The Calling

by Destiny Hawkins

  Sora, on the other hand, wasn’t experiencing any of these symptoms. She sat across from me with her eyes closed, hands in mine, with zero goosebumps and not one sweat bead on her forehead.

  The wave of euphoria shot through me again, causing me to tense. I tried to control my shaking but couldn’t help it. My eyes closed while rolling back, and the space suddenly grew hotter, but when the sensation was gone, that was it. Nothing special happened, and none of my energy emerged.

  Soren walked in with a small plastic cup of water for me. “You need to cool down.”

  I leaned my head back to look up at him when Sora grabbed my attention.

  “Focus, Rayah,” she commanded.

  I sighed. “I don’t know what I’m focusing on.”

  Sora looked up at me with a twinge of annoyance in her eyes. “Your energy, can’t you feel it?”

  Already beginning to feel like a let-down, I shook my head. “No. I still feel the same way I felt a half-hour ago.” I lowered my eyes and my voice. “Empty.”

  Soren slid his hand over my shoulder before pouring cold water over my head. It soaked into my hair and drizzled down my back with only a little running over my face. “Shut your eyes…and relax,” he soothed. “Feel the different temperatures, then only focus on the one that makes you more comfortable. Hot, or cold?”

  I swallowed and focused on the cold liquid flowing over my face and onto my lap, but then my mind went straight to the pool of icy water that Artemis dunked me in during pain testing. I thought of drowning…not breathing. My heart pounded as I replayed that horrible day in my mind, remembering the fear of drowning every time that he dunked me under the water.

  “Your energy is becoming hard to connect with,” Sora stated. “Try the other temperature.”

  I tried pushing away those dreadful memories, but the ones of me being burned with hot irons came crashing back. Artemis burned my face, my legs, my arms, and my stomach, and because of that, anything that reminded me of being burned became a complete distraction. Sometimes, I couldn’t even move.

  The space suddenly began to feel cold, causing me shiver. It was hard to focus on one temperature when I was feeling both with high intensity, and it was even harder when my thoughts kept shifting from one torture method to the other.

  I screamed the day Artemis burned me and was extremely close to crying. Not only because of the pain, but because I didn’t understand why I had to suffer so much. Why did I have to be so different, and why did the gods choose to make me the only lightless descendant.

  “I can’t feel your energy anymore.” Sora sighed.

  When I opened my eyes, I was looking into hers. I thought that I would find disappointment, but instead, I read sadness. Pity.

  “Well, we can try again,” I suggested, even though I really didn’t want to. I had had enough frustration for the night.

  “Not tonight.” Sora offered a half-hearted smile. “You need to rest, but we can try again once you come back.”

  I nodded, then turned to Soren who was sitting down again. He was watching me with curiosity displayed across his face, and so was Emerald, who I had forgotten was even still in the tent.

  “Once you figure out what’s been holding you back, then you’ll be able to use your powers,” Emerald said. “But it’s something that you have to figure out on your own. Deep within you there is strength, you just have to find it.”

  I nodded, slightly comforted by her words. “Do you really think that this will help my energy emerge?”

  Emerald smiled a knowing smile. “I can’t guarantee it, but I do hope that this helps. You can try again when you’re ready. Sora is more than willing to help you.”

  When I turned back to Sora, she nodded in confirmation.

  Soren jumped back to his feet. “Well, is that all for tonight, Grandmother?”

  “Yes.” Emerald sighed, finally growing tired. “You two may leave.”

  I slowly stood to my feet, unexpecting my legs to feel like noodles and stumbled backwards out of the tent, then crashed back down onto my bottom. Soren and Sora both walked out laughing, and I couldn’t help but to smile. They’re laughter was never cruel and somehow always made me feel apart. Like I was a new addition to the family.

  “One of the many effects of energy flowing,” Sora chuckled before helping me to my feet. “Your legs are going to feel like noodles for a little while, but it’ll fade soon.”

  I gave a slight smile. “I hope so.”

  Vexodus walked over to me and nudged my cheek with his nose.

  “Hey buddy,” I said rubbing over him. “I’ve missed you.” I didn’t realize just how dizzy I was actually feeling until I stood upright. I felt drowsy but like I was floating at the same time and could see how energy flowing could become addicting. “You are such a good horse,” I said as I continued to pet him. “And you’re mine.”

  I wasn’t feeling like myself at all, which seemed like a good thing at this point. I was going to enjoy my time in the Wild Lands through unfocused eyes and a new perspective.

  “Come on, Rayah,” Soren chuckled. “Let’s get you back to my tent.”

  When he gently grabbed my bicep, I turned to him to speak, but my mouth dropped. His eyes weren’t glowing at the moment, but they were still beautiful, and his hair was made of vibrant golden curls.

  “You look like a god,” I said in almost a whisper.

  Sora burst out laughing before walking away, leaving Soren with a slightly embarrassed look on his face. After a few seconds, he picked me up and held me tight against his chest, then carried me back to his tent and gently put me down on my mat before lying down on his.

  I was on my back when I turned my head to face him. Surprisingly, he was already watching me. Or, maybe that wasn’t so surprising?

  “Everything will be okay,” Soren reassured.

  Suddenly, emotions that I kept hidden deep inside of me crashed at full force. It was as if one moment I was actually happy, and then the next, it all just vanished as if I wasn’t meant for happiness. I was only meant to feel a deep twisting sadness that would never truly go away. “You don’t know that, Soren.”

  Soren rolled over to his side and reached over to take my hand. His thumb caressed over the backside of it, and I enjoyed the feeling. It sent tingles up my arm, but internally it hurt. What about Tristan?

  “You shouldn’t,” I pulled my hand away, “do things like that.”

  Soren’s curious expression didn’t change, and I was glad. I didn’t want to hurt his feelings. It just felt wrong to get so close to another man that wasn’t Tristan. Even if I didn’t love him.

  A slight smile pulled at Soren’s lips. “So, do you really think that I look like a god?”.

  I opened my mouth to speak, but no words came through, causing Soren to laugh, and then his contagious laughter caused me to chuckle. “You’re alright. Maybe not god status. I don’t know what I was thinking when I said that.”

  “Well, maybe you were actually thinking that I look like a god, and you just don’t want to admit it now that the energy flowing effects are wearing off.”

  “I don’t even think that I meant to say that. I think I meant to say that you look like Cane.”

  Soren chuckled. “Well fine, if I look like Cane, then you look like Vexodus.”

  “I’ll take looking like a horse over a dog.” Laughing was odd, but I didn’t fight the feeling causing me to do it

  Laughing…I enjoyed it.

  —

  “What you were experiencing last night were heightened emotions,” Sora explained. She was sitting across from me in the middle of the open field next to the village. “It’s also a symptom of energy flowing, and one that Soren said you seemed to like?”

  I blushed and looked down at the green grass in between us. Although dark, the grass was greener than the grass in Lytonia, like it got the proper care it needed from nature itself. “It was…different.”

  Sora grinned. “He said that you laughed
yourself to sleep.”

  Thinking of last night, I couldn’t even remember actually falling to sleep. I just remembered laughing at something Soren said, and then complete darkness. I woke up in my dorm to get ready for another day, trained with Carmen, and then went to bed early to come back here.

  After a full day of thinking things over, I became determined to learn energy flowing so that I could use my powers. Emerald said that darkness wasn’t all that she saw, which meant that there was some light in me somewhere. I didn’t fully believe that I was dark inside in the first place, but a small part of me did, and I wanted to prove that part wrong.

  “So,” Sora picked my hands up from my knees and gave them a squeeze. “You ready to get started?”

  I nodded my head. My hair tickled my cheeks as a slight breeze blew by, reminding me that I took it out of its bun. I couldn’t stand having my hair pulled back into one, so I figured that where it’s allowed, I’d take full advantage of letting it hang loose. I also remembered how Soren watched me the first time he saw me with my hair down, and although a part of me felt wrong about it, I liked the attention.

  “Good.” Sora let up some of her grip and closed her eyes, then took a deep breath. As she exhaled, I felt something odd happen within me that I didn’t feel last night. I was instantly hot, starting from my chest before the heat slowly spread over my entire body. “Relax, Rayah.”

  I took in a deep breath as well and closed my eyes as I exhaled. I focused all of my attention on the heat building inside of me but wasn’t sure about which part of my body to focus on. Last night, I was just trying to feel my energy in one spot, but now it was everywhere, and I didn’t know where to start.

  “Just relax,” Sora said calmly. “Try and push your energy through to me. Think of an ocean wave. Push it forward, and then pull it back.”

  I had never seen ocean waves in person before, but I saw them in many books and videos during my free time. On the other side of the Lighter Nation there was an ocean that stretched further than you could see, and in the videos, I remembered how the waves rushed over the sand, and then pull back into the water. That was what I was trying to do with my energy, but I just couldn’t figure out how to push it.

  After a good hour passed, I didn’t even want to try anymore, but I also didn’t want to give up either. I just didn’t understand why energy flowing was so hard for me. I could feel her pushing her energy into me and then pulling it away, which was where the hot and cold feeling originated. When she pushed the energy into my body, I felt extremely hot, but when she pulled away, I became cold. It was as if there was nothing inside of me after she pulled her energy back.

  “Rayah,” Sora said in mild frustration.

  I opened my eyes, filling with disappointment. It looked as if Sora was just as tired as I was and probably wanted to call it quits for the night.

  Sora pushed some of her hair behind her ear, then rested on her knees with her elbows.

  The concerned expression on her face worried me. “What is it?”

  Sora sat back upright. “Your power is there, but it’s just not connecting with mine.” She sighed. “During this process, when my energy flows into you, it’s supposed to intertwine with yours and help pull it back into me as you’re pushing, but I can’t seem to grab any of it.”

  I bit my lower lip and looked towards the woods. “I don’t know why it’s this way. It isn’t normal, is it?”

  “No, but we’ll figure something out. You can’t give up so soon.”

  When I turned back to her, she was offering me a smile, and I wanted to smile back, but the thought of failing leveling in only a few months kept me from doing so.

  “Why don’t you let me give it a try?” Soren asked, standing a few feet away from us, to my left. Sora seemed to know that he was there, but this was my first time noticing him.

  Sora bit her lower lip in thought. She looked from Soren, to me, and then back to Soren. “That might just work.”

  I drew my eyebrows together. “What’s the difference between flowing with you and him?”

  Sora furrowed her eyebrows and looked to her brother, who just shrugged.

  “I have that magic touch that everyone needs.” he chuckled as he walked over to us.

  Sora pushed herself up onto her feet and dusted herself off. “I’ll leave it up to you, Soren.”

  “Don’t worry, I’ll get the job done.” Soren laughed before sitting down across from me.

  Sora scrunched up her nose. “Your always so confident.”

  Soren gave a handsome smug smile. “I get it from Dad.”

  “Ugh.” Sora waved at Soren. “Only thing is, Dad had a reason to be confident. You’re just—”

  “Handsome?” Soren chuckled. “Gorgeous? Vibrant?” He tilted his head. “I have a glow to myself, don’t I?”

  Sora rolled her eyes with a sigh, then blasted back to the village with a dark blue light trailing behind her.

  “You two always have something to argue about,” I stated.

  Soren shrugged. “Everyone needs a little drama in their life.”

  I grinned. “If you say so.”

  Soren grinned back before holding his hands out to me. “Come on, I’ll show you why I’m so confident.”

  I hesitantly took his hands. “It’s not because of your looks.” I was trying to mask my nervousness, but the instant sweating in my palms probably gave it away.

  “Says the girl who thinks that I look like a god.”

  “I meant Cane.”

  “Sure you did.” Soren straightened his shoulders before tightening his grip around my hands. “Now, whatever you were doing with Sora, try it again. I’m going to warn you though, I’m a lot stronger than my sister, so the impact you may feel might surprise you.” His voice was calm now, leaving no traces of sarcasm.

  “Okay.”

  When Soren closed his eyes, so did I, and then when he took a deep breath, I took mine. It took a moment, but the sudden rush of power that flowed into me instantly warmed my body. It wasn’t too hot, and when it flowed out of me, it wasn’t too cold. It felt good.

  I thought that because he was powerful, I would feel even hotter or colder than with Sora, but the sensation of his energy flowing into me was even more euphoric than before. It felt invigorating, like I could do anything.

  I could imagine his lime green light flowing through the darkness inside of me, trying to latch onto something but couldn’t quite grab anything. I didn’t see these images with Sora, but with Soren they were vibrant and vivid behind my eyes.

  I should try and connect my energy with his now. This might work.

  Now, I was concentrating. I focused on his energy flowing into me, reaching for something, but I couldn’t see what he was reaching for. There was just complete darkness. What confused me was that I could tell the difference between my energy and his, so I knew that it was there somewhere, but where?

  Soren’s wave of light moved through the darkness like thick smoke, but then drifted away, grabbing nothing for the second time. Disappointment and anger began to fill me as I considered that this wasn’t going to work. I knew that I was giving up too soon, but this was embarrassing. People were wrong about me being strong. How could I be, with the way that I was now?

  “Don’t give up,” Soren’s voice echoed in my mind.

  The very sound of his voice ignited something within me. It was a small spark, but it would soon grow into a beautiful flame. I could see it trying to form, sparking in the darkness, and when Soren’s green wave came back, that spark did just what I hoped that it would do. It sparked into a blue flame that swirled around Soren’s light, coloring it with a royal blue.

  A smile crept up my lips as I watched it swirl around in my mind. I could feel it. I used this moment to get a hold of my energy, and then pushed it into Soren. His hands tightened around mine, but then he lightened his grip when I pulled it back. I was instantly happy that I was able to control my powers for even that moment, but wha
t I saw next struck fear inside me like never before. My blue light that was swirled into his green was no longer blue, but red. It was a beautiful and yet terrifying sight, because red was not one of the three standard colors. What is this!?

  I dropped Soren’s hands and opened my eyes. When I did, I thought that I’d be looking at Soren, but instead my eyes were on a dull white ceiling. For some reason, I had jumped back to Lytonia.

  When I sat up, I kicked my legs over the bed and dug my fingers into the thin mattress. What was that? “What’s wrong with me?” When I lifted my head to look into the mirror, I noticed that my eyes were glowing a vibrant royal blue. There were no traces of black in my eyes. Just blue, but…I wasn’t born with blue eyes. My eyes were green.

  “Stop,” I whispered. I closed my eyes for a few seconds, and when I opened them, they were no longer glowing. They were green and back to the way that they were supposed to be. I’m losing it. The stress must have finally been getting to me. I wasn’t used to feeling so many emotions at once, or giving up on myself so easily, and I definitely wasn’t used to hallucinating. Maybe it really was just stress causing me to see these things.

  I scooted back against the wall and pulled my knees up to my chest. I didn’t want to go back to sleep in fear that I’d jump back to Soren. He was who I wanted to be next to right now, but after what I saw, or what I thought I saw－it wasn’t normal, and it made me feel disgusted. I was disgusted with myself.

  —

  “You look exhausted,” Carmen said as we walked to our first class together.

  “I didn’t sleep well last night,” I said in a low voice.

  I could see Carmen’s expression turn to worry in my peripheral. “Why not?”

  I shrugged. “I just have a lot on my mind”

  She offered a smile. “Well, you know that you can tell me whatever is going on.”

  “No, I can’t.” I didn’t mean to say it with such anger, or at all for that matter. I wasn’t the type to take my anger out on my friends, especially since I had very little of them.