Elemental Origins: The Complete Series

by A. L. Knorr

  "I like your voice," he said.

  I laughed. "I like yours, too. I'm glad you found it."

  I smiled and felt my throat constrict as I stood up and put a hand on the top of his head. I had been hoping to meet a special boy in Venice. Raf was sweet and I liked him, but I could admit that Isaia was the boy who had claimed my heart this summer.

  "Where's Pietro? He was just here," I asked Elda.

  "He took Cristiano to the toilet. Which is perfect because I haven't had a chance to tell you, since we haven't had two minutes alone since we got back."

  "What's that?"

  She took a deep breath. "I told Pietro. Not about the fire, just...about Nic."

  I forgot to breathe for a second. "So he knows that Isaia... What did he say? I mean..." I glanced toward the bathrooms. "You guys seem okay. How did he take it?"

  "Well, our vacation certainly wasn't the most relaxing we've ever had, but...he admitted that he'd had his suspicions. I won't lie. He's very hurt." She watched as Isaia ran to meet Pietro as he and Cristiano left the washroom. "But, he's determined not to let it destroy us. And so am I. I have a good man."

  My throat tightened as I watched Pietro pick Isaia up and machine-gun kisses on his cheek. "You do. Do you feel better for telling him?"

  She let out a big breath. "Like a thousand pounds have been lifted from my shoulders. I have to atone, nothing changes that. But, at least now I won't be living in fear anymore."

  "Speaking of which," I had to get it out quickly since Pietro was already walking over. "You don't have to live in fear of Enzo anymore, either."

  Her eyes widened. "What did you..." She abandoned the question when Pietro arrived. Her eyes shone at me as I hugged Cristiano goodbye. She knew what I'd done.

  Elda kissed my cheeks and squeezed me hard, the way I had taught her Canadians hug. I wasn't sure if she didn't want Pietro to hear her, but she said quietly in my ear, "I can't thank you enough, Saxony. For everything. You're an angel, and you've changed our lives."

  "Well, you've changed mine too," I rasped with my now permanently smoky voice. "That might be the understatement of the century."

  "Keep in touch with us, please. If there is ever anything we can do. Anything." Elda stepped back. She looked more at peace than I'd ever seen her. Pietro and I kissed goodbye. "Come back for a visit anytime you wish, Saxony. Your family is welcome, too."

  "Thank you, Pietro." I smiled.

  The Baseggios waved goodbye and made their way to the exit. Isaia gave me a last look with those shining obsidian eyes. I winked at him and he smiled, showing his dimples, before the family disappeared through the airport doors.

  I stepped into the security line, double-checking that I had my passport and boarding pass. My skin prickled with a sensation that I was being watched, and I scanned the room. I tilted my head back to look up at the second level as I stepped up to the screening station.

  Ali and Giovanni, the man who had handed me Basil's card, leaned against the railing and looked down at me. They both nodded solemnly. The hair on my forearms stood up momentarily. I didn't know what they were doing there, but I didn't doubt for a moment that it had to do with me. I made my way through security. When I looked up again, they were gone.

  I rolled my carry-on to my gate and sat down to wait for boarding. I was early, and the only passenger waiting.

  I sent a text to my friends letting them know I was on my way home. We had all agreed to meet up when everyone was back, and I couldn't stop my knees from jittering in anticipation. Emotionally, I was doing the equivalent of rubbing my hands together.

  A matronly stewardess looked up at me from behind the check-in desk. She looked a lot like the kind lady I had met on the plane at the beginning of the summer and I blinked, having a twilight zone moment.

  "Tutto posto?" she asked. Everything in place?

  With effort, I stilled my jumping legs. I subconsciously put a hand against the breast pocket of my button-up shirt. The business card pressed against my palm. I smiled at her. "Tutto posto."

  <<<<>>>>

  Available August 2, 2017: PYRO, A Fire Novella

  Pyro picks up where Born of Fire concludes, at the airport where Saxony’s parents are waiting to pick her up…

  Will she give up her greatest secret for the greatest opportunity?

  Saxony has barely stepped off the plane from her life-altering summer in Venice when friction in her family rises up to meet her. Someone seems to be lighting fires in Saltford, and Saxony's little brother Jack suspects her - thing is, she's never told anyone that she's a fire magus, so where is Jack getting this idea from?

  When she calls Basil Chaplin, the number on the business card Enzo gave her in the previous story 'Born of Fire', she learns that he runs a secret school for magi. It's the perfect next step for Saxony, and she wants nothing more than to visit Basil's school and learn more. But there's a catch...

  She has to tell her family what she is, and she has no idea how they're going to take it.

  Don't miss the next story in Saxony's life as a fire magus!

  Chapter 1

  "Saxony!"

  I turned toward the sound of my mother's voice, my face splitting into a grin. I was engulfed by a lilac-scented cloud as my mom wrapped me up in a hug and squeezed me tight.

  "Welcome home, sweetheart. How was your flight? Did you sleep?" She released me, and my father swooped in.

  I reached up on tiptoe to hug my dad.

  "We missed you," he said. "Even Yuri missed you."

  I laughed. Yuri was Jack's Siamese fighting fish. "I slept. Flight was good," I rasped in my now permanently smoky voice.

  My mom's smile dissolved. "You're sick! Why didn't you tell me you weren't well?" Her warm hands flew to my forehead and face. A line appeared between her brows. "You're feverish."

  After the one time I had spoken with them (post tabacchi-shop fire incident that changed my life forever) I had kept our communication to texts and emails. I knew my mom was going to make a big deal out of my voice.

  "I feel okay, Mom."

  Annette Cagney was a mom's mom. She could mother up there with the best of them. There wasn't much I could do about it except reassure her that I was fine. The thought of actually telling my family the whole story of what had happened to me in Venice made my palms sweat. I wasn't ready for that. I wasn't sure I'd ever be ready for that.

  "She's probably just jet-lagged, Annette." My dad put a dry hand to my forehead. "Oh, you are a bit warm. Let's get you home to bed."

  Dad waited for the luggage while Mom got me bundled into our van. She rummaged in her purse and pulled out a package of cough drops. "Here, take one of these. I'll be right back with some tea."

  "I'm okay, Mom. I promise—" The van door slid shut and she jogged across the parking lot as my dad was coming the other way with my luggage piled on a trolley. I heard the two exchange words, and the worry in my mother's voice. I sighed. I felt bad for Mom. There was nothing that could be done to fix my condition. I'd already been down that road. The rear hatch lifted and my dad put my luggage in the back.

  "Thanks Dad." I smiled at him.

  "We'll have you home in a jiffy, Saxony. You can go straight to bed."

  "I'm really—" The rear hatched closed. "Okay," I finished to no one.

  Dad opened the driver’s side, got in and started the van. "So? Was Venice everything you thought it would be?" He drove through the parking lot and waited outside the sliding doors leading to arrivals.

  "It was more, Dad," I said. "I'd like to go back someday." In fact, I had to go back. I had made a promise to Enzo that I couldn't break. May as well prep my dad for the fact that I'd be heading back to Italy sometime in the future. I didn't know when that call would come. Barely conscious that I was doing it, my hand went to my shirt pocket, feeling for the business card of Basil Chaplin. Whoever he was, he was my connection to the world of fire magi.

  The sliding doors opened and Mom appeared carrying a hot tea fro
m the Tim Hortons kiosk in the airport.

  "It's twenty-nine degrees outside," I said. The last thing I felt like was a hot drink.

  "I know honey," said Dad. "Let your mother mother you. She hasn't been able to all summer."

  "I know." My heart swelled as Mom got in and handed me the travel cup. It was nice to be home. I had been too busy and preoccupied to miss my parents much while I was gone, but now that I was back, I missed them terribly. Funny how that worked. "Thanks, Mom."

  "Careful, Tim's always pours their water too hot."

  97 degrees, to be precise, I thought, sensing the temperature as my palms pressed against the paper cup.

  As we drove home, my parents asked questions about Venice and the Baseggios—my host family. I showed them photos on my phone of Piazza San Marco, the Grande Canal, water taxis and yachts, the beaches on Lido, and the canals at night with the moon high above lines of crisscrossing laundry.

  As my mom flipped through my photos, I watched the suburbs of Saltford go by. My neighborhood hadn't changed yet somehow it looked completely different. The manicured lawns, similar two-story houses painted in shades of pastels and grays, kids running through a sprinkler with a dog yapping at their heels. It all felt so safe and domestic in comparison to Venice.

  "Which one is this, honey?" Mom held my phone up so I could see the image of Isaia I'd taken near the beginning of the summer. "Is this Christian?"

  "No, Cristiano is the older one. That's Isaia." My heart gave a happy little ache at the image of the pale, black-eyed little boy. Early on, I'd taken a shot of him building a plane out of Lego on the floor in his room. He wasn't smiling, and he had those awful purple smudges under his eyes. Tears pricked behind my eyelids at the thought of how much he'd been suffering at that point in time.

  "Goodness, he doesn't look well," Mom said, zooming in on his face. "How old did you say he was?"

  "Six."

  She gave a little gasp and made a tsk sound. "He doesn't look a day over four."

  "He wasn't feeling all that well when I first got there, but…" I took the phone and flipped forward to the shot I'd taken of all of the Baseggios at the airport in Venice. "He was much better by the end of the summer. See?"

  While still small for his age, in this image Isaia was grinning, tanned, and noticeably healthier. His eyes had lost the haunted look.

  She took the phone. "Wow, he doesn't even look like the same child." The van swerved a little and Mom said, "Keep your eyes on the road, James."

  My dad grunted and quit trying to peer over her shoulder.

  "What was wrong with him?" she asked.

  "They weren't too sure," I said. It wasn't a lie. What was wrong with him is now wrong with me, I thought. And yet, the thought didn't make me as unhappy as it used to. Probably because I didn't feel like the fire inside was roasting me alive anymore.

  "Hm." Mom handed my phone back to me. "Are you going to see the girls this week? Are they all back?"

  "Not yet. Georjie has been back for a while. Her mom got sick so she came home early. But her mom’s a lot better now. We're going to have a sleepover at Georjie's soon, if that's okay."

  "Of course. As long as you're well. You'll have a lot of catching up to do with your friends." Mom gave me one of those 'we'll see' looks from between the seats.

  My stomach dropped. My voice was never going to go back to normal and my temperature would probably always run a bit higher than it should. I hoped Mom would get accustomed to my new normal by the time the sleepover came around.

  We pulled into the driveway of our gray two-story and parked in front of the garage. Dad wouldn't let me carry any of my luggage in. "Go on, go on," he said. "The boys can't wait to see you. RJ has soccer practice so you'd better say hi before he leaves."

  "And then straight to bed," Mom called as I opened the front door to my home. The smell of freshly baked banana bread hit me in the face and made my mouth water.

  "RJ?" I called, kicking off my sneakers.

  "Sax?" His voice came from the garage.

  My older brother knew I hated being called Sax. I pursed my lips and didn't answer. I heard him laughing.

  "Saxony?" he called again. The door to the garage opened and the smell of banana bread was ruined with the smell of oil.

  "You're taller!" I said when he stepped up into our foyer. "How is that possible?" My older brother had been six feet tall already. Now he had to be pushing six-one or six-two.

  "Yeah? Maybe." He didn't even notice my voice, but I had guessed he wouldn't. RJ was blind to details like that. If it wasn't a detail on his car, it wasn't a detail he paid attention to. If RJ had even ever had a girlfriend, he'd kept it on the down low. RJ and I used to bicker a lot, but we'd grown out of it and a friendship had formed. One day, I might broach the subject of girls with him, if I thought he might answer me seriously.

  RJ was wearing a blue mechanics jumpsuit with the arms tied at the waist, and a stained white tank-top. He pulled me into a hug, which was more like a hard chest-bounce accompanied by a loud back slap. RJ had started lifting weights a couple years ago and he'd grown in every direction since then. He already outweighed my dad and he wasn't quite nineteen yet.

  "Watch the threads," I teased, looking down at myself for oil stains. I wrinkled my nose at the scent of vehicle fluids and sweat. "You stink. What are you doing?"

  "Installing nitrous." He grinned and ran a hand through his dark brown hair. RJ was difficult to offend, unlike Jack, who was the most sensitive of all of us. RJ hit me on the shoulder with the back of a dirty hand, a brotherly love-tap. "Hey, how was Italy?" He peeled off the jumpsuit. "Game changer?"

  This was how RJ talked. Sports analogies and slang he picked up who knew where. Maybe the salt mine.

  I laughed at his choice of words. He had no idea just how much of a game changer it was. "It was awesome. You should go."

  "Yeah, the Ferrari factory isn't far from Venice, actually." He wiggled his dark brows. "That'd be worth a visit."

  I shook my head at him. "Still a one-track mind. You've got practice right now?"

  "In a half-hour. Game against the Vikings in two days. It's been a helluva season. You gonna come?" He threw the jumpsuit into the garage, where it landed on a spare tire near his Corvette. He shut the garage door.

  RJ had taken over the garage when he bought his first car two years ago. I think my dad didn't know whether to feel annoyed or proud. RJ got a job at the salt mine just outside of town when he was in tenth grade, and he’d worked there ever since. He saved part of his earnings for Uni and spent the rest on his car. The mine paid well, and his smarts got him promoted to a cushy job in the admin office.

  "Course," I said. "Where's Jack?"

  RJ shrugged a muscled shoulder. "Probably in his room playing video games. I'll catch you after practice."

  He headed down into the basement where his man-cave was.

  Mom and Dad came into the foyer laden with bags, just as Jack appeared at the top of the stairs.

  "Hey, Saxony!" Jack's face brightened. "You're home."

  My younger brother's voice caught me up in a pause. It was completely different from the last time I'd heard it. It was deeper, more resonant. "Yep. Dude, you sound like a man or something." I smiled up at him. "How was your summer?"

  Jack came down the stairs. His blond hair was messy and shaggy, and he looked like he'd grown at least a full inch. Unlike RJ, Jack was all elbows and legs. "Your voice sounds weird. Are you sick?"

  "Naw, I'm fine," I said. "Just a bit tired."

  Jack's face went through a startling transformation by the time he reached the bottom of the stairs. His blue eyes locked on mine and his smile disappeared. His chin jerked back just a little, as though someone had taken a swipe at his face. He stopped at the bottom, but came no closer.

  "What, no hug?" I teased, but I suddenly felt uncomfortable, like he'd just looked right through me and saw something he didn't like. My forearms prickled.

  Jack gave me a
swift, stiff hug and pulled away fast. I got the mental image of a porcupine as he turned and headed back upstairs. He shot me an unpleasant look over his shoulder, one I couldn't define.

  Like all siblings, Jack and I had had our differences, but he'd never given me a look like that. Not even after I'd hurt him in the spring. I had thought he was over that, after all he was the one who fessed up that he'd been torturing me, and he convinced my parents to let me go to Venice when they were ready to cancel the whole thing.

  "That was weird," I muttered, watching Jack retreat.

  "He's probably just picking up on you not feeling well," Mom said. "You know how good he is at picking up on other people's feelings and emotions."

  "Is he?" I looked at my mom with surprise. It wasn't something I'd ever noticed, specifically about Jack.

  "He seems to be lately," murmured my father. He squeezed by me with my biggest piece of luggage. I grabbed my carry on and my purse and followed him up the steps.

  "I'll be up shortly with the thermometer," my mom called up the stairs.

  "Great," I said under my breath.

  "Let her mother you," Dad said again. "She's missed you. Here we are," he grunted as he set my luggage down on my cream colored carpet. "Just as you left it. Welcome home, sweetheart." He kissed my cheek. "Mom's got a turkey for dinner tonight. Try and get some rest."

  "Thanks, Dad." I gave him a hug and he left me alone with my unpacking.

  Nothing in my room had changed but everything looked different. The blue walls and gray trim looked terribly wrong, not like me at all. They were the old Saxony. I had just painted my walls one year ago, I wondered what my parents would think of me painting again. Maybe orange, or burgundy.