leveled with mine.

  Jessa pressed her palm to his bicep, covering the bubble of blood that had formed there. “Sit down and relax,” she said. Immediately, his countenance changed and he sat on the floor.

  I moved in for the woman. She slid back against the wall, thin hands in front of her a face. “Stay away. I’m so sick of you crazy people and your magic. Please,” she begged. “Just leave us out of it.”

  But I was much bigger than her, and I swiped the needle at her arm before I could change my mind, the needle striking the skin. There was a small prick of blood and she grimaced.

  Again, Jessa was quick. She reached out her arm, connected with the magic, and told the woman to sit down and relax next to her husband.

  They looked up at us with pliable, vacant expressions, relaxed and open for anything. I fought the urge to feel guilty. But they know something. They could have been involved in the attack during Mom’s funeral, and maybe even the one yesterday. Don’t feel bad, just do what you need to do and get out of here.

  “Stay relaxed. Don’t get up. You two are going to answer our questions with complete honesty and zero reluctance.” Jessa knelt in front of them.

  “What do you know about the attack during the Queen’s funeral?” I asked, squatting to study their expressions carefully. I watched for any break in the magic, but they were as lost to it as anyone had ever been.

  “My brother was the gunman,” the woman said softly and slowly, but with no hesitation. “We hadn’t expected him to kill so many people. That wasn’t what he was trying to do.”

  “Who was he trying to kill?”

  “You and your father.”

  I figured. “So why kill all those other people?”

  “We don’t know,” the man cut in. “Maybe he had a problem with his gun or maybe he lost his mind or something? We don’t know.”

  I shared a glance with Jessa, and she nodded slightly, urging me to dig deeper.

  “Was he working alone?”

  “No,” the woman said. “He wanted us to help but we refused.”

  “Do you know who he was working with?” I pressed.

  She shook her head adamantly. “We don’t know. Some woman. He kept referring to his contact as a ‘she’ but we never learned more.”

  “Did they call themselves the Resistance?” Jessa swung her head to look at me when I asked the question,
frustration in the tilt of her mouth. But I had to ask it. I had to know.

  The woman shrugged. “I never heard him say anything like that.”

  “Was it someone from West America?” I continued, desperate for something more than this.

  “We don’t know,” the man said. “We’ve told you everything.”

  “Who gave him the gun?” I remembered the sickening ping-ping-ping of the semiautomatic rifle’s gunfire.

  “We’ve never seen him with one before,” he said. “We don’t think he was very well-trained. I mean, why would he be? Maybe that’s why he ended up killing so many people.”

  Such recklessness. Who would be stupid enough to do that?

  And this only confirmed what we’d assumed anyway, that someone put him up to it. Supplied him with the weapons and told him where to go and when. A she? It could have been Jasmine or someone else in the Resistance. It could have been someone connected to West America. Their president was a she, after all. But she wasn’t our enemy until recently, as far as I knew. Dad had started the war, not her. I doubted she was somehow secretly interacting with someone all the way out here. Then again, there was no way to know for sure.

  “Do you know how she, whoever she was, got in contact with your brother?”

  “We don’t.”

  I growled and stalked to the back of the small cell. The lights were soft, casting long shadows over everything. “Do you have any other information about your brother, that attack, the woman, anything you can tell me?”

  They sat in silence.

  “I give up,” I sighed, exasperated. “These people shouldn’t be here.”

  “But they were hiding something,” Jessa pressed, talking to me but pointing to the couple. “I’m certain they were.”

  I turned back on them and stalked in close. “That night you first met Jessa and you got so nervous that Faulk decided to throw you in here, what were you hiding?”

  “We don’t support the monarchy,” the woman said simply. “We haven’t for a long time. My brother knew that, which was why he tried to get us to help him execute the royal family. But we never signed up for something like that. We’re not killers.” A tear slid down her cheek. She still appeared completely relaxed, but I wondered if Jessa’s magic was starting to wear off, or if she was so upset about her brother’s ultimate demise that the tear had leaked through.

  “They don’t know anything,” I sighed. “Let’s go.”

  “After we leave, you won’t remember ever seeing or talking to us today. Got it?” Jessa’s voice cracked as she gave her last command.

  They nodded, and we left them there. The guard quickly locked the door. I was tired, the weight of it all suffocating me. I usually took the stairs, but not tonight. I glanced back to four men who stood along the wall. They’d been my tail ever since I’d gotten home, my bodyguards. I’d ignored them because they had kept their distance. I wondered if they could be trusted. Who among them was a spy, or worse, an assassin sent to kill me?

  I shot them a distrustful look and turned back to Jessa.

  “Well that was a bust.” I sighed. We made our way to the elevator, stairs be damned.

  “They’re not that different from me, you know?” She shook her head. “Do they really deserve to be locked up in here? They don’t support the monarchy, sure, but they didn’t do anything. They didn’t take action against anyone.”

  She had a point.

  “I am not in control around here,” I replied. “And it isn’t fair for you to always get mad at me for someone else’s actions.”

  She sighed. “Fine.” She ran a hand through her hair and looked up at the ceiling, I think just to avoid eye contact with me. We strode into the elevator, my bodyguards filling in any empty space. We rose to our stop, and we stepped out onto the marble-tiled floor, never uttering a word.

  “I’m going back to my room. I need to get to bed. I’ll see you tomorrow, Lucas,” Jessa said. She stood looking at me for a moment, then turned and walked off without a backwards glance.

  There was nothing else to say. She didn’t get it. She was never going to get it because she wasn’t me, and didn’t know the constant pressure I was under. And maybe she didn’t care.

  I ground my teeth and strode toward the royal apartment, in search of Richard. As much as I hated it, I needed to tell him about the failed interrogation. He might be convinced of West America’s hand in this, but I believed there was someone else trying to kill us. We needed to take it seriously before it was too late.

  When I found him in his private office, he motioned me in with a cunning grin. “I was wondering when you’d come to me,” he said.

  I shut the door behind us.

  It’s not like I’m on the same side as him. It was easy to tell myself things like that, but part of me was beginning to wonder if it was just another lie.

  8

  Sasha

  “It’s a good thing we learned to pilot a helicopter, or we wouldn’t be here,” Tristan said, shaking his head once again in disbelief. We’d come so close to death, but those lessons years ago had paid off with our lives once again. I kept replaying what had happened over in my mind, how just a few more seconds falling or a few more inches in the wrong direction and we’d be dead and gone.

  But I’d gotten ahold of the controls, and our backup had escorted us to our destination. Tristan and I had followed, shockwaves of adrenaline slow to wear off.

  “We’re so lucky,” I mumbled and met Tristan’s familiar gaze. So lucky.

  “Well, you’re here now,” Mastin said as he stood across from us.

  That we were. The airport below had looked enormous when we’d flown into a private runway. As we’d deplaned, soldiers surrounding us, Mastin had instantly locked gazes with me.

  Something flicked through his mossy eyes as he studied Tristan and I. Jealousy, perhaps? Tristan was mine just as much as I was his. We’d simply been through too much together. We were used to jealousy. But something about the look in Mastin’s eyes made me lose my train of thought.

  “How did the debriefing go?” Mastin asked.

  “The usual,” Tristan said. “We were placed in holding for a couple of days to corroborate our stories and go over details.”

  Nobody had protested. Of course they’d want to make sure we could be trusted before letting us into their country. I understood that. With everything going on, with death and war, it only made sense. Tristan seemed annoyed that Mastin still hadn’t showed up to help. In his opinion, Mastin should have gotten us through this process immediately. But Mastin was only one soldier. How much pull did he really have? This wasn’t some outpost of Resistance hiding up in Canada. This was West America.

  America. It’s just called America here, I reminded myself for the millionth time.

  In the end, our stories had checked out and we’d been transferred by plane to the capitol city of Los Angeles.

  “This is crazy,” I said, looking around at the terminal. It was gorgeous, all white surfaces and shining steel. “I can’t believe I’m here.”

  Outside, palm trees swayed in the wind. Sunshine shone through the window, warming my shaking limbs. My eyes kept returning to the trees. I’d never seen palms in person before, but I’d learned about them. Even though I wasn’t officially in school, Hank had made me study. Geography was important to him.

  “Believe it.” Mastin nudged me and pointed toward a group of people gathered outside. “Because it’s about to get a lot more apparent that we’re not in New Colony anymore.”

  I lifted my eyebrows, my curiosity piqued at his statement. We followed him out the sliding doors. A team of security surrounded us as we walked into the pleasant sun and made our way across the sidewalk. A soft breeze brushed against my face, and I smiled. I could get used to this weather.

  The chanting tumbled through the air and I nearly stumbled.

  “No magic allowed!” they screamed, holding up signs with things written across them like “GO HOME O
R DIE” and “GOD HATES ALCHEMY” and “MURDERERS ARE NOT WELCOME.” But that wasn’t all; there were also those chanting, “Alchemy is Progress” together with signs reading “WELCOME HOME FRIEND” and “MAGIC IS AMAZING” and “WE LOVE YOU JUST AS GOD MADE YOU.”

  Tristan tugged me close, his arm around my hunched shoulders, as he and the security cleared a path through the crowd. Mastin ushered us into a waiting car and slid in after us, shutting the door with a thud. It left only muffled sounds of the frenzied crowd. They swarmed the car and the driver took off before I had a chance to put on my seatbelt. My hands shook so wildly I couldn’t get the belt secured. Mastin reached over to help, his cool hand brushing against mine. I didn’t move.

  “What was that?” Tristan asked, twisting around to watch the crowd disappear. “Who are those people?”

  “Alchemy is a very politically charged issue here,” Mastin said.

  “But why were they doing that?” I asked. It wasn’t anything I’d ever seen before. There was no such thing as that kind of crowd in New Colony. Sure, there were crowds, but they showed support. That was it.

  “They’re just protestors,” Mastin said.

  “Protestors?” Tristan raised an eyebrow.

  “It’s a normal thing here. People assemble to yell about their rights or opinions. It doesn’t really do much most of the time. People are pretty set in their ideas. Not everyone would agree, but protesting is a waste of time, if you ask me. People have to vote.”

  I’d never voted, and I wondered if it made anything better. What happens when you vote, and you don’t get what you want?

  I turned to look back out the window, looking for more protestors. Maybe that’s what you did.

  “Your president?” I flipped back around and watched Mastin carefully. “You told me she was in favor of alchemy. Is that true?”

  “Yes,” he said, “she is. As are about half of the country.” His eyes fixed on me, so intense and sure. “And me too, after meeting you.”