Residue

by Laury Falter

  By that point, Estelle had pursed her lips and blown, picking up the gas flame from the lamp below and circling it through the air until it snaked under the railing at Alison. Her intended victim side stepped the flame but not before the damage was done. It left a scalding mark on her thigh and ignited the railing. Dillon responded with a burst of flame across the courtyard toward Estelle, which set the railing on fire in front of them.

  Smoke began to fill the courtyard as the fragile wood went up, obscuring the bodies moving swiftly on both sides. Oscar used this to his benefit, capturing the drifts with bouts of air and swirling them around the Caldwells. Dillon fought it, dispelling and sending the smoke across the courtyard and back to Estelle and Oscar.

  Spencer and Nolan, both gifted in channeling, had their eyes pinned on Burke, their lips moving frantically as they cast. Burke responded with a roar and then tilted his head in their direction and began moving his lips at the same blurred pace as theirs. Without having to be told, I knew they were trying to get into each other’s heads.

  All of this happened in a matter of seconds.

  Then Jameson stepped into the open and roared, “STOP!” He had his chin up and his hands in fists, showing the frustration he felt. But a second later, they no longer seemed to be under his command.

  I watched in horror as he was lifted into the air, his limbs being frozen in place. He couldn’t even rotate his head to find who it was levitating him.

  “NO!” I shouted and ran toward him, halting a foot away as if an invisible wall had been dropped in front of me.

  “Get back,” I heard Jameson shout and I thought it might be directed at me but it was too late.

  My feet left the ground and my extremities became cement blocks, unwilling to move. My eyes darted around, looking for the source and I found Charlotte, her lip curled up to one side in a snarl, entirely focused on levitating me.

  In the midst of chaos, flashes of flames through a smoke-filled courtyard, shouts and cries of pain, disintegrating balconies, they didn’t realize that their respective relative was no longer missing. Charlotte knew I was here and Vinnia knew Jameson was here but neither family knew it about their respective relative.

  We were now in a war zone where everything was distorted.

  Through clearings in the smoke, I searched for any eyes, any face with reason or sound mind. All I saw were faces contorting in pain or mouths open to release incantations, which had risen from murmurs to piercing shrieks.

  Oscar’s arms were now lifted, his fingers spread making it look like he was grasping for something. He was. It turned out to be rain collected in the spouts, which he threw into a whirlwind, twisting it toward various Caldwells. Dillon responded with flames, wrapping them around the spouts when he could catch them.

  Vinnia had taken to splitting her focus between suspending Jameson and using broken pieces of wood, turning them horizontally and shooting them like arrows across the courtyard. In turn, she dodged the shards of glass Charlotte sent in her direction.

  Estelle was collecting fire in the shape of basketballs near her feet, sending them across one at a time, while attempting to miss the ones Alison was sending back with her ability to levitate.

  Spencer and Nolan now had their hands on parts of the railing that still existed, gripping hard and sending their energy outward toward Burke. He in turn had started to shake his head as if a hornet were buzzing around inside it, a clear attempt at trying to keep Spencer and Nolan from infiltrating.

  Jameson and I were the only ones left untouched as the battle raged overhead. In the midst of it, I focused on him, preparing myself for what I was about to do. Vinnia didn’t know it yet but I was going up against her, my own cousin. I would have to tear through her levitation, just as I’d torn through the ministry’s hex on the outcasts. Only then could I lower Jameson to the ground where he’d be safe.

  Shutting out the chilling sights and sounds around me, I made the potent force inside my focal point. From the depth of my torso, it awakened and I felt it rise up like a sleeping animal clawing toward the surface and then across the conduit between Jameson and me. I worked on intensifying it, dedicated to breaking through Vinnia’s concentration.

  Gradually, his arms fell and his head turned back, peering over his shoulder at me.

  I nodded, answering the inquisitive look he gave. That’s me.

  His lips turned up in a confident smile and he tilted his head once toward me, acknowledging that he understood.

  I didn’t hear Vinnia scream in anger as Jameson landed on the ground but I deduced it was because she couldn’t see where he was. With the smoke so thick in the courtyard now only gaps and swirls allowed anyone to see what was happening throughout it.

  Then Jameson was sprinting toward me, reaching for my legs, but I was yanked upward, well outside his reach.

  I knew immediately what had happened.

  Charlotte had seen.

  His head swiveled from side to side, searching for something to reach me, something he could drag out to stand on, something he could climb. But there was nothing. I was in the very center, well away from anyone or anything that could help. I was Charlotte’s tool now.

  Jameson recognized it too and released a tormented roar and I shook at his fury. I was in the middle of a coughing fit as the smoke overwhelmed me I began to inhale the heady, thick air.

  There was only one thing that might be able to help now.

  “The…talisman,” I shouted down to him between coughs. He glanced up, puzzled, his eyebrows furrowing. “The Tristan Talisman…from class. It’s in Ms. Veilleux’s office.”

  He lifted up his shoulders in a confused shrug.

  “It incapacitates others,” I reminded him.

  Blinking a few times, he tried to recall and then his eyes widened and, without confirming he’d understood, his feet were suddenly sprinting across the courtyard.

  Only then did I relax. Just a few minutes longer and this would all be over. We’d debilitate our families, the fires eating away the balconies would be doused, the air would clear, and we’d help them see that Jameson and I were here, and that there was no need to fight.

  As I contemplated this, the smoke cleared and what I saw caused a scream to rattle up through my throat and echo against the buildings.

  “NOOOOOOOO!”

  Jameson lay face down, sprawled across the cobblestones, the smoke curling around his arms and legs as if it were trying to pick him up, help him get moving again.

  Watching this, an emotion I’d never had reason to experience before filled me, blanketed me, caused my fingers to curl into fists and my chest to swell to capacity.

  Fury.

  Without entirely realizing it, I churned that emotion, blended it with my own ability to levitate, and countered Charlotte’s energy.

  The next thing I knew, I was on the ground, a throb moving up my palms and forearms, pain radiating from my knees as my limbs took the brunt of the impact.

  Without time on my side, I shoved aside the affects of my fall to the ground and picked myself up. Fireballs and slivers of wood shot passed me and I wondered if any of these were what hit Jameson.

  I was at his side in seconds, rolling him toward me.

  His face had already started to swell. A gash around his left eye seeped blood and his skin was singed across his forehead.

  “Jameson?” I called out. “Jameson!”

  His eyes remained closed.

  “Jameson!” I shouted again but he gave no response.

  With my focus on the open wound I didn’t immediately notice the changes happening elsewhere on his face.

  Steadily, the skin across his forehead smoothed over and the blackened discoloration faded away. The bulge around his chin sunk back until the inflammation disappeared completely. Finally, the stream of blood down his temple and into his hair tapered away and I watched as the skin around the gap merged together, sealing the wound.

  “Jameson,” I said, my voice calmer,
recognizing that my touch was healing him. “Jameson.”

  “Almost there, sweetheart. Just give me a second.”

  At least he had his wits back.

  Then his eyes opened and he gave me a weak smile. “Careful. You’ll heal the last of that scar over my mouth you love so much.”

  I laughed lightly and countered, “And how do you know I love it?”

  “Admit it,” he moaned, pushing himself up. “It’s one of the reasons you can’t take your eyes off me.”

  I wasn’t about to succumb to his conceit, even if he’d just been knocked out. Instead, I helped him to his feet.

  “Can you make it?” I asked referring to Ms. Veilleux’s office.

  “Race you,” he muttered playfully.

  We did race, although not against each other. It was against our families. From the sounds above, their aggression was growing.

  Inside Ms. Veilleux’s office, Jameson tried to find the light switch but there was none and resorted to lighting a candle. I swung around the edge of the desk, making my way toward Mr. Thibodeaux’s talisman stored on the bookshelf.

  The noise outside was muffled but thumps through the ceiling told us that the fight had made its way inside the walls of our school.

  “Got it,” I said, spinning around with the talisman in hand.

  “Just in time too,” he said. “They’re going to destroy this place.”

  “Along with themselves,” I added.

  With those words still hanging in the air, we sprinted back to the courtyard, through the hazy smoke and flashing fireballs, and into the center of the battle.

  Inopportune time or not, my mind drifted back to the first time Jameson and I had worked together in class. Even though we’d only been attempting to cure the rash given to him by my cousins, together, we’d ended up healing everyone in the room. We had no idea back then that only a few weeks later we’d be tapping that same channeling of energy to prevent our families from killing one another. And here we were, in the middle of their fight, risking our own lives.

  I held up the talisman, still wrapped in its cloth, and asked, “Think we can do this?"

  “We’ll know in a minute,” he said, uncertain himself. “Just don’t let go of me, Jocelyn. That’s the last thing you’ll want to do.”

  I wouldn’t. I couldn’t if this was going to work. And it was chancy as it was. Assumedly, if Jameson could channel the energy from the talisman to our families, it would disable them. But I would need to be holding Jameson to heal him from the affects of the mystical artifact as well. The only element of surprise, the one unsure thing was whether the talisman would disable my abilities too.

  Doubt clear on his face, Jameson pulled at the overlapped corners of the cloth, revealing the artifact inside. His hand slipped into mine. The other came up, fingers extended, ready to take hold…

  The explosion came down directly between us, throwing our bodies backwards, our legs sweeping up from underneath us as we were carried across the ground.

  I landed with my back against something hard, knocking the wind from me, pain searing across my shoulder blades. The world outside suddenly reflected a churning washing machine with images and sounds tumbling around indistinctly. My hands were at my sides, resting in the gravel of something that had been blown apart during the battle. The talisman was gone.

  I’ve been hit. I heard the words more as a voice than a thought. Then it occurred to me that Jameson had been, too.

  From then on, I attempted to stand. Moving forward, bending at the waist, I drew in a hoarse, staggered breath only to cough it out, carrying dust, smoke, and flecks of unidentifiable material. Although they were weakened, I slid my arms alongside my body and braced myself. I then shifted my weight to the left, hoping for the momentum to roll over on to all fours. From there I could use whatever I’d landed against to crawl upwards.

  But that didn’t happen.

  I buckled beneath my own weight, my legs spreading outward, bearing the brunt of my failed attempt.

  Trying again, I pushed my torso off the ground only to collapse again. From there, I simply rolled to my back and realized I’d landed beneath the smoldering remains of the balcony.

  “Jameson,” my voice called out, too gruff to be distinguishable. It didn’t matter. I wasn’t calling for him. I needed to hear the sound of his name, knowing it would motivate me passed the pain and weakness pulsing through me.

  It worked. I pushed myself up and over until I was propped on my hands and knees.

  Tilting my head up, I found the thing that had split us apart.

  A balcony pillar had come down, directly where we’d been standing, splitting in two from the impact. And somewhere on the other side was Jameson.

  Unable to stand, I crawled over broken glass, burning shards of wood, and charred plants toward him. Only vaguely, I noticed the tearing of my skin, the layers of my palms peeling away and the flaps of skin scraping along the ground as my knees dragged me forward.

  “Jameson,” I shouted only to hear it come out a whisper.

  Reaching the pillar, I heaved for air, summoning the strength to speak it louder. He had to be there - on the other side. He had to be breathing. He had to be alive. He had to be. He was too strong. Too resilient. And we’d gone through too much to get to this point. Against all the odds, despite our family’s wishes, we were together and our love had survived. But he didn’t know it. Because I’d never told him. That I love him. I never said the actual words. I only hinted and right now, right here that wasn’t enough. He deserved better. He deserved to know.

  “Jameson!” I screamed, this time his name carrying past the edge of my lips.

  Then he was there.

  His arms swung over the pillar, pulling himself up, his face crusty and blackened, his forearms bleeding from wounds down both sides.

  “Jocelyn,” he breathed, relieved.

  “Jameson,” I chocked. “I thought…I thought…”

  He slid down and wrapped me in an embrace, locking me in an iron embrace that said he wouldn’t allow us to separate again.

  “I know, I thought I lost you, too,” he sighed into my hair. And then he was kissing me, his hands on my cheeks, his lips passionate and tender.

  I returned it with the same vigor, my body trembling against his.

  Then I pulled my lips away and, with my hands on his face, told him what I should have said a long time ago. “I love you, Jameson.”

  He swallowed, his nose flaring with a deep inhale as he reacted to hearing me finally say the words. “I wondered how long it would take you…”

  I laughed, my head rolling back, despite the pain it caused. As it fell forward, I gently rested my forehead on his, captivated by the weight of his hands on my hips and the feel of his arms resting against mine.

  Only then did I realize that the courtyard was calm. Just the crackling of the embers could be heard.

  “Jameson?” I asked, looking up, wondering where the screams, incantations, and sizzling fireballs had gone.

  We straightened but didn’t pull away, surveying the area around us. More than one pillar had fallen and they lay burning across the courtyard. Beneath them were the remnants of the balconies and railings, no more than shreds of wood now. Broken glass, pieces of what had once been classroom windows, gleamed in the flames. Branches and leaves from healthy, lush plants were now burnt and littering the ground. Everything seemed to smolder. The air, however, had cleared. There were no more fireballs or makeshift arrows. The smoke had lifted, giving way to the true damage. The courtyard and the building’s façade around it were entirely destroyed.

  It was eerily silent but we weren’t alone. The faces of our families peered over the edges of what had been the balcony. They were motionless, captivated by what they were witnessing.

  “What are they looking at?” I whispered to Jameson, apprehensive that any louder voice might disrupt the peace.

  He caught my eyes and smiled.

  “Us.” />
  21 THE TRUTH

  For a brief second, I thought my cousins and the Caldwells had stopped themselves by their own free will, that they’d come to their senses, and realized there was no need to fight. But that was too much to hope for.

  The destruction would have continued and someone would have been seriously injured if my mother and Ms. Veilleux hadn’t returned. They stood at the opening of the tunnel, not shocked so much as disappointed.

  I felt like a child being admonished without words. And I’d been trying to stop the fight. I couldn’t imagine what my cousins and Jameson’s brothers and sisters felt like.

  Cautiously, they stepped forward, through the devastation.

  “This…” said Ms. Veilleux “is more than I ever imagined.”

  My mother simply shook her head.

  “We didn’t realize-” Estelle began to say but my mother languidly swept a hand through the air in her direction and Estelle’s mouth clamped down. Whether my mother had cast against her or not, I couldn’t tell but she’d done the job. Estelle remained quiet.

  None of those on the upper level had moved and I began to question why until Ms. Veilleux motioned above her head and they began to drift down over the edge to land on the ground floor. She had stopped the fight, levitating and restricting them enough to prevent any further damage from taking place. Only Jameson and I were free to move about and that was probably because we weren’t causing the ruins…we were part of them.

  Still, it was easy to see from the disbelief in their expressions that they had heard Jameson and me pronounce our love for each other. They never removed their gaze from us as we stood together, hand in hand.

  “You’re going to have to accept it,” Jameson said to everyone listening, including my mother and Ms. Veilleux. “I love her. Nothing’s changing that. Not my last name and not hers.”