by Lucia Ashta
There was no one around to hear him air my secret, or to see his tears. Rane didn’t cry often, too concerned about being strong enough to fill the role of our missing father in the family. But he cried openly now. “By the oasis, I can see you.” His words were thick with emotion.
It was contagious. After a lifetime of believing I’d be invisible forever, Dean had seen me. Now Rane was seeing me. Did I dare to believe I’d become a true part of the world I’d wanted to join for longer than I had memory? “You can see all of me, like Dean did?”
Rane nodded, a few strands of his long, dark hair pulling free of the tie that held it back.
“Every bit of me?” I tried to grasp the concept and failed.
“Every bit.” He smiled through the tears. “You definitely didn’t bother primping before you left the house, did you?” He was teasing as I had teased him a million times, but there was a truth to it too. I’d never before afforded a single thought to my appearance. There had never been reason to.
“I can see you too,” Traya said, moving to stand behind Rane. “Nir, you really are beautiful. You’re stunning.”
Well, so was she.
Rane said, “Of course she is. She looks exactly like me.”
I laughed through my own tears, wiped at my nose, and swatted at my twin—the one who looked just like me.
17
As soon as Dean drew within earshot, I called out to him across the rock clearing. “Why can you see me now? What’s changed?” My tears had dried by then, and I was grateful. I didn’t want to appear weak in front of the fierce dragon charmer now that he could see me. He can see me. The realization echoed through my mind. Rane can see me. Traya can see me. They can see me. Holy crapola, they can see me! I’m not invisible anymore.
“That’s something only you can figure out,” Dean said.
That wasn’t the response I’d been looking for. I wanted answers—real answers—to account for the challenges of my life. “I need more than that, Dean.” I risked sounding impetuous. “I’ve lived with my... condition all my life—until now. What’s the difference?”
He was close enough now that I could make out the features of his face beneath the moonlight, the one that always made me think of faithum, even when I wasn’t supposed to. He looked worried. No, that wasn’t it. Maybe he was just tired, or maybe it was something else entirely. I didn’t know the man well enough to read him, and just then, he was inscrutable, when I needed him to be the exact opposite.
He crouched down next to Rane, Traya, Rosie, and me and said, “I’m honestly not certain what caused this sudden change in you.”
I glared at the intimidating dragon charmer. I needed answers. More than any other time in my life, I needed to understand. How could something that had seemed to punish me for so long be fickle? How could something I’d come to accept as my fate in life disappear like a wisp of smoke?
He chuckled—he actually laughed at me!—and said, “All right. Clearly you need some kind of answer before you’ll release me from that ferocious glare you have going on.”
I wasn’t used to being careful with my expressions or how much they revealed of my thoughts and emotions.
“If I were to guess,” he started, and I trained all my faculties on him. I leaned forward to catch every nuance of his explanation, even if it was a guess. “I’d say that your state of invisibility, or visibility in this case, is fluctuating because you’ve started exploring your connection to faithum.”
“Are you saying I could have done that at any point before now and become visible, and saved myself from so much grief?”
“No, I’m not saying that. Things happen only when we’re ready for them. You weren’t ready to connect with faithum before now, or you would have done it.”
“But I could have.”
“Aye, you could have, just as you might have done a million other things. What matters is that you didn’t. You only did it yesterday. And so yesterday was the right time for this next step in your personal evolution.”
“My personal evolution? You sure say things in a way I’ve never considered them.”
“Perspective changes everything. Two people can experience the same events and see them in an entirely different way. One can find joy and blessing in what another cannot. Even if, say, those two people were to happen to be a set of forbidden twins—not that any of those exist.”
Dean’s face was deadpan. Nothing about him indicated that he knew he was addressing a set of such forbidden twins.
But Rane and I knew, and Traya obviously must have known. Rane, who remained seated next to me, stopped breathing. And even though he and I tried very hard not to reveal our reaction to what Dean had said, it was exactly this lack of reaction that gave it all away. We were too rigid, too indifferent, too... afraid to do anything more than stare back at the man who now held more than my own fate in his hands.
I never—ever—imagined it would happen, but now that I was visible, I wished to be invisible. I couldn’t afford to put Rane, and by extension Traya and Mother, at risk. When no one could see me, no one realized I looked just like Rane, not even me. That had been better than the lump of terror that blocked my throat.
The irony of my life wasn’t lost on me. When I was invisible, I only wanted to be seen. Now I wanted to fade into the glow of the moon.
I wished to be invisible.
“Uh, Nir, what’d you just do?” Rane, breathing again, asked in a shaky voice.
“What do you mean?” I was irritated, not with him, but the untenable situation of my life. There seemed to be no good way for me to exist. If I flipped that around, then the only good thing for the people I loved was for me to cease to exist. It was the only way to keep them from a danger I couldn’t entirely foresee.
“No. Don’t you think that.”
Rane’s voice was fierce. That was enough to snap me out of myself. “What are you talking about? You’re confusing me.”
“I don’t know exactly what you were thinking, but I picked up on the general idea. And you couldn’t be more wrong if you tried.”
“Oh geez thanks, my dearest loving brother.” But I realized what he was getting at, what he must have felt.
Dean’s sharp eyes were following the interaction.
“What I was getting at, before you had those ridiculous thoughts, is that you’re invisible again.”
An entire beat passed before what he said hit me. “What do you mean, I’m invisible?” I didn’t sound as sharp as I would have liked in front of a legend, but I couldn’t help myself.
But Rane didn’t treat me as if I were stupid. Better than anyone, he understood what I’d gone through as his invisible counterpart. “I can’t see you anymore.”
“And you?” I looked to Dean and Traya. When neither answered, assuming I was addressing the other, I huffed. “Dean and Traya, can you see me?”
Traya shook her head, her long hair scattering around her face and big eyes. Dean said, “I can’t, and that is most interesting.”
“What’s interesting about it?” I snapped, irritated at, well, everything.
“A fluctuation of your visibility, and invisibility, implies that you have some control over it—”
“I obviously have no control over it—or anything else, for that matter.” It was disrespectful to interrupt someone so much higher in rank than me, but I couldn’t get myself to care.
“That’s only because you’re not yet aware of the actions which triggered the response.”
I didn’t bother responding. No one wanted to hear what I was thinking. It was a lot of the swearing that Mother so disliked and censured us for.
“Something must’ve happened that caused the change.”
“I didn’t do anything.”
“You don’t realize what you did, but you definitely did something. Every action is really a reaction, a response to some force put into motion.”
I didn’t do anything. I didn’t bother repeating the thought aloud. D
ean obviously thought he knew better than I did what went on in my head.
“I’ll have to give it some more thought, but I think what’s likely is that you activated your faithum when you joined the other charmers to dispel the dragons, and now you’re triggering your faithum without yet being aware of what you’re doing to cause it.”
No, I’m not.
“Were you thinking anything that would make you become invisible again?”
“No, I wasn’t.”
“Don’t just respond, think. Remember. You didn’t say anything that would make it happen, but did you think it?”
“No, I didn’t. I didn’t think a single thing that would make this happen...” I trailed off. Oh crap. He’s right. I did think it. “I wished I were invisible.” My soft words were an awed whisper.
“And so that’s what you became.” Dean sat back on his heels with a triumphant look on his face.
18
Rane looked how I felt: totally and utterly flabbergasted that the one person, who’d had absolutely no control over her life, could wish for something and have it happen!
I wasn’t sure what the hell I thought anymore, and that’s exactly what Rane looked like, jaw slack, eyes wide, utterly speechless. He didn’t even try to hide his reaction, nor did I, but I was back to no one being able to see it.
Traya, my steady, kind sister, didn’t say a word. She continued to stare off into the openness that stretched into infinity, until the purple glow of the moon could no longer illuminate it.
Finally, in a shaky voice, I said, “That must have been how I made Rosie invisible that one time. I wished that I could do it to keep her safe.”
“But then what made you drop her invisibility?” Dean seemed to be the only one unaffected by my apparent connection to faithum.
“I... I think I grew frightened that I wouldn’t... that I wouldn’t be able to maintain her invisibility long enough.” As if Rosie realized I was speaking about her, she looked up at me, the only one to still appear to be able to see me.
“That makes sense,” Dean said while I thought, That actually makes no sense at all. But the fact that it made sense to someone was encouraging.
“Then will you please help me understand? After all this time of wondering and discovering no answers, it would be so important for me to understand how I am, and why I’m this way.”
He nodded curtly. “I’ll help you as much as I can. But there’s no time for all these questions now, including the one I imagine you’re forming now, as Rosie looks up at you, and clearly sees what the rest of us no longer do. The others are coming. Shula is on her way to inform me that our time has run out.”
I looked across the clearing, but saw no sign of Shula.
“But I’ll tell you something before she arrives, because the sooner you learn this, the better. The sooner all of you understand it, the stronger and more capable you’ll be. Fear was the problem when you weren’t able to maintain Rosie’s invisibility. Fear is always a problem, no matter the circumstances. Do you know why?”
“Because it keeps us from taking action?” Rane hazarded.
“Yes and no.”
“Because it impedes our ability to access all that we can when we’re outside of fear,” Traya said, finally turning to look at Dean.
“That’s close,” Dean said. “Do you want to guess, Anira?”
“No, thank you. I’d just like answers, correct answers. If we don’t have time for much, I’d like your answer.” When Dean just looked at me, following Rosie’s gaze, I imagined, I added, “Please.”
But it didn’t look as if he’d been waiting for good manners. I didn’t know what he’d been waiting for, but to my relief, he did answer. “Fear will always impede an action, along the lines of what Rane said. Not only is fear an unpleasant sensation, but it interferes with its opposite. And what is the opposite of fear?”
“Faith,” Traya said.
“Exactly. And faith is the basis of faith-um. That’s why it’s in the name for magic. When you’re in fear, you deny faith. Both can’t coexist. You have to choose between the two. It’s either fear or it’s faith, and only one of the two allows you to do faithum. The other denies it. When you’re in fear, you doubt you’ll succeed. Even if you hope you will, or you believe there’s a chance that you will, you’re also still accepting there’s a chance that you’ll fail. Meaning that you’re giving at least some energy to the possibility of failure. Faithum is basically energy manipulation. It’s the energy of our thoughts, words, and intentions. When you give energy to belief in failure, which is exactly what fear is, it’s that much more difficult for you to be confident of success. So the moment fear enters your consciousness in sufficient degrees to overshadow faith, you’ve lost the battle. But that doesn’t mean you’ve lost the war.” He smiled, as if that last statement were reassuring enough.
But I didn’t feel one bit reassured. If fear was that devastating that it had caused me to expose Rosie and indirectly cause all the mess we were in, then it just made me afraid I’d do it again. I was afraid I wouldn’t be able to not be afraid. I knew that was messed up, but it’s how it was.
“Does that all make sense?” Dean asked.
“Aye,” Traya said.
“I think so.” Rane sounded as if he was processing all that information.
Traya, Rane, and Dean looked in my direction. “And you, Anira?”
“It makes sense but—” I didn’t want to admit a weakness to this man, who’d already identified my failures.
“But?”
“But now I’m just afraid that I won’t be able to avoid fear when I need to.”
“That’s perfectly logical.”
How the hell is that logical?
“Like everything worthwhile in life, it takes practice. Unfortunately, there’s little time for it now. We’ll all just have to do the best we can.” He stood. “We’re out of time, though I do hope we have opportunity for more explanations and explorations before our time together is over.”
That sounded far too ominous for my liking, even if nothing in his tone suggested it.
“It’s fascinating to discover what you’re capable of. And if you’re capable of this level of faithum while still fully untrained, I wonder what your brother and sister are capable of, especially since you seem so... close.” The unspoken, Especially since you and Rane are twins, hung in the air, making me squirm—invisibly.
Dean turned toward the forest, which still smoldered, waiting. When Shula finally entered the clearing, and the purple moonlight illuminated her sure, hurried steps, I had to tear my thoughts away from the forest, from all that we’d lost already. Dean had said that I might be able to do something to help accelerate the forest’s healing, but I feared I wouldn’t be able to do a thing. And yes, there was that fear thing, and like an itch I didn’t want to scratch but couldn’t stop thinking of, I wanted to be rid of it, but wasn’t.
Shula moved quickly toward us, her hand at the hilt of her sword, though I didn’t spot any immediate danger. She started speaking even before she reached Dean. “They’ll be here in minutes.”
“How many?”
“Not enough. A third.”
“But most of them trained?”
“All of them. Not one trainee, except these two.”
“These three,” Dean corrected, and I was grateful to be counted even when invisible.
“Right. Sorry, Anira.”
“No problem,” I said. “I’m used to it.”
“And what do we do about Anira?” she asked.
“Do about me?” But apparently I was the only one not to understand.
“I guess that’s up to her,” Dean said to Shula. Then to me, “Are you revealing your existence to the tamers and charmers coming to join forces with us?”
Oh. That.
“Nir, you can’t,” Rane said. “That will just put you in danger.”
And him in danger, and therefore also Traya and Mother. It was the same argume
nt I’d hinged my secret existence on all my life. “I realize that. But what if I can’t maintain my invisibility anymore?” After a lifetime of wishing I weren’t invisible, worrying that I might not be it was just... odd. Since introducing myself to Dean, everything routine about my life had been upended. The comfort I’d experienced in my invisibility, without even realizing it, was gone. I was so far out of my comfort zone I feared I’d never find it again.
And there was that fear again. Damn.
Shula said, “We’re out of time.”
“So we do as we’ve always done,” Rane said. “No one knows about her unless they absolutely have to.”
“But how can we do that now?” I said. “Everything’s changed. I have a role to play in whatever’s coming.”
“You’re not going to be spying on Pumpoo anymore.”
“Well maybe not that, but surely I have a role to play that no one else can.”
“There is no doubt in my mind that’s the case,” Dean said. “After your display of faithum, you undoubtedly will contribute in some significant way.”
“Then the others need to know about me.” I sounded decided even though I was only pretending to be resolute.
“No. The risks are too high,” Rane said.
“Dean said we could trust them.”
“Actually,” Dean said, “I said you could trust the charmers with us already. I believe—and hope—you can trust the rest of the tamers and charmers about to arrive. But I can’t guarantee that Pumpoo hasn’t gotten to at least one of them. There’s nothing Pumpoo could say or do to sway the Alpha Team to spy for him. But the others... Let’s just say it might be difficult to put the Dragon Force above your blood family if Pumpoo threatens their lives.”
“You really think he’d do that?”
“I think it’s likely he already has.”
“Then it’s decided,” Rane said. “We don’t reveal her presence.”
I thought I’d decided the opposite, but suddenly, with a reminder of how vicious Pumpoo was, my desire to take an active—and visible—part in the Dragon Force as it opposed tyranny didn’t seem worth the danger it would put my family in. I relented without wanting to, because it’s what I’d always done. This was both my burden and my responsibility. “Fine,” I said, just as Yoon entered the clearing. “No one says anything about me... for now.”
