by Emme DeWitt
“My phone,” I muttered to myself, patting my pockets forgetfully. “Huh.”
“Here,” Niko said, offering me a phone. “I believe yours was left quite some time ago in a snow bank in Indiana.”
The sleek black phone looked new, much newer than my old phone.
“Oh, yeah,” I said. “I can’t believe I’ve been without it all this time.”
“It had a tracker in it. No good.” Niko shrugged. “This one has no GPS tracking.”
“Kind of silly with you and Eli, huh?” I said with a smile.
“Exactly,” Niko said. “I’ve programmed our numbers in there. In case today—”
“Isn’t just the wake?” I said, dread coloring my voice.
Niko stood to his full height and waited.
“Thanks,” I said, tucking the phone into my pocket.
“Shall we?” Niko asked, offering his arm. “We are late.”
“The diva needed to put on her eyeliner,” I said saucily. “What could you have done?”
Niko chuckled, offering his arm to me.
“Yes, I was completely helpless,” Niko replied.
“Whatever,” I snorted at him. “I can read you like a picture book. You’re all warm and squishy on the inside.”
“Don’t tell anyone,” Niko said, his face darkening. “Teddy bears make poor bodyguards.”
“I promise.”
I held my pinky finger out to him, and he hooked his massive hairy knuckled finger around mine before we popped into the downstairs hall to my unexpected sendoff party.
“They are holding off the wake for her.” Brendan’s raised voice bounced off the wood paneling and trim. “She has to go.”
“Get her uncle on the phone, and I’ll consider it,” Aleks shot back coolly. “How do I even know you’re going to take her there? You’re probably just going to send her right back to that institution and collect a nice reward for your troubles.”
“How dare you question my motives and my word!” Brendan said. I could feel his whole aura vibrating in agitation, even through the wall separating Niko and me from the argument. “I have known Evangeline since we were kids. I’ve known that family even longer. I have every right to escort her to the wake. Who are you to say whether she stays or goes?”
“I have her best interests at heart,” Aleks said. “I’m not sure you do.”
“Oh, so she’s a prisoner here just like she was in the institution. The dressing’s a little nicer, but it looks the same to me,” shouted Brendan.
Niko raised his eyebrows at me, but I held my hand up. I wanted to hear this without getting in the middle of it.
“I’m not the one making her life dangerous,” Aleks growled back. “My interests and Evangeline’s safety fall neatly on the same side. I don’t know if you can say the same.”
“I want what is best for her,” Brendan said. “That will always be my side. And what are we, competing little league teams? What sides are you even talking about?”
“I can’t tell if you’re playing dumb on purpose or you really have no idea what is going on in our world,” Aleks said, the disbelief leaking through in stronger beams from his normally silent clouded aura.
“Our world? Last time I checked, you weren’t Elevated,” Brendan shot back ruthlessly.
“My family’s business is my business,” Aleks said. “And Evangeline falls into that category. I don’t trust you farther than I can throw you.”
“Luckily, whether you trust me or not is irrelevant. Evangeline is coming with me. The end,” Brendan launched back.
The boys continued shouting at each other. I turned to Niko, pulling on his collar lightly to bring him down to my level. He obliged without hesitation.
“I have to go, but you’ll be able to find me, right?” I asked, a tinge of worry coloring my feigned confidence. I had been so sure in my bedroom I was making the right decision to go. My stomach was flipping over and over again. Maybe I wasn’t thinking this through.
“Of course,” Niko said. “We are on speed dial. Any of them. Eli and I are on standby for you.”
I nodded, letting my hand drop from Niko’s lapel before he could tell it was shaking. Suddenly, I was terrified to leave the safety of the Navratil manor. Surely I could just stay here, tinker with my research, slowly make plans to track down potential Elevated people, make sure they were safe or at the very least aware of what was afoot. I shoved the cold fear down from my stomach into my toes. I didn’t have time for that nonsense.
I popped up on my tiptoes and placed a thankful peck on Niko’s cheek before he could straighten fully.
“Thank you,” I said. Niko inclined his head.
“Ready?”
I exhaled deeply, waiting for a break in the shouting match before I turned the corner.
Queen. You are the queen chess piece. Act like it.
“Are you both done?” I said, walking into the cloud of heated emotions.
Brendan’s energy field was pulsing menacingly, and his aura was crowding out the thick black smoke attached to Aleks. In my Elevated mind’s eye, I could barely even see the boys beneath their emotions. I swiped the air.
“What are you doing?” Eli piped up from the staircase. Her curiosity flared out briefly from her lounging posture up the stairs.
Both Aleks and Brendan stopped arguing long enough to see me swiping through the air like a maniac. From an outside perspective, I bet it looked ridiculous.
“Brendan, calm down before you suffocate me,” I ordered, my tone sharp. “You know better than to act like this around me.”
Brendan’s aura field immediately shrunk, the color changing to a muted guilt tinge, a stark contrast to the rage and indignation from moments before.
“Sorry, Evangeline,” Brendan said. “I got carried away.”
Eli snorted on behalf of everyone.
“Aleks, can you come with me for a second?” I asked, kicking at the dark cloud around his feet. “Brendan, wait here. Don’t embarrass me.” I looked pointedly at Eli and Niko watching him from the two entrances further into the manor.
Brendan nodded quickly, the desperation for approval leaking out from his quickly built shields.
I walked into the dining room and waited for Aleks to follow me. He was on my heels and shut the door softly behind us. I spun around to see his hands stuffed awkwardly into his pockets. The rest of his body language read as impassive, but I knew he was trying really hard to hide behind that mask.
“You’re going, aren’t you?” Aleks stated, his tone deflated.
“You know I am,” I said, my hands reaching farther into my own jacket pockets in avoidance. Strong shoulders. Confidence. Deep breaths.
“And you’re not worried at all,” Aleks pressed.
“I’m going to take Brendan at his word,” I said. “I have no reason to doubt him.”
“You’re not serious,” Aleks said, his hands flying out of his pockets to emphasize the other side of the wall. “He was supposed to take you back to the Association after the wake. And now suddenly, he’s not going to do that a week later?”
“I guess we’ll have to see,” I replied. My fists clenched tightly in my pockets, but I hoped the rest of my expression was as blank as I intended. “Not going doesn’t seem to be a viable option.”
“I can’t let you go,” Aleks said, shaking his head. “Absolutely not. We don’t know what will happen. We can’t risk it.”
“We?” I asked. “Risk what, exactly?”
Aleks stiffened. His mouth moved as if to explain, but the silence stretched on. The heaviness in the air dug into my heart.
“What am I to you, Aleks?” I held in a sigh, but emotionally I felt myself sink a little into the disappointment and grief of the answer I could feel coming.
“You’re—”
“The Queen?” I said, my words slicing through his explanation.
His jaw snapped shut at my words.
“You were awake.”
“Y
ou talked about sides earlier,” I said, rushing my words before I could change my mind. I had to let this out before it ate me alive. “But I don’t really know what sides you’re talking about. And I really don’t appreciate being referred to as a game piece, whether it’s the Queen or what everyone is in the end—a pawn. I will not be moved around the board at your command.”
My voice wavered with anger. Tears prickled the edges of my eyes, and I struggled to clear my throat. I hated that I cried when I was angry. I needed to say what I needed to say without tears ruining the power of my words.
Aleks stepped forward, his hands out ready to comfort, but I put up my hand and stepped back a pace.
“I wanted to tell you,” Aleks said, the dark matter at his ankles licking at the distance I had tried to keep between us. “I was trying to find the right time. You’re not some pawn in the game, Evangeline. You’re the most important one. I’m not the player moving you around at my will. I didn’t know if you were ready.”
Aleks growled, his fingers flexing in the air in frustration.
“I’m not explaining this right,” he said desperately. “Evangeline, I’m on your side. You’re the chess master, not me. I’m just the placeholder until you’re ready. You’re going to be the great unifier. That’s the ‘we.’ That’s why you can’t go.”
“I have to,” I said simply, the thickness in my throat making the statement sound weaker than I wanted it to.
“I can’t promise I can get you back,” Aleks said, shouting out his frustration. “I don’t want to lose you.”
“What, then you’re back at square one? Trying to find some great unifier according to some prophecy no one has a copy of or any proof that actually exists?” I shouted back. My own frustration colored my voice.
Aleks stepped back, his face flinching at my words. I could feel the air heat around me with my anger. Somehow, it was in the air, causing my face to glisten with sweat.
That wasn’t good.
“We’ll find the answers together,” Aleks argued, his own temper matching mine. The clouds at his feet turned black, and a warning bell went off in my head. “There’s no other option. It’s just you. That’s why it’s imperative you stay safe.”
The warning bells ratcheted up a notch. That really wasn’t a good sign.
“I’m so tired of being shuffled between houses. Between families. Between prison cells,” I spat back at him. My tongue lashed out, and I realized however true the words were, I wasn’t sure where they were coming from. The nagging voice in my head was sending out panic signals, but my mouth continued to move of its own volition.
“I am my own person. I have my own problems. I have a right to decide how I deal with them,” I screamed.
My vision blurred in front of me, and I felt my tenuous grip on reality stretching too thin. I was just so angry.
Muted banging added to the din, and I realized someone was trying to get into the dining room.
While I was momentarily distracted, a blurry figure filled my vision.
Aleks’ dark eyes glimmered in front of me, and I could tell he was focusing intently.
On what? I thought to myself in a detached voice.
His hand was on my cheek, and he closed the distance between us, pulling me close to him.
All I could see were his eyes, so all my anger channeled directly into our forceful visual connection.
I know, I heard in my head.
The voice snapped me out of my fury trance. That was Aleks’s voice. Why was Aleks’ voice in my head?
I understand your pain, Aleks said in my mind. I didn’t mean to hurt you. Please believe me.
I tried to pull myself out of his embrace, but he held on firmly.
Just let it all go, Aleks said. My eyes focused on his lips, still in shock that he had somehow managed to penetrate my mind, especially as a human. His lips weren’t moving at all. He was definitely in my head, behind my protective barriers. My mind started and stalled over and over again to register this new phenomenon.
Suddenly, Aleks leaned even closer, and my eyes watched as his head dipped near mine, my eyes slowly going out of focus again as Aleks’ lips met mine. What began as a firm lip lock changed into a hungry exchange of anger and relief and understanding.
Just as my anger began to dissipate, a loud bang erupted in the room. And everything went black.
It’s not too often you get woken up by a literal pain in your butt, but the first thing I noticed when I came to was the shooting pain radiating down my legs. I sat up, trying to rub the pain away. Aleks lay on the floor of the dining room a few feet from me, and I yelled out an obscenity in surprise.
I crawled over to him, checking him for breathing and a pulse. Both were weak, but there. More pounding came at the door until I heard a little pop. In moments, Niko was on the other side of Aleks, also checking for vitals.
“I think he’s fine. I don’t know if he hit his head though,” I said under my breath. “Damn it. Why does he always have to poke his nose in other people’s business?”
Niko clicked his tongue at me.
“You should be thankful to have such a…friend,” Niko said, avoiding my eye deftly, focusing instead on checking Aleks for injuries.
My hands dropped from Aleks’ wrist as Niko took over first aid. I sat back on my heels to observe him and immediately toppled backward with an unceremonious screech.
“What?” Niko said, his hands moving more swiftly over Aleks’ prone body, trying to find the source of my distress.
My hands were clasped over my mouth as I tried to make sense of what I was seeing.
The murky cloud that had grown from the tar-like black energy around Aleks had transitioned yet again to a solid black aura around his entire body. The energy moved and hummed like everyone else’s, minus the color. I had never seen such darkness mask a person before. While most humans had a series of halos around them, the Elevated tended to have a purple wave surrounding a pure white core.
Such a little detail hadn’t seemed so important. At least, not until Aleks’ core had become black.
Black did not seem like a good color to have as a core energy color.
“Please tell me I didn’t kill him,” I said through my hands.
Niko glanced briefly at me.
“What makes you say that?”
“His energy is…concerning,” I said, my voice hitching with anxiety.
“Hasn’t he always been unusual to you?” Niko asked, straightening Aleks’ limbs one by one after checking for breaks.
“Yes?”
“He’s not dead,” Niko assured me. He waited patiently for me to explain further.
“Yet,” I said darkly. “There is no way he can survive like that. It doesn’t feel…right.” My eyes watered from not blinking enough. I couldn’t help but follow the ebb and flow of his energy, dark as it was. It was almost like Aleks was wrapped in shadows. My stomach felt like it had turned itself inside out. Just looking at it made me extremely uneasy. I couldn’t place what seemed so…wrong about the aura.
Banging erupted once again on the other side of the door. Niko ignored the noise. My shoulders jerked as if someone had punched me in the stomach.
“Aleksander is very durable,” Niko said, straightening from his medical survey. “But if he comes to and you are still not gone, you will never leave.”
“You want me to leave him like this?” I squeaked. A variety of half-realized thoughts spun in my mind. What-if scenarios collided with worst-case scenarios, and I was left with a thick cloud of unease. My gut was silent.
“Will you staring at him give you answers?” Niko retorted.
I scowled at him, his crisp words snapping me from my reverie.
“Evangeline! Are you all right?” Brendan yelled through the door. “Answer me!”
The directive drove through the ruckus in my mind, poking at the core of my being. A flash of red colored my vision as an uncontrolled wave of anger licked out at the impact.
Don’t tell me what to do, I shot back in my mind.
The knocking stopped.
And I realized my words had ridden the wave of rage out into the minds of those around me. I counted the auras in the house. Eleven. Eleven people had just heard me in their minds unannounced.
My eyes grew wide, and Niko shook in a silent chuckle.
“Did I…?”
“I think we all heard that,” Niko said, tapping his head. “You should compose yourself before you visit your family. I’ll be right back.”
Niko gathered Aleks into his arms and popped out of the room.
I sat cross-legged on the floor and began a breathing exercise. Niko had a point. Flying off the handle immediately upon meeting my family after a long time was not going to help me keep my freedom. Abuela’s wake was also not the time or place to go off like a loose Elevated cannon. I would apologize to Aleks for leaving after knocking him unconscious when I got back. After all, I would only be gone a few days. Hopefully, by that point, he would have regained consciousness and maybe even some appreciation for the fact that I came back as promised.
Hopefully.
I could feel agitation radiating from the other side of the door. Between Eli and Brendan, the foyer was becoming quite heated. I didn’t have time to stroke their egos and make them feel better.
Beginning with the localized emotions, I brought up a hallway of doors in my mind. The boxes the dean had suggested did not work for the amount of complexity I was working with. The energies needed unlimited boundaries with a firm access point, and a series of cosmic closets was the only thing that came to mind. They had worked a whopping one time before. I sent a silent prayer out that they would work again.
Slowly, I unpacked all of the external emotions and escorted them into the appropriate doorways. Once the outer ring around me was solid, I thought through what I had been feeling lately. A lot had happened the past few days, and I had not done any emotional check-ins with myself. I had been too busy trying to solve the puzzle of the Elevated hierarchies and the implications of a poorly played chess game.
