The Elementals

by Saundra Mitchell

  “Mollie Foster,” she said, her spine going straight.

  “She’s going to be bigger than Pearl White,” Kate interrupted. “People will forget all about The Perils of Pauline when they see Mollie on-screen.”

  Patiently, Amelia waited for Kate to quiet, then said, “All right, then. She’ll be staying.”

  Kate looked to Mollie, then back to her mother. “Do you mean it?”

  “We’re not leaving San Diego yet,” Amelia said, stepping back into the hall. “And we have plenty of room. I’m not turning a child loose on the beach at this hour.”

  Throwing herself into Amelia’s arms, Kate hugged her fiercely. They were exactly the same height. “Oh, you’re my favorite, Mimi. Thank you!”

  Chiming in, Mollie beamed. “Thank you, ma’am.”

  A grimace touched Amelia’s brow, but she smoothed it away with her fingertips. “Give her one of your nightgowns, Kate. And both of you get to bed.”

  Pressing a kiss to Kate’s forehead, then shaking Mollie’s hand, Amelia excused herself and returned to the party.

  Kate closed the door and exclaimed, “I can’t believe they’re letting you stay. But, oh, they had to! I would have insisted.”

  “Can I tell you a secret?” Mollie asked.

  Kate opened her armoire, rummaging for two gowns. Possibility danced through her thoughts, and she could hardly keep from smiling. She’d never had a friend to stay.

  Sometimes, when she was little, her parents would have friends with children over, but that was hardly the same as picking a confederate of her own. To have someone to share secrets, to make plans with—it was unbearably wonderful. “Tell me anything.”

  Mollie said, “None of that was true.”

  Butterflies fluttered in Kate’s stomach. Turning to look at her, she asked, “What do you mean?”

  Mollie dropped herself onto the foot of Kate’s bed, then fell back among the pillows. Spicy perfume wafted up, a dot of it on the sheets always to sweeten the room. Kicking up her feet, she stroked her fingers along the fine linens. Finally, she tipped her head to catch Kate’s eye.

  “My father lives in Old Town. He’s a street sweeper.”

  “What?”

  Mollie went on. “I’ve slept on the beach once or twice, but only because I wanted to.”

  A glittering chill swept over Kate’s skin. “You were . . . you were lying?”

  “No,” Mollie said. She lifted her head, curls cascading from her shoulders, a victorious smile touching the corners of her lips. “I was acting.”

  Wringing a nightgown into a knot, Kate stood silently for a moment. No clock ticked, but the relative quiet seemed to count itself, stretching out in waves. Then, with two running steps, Kate leapt onto the bed, planting her feet next to Mollie’s head. Too giddy to hold still, she bounced.

  “That was amazing,” she said.

  Mollie laughed, reaching for the nightgown. “Do I get the part?”

  All Kate could see were the flickering lights of the theatre and the way she’d frame Mollie’s face with the camera. Theda Bara had nothing but smoky looks to recommend her; Pickford played the same role again and again. People would line up for days! Riot in the streets! Beg on the corners and pay twice the price to get a glimpse at the latest Witherspoon and Foster reel!

  Looking down at her star, Kate swore, “All of them. Every single one.”

  ***

  Sam led the way through the darkened wood. The moonlight was so bright that he and Julian cast shadows. A choir of crickets keened, stopping abruptly when Sam kicked a stone out of the way.

  “Probably our last boys’ night,” he told Julian.

  “Will you stop saying that?” Julian prodded his brother with the foot of his crutch, then hurried to keep his pace. “You sound like a doom clock. The end is near! The end is near!”

  Sam swooped down and rose again with a branch in one hand. “Maybe I know something you don’t know.”

  Prodding him again, Julian snorted. “Do you? Do you really, Sam? Hey, maybe pigs fly!”

  “Mmm, wingèd bacon. Floats right into your mouth.”

  “Better shut up before they ration that, too.”

  They both laughed, continuing their march through the dark. At the other end of the path, Charlie and Henry had already built a fire. Root beer chilled in a basket in the creek. There was a good chance they’d share if the younger brothers managed to wrestle the bottle opener from them.

  Charlie called out when he saw Sam and Julian emerge from the woods. “What’s the password?”

  “Chucks!” Sam called back.

  “Sorry,” Henry said, dipping a twig into the flames and shaking his head. “Try again.”

  Heading for the fire, Julian said, “I know what you did with Papa’s binoculars.”

  Charlie whistled, circling away from him. “Straight for the blackmail.”

  “I told you Julian was the evil one.” Henry grinned, swirling the burning twig in the air. He drew his name and a star, then tossed the stick back into the fire.

  With two more steps, Charlie crashed into Sam. Slinging an arm around his neck, he ground his knuckles against his head. Built solidly, the tallest of all of them, Charlie barely moved as Sam struggled to escape. “What about you, jack-a-dandy?”

  “Your mother’s a pork pie!”

  Henry jumped in then, which left Julian to sneak into the root beers early. Popping the top, he caught the foam as it spilled over the mouth of the bottle. That was the best part of any beer: its flavor distilled into effervescence.

  By the time the rest of his brothers came up for air, Julian had finished half a bottle, nailed the cap into the side of his stump-chair, and settled in by the fire. Gentle waves of heat washed his skin. Embers circled toward the stars, lightning bugs flashing along the lawn.

  This was a fine place, Charlie and Henry’s cottage at the far side of the farm.

  After staggering in, Sam flopped onto the ground. He tugged Henry’s pantleg. “Bring me a root beer?”

  “Nope,” Henry said, but fetched the basket anyway.

  Charlie took the stump closest to Julian. Always fussing, he moved Julian’s crutches back from the fire and kicked his foot a little. Charlie shrugged apologetically. “I’ll catch hell if you get burned.”

  Rolling his eyes, Julian moved a fraction of an inch, then gave Charlie a warning look. That was all the fretting he planned to put up with tonight.

  Still, Julian felt the slightest bit guilty, because Charlie had always been better than a brother. The first raspberries of the season were always his because Charlie brought them up from the riverbank for him. When they both still went to school, Charlie pulled him in a wagon so he wouldn’t have to walk the three miles into town.

  Raising his bottle, Julian nudged him. “Hope you got me something good for my birthday.”

  Serious, Charlie said, “I’m getting engaged.”

  “Told you,” Sam whispered near Julian’s ear.

  Henry nearly fell into the fire. “How come I’m just now finding out?”

  He and Charlie had built the cottage together, moving into it the minute Henry turned eighteen. Though they worked the family farm, they had a little slice of independence at the end of the day. They were a team; at least, they always had been.

  Sam hummed a funeral dirge, and Julian said, “You sure don’t sound happy about it.”

  “I got called up.” Pulling an envelope from his back pocket, he waved it listlessly. There was no missing the War Department’s seal on the return address. “It’s not right to make Marjorie wait ’til I get back. Mama’s been saying she could use some help in the house, so I expect Marjorie’ll move in . . .”

  Pushing a hand into his hair, Henry sat back hard. “I don’t know what to say.”

  “It was bound to happen.” Charlie turned the envelope in his fingers, over and over, as if it might change shape or fly away. He had strong hands—broad fingers and wide palms. But they were gentle, and
it was hard to imagine them holding a rifle.

  “Well.” Sam flipped a bottle cap into the fire, then looked up. “Can I move in here, then?”

  Julian shoved him off the stump, and Henry tossed his hat after him. Charlie didn’t bother to intervene. He stared into the flames, his eyes reflecting shadows from the inside, and the out.

  Clapping a hand on Charlie’s shoulder, Julian waited for him to look over. “It’ll be all right. Papa said it’s about over but for the crying.”

  With a trace of a smile, Charlie cracked his knuckles. “I hope he’s right.”

  After that, they were quiet. Lips on bottles and a crackling fire joined the frogs and crickets, but the Birch brothers ruminated instead.

  Julian ached. He’d read so many accounts of mustard gas attacks that he’d had nightmares about it. Men trapped in trenches, poison rolling over them . . . It made Julian sick to think of Charlie out there among them.

  Sam rose to his feet. “All right, girls, quit your belly­aching.”

  Henry scowled. “I hope Mama hears you say that.”

  Sam ignored him, turning to Julian. His bright eyes shone as he clapped his hands, as if warming up to something. There was an air of carnival barker to him, that same big, bright personality that drove girls mad and drove his brothers to distraction. “Julie, do your trick for us.”

  Incredulous, Julian stared at him. “You go take a leap.”

  Charlie cleared his throat. Rubbing his hands together, he still gazed into the fire, but he said, “I could stand to see it again.”

  Since Charlie wanted it, it would happen. Like that, Sam and Henry went to work looking for suitable subjects. Julian watched them, darting into the cottage and out, turning over stones and peering under the porch. It only took a few minutes for them to return to the circle.

  Henry stood back as Sam thrust a rusty pie tin into Julian’s lap. Somehow, those mad beasts had found three beetles, a lightning bug, and a salamander—all dead.

  Sliding to the ground, Julian leaned against the stump. Slowly, he raised the tin to eye level. When he drew his next breath, he tasted dust and ash. Inhaling until his lungs burned, Julian courted an uncertain sensation. It felt like his tether to the earth might slip; he was a balloon dancing on a string. Then, at once, he blew across the still bodies in the tin.

  One by one, they flickered to life. Tiny legs trembled, and the beetles flipped themselves over. Even in this faint light, their iridescent shells shimmered. With a rattle, they spread their wings and flew off.

  A faint glow signaled the lightning bug’s return. As it staggered along the plate, its flashes coming brighter and faster, the salamander opened its eyes. Wary, it blinked and breathed but refused to move. Sam touched its tail, but it clung to the illusion of death.

  “Take it,” Julian said, shoving the plate into Charlie’s hands. The wave was coming. He steeled himself, then slumped into darkness. Perfect night consumed him—no light, no stars. No sound, no breath. Nothing, he was simply nothing, forever, and for a moment.

  Suddenly, a streak of sunset spread in the distance. The girl turned again, her hair flowing like water. It was black but for a lone wave of silver that threaded itself among the rest. She was a siren; her gaze slipped right into him.

  For the first time, he saw her details; he tasted honeysuckle on the wind. Since the very first time Julian had used his gift, she’d been waiting for him. Now he had the reeling sensation that she was alive; real—truly waiting for him. She reached for him—

  And then he opened his eyes. For a split second, Julian felt every part of his body waking. It was like a machineworks grinding back to motion. Blood pounded in his ears, every hair prickled. Muscles burned and learned to stretch again. It was pain and pleasure at once, one overwhelming moment of awareness.

  He was alive, he breathed—from his brothers’ perspective, he’d simply dropped his head and then raised it again.

  Whooping, Sam stepped over the fire, celebrating, and Henry carried the salamander back to the woodpile. But Charlie smoothed Julian’s hair back. He studied him with gentle eyes, a shadow cut into his brow.

  With a shake, Charlie asked, “All right?”

  Hoping his big brother had seen what he needed to, Julian simply nodded.

  ***

  Nathaniel leaned against the wall, gazing out the window. The first shades of dawn weren’t on them yet, but their guests had tottered home. It was a chance to listen to the house settle. To the sea in the distance. To the wear of Amelia’s feet across the thick Persian rug.

  “Why don’t you let me rub your neck?” he asked, following the ghost of Amelia’s image in the glass.

  “I don’t understand her, Nate,” Amelia replied. Her silken dressing gown puffed like a sail when she threw up her hands. “I have no idea what would make her happy.”

  Lips barely moving, Nathaniel said, “I don’t know that you’re supposed to.”

  Amelia narrowed her eyes at him. “Oh, such composure. As if you weren’t apoplectic when you caught her kissing that boy in Paris.”

  “That jackal, you mean.”

  “I said what I meant. I always do.”

  She dared him to argue, then stood. Drifting back to him, she slipped her arms round his waist. Pressed her cheek to his shoulder. The familiar warmth of his skin soothed her.

  “Amelia,” he murmured, covering her arms with his own.

  Melting against his back, Amelia sighed. “I’m waiting for the inevitable disaster.”

  That truth, finally spoken, hung heavy between them. Turning in her arms, Nathaniel rested his brow against hers. His fingertips walked her back, trailing up into the tangle of her hair. “Did you see something?”

  The moment he asked, he wished the question back. The last time Amelia had peeked at the future, it was 1889, and thereafter, everything went to pieces. That summer had burned her so completely, she hadn’t looked since—no matter how tempting.

  Amelia said, “No, I lived it.”

  “Of course you did. Didn’t we all?”

  She kissed him, and lips still clinging, she whispered on his mouth, “Take me somewhere.”

  Folding around her, Nathaniel pulled them into the wind. It had grown easier over the years. Once, he’d had to will the elements to part for him. There was force to it. A certain sharp-toothed deliberation.

  Now, over continents and decades, carrying Amelia and Kate, it took nothing at all to move them. In fact, sometimes it seemed harder for him to stay in place.

  When the dark parted around them, they stood on the balcony of a tower. Robe billowing, Amelia closed her eyes and leaned into the wind. It was cooler here, and it carried the perfume of warm figs.

  “Better?” Nathaniel asked.

  She nodded, fingers curled around the wrought-iron rail. As her hair pulled free, she shook it from her face, staring resolutely into the distance. “I always thought if we made sure she saw everything, experienced everything . . .”

  With a sideward glance, Nathaniel said, “Then what?”

  Frustrated, she threw up her hands. “I don’t know, Nate. I don’t know. Happily ever after? Nothing would ever go wrong again? I don’t know.”

  “What can she possibly do with an extra thirty seconds that she couldn’t do without it?” It was the first time he’d asked the question aloud. Until then, it had been a private shield, a perfect curve of steel to keep him from wondering too much, worrying too much.

  Turning to Nathaniel, Amelia curled her fingers round his wrist, counting the beats of his heart. “In the beginning, I saw a single vision at a time. Look what became of it.”

  Nathaniel pursed his lips, then after a moment said, “Do you know what I think?”

  “Far too often, but please, do go ahead.”

  “If she were the very same girl that she is at this moment, but stripped of her silver hair and ability to stop time”— he squeezed Amelia’s arms gently—“we’d still be having this conversation.”

&
nbsp; A soft sigh on her lips, Amelia rested against his shoulder once more. Exhaustion rippled through her. It had been a long night: too many people, too many emotions.

  Weary, she closed her eyes and asked, “Why are you such a monster?”

  Nathaniel kissed her brow and gathered her again. Holding the wind off long enough to reply, he filled her ears with the low, dark honey of his voice and the only answer he ever gave: “How else would you have me?”

  Five

  The next evening came, and hurricane lamps cast a warm glow across the Birches’ backyard. Sweet hickory smoke wound toward a cloudless sky, and Zora carried a pitcher of mint lemonade from the kitchen.

  Adding it to an already laden table, Zora laughed when Emerson abandoned his grill to pick her up. He spun her gently, flashes of calico and lace swirling, then dropped her back to her feet. Beckoned by the curve of her neck, he answered with one kiss, and then two.

  “I wonder who that is,” Zora said, catching his arm and holding him in place. “I hope it’s my husband.”

  “Were you expecting him, ma’am?” Emerson asked.

  Laughing, Zora nudged him with her shoulder. Then she settled beneath the sheltering curve of his body. He smelled of smoke and sweat, and beneath that, clean, new earth. She swayed with him, smiling at the party that sprawled across her lawn.

  Sam stood on his hands, showing off for a cloud of pretty, perfumed girls from town. From his sprawl on a bench, Henry picked through a bowl of ambrosia salad as he talked with one of the Hawkins boys.

  Brow furrowing, Zora asked, “Do you see Julian?”

  Emerson kissed her neck again. “Nope.”

  Amused, Zora rephrased her question. “Do you know where Julian is?”

  “Yep.”

  “Em,” Zora said, and slipped out of his arms. She backed away from him, plucking up a pair of salad tongs to brandish. He straightened to his full height, then took a step toward her. Warning, Zora repeated, “Em!”

  “Zo,” he replied. His boot fell heavy on the porch, another stride closer.