Elemental Hunger (38 page)

Hanai slept, his head resting on my shoulder. Adam didn’t strike up a conversation, and like I was going to. He’d always been the chatterbox in our relationship.

I squirmed, and Hanai’s head slipped to my chest. I adjusted so he would be more comfortable, which meant I had to lean into Adam. “Sorry, is this okay?”

“It’s fine,” he said, but he didn’t sound fine.

“Are you okay?”

Adam hesitated for a fraction of a second. “I’m fine.”

“That’s the second time you’ve said ‘fine.’”

“So?”

“Which means everything is not fine.”

When he didn’t answer, I wished I could read minds. I concentrated really hard, hoping to hear a whisper of what he had going on inside his head. I heard nothing.

He chuckled. “You’re funny.”

I didn’t find anything amusing. I wanted to know what he was thinking.

Adam gripped the steering column until his knuckles turned white. “Okay, I’m thinking that I wish I could find a way to tell you how sorry I am. I’m wishing I had the words that would make you feel clean again. Something that would convince you that I’m your Airmaster—that I’ll always be your Airmaster—and anything else you want me to be.”

I swallowed hard. Felix said that once Adam put his mind to something, he followed through. I just wished I knew what he’d decided first—to be my Airmaster or to be Alex’s sentry.

Adam stiffened, and he sighed.

But I couldn’t take back the thought. He didn’t offer an assurance, so I stared out the windshield with confusion swirling in my mind.

Finally, darkness swallowed the sky. I fell into it, welcoming the unthinking realms of sleep.

A lull in movement woke me. We’d stopped. I opened my eyes to a navy blue blanket of chilly air.

Adam’s voice: Frantic.

Hanai: Chanting.

The call of fire sang to me, but it faded quickly. I jumped from the vehicle and ran to where Adam and Hanai were kneeling over someone. More than someone—a Firemaker. And this fire felt like home.

“Holy blazes,” I whispered, arriving on-scene. “Jarvis.”

He burned, the flames licking his black clothes, dancing in his dark hair. His eyes were closed, but fluttered open when I touched his forehead. He opened his mouth, but no sound came out. Fire sparked from his fingertips like flaming droplets of rain. His irises blazed red before he closed his eyes again.

“Hanai?” I asked.

“This is beyond what I can heal.”

Adam, who had been mixing a mud concoction, slathered it over Jarvis’s fingers, hands, and wrists. The fire went out. He ripped a strip of cloth from his shirt, slopped mud on it, and laid it over Jarvis’s forehead.

He used his air to try to smother the flames dancing over Jarvis’s clothes, but they continued to blaze. Adam cursed. “I’ll see if there are any Elemental cancellers in the car. His Element is killing him.” He stood and strode back to the sentry vehicle.

I could not watch the flames incinerate Jarvis. I held my palm over his stomach and urged the fire to leave him. It rushed into my body, expanding into every crevice. And, blazes, it was hot.

I fell backward, consumed by Jarvis’s power.

“Gabby,” he murmured. His voice sounded so weak, so unlike the Firemaker I’d once known and loved.

I scrambled back to him. “I’m here.”

“I’m—I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay,” I whispered, pressing my hand to his forehead. “You’re going to be fine.”

“I—I set the fire in Crylon.” He reached blindly for my hand. I gripped his between both of mine, shock quieting my reassurances.

“Don’t let her…do to you…what she did to me.” He coughed, and this time the red was blood and not flames. “I’m c-cold. S-so c-cold.”

“I took your Element. You were—” I cut off as he endured another round of coughing. I flinched away from the sound until it quieted.

I looked down.

He was dead.

The flames burned twenty feet high. I watched them jump, refusing to breathe through my nose. I kept my eyes on the pinnacle of the pyre so I wouldn’t have to see the mournful eyes of Hanai. Or the angry glare of Adam. I really didn’t care who saw the smoke. Alex knew we were coming anyway.

“The timeline is too fast,” Adam had argued. “Davison and his Council aren’t ready.”

I didn’t care. He’d requested I come Tarpulin. He better blazing get ready.

I watched the smoke ascend into the sky so I wouldn’t have to watch Jarvis’s flesh melt away, his bones blacken. Yet the images engrained themselves into my memory anyway. Something wet tickled my face. I didn’t wipe away the tears. I didn’t do anything. Just watched the flames, flickering in the crush of dark surrounding me. Focused on drawing breath one more time. Then another. The smoke would’ve brought serenity, but comfort was not welcome at this funeral.

Eventually, I brought my knees to my chest and rested my head on them. The sobs came. My shoulders heaved, my heart wailed, my soul emptied itself into the tears and hiccups.

For my dear Jarvis. My dutiful Educator Graham. My former roommate Patches.

For my friends and Councilmembers Cat and Isaiah.

For two people I loved: Adam and Hanai.

And for myself.

I cried and cried, even when Hanai wrapped me in the comfort and security of his arms.

Dawn brought with it a city. Like a great fish hoisting itself out of deep water, Tarpulin rose from the depths of darkness with the sun. The waves reflected gold and pink into the sky. Just before the water, the city lay in a sprawling circle, a tall spire in the center stretching above the other buildings. Streets radiated from the Supremist’s fortress to an impenetrable city wall.

On the southwest edge of the circle, a mountain reached into the morning sky. My fire burned hotter at the thought of what lay underneath: The Elemental school. The mound of earth spilled right over the towering wall.

Beyond the wall lay endless plains.

With a mass of sentries already headed our way.

I got to
my feet as icy tendrils of wind kissed the sweat coating my body and turned it into a layer of frost.

“Adam.” I stumbled toward the hovercraft without looking away from the approaching sentries.
Maybe they’re Davison’s
, I thought, but I knew I was deluding myself. No matter whose they were, Adam would be able to read their minds.

He sat up, his eyes bloodshot, before I could pound on the window. In the next moment, he wrenched open the door. “What is it?”

I pointed toward the advancing sea of black.

“Sentries,” we said at the same time.

“Not ours,” Adam added, cocking his head to the side.

To his credit, he didn’t scold me for revealing our position with Jarvis’s funeral pyre. He simply squeezed my hand and turned toward the vehicle. “Hanai. Wake up, man. We’ve got trouble. Gabby, get in the car.”

Before I could take a step, a pillar of earth shot into the sky. A hulking man landed lightly next to the chasm, a steely glint in his eye.

“Mr. Gillman,” he said.

Adam stepped forward, pushing me behind him. “Lucas.”

“Alex would like a word.” Lucas-the-Earthmover folded his arms.

Adam didn’t answer. Hanai stepped next to me, sliding his hand into mine. This time, though, the desperation coursing through my bloodstream didn’t melt away. Lucas’s face relaxed instead.

“She doesn’t need Adam,” Hanai said, his voice quiet but filled with authority. “Tell her you couldn’t find us.”

Lucas almost smiled—or what I imagine would pass for a smile on his rough face. He leaped into the tunnel he’d made without another word.

“Holy tornadoes, Hanai,” Adam said. “Unbelievable Element you’ve got there.” He turned toward me. “Get in the—”

“Halt!”

Five sentries—with guns pointed—stood before us. A moment later, a rush of wind blew my hair back, announcing the arrival of an Airmaster. He stepped from behind the sentries, clearly the reason they had arrived so fast.

“Hi, Theodore.” Adam spoke without a hint of camaraderie. The Airmaster growled before taking off again, flying back toward Tarpulin.

A sentry sneered and lifted a black box to his mouth. “We have the Elementals.”

The box beeped, and a female voice said, “If they try to flee, kill them.”

We stood there, the three of us staring down the barrels of five guns. In my head, I asked Adam a hundred times what we were going to do, but he didn’t move a single muscle.

Minutes stretched into forever. Finally, the Supremist arrived, wearing a luxurious set of crimson robes. Her hair stood only half an inch long, and her cheekbones were sharp and angled. She appraised me with anger flowing freely through her expression.

Relief flooded me. I’d accomplished what Davison wanted. If I could survive, I might actually have a chance at having a real Council, with a real city.

“Adam.” She raised her hand and the sentries lowered their weapons. “Is that girl in your custody?”

“You’re a girl too,” I snarled before I could quiet the words.

“And now everyone knows it,” Hanai added.

The Supremist trained her murderous eyes on me and then him before settling back on Adam. “So it seems.”

For the first time, Adam shifted nervously.

“I know you used your air—” she started.

“Yes, I did,” he interrupted her.

Something like betrayal—maybe hurt?—flickered across her face. Then she strengthened her jaw. “But—why?”

Adam’s shoulders tightened. “Because I don’t agree with your policies.”

“Because I’m a w—”

“Your gender has nothing to do with it.”

Pieces slid into place. Jarvis set that fire in Crylon. That had happened at about the same time the news came out that Alex was a woman.

In the middle of it all…
Adam.

I pressed back into the vehicle.

“Not me, Gabby,” he whispered. “Felix went to Crylon.
Felix
has been giving orders, fixing mistakes. I defected last year, remember?”

“How did you spread the rumor that Alex was a woman if you were with me in Forrester and then in the Outcast settlement?”

Adam glared past me toward Alex. “I told you once, Gabriella, the air tells me everything. I can use it to send messages to others. Remember how I asked Isaiah to come be our Earthmover?”

I nodded.

“I sent air messages to all the Councilmen across the entire United Territories, first to let them know about Alex, and then to see if they would join Davison’s uprising. Word travels fast.” He didn’t look away from Alex once.

Before I could process what he’d said, my feet turned cold. Icy cold. I fell to my knees as my fire ebbed away. I moaned as I felt the heat of another fire. Alex’s rage, her intense hatred of Adam, seeped into my soul. Strangely, I wanted nothing more than to watch him burn.

A hand, made entirely of angry fire, grew in front of me. It reared and slapped Adam hard across the face. When he righted himself, his cheek was unmarred, perfect. I absorbed the flames into my body, where the heat boiled under my skin. It raged throughout my senses.

But it didn’t hurt.

Because it was
my
fire. That—woman—had
stolen
—my—Element. No wonder she hadn’t been able to hurt Adam, my bonded Airmaster, a chartered member of my Council.