Scorched: Book 1 of the Scorched Trilogy, page 14
We appeared to be the only people in the park, at least in this section. There hadn’t been any cars parked near ours, and I didn’t see anyone walking nearby. I wondered if the Arboretum was even open this time of year or if Munro had broken in while I’d been sleeping. I was probably an accessory to a crime, and I wasn’t even awake to know about it.
Neither of us spoke as we walked down the path, me trailing Munro slightly. Every once in a while, he would turn around as though to see if I was okay or still following behind him, but I didn’t mind since I didn’t know where we were headed. The cool fall air was quickly pushing away the remnants of sleep. The chill in the air and the scent of wet mulch, pine, and fallen leaves was comforting, and I let it wrap around me like an embrace.
Munro slowed as we approached the end of the path which opened up to the Japanese garden. There was a large pond and water that trickled in a gentle waterfall over a bed of stones. Koi in a variety of oranges, yellows, and whites swam through the waters, occasionally nipping their mouths up to the surface in search of food. A short footbridge crossed the pond and led to a small pagoda that contained a few stone benches, and I followed Munro again as he headed in that direction.
“Take a seat.” Munro motioned to one of the stone benches before he straddled it.
His long legs settled on either side of the bench and a gentle breeze ruffled his dark hair, blowing it into his eyes. He pushed his hair back then pulled his hood up to block the wind.
I bit my lips to repress my smile and sat down on the bench facing him. I pulled one of my legs up onto the bench, hooking my foot behind the knee of my other leg and waited for him to start. He was the teacher, I was there to learn and had no idea what he had in store for today.
His eyes moved over my face as though exploring every nuance, marking each freckle. A blush crept over my cheeks as I waited for his inspection to end and for him to start talking. As if he had forgotten himself, Munro blinked several times before he straightened himself, and I swore I could feel him erect a mental wall between us. I’d sensed him doing it a few times now, and I found it both annoying and amusing. I grumbled impatiently, which broke through his thoughts, and he snapped his focus back to my eyes.
“Last time we were together, we talked about feeling the magic. How you need to find a spark and pull it inside of you to manipulate it.” He paused, waiting for me to agree as if I could have forgotten what happened the last time we worked with magic. “Do you remember I mentioned the four sects and how each was inclined toward an element?”
I nodded again, recalling how he'd been a fire user and that he thought I was an earth user.
“Well, today I want to test your affinity for the elements. Most of the time your magic comes from your family line, which has a predisposition to certain elements based on your ancestry. It's rare, but some people will have abilities that span two elements. Typically, you'd figure out your element as you grew up, but with you...” He trailed off, his eyes flicking over mine almost apologetically.
I waved my hand, dismissing the concern. “Sure, I get it. I’m Harry Potter, you’ve got to throw on the sorting hat and figure out what house I belong in.”
Munro rolled his eyes. “Not exactly, but yes, I do want to test out your ability to connect with each of the elements.”
I looked around the quiet park and wondered why we were in a public setting. “Um, I don’t want to question your guidance so soon,” he grunted out a laugh and his eyes sparkled with humor and disbelief, “but why are we in the middle of the Arboretum? Wouldn’t it be better to go some place private?”
Munro looked around, his eyebrow raised in mocking question as if to ask what the problem was, and I gave him an unamused look in return.
“Okay, yes, I see there are no people around, but isn’t this a bit public?”
“You need to have access to nature: the earth, running water, fresh air. It will help you to connect. Besides, it's late in the season. No one is coming back here. If they do, I'll hear them before they get close.” He pointed to all the downed leaves.
I shrugged. “You’re the boss. What do we need to do?”
“Let’s start by trying to find the spark again,” he said this casually as if we hadn’t almost caused an explosion the last time we tried this out.
“Is that a good idea?” I was feeling nervous like I was harboring a bomb inside of me.
Munro nodded his head. “Yes, you will need to get comfortable accessing the elements. Last time, I was doing it with you. Today, we’ll just focus on you.”
Nervousness danced over my body as I replied, letting him know I understood what he was saying, “Okay, flying solo.”
I tried to sound more composed than I felt, hoping I could fake it until I was more comfortable. I closed my eyes, even though it was making me nervous to have him watching me, and tried to block him out.
Inhaling and exhaling deep breaths, I tried to calm my nerves and connect to the elements surrounding me. With each breath, I loosened up a bit more and began to feel those golden sparks lighting up around me, filling my lungs with each inhalation and spreading out to the very edges of my fingertips.
The sparks moved like liquid through my body, like a warm blanket wrapping me in every good feeling I'd ever had. With just a thought, I tugged at the sparks and was delighted when they seemed to move in response to my thoughts. With another mental direction, I swept the magic out, imagining a hand sweeping under a bed, looking for something it couldn't see.
I wanted to explore what the magic could show me. It was like malleable water as it swept away from me, gently nudging against the essence of Munro. He gasped, and I sighed in pleasure. My magic really liked the way he felt. I forced my eyes open, keeping the sparks close to me, waiting for whatever I asked them to do next.
“Looks like you’ve connected.” Munro gave me a warning look, and I pressed my lips together to stifle a smile. Nodding and smiling as I succumbed to the joy coming from the magic and the connection.
“What now?” I asked, excited to take some of this energy and do something with it.
“Let’s try fire. Since it’s my element, I can help guide and contain it more than the others.” Nervousness hovered low in my chest as I thought about the fire that destroyed my parents. Munro’s keen eyes seemed to understand right away.
“Don’t be nervous. It’s just a little spell. Your magic still isn’t focused enough. It’s not likely you’ll even get this to work.” He leaned over to pick up a leaf from the ground and laid it in his palm. It was mere moments before the edges started to curl and smoke began to drift up from the leaf.
My mouth opened in a small gasp when the rest of the leaf went up in flames before all that remained was ash that slowly floated back down to the ground. The embers were dead before it touched the earth.
“Wow,” I whispered.
Even though I'd healed Munro at the party and had that odd time-stopping moment, it hadn't really seemed like magic. I could feel something happening in both of those instances, but I hadn’t known I was using magic. Seeing flame coming from nothing was way more tangible than the other events.
Munro chuckled. “You are easily impressed.”
“How do I do that?” I asked, excited for the opportunity to do some real magic.
Munro picked up another leaf and held it out to me. I grabbed it without touching his skin, afraid of the chaos I’d create if I touched him with this much magic floating around. Holding it in my palm just as he had, I looked up at him expectantly, waiting for direction.
“Find the spark again, concentrate on feeling it. Connecting with it will become easier the more you do it. Eventually, it will become second nature.”
I nodded in understanding. It had been easier to connect this time, although it still required a lot of concentration. I searched for the spark again, inhaling deeply to clear my mind, and waited for Munro to continue.
“Once you’ve connected with the magic, sift through it, feel for the warmth of flame.”
What he said made absolutely no sense, and yet I still understood what he meant. The golden sparks floated around me, looking like a million twinkling lights pulsing and ebbing around us. Doing the same mental sweep I’d employed earlier, I focused on looking for a specific feeling, one of heat and warmth.
The sparks were like a living being, parting and separating and offering up exactly what I needed. Pulling the warm sparks toward me, I sensed when they settled on my skin before they sank in, like soil drinking up rain after a drought.
Focusing on the leaf, I thought the words, smoke, curl, flame like a mantra. Smoke, curl, flame. Smoke, curl, flame. A huge smile broke out over my face when the leaf did exactly as Munro's had done, floating up in the air as an ember before drifting back to the ground. A euphoric feeling swept over me from having just made that happen. Munro had a slight smile on his face, but I couldn't help noticing he looked more concerned than excited.
I pushed at his foot with my toe, excited and wanting him to share the excitement with me. “Isn’t this a good thing? You look like I’ve asked you to hand wash my dirty gym socks.”
He laughed at that and shook his head. “No, you're right. It is a good thing.” He paused, watching the ash floating around us, avoiding looking at me when he spoke again. “It's surprising.”
I cocked my head at him. “Like, surprise! All your friends came to celebrate your birthday? Or surprise! There’s a killer clown hiding under your bed?”
Munro rolled his eyes at my question.
“It's unusual. Like I mentioned before, people usually only have an affinity for one element over another. Most people can use their element almost effortlessly, it's second nature. With some training, they can tap into the other elements but it's much more difficult. You accessing fire so swiftly,” he frowned again, choosing his words carefully, “it’s not bad, it’s just… unusual.” He finally finished.
Even though his words said it was okay, his tense body language implied otherwise. His eyes were flickering over my face, trying to puzzle something out.
“How are you feeling? Tired? Headache?”
I shrugged my shoulders. “Fine, I think. Why?”
“Do you want to try the other elements? I don’t want to push though, so if you’re starting to get tired, we’ll stop for today.” He searched my face, eyes scanning for signs of fatigue as his lips pressed together so seriously that I wanted to smile.
“Let’s do it. I feel good. What’s next?” Suddenly I was eager to test the other elements.
Munro nodded slowly. “Okay, but let me know if it gets to be too much. We don’t need to run, we can start with walking.” He was waiting for a response from me, so I mumbled out an “okay.”
“Let’s try water.” He grunted out a petulant little sound that had me tilting my head at him. “It’s not my strongest element,” was all I got in a grumbled reply.
Munro got up off the bench and grabbed another leaf from the ground. He walked to the edge of the pond and dipped the leaf in before walking back to sit down again. This time he was slightly closer, so his knee brushed gently against my leg.
He held the leaf close, so I could see the drops of water clinging to the dried veins of the yellowed leaf. I could sense his concentration as the magic he summoned pulsed around us. I focused too, wondering if I could see the magic he was using in the same way I saw it when I found the fire within it. And there it was. The golden particles floating around us, blanketing us like a protective force.
Focusing my eyes back on the leaf, I watched as the drops of water began to coalesce into one larger drop. It trembled on the blade of the leaf before floating up in the air a few inches. A small sound of delight escaped me and must have broken Munro’s concentration because the little bubble burst a second later. The drop flicked us both with a little sprinkle of water, and I couldn’t help the laughter that bubbled up.
“That was so cool.”
Munro just laughed his deep chuckle. “Really it was about the most pitiful piece of water magic I can manage. I’m terrible with water. I think the fire in me doesn’t particularly like it.” He looked almost embarrassed by this admission, and I was utterly charmed by the expression on his face.
“Well, I guess I'm just easily impressed,” I said, but who could blame me. I hadn't even known magic was real a week ago. To see it right in front of me was incredible.
“Can I try?” I was excited to see if I could make the same thing happen.
Munro nodded and got up again, dipping the leaf in the water and coming back to hand it to me gently so he didn’t lose any of the droplets. He avoided touching me, which was probably a good idea with as much magic as there was humming in the air around us.
“Take your time. Concentrate.” Munro’s voice was low and soft, nearly a whisper, like we were in a church instead of by ourselves in the park.
I blocked out everything around me, centering my attention on the leaf and thinking about the golden particles surrounding us. My original intent was to do just what Munro had, to pull the drops of water together and make it float, but my mind didn’t seem to be on the same page.
It started off the same way, with the little drops of water pulling together. It made me think of riding the bus to school when I'd been younger. The bus would grow so humid with dozens of chatty kids expelling heat inside, that the windows would fog up. The little rivulets of moisture would slowly creep down the window until they found first one drop in their path, and then another, and another before finally merging and forming a larger drop that would speed down the window. With the water on the leaf, it was the same action.
The water quickly converged into one large drop, but it didn't rise up in the air as Munro's had. Even though that was my original intention, a new thought popped into my head and the moisture was absorbed into the leaf. Spurned by some unknown urge, I pushed the magic further, willing the dampness from the ground and even from the air around us to gather. Drops of water sprung up from the ground, bouncing like little balls to arch and land on the leaf until the droplets rolled together before being absorbed by the leaf. The yellow color started to bleed out but was quickly replaced by a verdant green that spread over the leaf.
I still didn’t stop, captured by the magic happening to the object in my hand. Shoots started springing from the end of the leaf, as though it was regenerating the branch that it had fallen from. With a startled gasp, I jumped up threw the branch away from me like it was on fire. The dried yellow leaf was now a foot-long branch with new sprouts and unfurling leaves starting to shoot off of it.
“What the fuck!” I said, breathing heavily as my pulse hammered in my chest, ready to beat right out of my ribs.
I whipped my head up to stare at Munro, I’m sure with a panicked look on my face. He had also moved off the bench and was staring at me with a shocked look on his face. Shit, shit, shit. Why did he look so freaked out? I was the one who should be freaked out, he knew about all this stuff.
“What did I just do?” I backed away from the branch another step like it was snake ready to strike.
Munro didn’t move and took another moment before he answered, all while I stared at him nervously.
“Well. That was not what I expected.” He ran his hand through his dark hair, and his voice sounded surprised.
“That’s it? What did I do?”
Munro didn’t answer right away, just looked at the branch on the ground before he raised an eyebrow at me.
“It’s not bad Annie, it’s just…” He paused again, and I blew out a frustrated breath.
“Do not say unexpected,” I bit out.
He nodded thoughtfully, licking his lips. He stared at me, but his eyes gave nothing away, and I couldn’t tell if he was worried or if this was just a typical magical lesson.
“Maybe we should go talk to Ryan. He might know more.”
I started chewing on my lips nervously.
“Annie, really it’s okay. You haven’t done anything wrong or bad. That was just very advanced and it’s surprising is all. Ryan might know more about your family line. Maybe your family was gifted with more than one elemental power.” Munro came to stand in front of me as he spoke gently.
He tucked his finger under my chin to tip my head up to look at him, and the current of electricity shot through me at the contact of skin on skin. I nearly screamed when the branch laying at our feet suddenly burst with a dozen new shoots and leaves that unfolded in a rapid flurry. With a yelp, I jumped back, now completely freaked out. Munro also looked at it with a stunned expression on his face.
“Let’s get out of here.” The words squeaked out of my throat and I hurried toward the path we’d come from, not even bothering to see if Munro was behind me.
I only slowed when the pond and pavilion were out of sight, but still felt anxious and a small frisson of fear was running through me. Those emotions were quickly taken over by exhaustion, and I started to feel like I’d just gone for a ten-mile run, uphill.
My legs were wobbly, and I could feel sweat dotting my brow, even with the cold temperature. Munro caught up with me on the trail, slowing once he reached me to match the sluggish pace, which was all I could manage at the moment. We walked in silence, both of us obviously trying to process what had just happened.
Munro opened the passenger door for me when we reached his truck, and I was grateful because I wasn’t sure I had the energy to pull open the lever. That was how numb and tired my body was feeling. He settled in on the other side and cranked the heat as high as it would go once he started the truck. After we made it out of the park and he didn’t have to keep shifting the car, he placed his hand palm up between us and gave me a side glance.
“Touching will help you feel better.”
I didn’t even hesitate before sliding my hand into his, and he moved to interlock our fingers, so our hands were pressed tightly together. I closed my eyes as a sense of relief swept through me. Relief to be touching him and relief from exhaustion as a warm comfort blanketed me, easing the tension that locked up every muscle in my body.
