The Elementals: An Elemental Origins Novel

by A. L. Knorr

  The words flowed from her lips, relaxed and casual, but their impact was far from casual. Georjie, Targa, and I shared looks of surprise.

  I pulled myself out of the pool and wrapped a towel around myself. Georjie followed me and we settled with Akiko on the blanket. Targa stayed in the water but rested her elbows on the side of the pool. She put her chin on the back of her hand, her discerning gaze on Akiko.

  "Is Aimi older or younger than you? And when can we meet her?" Georjie folded her long legs beneath her, her towel draped around her shoulders.

  "She's older," Akiko said this with an enigmatic smile. "Much older, I think."

  "You think?" Targa dropped her chin and stared at Akiko. "You don't know?"

  Akiko shook her head. "I have been trying to think of the best way to share my story without shocking you, or making you think I'm making it all up." She shrugged. "I don't know any other way of doing it than just telling it straight."

  I thought back to the moment Isaia had pushed the fire into my body. I couldn't imagine Akiko having anything to tell that was more unbelievable than my own story.

  "Just tell us the truth," Georjie said, using the corner of the towel to wipe moisture from her face. "We'll believe you."

  "All right." Akiko let out a long breath and then spoke slowly. "The truth is, I am not human and neither is my sister." Her words seemed to echo across the pool and the space. "I share my story with you now because I have to say goodbye and I want you to know why. I want you to know who I am and why I have to go. Why I have lied to you."

  My heart began to pound and I was flooded with a confusing tangle of emotions. I found I had to open my mouth in order to get enough oxygen. Not human? Say goodbye?

  "What are you if you're not human?" Targa sounded so calm that I glanced at her in surprise.

  "I am what is known in Japan as an Akuna Hanta, a demon-hunter. I was born in 1908. I was conceived to human parents and, as far as I know, I was human until my sister gifted me with my tamashī—a connection to something called the Æether and the heart of my Hanta powers."

  "You're over a century old?" breathed Targa. Remarkably, she seemed to calmly accept this confession as true.

  My throat constricted and the heat of my fire flickered in my belly. If I hadn't been through my own supernatural summer, I would have though Akiko was making this up. Georjie and I shared a glance and I saw my own shock reflected in her face. I had no trouble believing Akiko to have some kind of supernatural ability, but to be over one-hundred years old?

  "How?" Georjie asked.

  "Perhaps if I show you something, it will help." Akiko opened her right hand out to the side and a bright light appeared in the region of her heart.

  Targa gasped, Georjie's hand flew to her mouth, and I blinked in awe, staring at the light.

  "This is my tamashī," Akiko explained. "For over ninety years it was in the possession of Daichi, my captor."

  “Daichi?” I sent Akiko a questioning look.

  “I was never allowed to refer to him as anything but Grandfather,” she explained, “and I only learned his true name just this past spring.”

  I was speechless, but Targa loosed a disgusted sound. “Ugh! I knew there was something off about that guy.”

  "He was your captor?" Georjie's eyes reflected the white light of the glow in Akiko's chest.

  I stared at it, thinking how similar yet different it looked from my own fire. As we watched, the light began to move. It traveled along Akiko's right arm until it reached her palm. It hovered there for a second before vanishing, making the space seem much darker than before. I blinked rapidly as my eyes adjusted.

  "Have you ever heard the term kitsune?" Akiko asked.

  "Japanese mythology," Georjie answered with a nod. "A girl who can transform into a fox, or something like that."

  Akiko nodded. "Aimi is a kitsune. She was taken in by my parents before I was born, given a home, taught our language, and cared for. As a reward, when my mother was pregnant with me, Aimi blessed the unborn child with a tamashī. She thought it would give the baby a long life and a keen intuition as well as good fortune. But the tamashī transformed me into a Hanta."

  "Can we meet Aimi?" I asked.

  "She is still in Japan."

  "And Daichi?" Targa asked.

  "Daichi is dead."

  A beat of silence.

  "Did you…kill him?" Targa's question was barely audible.

  "Of course she didn't kill him!" I blurted. "Akiko doesn't have a killing bone in her body." My eyes flashed to hers as a cold thought occurred. What if Daichi had been a demon? She said she was a demon hunter. Maybe she had killed him. "At least for humans you don't. Right?" I added, weakly.

  "I didn't kill him. He killed himself with his own sword. The one he sent me to Japan to retrieve."

  "Whoa. Okay." Georjie put her palms out. "You need to start from the beginning. I am so confused right now. How and why was Daichi keeping you captive? And why was his sword left in Japan in the first place? And why did he kill himself? And why do you have to say goodbye?" She took a deep breath. "And can I put some dry clothes on before you talk? I'm getting cold."

  3

  Saxony

  I lay on my stomach on a towel with another draped over my back. I barely noticed the damp fabric against my skin as I stared up at Akiko with my chin propped in my hand. I had no sense of how long she'd been talking; it seemed time was no longer relevant in our little oasis of secrets.

  Georjayna sat cross legged at Akiko's feet, one elbow resting on the seat of the Adirondack chair Akiko was sitting in. Georjie had put on a terrycloth hoodie and matching bottoms to keep warm, the pastel green hood was cocked over her head. Tendrils of blond hair spilled over her shoulders and out from under the hood, making her look like an elven character against the lush foliage behind her.

  Targa was still in the pool, her chin resting on her forearms. Her otherworldly eyes rarely left Akiko's face. In all the years we had been friends, Akiko had never held our attention for so long or with such a firm grip.

  It seemed that years of intrigue and mystery were falling away from Akiko layer by layer, like she was a flower opening slowly to the sun. Even the flickering torches appeared to be listening as she told her tale of the shape-shifting sisters, the fearsome Oni, the wakizashi she went to Japan to retrieve, the Yakuza, and her beloved Toshi. Her family had not died from a contagious illness like she’d once told us, but had gone on living after she'd been taken by Daichi. She even visited their graves when she was in Japan. She also told us about a fellow Hanta who had helped her retrieve the sword, a man named Yuudai.

  I was dazed by the life story my friend had been forced to keep all these years, but I had no trouble believing her. I recalled Basil mentioning that fire magi were not the only supernatural beings known to him, and we weren’t even the most powerful. I wondered if he knew about the Akuna Hanta; maybe they were even documented in his dossiers.

  From time to time I would glance at Georjie and Targa, watching their faces for traces of disbelief. I found none, and this amazed me too.

  When Akiko had explained how Daichi had stolen her freedom, the fire inside me raged and my face flushed with anger. It was a good thing I hadn't known how much she was suffering because with my temper, I would have done something that might have gotten me arrested.

  For her part, Akiko did not seem to harbor any ill will toward Daichi or even Raiden, the Yakuza boss who nearly killed her and who would have enslaved her for his own gain. I had thought that Dante was evil incarnate, but he seemed like the Easter bunny next to the Yakuza.

  The only time Akiko got emotional was when she spoke of Toshi, of their tender and hopeful love and how it was thwarted.

  "I am so ashamed for thinking that my sister had plotted to get me out of the way so she could marry Toshi." Akiko's voice was solemn and heavy. "I will never forgive myself for that."

  I heard Georjie sniff and looked over to see her wipe her cheek.
She said with a husky voice, "I wish we could have met him. I've never seen you date or even have a crush. You always talked about the guys in school with such disdain, calling them boys." Georjie wiped her other cheek. "Now I understand why."

  "You shouldn't punish yourself for thinking your sister wanted Toshi, Akiko." These the first words Targa had spoken in at least an hour. "You never know what people can be capable of."

  "Ain't that the truth," I added, thinking of Dante.

  "So cynical," Akiko looked from Targa to me. "I'm the centenarian here, not you. Why so embittered?"

  It was Georjie who answered. "Saxony fell for a guy who turned out to be a psychopath and I found out a relative of mine was a murderer. But that doesn't explain your cynicism, Targa. Is your mother rubbing off on you?"

  "Maybe." Targa's lip lifted in a smile.

  "Excuse me? You have a murderer in your family, Georjie?" My jaw was on the floor. "I do not recall seeing any reference to this in your text messages this summer! You've been holding out on us, too?"

  Georjie waved me off. "We'll get to me." She looked at Akiko. "So to sum up, you're a shape-shifting demon hunter with the ability to tear an evil spirit from a human body and trap it deep in the earth. You've met another Hanta, whose name sounds chillingly like 'you die,' your sister is a fox-shifter who can influence luck, you're actually almost one hundred and ten years old even though you look twelve.”

  “And she’s gone through high school a few times, too," I murmured. "No wonder she’s so good at trivia games.”

  "Don't forget that she can fly higher than a jet-plane and visit the formless void where all spirit originates," added Targa, lifting her head from her forearms.

  "And you want to leave us and Saltford for good," I added sourly.

  "To go rid the world of demons," Georjie said by way of defense.

  "And you can see demons as well as all living beings’ connection to the Æther while you're in bird form, by way of a spiraling double-helix shooting up into the sky"—Targa put her fingertips on the crown of her head—“from here.”

  "Like some ethereal billboard revealing that person’s most innermost nature." Georjie took the hood off her hair and pulled her long locks away from her neck.

  "And you want to leave us and Saltford for good," I repeated, receiving a comically withering look from Georjie. "What? Isn't anyone else bummed about this?"

  Akiko was laughing. "You guys are crazy."

  "Is that about the size of it, Akiko?" Targa finally got out of the pool and sat on her hip on the edge with her legs dangling in the water.

  "More or less." Akiko nodded.

  I sat up on my haunches and put my hands on my knees. "You know you gotta show us, right?" I reached for my glass of cranberry tonic.

  "Please shift for us?" Georjie's spine straightened eagerly. She looked as though she was prepared to beg all night if that's what it was going to take. "Please?"

  "If you wish.”

  I almost spewed my drink out at the blasé tone of Akiko's answer. Still so understated. As if we weren't all dying to see her shift. Targa burst out laughing at my snort and attempt to swallow my drink before we all ended up wearing it.

  Akiko shook her head at me, smiling. She stood up and took her robe off and folded it. After tossing it behind a thick-leafed plant, she turned and saw Georjie and I share a bemused look.

  "For after," Akiko said.

  I got it, but Georjie still looked confused.

  "’Cause she'll be naked," Targa and I said at the same time.

  "Oh…right." Georjie blinked. "Of course. Your clothes don't shift with you."

  There was a blurring of Akiko's form and a shimmering of the air around and through her, and suddenly she was no more. Her damp bathing suit fell to the ground in a sodden heap.

  A tiny finch the color of a lemon sat on the Adirondack chair, cocking its head at us and observing us through its shining black eyes. It gave a chirp.

  "Whoa," Georjie breathed.

  I couldn't resist holding a finger out to the little bird. Akiko hopped onto my finger and clutched it with fragile little claws.

  The air around the finch shimmered again and a raven the size of a small dog appeared on my hand. I gasped with surprise and turned my hand so she could grip my wrist and balance better.

  "How can you change mass like that?" Targa asked.

  "Are you kidding me?" Georjie shoved at Targa's shoulder with her foot and sent her back into the pool with a splash. "She just changed into two species of birds before our very eyes and you're asking about mass?"

  Targa came up laughing. "I can't help it." Targa smiled through the wet hair sticking to her face. She pushed her hair back. "Logistics, you know."

  "Logistics, whatever. This is magic."

  The crow gave a throaty caw and Akiko took to the air, circled tightly over the pool once, and disappeared into the plants where she'd tossed her robe. I picked up her sodden bathing suit and threw it into the bush.

  “Thank you,” came the muffled reply.

  A moment later, she stepped out of the foliage, tying the robe’s belt. She was smiling, but she also looked a bit dazed.

  "That was amazing!" I cried as Akiko rejoined our group and sat down. I was bursting with questions, and I wondered if she would shift on command into whatever bird species I asked for. Maybe a dodo bird? That would really throw our biology prof at Saltford High into a tizzy.

  But Akiko had her eyes on Georjayna. "What have you got in here, Georjie? Silkworms or something?"

  "Silk…what?" Georjie sputtered. "Why would I have silkworms in here?"

  "Well you've got something because I can see their connections to the Æther."

  Georjayna's smile faded and a look of understanding and wonder crossed her face. It was like drawing back a curtain on a clear blue day.

  "How many?" she asked Akiko.

  "I didn't count them, but quite a few. Maybe fifty. What are they?"

  Targa and I shared a bemused look.

  Without a hint of a joke on her face, Georjie answered, "They're faeries."

  "They're what now?" Targa’s eyes widened.

  "Well, to be strictly accurate, they're faerie cocoons."

  "Could this evening get any weirder?" Targa murmured.

  Yes it can. I haven't told my story, yet, I thought. Just you wait. It seemed sometime in the telling of Akiko’s story, I had made peace with telling my own.

  Akiko was nodding her head like nothing was unusual. "Faeries. Cool. Show us?"

  Georjayna crawled forward on her hands and knees to a potted plant with distinct trumpet-shaped flowers that I thought might be datura. "There. Can you see it?"

  I squinted into the shadows, feeling like an idiot. "Uh…."

  Targa bent over at the waist, peering where Georjie pointed. "I don't see anything. What are we looking for?"

  Akiko was also shaking her head. "Nope. I can see their connection to the Æther while I'm in Hanta form, but I can't see anything now."

  Georjie looked disappointed, but not surprised. "I knew Targa and Saxony probably wouldn't see them, but after your story, Akiko, I thought maybe…" She let the leaves close in again and shrugged. "Guess not."

  "Faeries? Is this for real?" My faith was being stretched to its limit with this one.

  Georjie nodded. "Akiko isn't the only one who had a wild supernatural summer, either. You know that photo you commented on in the foyer, Saxony?"

  I nodded.

  "It’s not photoshopped. That's really me." Georjie took a deep, shuddering breath. "I'm a Wise, a kind of Earth Elemental… I guess. To be honest, I'm still trying to figure out what a Wise is because I can't find anything on them, not even in the memoirs my ancestor left behind. She was also a Wise."

  Targa and I stared at her, our mouths agape.

  Akiko was listening and nodding as she poured herself another glass of tonic.

  Georgie continued, speaking more rapidly. "I don't know if you've ever hea
rd the term before; I hadn't. But I'm not making this stuff up." She held up both palms. "It was the faeries that called me that."

  Targa's vivid eyes drifted from Georjie to me and back again, swimming with bewilderment. I felt the same. When Akiko had started telling her story, I was amazed. But now, Georjie too? What is going on here?

  "But Jasher could see them too,” Georjie was saying, “so I knew I wasn't going nuts, plus the whole tree experience just before my mom called," Georjie's hands were flashing around nervously, "and the horrible thing that Mailís did…"

  "Georjie, honey." I put a hand on her arm, gently pushing it down before she poked out someone's eye. "Why don't you go back to the beginning?"

  "I know I sound like a crazy person," Georjie wailed. "I wasn't planning on telling anyone, except Akiko saw the faerie helix-thingies and…"

  "We believe you," said Targa, who had gotten the incredulous look down to mild amazement.

  "You do?"

  "Of course, we do," I said. "You've got enough street-cred in our books to tell us you met King Kong at a pub in Anacullough and we'd believe you."

  Georjie cracked a smile. "Really?"

  "Yes." Targa took the Adirondack chair across from Akiko. "But you better go back to the beginning, because even though we believe you, nothing you just said made any sense."

  "Right." Georjie took a deep breath and pulled her knees in to her chest, wrapping her arms around her legs. "The beginning."

  We listened, eagerly, as Georjie told her story.

  "I can't even explain what it felt like, it was so strange…" Georjie said, her brown eyes alight, her expression faraway and engrossed. "It was so wonderful and powerful. It was like my roots went hundreds of feet into the earth and told me everything about what was around me. The layers of the earth's crust and everything growing there was listening and waiting."

  "For what?" Targa sounded as awed as I felt.

  "To understand my will, for me to ask it for help. I towered high above the ground, even as my roots shot deep into it. Honestly, I thought I had transformed into the biggest tree in the world."