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“I’m serious.” She hugged the pillow. “You should’ve told me.”
“How did you even find out about that?”
“Xander told me. He said Drake was pretty out of his element the next morning and he wanted to know more about how it was for him when he met me. Xander said it was weird hearing Drake speak that much.”
“Yeah, Drake made it clear he didn’t want anyone to find out about it.”
“Because it’s forbidden. It’s not like Xander and me. They won’t look the other way.”
A sigh left my lips as the butterflies kept crashing against the walls of my stomach. I loved that feeling but hated it at the same time. “I know. Mrs. Beatty told me why phoenix griffins are not a suitable match for Spirit faes.”
“Oh crap, you think she knows?”
“I think she picked up on it. You say she sees straight through the bullshit, then yes. I’m sure a part of her saw straight through mine.”
Brooke hissed out a curse word.
“When did they leave?” I asked.
“The day after Misty Hills.”
Brooke gasped, swung her legs over the bed and ran to her nightstand. She opened the drawer and took out a blue box with a beautiful bow and brought it back to my bed. She gave me the present and there was a note folded underneath the bow.
“Open it. I’m dying to know what’s inside.” She clapped her hands.
“Is it for me?”
“Yes, it’s for you. Xander gave it to me. I was so happy thinking it was mine, and then he told me I was only the courier and had to give it to you when you wake up.”
I grabbed the note. My heart grew inside my chest as I unfolded it. Only a few words stared back at me.
I’m a Gowk, sorry.
He made me so confused. Sorry about what, the kiss, the way he ignored me? It wasn’t clear.
Brooke waited as an enormous smile spread across her lips as curiosity twinkled in her eyes. “And?”
I gave her the note. She grabbed it out of my hand, and her eyes read through the line, turning the note over. “That’s it?”
I shrugged as my fingers pulled at the strings to open the box, finding the same device that Brooke had. It was some sort of phone.
Brooke shrieked. “That must have been one hell of a kiss, Sophie.”
I remember the buzzing and the toe-curling feeling.
“Yeah, it was pretty magical.” I took the device out of the box and looked at Brooke. “How do you switch it on?”
Brooke leaned over and gave me a quick breakdown of all the buttons on the side and pressed the top button. The screen lit up with images that moved. Mine was of snow falling in the forest and a cabin with smoke escaping from the chimney. My fingers brushed the screensaver. It looked so real.
Plenty of text messages came through. Drake had sent all of them the last two days while I was sleeping. I read the first message.
Drake:
OK, can see it. MayB I wanted this match 4 my brother, hoping he would grow up. But he isn’t UR match. He couldn’t even perform half of the things 2 calm UR headache that night. I don’t care that Mavis says it was because the bond is not sealed yet. Xander calmed plenty of Brooke’s headaches when they were still sneaking around, not knowing that they were the perfect match for one another.
I smiled as I read that, and a warm tingling sensation spread through my chest. My fingers pressed on the second message.
Drake:
Sorry that I pushed you on him, and sorry 4 being an asshole that day. Mavis asked me 2 assist you and her to Misty Hills and I was going 2 apologize to you, but then my brother showed up and I had 2 step aside. I never envied him as much as I did that night. I would give anything just to be a normal griffin.
The third one turned the color of my cheeks.
Drake:
U R one powerful fae, Sophie, and it drives me insane. It has nothing 2 do with the pull, either. It’s a Drake thing. I’ll see U when I get back. We will figure it out if U can find it in UR heart 2 forgive me 4 being a jerk. Hope U feel better soon.
The next couple of messages were weird.
One said text me if you want and another said don’t text me.
I remembered what Brooke had told me that day when I’d asked her why she was worried about Xander. She couldn’t text Xander because they were both on a mission. This was what these texts meant.
The last one was not to text him.
I understood what Brooke had felt that day. She did not know whether Xander was okay.
“They always come back.”
“Until the day they don’t, Brooke.”
“Yeah, well, something tells me that the Fire-Bird has something to come back to now, so he will be more adamant this time.”
I wanted to jump out of my skin. The butterflies caused turmoil in my stomach, almost making me nauseated—in a good way, though.
“Yeah.” Her hand twirled in my face’s direction. “You need to hide that constant happiness, too. It was what gave Xander and me away.”
Laughter bubbled out of me as I fell on my bed, and then the smile disappeared as the vision of the human circle traipsed into my head. It felt so real. Just when things turned around for me, I had to dream about that. What did it mean? And why were all of us kids?
25
I read Drake’s texts twenty times. He knew what the pull to Spirit faes were, and yet he kept telling me it wasn’t the pull, that it was a Drake Evans thing. I had to smile at that. But deep down I knew how I felt, it was something different, something I’ve never felt for anyone ever before. It was so intense it twisted at my guts and seared through my veins with an all-day longing when I wasn’t with him.
I recalled what Mrs. Beatty told me about the natural bond between Drake’s parents.
What if we had that natural bond? He did save my life, and as everyone had mentioned before, he was quite frantic about saving me, this Lost One in particular.
I couldn’t wait for the text message to go through; I was feeling anxious to hear his voice.
How are we going to do this?
When Brooke and I went for dinner, every single person with cat-ears looked up at us. They were driving me insane with their constant staring.
I was extremely happy that Chase wasn’t around. I didn’t have the strength for him tonight.
Brooke excused herself early to go check something in the library. And I excused myself early as my headache started, it felt like a someone was turning a corkscrew grinding into my temple.
I walked down a deserted hallway when something in the dark corner caught my eye.
I turned to look and gaped. It was Chase kissing a blonde, no, grabbing her lips with his was more like it.
I couldn’t wait for Drake to come back.
“Sophie,” one of the other boys yelled my name, and I sort of froze as he came running over.
It was the griffin with the red hair. The one guy that didn’t feel threatened by Chase’s presence.
“Yes.” I smiled as he reached me.
“Sorry, but I think this might be the only time to introduce myself without Evans hovering around you. Name is Sam.” He reached out his hand to shake mine.
“You clearly know mine.”
Chase slipped past the pillar and walked down the hallway as Sam spoke about hanging out sometimes. “Sure, that would be nice. A change of scenery might not be a bad thing,” I whispered as the girl with blond hair glided past us.
“Hi Sam,” the girl sang.
“Tiff.”
She waltzed down the hallway and into a room a couple of doors from ours.
“So, I guess I’ll see you soon.”
“Okay.” A chuckle escaped my lips, and he rushed back the way he came.
He seemed nice enough, and maybe he could be the griffin that I needed.
I entered the room and stared at Cali’s bed. I felt sorry for her. Chase was a huge player, like Brooke had said. It was another girl every week.
I walked to my bed and grabbed the phone I stashed underneath the pillow. No text had come through yet.
I could only imagine Drake running for his life again, trying to get some poor lost soul to Earwyn.
The bathroom door opened, and Cali smiled at me. I shoved the phone under my pillow and my eyebrows pulled together as I stared at her. There was no sign of tears or puffy, red eyes. Did she even know?
“Are you sure you are okay?” Cali asked.
I smiled. “I’m more than okay? Are you?”
“Peaches. The Chase thing will not make things weird between us, will it?”
Oh, crap. She doesn’t know.
“As long as you don’t push him on me, I can’t see why not.”
She laughed. “Something is wrong with you, girl.”
I giggled but felt sorry for her. That crap was going to hurt when she discovered it. Brooke walked into the room.
“I don’t even have to ask why the long face?” Cali said as she paged through a book while sitting on her bed.
Brooke face-planted my bed. She left out a frustrated grunt, muffled by the bedding.
“When was the last time you heard from Xander?” Cali asked.
“Yesterday. I hate it when he doesn’t phone.”
“He will be fine,” Cali said and got up to make her bed. “Besides, he is on Alex’s team now. I can just imagine what a team Drake and he are going to make.”
“What?”
“Both are bad-asses. I don’t know why you are so afraid.”
“Because there is always some sort of snag when they get closer to Earwyn.”
“There was no danger the last time.”
“Because they came from Hong Kong. I don’t know where the entrance is this time. They don’t either.”
Cali launched into the amazing afternoon she shared with Chase. Knowing that Chase kissed another girl gnawed on the inside of my gut. Do I tell her? Hell no. That will hurt too much, and will she even believe me?
“He is such a tease, Cali,” Brooke sang, sounding annoyed.
“I don’t care. Chase is my tease.”
We both laughed at the way she’d said it. If only that was the truth.
“What, it doesn’t even bother Sophie one bit?” Cali waved at me.
I shrugged. “Because he is not my match, but Brooke has a point. If the team comes back with fresh meat that is a girl, Chase moves on from chaperoning me to her. I bet she will not look at Chase the same way I do.”
“She must try?” Cali chirped, and I shook my head. I hoped the blonde that he’d made out with had a wicked ability that was going to match the Fire fae’s.
“I forgot to tell you; the other new kid started. She is sixteen years old.” Brooke looked at me.
“The Manticore?”
“Yes.”
“At least she is here with her entire family.” I sighed, missing Mom and Dad like crazy.
“Yeah, she is one of the lucky ones.”
Brooke’s phone rang, and she squealed. I didn’t dare to look at my phone as Cali was in the room.
“Hey, baby,” she cooed.
Xander’s laughter came from the speakers.
“I assume the dangerous part of the mission is over. So when will you be coming back?”
“I don’t know. Alex is still waiting on Mavis for the location for the entry point. We already used his key today, so we’ll get it early tomorrow morning.”
“So tomorrow?”
“I pray.”
“I miss you. These missions are getting on my nerves now.”
“Yeah, Alex says that Mavis put a beacon out to call everyone back from their missions.”
“Why?”
“Nobody knows, but I’m over this mission now. It’s taking way too long.”
“You are a giant baby, Xander,” Cali yelled, and Xander laughed.
“Hey, Cali.”
Brooke looked at me and then back at the phone. “I forgot to tell you, the Spirit fae graced us with her presence.”
“Thank God for miracles. Is she okay?”
“Yes, but these headaches are messing with her personality.”
“I’m sure the stones will deflower her beautifully.”
“Xander,” I yelled. “Stop using that word. It’s disgusting.”
Brooke roared with laughter. “I forgot, yeah, that word is not fresh where we come from, babes.”
“What word?”
“Deflower,” Brooke said.
“What does it mean?” Drake yelled in the background, and my heart felt like it skipped a beat.
“For me to know and for you to find out, Fire-Bird,” Brooke retorted.
My phone hadn’t vibrated yet.
“Find out, Drake,” Xander spoke, and I could hear Drake laughing, knowing he already looked it up.
“What does it mean?” Xander asked.
“Drake, you are a party pooper,” Brooke yelled.
“What?” Xander commanded Drake this time. I could hear the smile in his voice.
“To deprive a woman of her virginity,” Drake said louder in the background, and everyone laughed.
Brooke included.
“Baby, who deflowered you?” Xander asked.
“I was innocent until I met your ass,” Brooke scolded him playfully, and Cali looked at Brooke with a raised eyebrow. There was no way Cali was still a virgin.
“I like that word, deflower.” Cali looked at me.
“Sophie,” Xander yelled. “Who deflowered you?”
“Hopefully, the stones in Scotland, Xander.”
“Keep the deflowering to the stones, Soph.” Maverick’s voice came from the background.
I could hear more laughter erupting.
“What?” Maverick said as Cali looked at me.
“He can heal my headaches,” I answered, whatever was brewing inside that mind of hers.
“He’s like a hundred years old,” she whispered back.
I was on fire and nailed Cali’s thoughts. Girl hormones were just as bad as boy hormones. “Rather an old man’s darling than a young man’s slave.”
“Mav, you have plans with Soph we don’t know about?” Drake asked.
“Well, I dinnae see any of the cat-ears going to get that lass’s attention soon. And from what I gathered, I’m the only one that can take her headaches away. Me and my magic hands.”
“Maverick! Don’t even think about it. Sophie needs a griffin.” Alex was the only one that didn’t think Maverick was funny.
Brooke whooped as Xander roared with laughter, and my cheeks flared up.
“I’m only joking, Soph, relax,” Mav yelled.
“Oh, Sophie grabbed a knife and stabbed herself, Maverick,” Brooke joked, and more laughter elicited.
“Poor lass, I would too if my headaches were that bad.”
My phone vibrated under my pillow. I turned around with my back facing Cali and peeked at my newest message.
Drake:
I will stab myself too. How do u feel?
Sophie:
I’m Ok.
I pressed the send button and waited for his next text as my heart pounded.
Drake:
Cali still in the room?
Sophie:
Yes, she is not going away soon. This conversation is way 2 juicy 4 her.
Drake:
Dammit
Brooke still cooed sweet sentences to Xander.
Sophie:
R U still with everyone while U R texting me?
Drake:
No, but Maverick knows something. He only said those words 2 rile me up and 2 admit it in front of all of them.
Sophie:
U R such a clever little Fire-Bird.
Drake:
It’s Master Fire-bird, and U’ll piss urself if u see how big this fire bird is.
My fingers glided over the keys.
Sophie:
😂, I have news for you. UR brother beat U 2 it.
Drake:
He has nothing on me.
He can say that again.
Drake:
My luck, he could still be ur match. Headache?
Sophie:
🤢. And he is not my match, thank U very much.
Drake:
Sorry. Wish I could help.
Sophie:
Thank U for the phone.
Drake:
😂, it’s not 4 UR benefit. It’s 4 me.
Sophie:
Still, thank U.
Drake:
We need to get rid of those headaches.
Sophie:
Oh, I’ll 🍻🥳 🎉 the day they go away.
Drake:
😂😂😂 I’m holding U 2 ur words.
We chatted for the entire evening and came up with a great alternative plan. Maverick could heal the headaches so that I could get my sparkiness back. That way, his brother could play with someone else.
He hated it when his brother showed up the night Mrs. Beatty asked him to come with us to Misty Hills. That would’ve been perfect if Drake could’ve been there and not Chase.
The conversation was reaching the end, and I hated saying good night.
I hoped Mrs. Beatty would send them the entry point location soon so that they could come home soon.
I was on cloud nine when his messages stopped, and I couldn’t wait to see him again. The image of him in my mind did not do that guy any justice, but I knew it was going to be hard to sneak around without getting caught.
