Elements of Power (Council of the Harvest Moon Book 1)

by Kate Stoessel

  “Open it,” I suggested.

  As she gently opened the cover, her eyes fell on the inscription.

  Dear Madame Spine,

  There are not many up to the task of being a Time Traveler. I am so happy that Khlorie has you there to guide her. For the lessons of time teach us to be patient, empathetic, and open-minded.

  Happy Travels,

  Henry Bishop

  Tears came to Madame Spine’s eyes and she reached over the reception desk and pulled me into a tight hug. When I got her to release me, Perry and I waved goodbye and walked out into the night.

  “Well, you made her year.” Perry said, squeezing my hand as we walked. I smiled at that but couldn’t focus. I released my hand from his and twiddled it nervously.

  “Perry, there’s something I’ve been meaning to ask you,” I began hesitantly as we began approaching the cottages.

  “Anything,” he responded simply.

  “How did you know where I was that night?”

  “I’ve been wanting to talk with you about that," he sighed. Taking a deep breath, he started to answer. “I could just feel your fear and I knew where you were.”

  “Feel my fear? Like an empath?”

  “Not exactly. I did feel a bit of how you were feeling, but it was like we were connected by a…”

  “A tether?” I ventured.

  “Yes, exactly like that.” He responded. “I just walked in the direction the tether led me. Orpheus sensed your panic through me and insisted on coming. There’s more.” He paused and turned towards me before continuing. “It kind of stuck, Khlorie. I always know where you are now. I can just sense you. It’s like another power.” He ran his hand through his hair, a nervous tick I was realizing. “How do you feel about that?”

  “Do you always know what I am feeling?”

  “No. That only happened the one time. Most of the time you are just this beacon on the end of our tether. I wish I knew what you were feeling now,” he added sheepishly as we reached my cottage.

  “I guess, I kind of like the idea. It’s nice knowing that someone important to you knows where you are. Just promise not to do anything weird.” He laughed, the tension leaving his body. Warmth radiated off him. I stepped closer. “Do you think that you can sense me because we are both elementals?”

  “No,” he said, leaning down until his face was inches from mine. “I don’t think that is why.” His lips captured mine swiftly, and I met him eagerly, circling my arms around his neck.

  “Khlorie, can you guys do this later? We need to get ready.” Itzel stood at the door smiling broadly. “My plan relies heavily on outfit choice.”

  “We need to find a better place to kiss,” I said quietly. “We keep getting interrupted here.”

  “I have some ideas,” he replied flirtily. “Goodbye my dieramai.”

  “You’ll see her in thirty minutes. This is a lot,” Itzel laughed before yanking me into the cottage. “I already went through your closet and picked out an outfit that looks like it’s right for a party and will work for training. De nada.”

  Laughing, I got dressed in the Itzel approved outfit and spelled myself some makeup and a side braid. When I was done, I emerged to find that my cottage was full. Orpheus and Anubis were making sure that everyone had a set of magical ear protection. Lavinia and Viv were insisting that Westin hide his weapons, and Itzel was moving between everyone reminding them of the plan.

  “Here,” she told Westin. “You can carry the drinks and hide your weapons inside. It’s supposed to be a party. No one brings knives to a party. Just do it. ¡Por el amor de Dios!”

  Perry arrived last, his hair still wet from a shower. His blue eyes found mine first and he smiled brightly in my direction. Viv sighed, looking at him. She pulled him into a quiet, but intense conversation in the corner of the kitchen. I was too far away to hear what they were saying, but Perry was actively disagreeing.

  “Remember,” Itzel told everyone, refocusing my attention. “Just act natural. We are not trying to avoid the marshals. We are trying to get them to avoid us. ¡Vamonos!”

  As a group, we marched into the night talking happily. Itzel and Orpheus lead the way, with Westin, Viv, and Lavinia bringing up the rear. Perry figured that I was likely to draw the most attention, so he asked me to stay in the middle of the group. He draped his arm over my shoulders to make me even harder to spot. I was not complaining. The plan worked perfectly, with the marshals on duty barely giving us a second look. When we got to the glade, Orpheus and Westin lifted Itzel up like a conquering hero, before Perry got everyone’s attention.

  “Ok, tonight we are going to try some team magic games,” he announced smiling. We are breaking into two teams. Each team will have four batons to hide somewhere in their half of the woods. The team that collects all four of their opponent’s batons first wins. Full powers expected. The only rule is to not cross the halfway line until both teams agree to begin. With a wave of his hand, a glittering line bisected the woods.”

  “What are the teams?” Westin called out.

  “We are keeping the study groups together and then splitting the remaining players,” Orpheus answered. “Team One is going to be Itzel, Anubis, Lavinia, Westin, and me. Team Two is going to be Khlorie, Perry, and Viv.”

  “That doesn’t seem fair,” Westin said. “They have two less people.”

  Perry laughed, “I’m not worried about it.”

  Once the timer started for us to hide our batons, the team huddled up to talk strategy. We decided to keep the batons in the same general vicinity, so we could defend them, but put them in very different places. Perry took one and used his air powers to hide it atop the tallest tree we could find. I opened a hole in the earth three feet deep to hide another, planting a flower on top of it so we could find it again later. Viv put one out in plain sight to lure the other team into her illusions. For the last one, I bored a hole in a giant boulder just the size of the baton and sprouted some ivy to cover it up.

  “That doesn’t seem fair,” Viv called as she watched me hide the last baton.

  “Well, Itzel can just command us to get the batons. There is no use in making this easy on them.”

  Perry asked Viv to play defense and keep the other team from locating our batons with her illusions, while he and I got to search. Once Perry reviewed everyone’s powers for me and we settled on a game plan, we met up with the other team at the forest’s halfway mark.

  “Should we shake hands before we start,” Orpheus asked mischievously, trying to get some inside information.

  Westin began counting us in for the start of the game and my powers were buzzing excitedly inside me, ready to be let loose. When the game started, Perry and I hit the other team’s line with a wall of air, kicking them back to the edges of the glade. While they were knocked out, Viv plunged them into an illusion that was meant to drive them in the wrong direction. With Itzel and Anubis discombobulated, we were able to get past their most dangerous witches and begin our search. Searching for Lavinia, I noticed that she must have shifted before we knocked down the group.

  “Go ahead,” I called to Perry. As he took off into the forest, I scanned the dimly lit glade for signs of Viv’s girlfriend. I had never seen her in her mist form, but it was a crystal-clear night. So, when a low cover of white, fog-like mist darted across my peripheral vision, I knew it was her. Acting quickly, I called up a breeze to blow her back towards her team’s half of the forest. With a circular motion of my hands, I trapped her in a small, but fast-moving wind tunnel. Biting my cheek and rocking back on my heels, I hoped that Lavinia would not be feeling the effects of being tossed violently by the wind. Did conscious mist have pain sensors or get dizzy? I wasn’t sure. Deciding it was probably ok, I turned to run after Perry. Only steps into the forest, my legs got swept out from under me with a kick. Landing on my back, I looked up to see Westin. He had quickly bounced back from the air attack and was now standing over me knives in hand. I was a little offended that with
all of the firepower on their team, Westin was the one that they sent after me. However, underestimating him was proving dangerous. He lunged forward and I rolled away, barely escaping as the edge of his knife skimmed my clavicle. Jumping up to my feet, I was regretting refusing to take combat with Brigid at Gables. Westin stamped down hard on my foot to distract me, before grabbing my arms to try to keep me from casting. Unfortunately for him, I was no longer limited by the casting rules of witchcraft. Remembering how Evans, the fire fairy, had set his arms aflame, I allowed my fire power to light up my captive hands. As the flames danced up my arms, the fire reached where his hands gripped me and engulfed them. Forced to jerk back, I had enough distance to knock him backwards with the air element. With Westin out of the way, I moved forward, searching for Perry. As I ran through the forest, however, it was eerily quiet. I could not pick up any sounds of another person. Blinking quickly, as if it would help me spot Perry, I began sprinting through the woods. Something was not right. When I reached the edge of the forest, I forced myself to calm down. Taking a few deep breaths, I began to strategize in my head. As clarity found its way back to my brain, I noticed something on the very edges of my consciousness. Investigating further, I began to feel a tug as if a rope was tied around my midsection. The tether. Focusing on the connection, another consciousness came into my mind. I could feel Perry! But he wasn’t moving. Fear pooling inside me, I took off through the underbrush to locate him. Every couple of steps, I checked our tether to make sure I was going in the right direction. Still sensing no movement, I broke into a run, forgetting all about the game in my quest to find Perry.

  When I reached my trainer, he was laying asleep at the bottom of a tree with Anubis standing guard. With a wave of my hand, a tree branch swung down and grabbed Anubis by the waist, pulling him about 8 feet off the ground and holding him securely against the trunk. When I was pretty sure that I was out of Anubis' sleep-mojo range, I conjured an orb of cold water and dropped it unceremoniously on Perry. He jerked up and looked at me.

  “Anubis,” he warned. I smiled and pointed up in the tree.

  “Handled it.” I replied. Perry followed my gaze up and laughed.

  “I see that.” His eyes travelled back down to my dress, which had burn marks on the sleeves and a slice under the neckline where Westin’s knife had gotten too close. “What happened? Are you okay?”

  “I’m fine,” I replied. “It was my own fire and getting a bit too close to Westin’s knife.”

  “He pulled a knife on you?” Perry's face darkened and anger filled his features. A rough wind kicked up.

  “Well, yeah. I have fireballs. He heals. What else was he going to do?”

  “He should have never tried to hurt you.” The wind started searching through the trees and I knew Perry was looking for Westin.

  “Westin is not our focus right now. Finding their batons is the focus. I have to imagine we are close since Anubis was standing guard here.”

  My words didn’t register at all with Perry, however. “My focus is anyone who hurts you.” Perry shouted, consumed by anger. While I had seen him mad before, this was almost comical in scope. That was when it clicked for me.

  “Listen to me Perry. This is Orpheus in your head, making you angry. He’s trying to distract you. You need to snap out of it.” I grabbed both of his cheeks, but he shook me off and stalked off after his prey.

  “Orpheus,” I called into the darkness. “You’d better follow him and make sure he doesn’t end Westin. I don’t know if even an indestructible boy can live for very long without air. Do you?”

  A rustle off to my side told me that Orpheus heard me and was, hopefully, off to stop his friend from doing anything permanent.

  Realizing that I was on my own, and not wanting to let Viv down, I decided to try to use some of my powers. After all, that was the point of the exercise. Reaching down into the soil, I connected with nature all around me. Feeling the lifeforce of the whole forest, I commanded any natural hiding place to reveal its batons. With my other hand, I sent a gust of wind to retrieve any that might come into the open. A tree regurgitated one from its hollow, another popped up out of a burrowed den, a third was tossed from a large bush. Being an Earth elemental kind of meant that I had home field advantage. I laughed as I gathered the three batons.

  I was about to search for the last one when I was knocked off kilter by a violent shift in the world around me. The air shimmered and twisted. Up was down and down was up. The colors of the forest blended together until the forest around me was replaced by a dank, plastic cell. On the other side of the bars was Viv.

  “Hi Khlorie,” she said.

  “Viv, you’re on my team. We only need one more baton and this is over.”

  “There are more important things than a silly game,” she called. Her eyes were glazed over. No longer was her fierce intelligence discernable in their depths. She stood just a little too erect to be natural.

  “Itzel is controlling you.” I called to Viv, trying to snap her out of it. “Perry!” I started yelling. “Perry!”

  “Itzel wants me to keep you busy until they find all of the batons. She suggested that we find something to talk about.” She motioned to a plastic folding chair that appeared in my cell. “There is something I have been wanting to say.”

  “Viv, I’m not sure this is the time to have a heart to heart.”

  “I like you,” she began. “I really do. So, I want you to know that this is nothing personal.”

  “Thanks, I think. I like you too.” Conjuring an orb of water, I shot it at her, trying to snap her back to reality. She simply stood there, a drenched sentinel. “That wasn’t personal either.”

  “You need to leave Perry alone.” Viv said calmly, oblivious to the water dripping off her face and body. “He was supposed to stay away from you as much as possible. That was the plan.” She sighed. “He only lasted a few weeks. Guys have no self-control. Although, he’s usually more level-headed than this.” She squinted, as if examining me. “Your relationship is going to end up getting him and his mother locked up in some ACC hellhole, if they are lucky.”

  “What are you talking about Viv?” Listening carefully, I gave up trying to escape for the moment. I knew that Viv had been worried about something. I wanted to hear her out.

  “He loves you. That is obvious. He’s never been serious about anyone before. Did you know that?” I shook my head. “People have always gravitated to him and wanted to be with him, but he’s been mostly oblivious. Not with you, though. He has been hyper aware of you since the day you met.”

  “That’s how it’s been for me too. Frankly, I am not sure how any of this is your business.”

  She continued as if I hadn’t spoken. “I’m happy for you both. I am. But being with you puts him under scrutiny, and his family cannot afford that.” There was a note of pleading in her voice and concern creased her beautiful features. “When he told everyone he had feelings for you at the Health Center, I wanted to throttle him. That Marshal is never going to let you two be together, and he is certainly not going to vanish Morrigan Lethestone’s daughter. Perry just put a huge target on his own back. It’s just a matter of time now. I’ve asked him to leave, but he won’t.”

  “Marshal Trackerson has never cared who I dated,” I replied.

  “He cares now that you are different,” Viv paused, letting that sit with me. “Can you honestly tell me that Marshal Trackerson and your mother didn’t look into Perry the minute they knew he had feelings for you?”

  I couldn’t say that. “All they found were some old records about Perry’s mom at Supernatural equality rallies. That is hardly incriminating.”

  “They will keep digging,” Viv replied standing up on the other side of the bars. I walked closer to her.

  “What will they find?” I could feel the pieces falling into place. There was a secret about Spindlewick that I did not know. It had to be connected.

  “The truth,” she whispered. “About Perry’
s father.”

  “Itzel!” Called a voice from somewhere outside the illusion. “Find Itzel and Perry now!” I could feel Orpheus’s power seeping into the illusion. Viv closed her eyes, tightening her hold on the reality she created. Orpheus’ voice faded to nothingness and his powers recoiled.

  “What is the truth about Perry’s father?” I asked, knowing we only had minutes before Itzel came and released Viv.

  “Perry’s father is a fairy.”

  “That can’t be,” I replied, my mouth falling open in shock. “It’s illegal. That would make Perry half…” I couldn’t even finish the statement. I collapsed on the cold plastic floor of the cell. My muscles went rigid as I processed this news. If this was true, Perry would absolutely be in as much danger as Viv predicted. No one could ever know.

  “Did you really believe that propaganda about elemental powers being the evolution of witchcraft? You never wondered whether something else was going on?”

  “Wait.” I looked up at her, breath escaping me. “Are you saying that you think that I am part fairy too?” I couldn’t keep the incredulity from my voice.

  “I know you are,” Viv added confidently. “That’s why the ACC will never let you be together.”

  “That’s ridiculous,” I cried. “I knew both of my parents. They were witches.”

  “Perry thinks it is your father’s mother. What do you know about her?” Viv asked.

  “He talked to you about this?” She nodded and I hung my head. “I never met her. My mother told me that she died in childbirth.” I paused, remembering the silly stories he would tell me as a child. “But Grandpa Bishop always told me that she was a beautiful princess that he met on his travels. He said that she was the most powerful woman he had ever met and that they could not be together because he was not royal. He would enchant marionette puppets to act out the love story as he told it.” The sweet memory danced through my mind. Enough doubt crept in, however, to puncture the glossy mental images of the marionettes.

  “A fairy princess, perhaps” Viv prompted. As she spoke, my hands started to shake.