Hopeless Magic (12 page)

"How can you possibly know that?" Talbott was suspicious, making Avalon hesitate speaking again.

"Sebastian explained to me the circumstances and I can find no fault with him," Kiran stood up straighter, inadvertently drawing further away from me. "He asked Beckton to walk you home, after you left the club. He didn't want you to walk back to your car alone. His intentions were completely blameless. Beckton must have been at the trial, he must have put the pieces together on his own. Trust me. This was not my father, nor was it Sebastian," Kiran rubbed his hand against my 176/711

back, but I found no comfort in the gesture. I felt instead, patronized and I was not happy about it.

Avalon began to defend me, but I cut him off.

"Kiran, he was waiting for me. He was hiding in the shadows waiting. He knew exactly who I was and that I would be alone. He tried to kill me....

He tried to kill me," I said every word carefully and pointedly.

"It doesn't matter now," Kiran said quickly, pulling me into his arms again. "He is being taken care of, I have seen to that."

"Wait.... Where is he?" I asked, confused. I thought I saw Jericho drive away with him.

"After I picked you up Eden, Amory relayed everything to Kiran and handed Beckton over to Kiran's guard," Avalon explained quickly, so I did not give anything away about Jericho. He made it clear in our shared thoughts to leave as much about any other member of the Resistance out.

"He will never hurt you again," Kiran whispered soothingly, hugging me tighter.

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"He can't hurt anyone again; he doesn't have any magic left," I mumbled, outraged by the thought of him and irritated by the others around me.

Wasn't I the one who took care of him? Wasn't I the one who had made sure he could never hurt anyone else again?

"I really wish you wouldn't have done that,"

Kiran's comment surprised me and I drew back, defensive.

"What do you mean?" I narrowed my eyes in suspicion, a feeling of resentment washed over me and I was unsure what to make of my reaction to the love of my life.

"It's just that, when you do things like that, you draw unnecessary attention to the strength of your power. Now we either have to explain why a sixteen year old girl can drain a trained and vet-ted Titan guard or we have to hide all of the evidence altogether. Either scenario is extremely difficult, and both could result in dire consequences," his eyes pled with me to return to his arms, but his words were spoken so insensitively 178/711

and matter-of-factly that I had trouble actually comprehending them.

"Kiran, he tried to kill me. He nearly succeeded.

A couple of times actually. What was I supposed to do? Just walk away? He wanted me dead and if I hadn't taken every last ounce of his magic, everything that made that possible, I wouldn't be standing here today," I watched Kiran open his mouth as if to explain himself but I had had enough. I was not bait for either side of this damn civil war to take advantage of. I was a person, a person who was just figuring this whole freaking thing out and my magic was ready to explode thanks to those yahoos and their excessively emotional states. I was the one who should be over emotional, I was the one who should have been arguing and demanding explanations. I had had enough.

I turned around, fed up with all of them and stormed through the double doors leading back into the lobby of the building. I could feel all three boys close on my heels and if it weren't for 179/711

Sebastian standing just a few feet from my point of exit I would have left them all in my dust on the way to class. As it were however, I had to stop and face the idiot probably responsible for my near death experience last night.

"What?" I shouted, not at all surprised to find him spying on us. The boys all skidded to a halt behind me, clearly more unnerved by his presence than I was.

"I'm sorry to interrupt," Sebastian said snidely, obviously proud of himself for catching us in the middle of something. I crossed my arms defiantly and glared at him until he eventually continued.

"Eden, it has come to King Lucan's attention that you were raised human, and that you have just recently been introduced into Immortal society."

"And?" I asked rudely, my tone full of venom.

"Well, if that is indeed the case, then it would seem you haven't experienced the Eternal Walk,"

he continued as if I were lying about being raised by humans. I could assure him that this was one of the only things I had been completely honest 180/711

about. "Lucan has ordered that you follow through with this rite of passage as soon as possible. Preparations have already begun to be made."

Personally I had absolutely no idea what Sebastian was talking about, but the reaction I felt inside of Avalon made every one of my hairs stand on end. Avalon reacted with such fear and trepida-tion that whatever this Eternal Walk was, had Avalon scared out of his mind.

Kiran instinctively put a hand on my shoulder and I felt his fingers shake where they lay. Despite the boys reaction, I frankly, had had enough.

I didn't know what the Eternal Walk was and that pissed me off. I was tired of hiding my relationship with Kiran and my identity from the rest of the world and that pissed me off.

I let out a scream of frustration I couldn't control and finally the magic I had been holding on to all morning rushed out of me. I had reached a breaking point in sanity, the internalized magic arrived at it's full and powerful limits in the glass of all 181/711

of the doors and windows of the lobby. Glass shattered all around us in one electric pulse of energy.

I didn't bother with feeling guilty or ashamed, but walked straight past Sebastian and up the stairs towards English, my clogs crunching on broken glass the entire way. Those four boys had made a mess of my life and so they could be the ones to clean up the mess in the lobby, for all I cared. At least Mr. Lambert wouldn't be yelling at me for being late today.

12.

"Ms. Matthews, you're presence is requested in the principal's office," Ms. Woodsen spoke softly and delicately, despite her wild appearance, to me before I could reach the entrance to Drama. I smiled graciously and turned around on my heel.

Fighting through the pressing crowd of my class-mates, I came out on the other side relieved.

Drama was not my forte, to say the least, and I wasn't exactly emotionally prepared to work on dramatic prose this morning. I'd had enough drama in my life to satisfy the most avid attention seekers, I could easily go without a peer group of judgmental adolescents all bent on my literal destruction.

In the lobby of the English and Drama Building, men had already been called to repair the broken glass. The marbled floor was pristinely clean and the window sills wiped and waiting for new panes to be installed. I smiled to myself, content 183/711

with the gratifying feeling of destroying something and walked through the crew of men working without a single hint of guilt.

I made my way across campus quickly, the November air was frigid and windy. The Nebraska sky had ceased to send soft, refreshing rain and was now in a steady state of spitting ice. I pulled the hood of my jacket over my head, an accessory that had now become my constant companion.

Mrs. Truance nodded her head in disdained approval on my way to the staircase leading up to Amory's office. I grudgingly used my magic, to dry my clogs and coat before entering "Principal Saint's" office without knocking. Amory would not have been pleased if he knew I was withhold-ing my energy for the simple sake that I could.

He would have been even more upset if he knew how I dispelled the built-up electricity this morning.

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"Eden," he gasped upon my arrival, standing at his desk shuffling papers. I rushed to his arms and he held me tightly to him.

Suddenly I burst into sobbing tears, soaking his expensive tweed suit jacket. I felt foolish and childlike. I might have been able to hold in my magic, but my emotions had overtaken me.

"There, there," he soothed, rubbing my back. His deep, melodic voice reached to my soul and I had never been more relieved to be in my grandfather's calming presence.

"They're never going to stop are they? They are never going to stop and I'm going to have to keep hurting them!" I wailed, my sweeter emotions overtaking my fear and anger.

"Oh, Eden," I heard Amory's voice break and he hugged me tighter.

My sobbing continued for several more minutes.

Amory's magic wrapped around me, doing its best to comfort and calm me. I felt as though I was past the point however. Eventually my tears stopped and my shaking subsided. I stepped 185/711

back, wiping my face with the sleeve of my pressed white uniform shirt.

Amory coughed forcefully, ridding his voice of any emotion before gesturing with his hand for me to sit. I obeyed, sitting with my legs beneath me in one of Amory's comfortable leather chairs opposite his expansive desk. He also took a seat in his own high-backed leather chair.

"I'm sorry about the windows," I mumbled glumly, sniffing and unable to look Amory in his eyes.

"Oh, it's just glass," he smiled gently, but it didn't reach his eyes. Amory had the same black eyes that I had and they were etched deeply with concern. For a moment he looked ancient, as if he had been alive since the beginning of time.

"Eden, earlier this morning, I spoke with Lucan,"

Amory took a moment to pause and let the gravity of what he was about to say settle over me.

"He asked many questions about you, none of which were what I expected. He is playing this 186/711

game carefully; I believe he knows what is at stake if you suddenly disappear."

"Then why is he trying to kill me!" I demanded rather than questioned.

"I am not entirely sure if he
is
trying to kill you. I am beginning to believe he is only testing you.

He is doing his best to find out what exactly you are capable of," Amory folded his hands on his desk and stared at me intently, waiting for my reaction.

"I'm not a research project," I growled.

Eden, I am afraid that is exactly what you are,"

he shook his head slowly while looking down at his hands.

"So what were his questions?" I stifled my urge for nasty sarcasm.

"He was asking about your upbringing, your human upbringing," Amory pressed his fingers together and his gesture displayed the gravity of his words. To me a human upbringing was menial and insignificant. If anything, I was proud to have been raised by a human. From what I could 187/711

tell, Aunt Syll valued human life significantly more than anyone in this over-privileged, snobby, super-human, fantasy world. But as I became more aware of the culture around me, I found that they saw my guardian as a joke, an unbelievable coincidence or even worse, an insult.

"What about it?" I grunted, finding myself only growing more and more irritated.

"There is a tradition with young Immortals when they reach adolescence. When an Immortal child enters a new period of life, such as young adult-hood or marriage, or child birth, tradition dictates that they take a symbolic walk. Each new phase of life signifies an extreme change to one's present condition and a taking on, if you will, of new responsibility. Each Immortal life is unique and highly regarded in that there is a ceremony for every major milestone. Normally, when an Immortal is born in to this world there is a baptism of sorts and a three-day festival. We call it the Eternal Baptism, and we bath each infant in holy water, not in the human sense, but in our 188/711

own version of holy water. In reality your parents bestowed this honor upon you and your brother in the secrecy of their private lives, but when you turned thirteen, the traditional practice was not observed.

It is entirely my fault, since I am the one who kept you in hiding and kept our way of life hidden from you. Unfortunately, now that you are known to the King, he expects you to fulfill your rite of passage. He has agreed to forgo the new-born christening, since I assured him, I baptized you upon your realization of self, but he has been stubborn about the Eternal Walk, the ceremony conducted when you reach adolescence."

"Why is that?" I asked, trying to get my head around thousands of years of tradition I had yet to catch up on.

"Because the Eternal Walk is significant to understanding what kind of Immortal you are. Before the separation of races, every Immortal would participate in the ceremony and learn what powers they exhibited most strongly and what 189/711

kind they took on. It made sense thousands of years ago when a Witch could be born from a Medium and Titan and so forth. Today, the ceremony is done for the sake of the king. You see, Lucan, just like his father, and his father's father, monitor every single Walk, so that they can prove to themselves that every member of our community is adhering to the laws. Since the Monarchy, every Immortal has taken the Eternal Walk to prove their allegiance to the King. Well, until you and your brother."

"I don't understand," I said bluntly. "So I take a walk, Lucan is there, and then I can officially be a teenager? Is this like the Immortal version of a Bar Mitzvah?" I was lost.

Amory chuckled, but shook his head, "You, my dear, will endure an agonizing and strenuous test of both character and skill to determine the type of Immortal you are. Lucan will watch the demonstration with a board of advisors, and when you have reached your limit and are wrapped in the Holy Flame, he will discover your 190/711

true and hidden identity, I'm afraid. Not only will your secrets be revealed for all, but after the fact, you will be weak and displaced and Lucan will be able to do whatever he wishes with you,"

Amory's face was suddenly grave and took on his ancient expression again. He rubbed his temples with his fingers as if fighting a migraine. I had the urge to walk over to him, but couldn't make myself move. I was too stunned.

"Is that all?" I finally found my voice. "So what exactly is it?" I courageously asked, not entirely sure if I wanted to know the answer. I imagined all kinds of terrible scenarios of torture, but nothing I could come up with would leave me as un-protected as Amory suggested.