Scorching Secrets (8 page)

“That’s disturbing. No one should be able to do that,” David says while attempting a similar move. David has trouble sitting Indian style, so stretching is almost comical with him.

She looks up and smiles at him. “You’re just jealous.” When she sees him, she starts laughing. “You really should try yoga, man.” Her laugh is infectious. I can’t help but smile with her. I look over and see Emma watching me. She smirks but doesn’t say anything. I know that she’ll try to start meddling, but I’m not ready to tell Ryanne yet. I’ll have to talk with Emma later. She’s not known for keeping secrets, and her sharing a room with Ryanne isn’t going to make it any easier.

Her smile widens when I narrow my eyes at her. Ryanne glances between the two of us, wondering what is going on. Crap. She’ll definitely ask about that later. She turns toward Liam and asks him to spar with her. He nods, and they walk to the opposite end of the yard. She doesn’t spar with Emma anymore because they are too evenly matched. None of the opponents she’s been up against so far have been similar to her size. I lean toward Emma when Ryanne is out of earshot. “Don’t say anything to her.”

“Why not? Come on, Colton. You know everything will be so much easier when you tell her.”

“I’m not ready to tell her yet, and I know that she’s not ready to hear it. Please don’t say anything. Don’t drop any hints and stop looking at me like that. She knows that something is going on. She already thinks I’m keeping things from her.”

“Because you
are
keeping something from her. You’re just lucky that she can’t read your mind. If she reads it from my mind, it’s not my fault.” She gets up and walks over to David.

I look toward Bragden, and he nods at me, understanding my need to spar with someone who will fight back just as hard. We start sparring like normal. After the first couple of punches and kicks are thrown, we start to pick up the speed and intensity of the moves. Neither one of us can infuse magic into our hits like Ryanne can, but they still hurt. When she hits you, it hurts like hell. I’d been on the receiving end of some of the hits and they leave a nasty bruise if Logan doesn’t heal them.

I glance over at Ryanne and see her sparring with Liam. He got a punch in on her shoulder, but she retaliated with a kick that knocked him to the ground. I would have laughed at that if Bragden didn’t punch me in the gut. “You need to pay attention. She’s fine. Liam’s not going to hurt her.”

“I know. I know.” I duck one of his kicks. “It just bothers me that she always,” I punch him in the shoulder and bring up my arm to block his arm, “takes everything so lightly. She doesn’t care that she,” I jump back, “is always putting herself in more danger than necessary.” Bragden stops sparring with me and glances over at Ryanne.

“You know why she does it.” I watch as they stop sparring, and Liam says something to her. She is breathing heavily but nods. When she turns her concentration towards the trees, a bunch of dead branches start coming toward her, and she creates a large pile in the center of the grass. I notice that David, Logan, and Emma have stopped what they are doing and are now watching to see what she is going to do as well. When the pile is big enough, she turns and looks at him, waiting for further instructions. He says something and points toward the house. She starts backing up. Liam takes a couple of steps to the side and nods at her.

*****

“I want to try something new with you,” Liam says after he stopped sparring with me.

“Ok, what is it?” I ask a little skeptically, while trying to calm my frantic breathing.

“I want to see if you are able to call magic to you while you are sparring. Not just into your limps. Can you create a large pile of wood for me?” I nod and turn my attention to the forest in front of me. I close my eyes and push my magic out, picturing dead branches of wood creating a large pile in front of me.

“Now what?”

“Ok, now I want you to go stand near the house and get a running start. Halfway there, I want you to do some of those flip things that you can do.”

I giggle at his expression. “Flip things?”

“You know what I mean. While you are flipping, I want to see if you can call magic to you and strike lightning into that pile of wood when you stop.”

“Is that all?” He glares at me. “Ok. Flip. Concentrate. Strike. Got it.”

I start to back up, getting closer to the house. I take a couple of deep breaths and concentrate on creating lightning. Liam takes a few steps back and nods at me. With one more intake of air, I start to run forward. After a couple of steps, I do a double full twist while visualizing lightning striking the wood. Flipping on grass is more difficult than doing it in a gym, since the ground is uneven and not spring loaded. I stop flipping halfway to the woodpile and push out the magic. I’ve only ever put a shield around myself before, but seeing the amount of magic going toward the wood, I use the last of my energy to create a large enough shield to protect everyone in the yard.

Colton

I turn toward Bragden and ask, “What is she doing?”

“I’m sure we are about to find out.” Running toward the wood, Ryanne jumps into the air and flips before twisting her body a couple of times. When she lands back on the ground, she turns around and doubles over. The large pile explodes; wood catapults in all directions. Bragden and I fall to the ground to avoid being hit when the wood seems to hit an invisible barrier. Bragden looks over at me confused. Shrugging because I have no idea what actually happened either, I look across the yard at Ryanne and see her standing there with her eyes closed, her face furrowed in concentration.

When all the pieces of wood stop raining down, Ryanne collapses. Bragden and I jump up and run toward her. Liam beats us to it since he is closer. Before Liam gets to her, she starts to move.

He helps her sit up. “Are you ok?”

She smiles up at Liam. Bragden and I make it over to her, right as she says, “It worked.”

“What was that?” David asks when they reach her.

Logan pushes through everyone. “Are you hurt?”

She looks around at all of us, looking for something. “None of you got hit with any flying pieces of wood?” We all shake our heads. Liam removes his hand from her back. Pushing off the ground, she attempts to get up.

Logan stops her. “Maybe you should stay seated for a little bit.” She brushes him off. Liam stands up and reaches a hand down to help her up. She takes it and sways as she stands.

“I didn’t think that would work. I’ve never created a shield that big before. I didn’t think I made it big enough to cover everyone.” Her smile gets wider. A shield? She created a shield?

“You created a shield?” I ask.

“Is that why the wood just stopped moving toward us?” Emma asks with wide eyes.

“Yeah, I just pushed a lot of magic out right after the lightning. I pictured this wall between us and the wood. I did it once while I was in the dream world with Liam. I didn’t know if it would work here, but I tried it anyway. I didn’t want anyone getting hurt because of me.”

“I’ll admit, when I first thought of that, I thought it would take a couple of tries for it to work. I’m really impressed that you were able to do that on the first try,” Liam says and then turns to everyone else. “I didn’t tell her anything about a shield. I didn’t know she could do that.” I look toward Ryanne and notice her swaying. I take a couple of steps toward her.

“Ryanne, are you ok?” I touch her arm, trying to get her to look at me, but she is staring at the ground, blinking rapidly.

“I’m a little dizzy,” she says right as her legs give out, and she collapses again. I reach out at the last second and catch her before she hits her head on the ground.

“Logan, can you tell me if she’s in a vision or not?” I ask him.

“I’m not sure if I’ll know if she’s in a vision or not, but I can see if anything else is wrong with her.” He crouches down next to us and puts his hands on both sides of her face and closes his eyes.

He shakes his head before he opens his eyes. “She’s not in a vision.” He looks down at her. “She just used too much magic. She would have been fine if she didn’t put up such a large shield to protect us. Her body just couldn’t handle pushing that much magic out yet.” I look down at her and see her eyes are closed and mouth slightly open. I pick her up, cradling her against my chest.

“I think she’s done training for now. I’ll go put her in her bed.” Tom is sitting in the kitchen when I walk in carrying Ryanne. He stands up when he sees her in my arms.

“What happened?”

“Logan or Liam will be able to explain when they finish cleaning up outside. I’m going to put her in her bed. I’ll be back.”

I walk past Tom and walk up the stairs. Entering Ryanne’s room, I walk over to her bed, the one closest to the window, and carefully put Ryanne down on it. I take off her shoes and socks before pulling the comforter over her. Her head rolls to the side. I lean forward and place a small kiss on her forehead. One of these days, I’ll get to do that when she is actually conscious and aware of me doing it.

One day, I hope.

Entering the kitchen, I find everyone sitting around the table. “So she passed out because she used too much magic?”

“Tom, do you think that if we continue working with her magic, she’ll build up a resistance to it? So she can use it and not worry about passing out?” I ask after sitting down.

“I think that that’s something that we should look into. She’s pretty powerful if she was able to strike a large pile of wood and then create a shield large enough to cover the whole yard…” He trails off. Tom has a small smile on his face. “She’s pretty incredible, isn’t she?”

Emma looks at me and grins evilly. I roll my head back and look at ceiling, waiting for her remark. “Colton sure thinks so.” I groan. I reach over and lightly shove her out of her chair. She’s pretty light for a tall girl. I can’t help but laugh when I see her expression. She is completely shocked—eyes wide, mouth hanging open as she sits on the ground. Apparently everyone else finds it as funny as I do because there is a chorus of laughter throughout the room. Seeing her pointed glare, David reaches down to help her stand up.

Back on her feet, she points and me and says, “If I was Ryanne, you’d be soaking wet right now.” Emma sits back down in her chair and crosses her arms. Though her posture is angry, I can see the smirk she is trying to hide.

“Liam, what did you tell her to do exactly?” Tom asks.

“I was just curious to see if she could concentrate enough to bring out any weather elements while doing something else. So I asked if she could do some of her flips and strike the wood with a lightning bolt. I figured that it might be beneficial in the future.”

Tom nodded, “Yeah, it could be very useful. We know how she is. It was a very good idea.”

“What was a good idea?” We all turn around and see Ryanne standing in the doorway, waiting for our response.

“Why are you awake?” Logan asks. “You passed out. Your body needs to recuperate.”

I shake him off. “I feel fine. Good as new.” Everyone continues to stare at me. “What?” You’d think that I had grown a second head. I walk to Liam’s chair and rest my arms across the top of the wooden back. Colton is directly across from Liam and watching my every move.

“Did you forget the part where you passed out because you used too much magic?” Colton pauses and points toward Logan. “You had to give Logan some of your magic when he used too much. How are you awake right now?”

“I don’t know. I just woke up, and now I feel fine.” They should know that my magic does some crazy things. I can’t explain everything that happens to me. When they continue to watch me, I walk out of the kitchen and grab my notebook and iPod off of the coffee table in the living room. A vibrating sensation spreads through my limps when I come into contact with the notebook. That’s odd. Still feeling everyone’s eyes on me, I shake off the feeling and return to the kitchen.

Tom pushes himself away from the table. “Here have my seat. I have to go do something anyway.” He walks past me and out of the room. I slowly walk around and sit where he was. I put my notebook on the table and scoot the chair closer to the table. Clicking shuffle on my iPod, I pick up my pencil and start to draw. I have to draw this door. I don’t know why. I had a dream about this doorway. Wide at the base, the top of the doorway meets at a point. Arabesque like designs are carved into its old wood exterior. A large black handle hangs low on the left.

I bite my lip to keep from singing along with the song “Wide Awake” by Katy Perry. I can feel everyone’s eyes on me as I draw, but for some reason, I can’t stop. I need to draw this door. My pencil glides across the page creating intricate swirls and star like designs on the door. I add the last detail and sit back a little, looking at the drawing, when I feel someone tap my arm. I look up and see Colton watching me. I take my headphones out and face him, waiting for his question. “Yeah?”

“Why did you draw that?” His eyes flicker down to the door before meeting mine again.

“I don’t know. I think I just had a dream about it earlier, so I…” I inhale and grab my stomach as an intense pain shoots through it. I lean forward and rest my head on the table, arms folded across my stomach. The pain is unbearable. I am on the verge of hyperventilating when I feel myself start to fall.

Colton

I watch as Ryanne doubles over, groaning in pain, and grabs her stomach. I look over at Logan and see him already walking toward her, preparing to heal her. What is going on? Her breathing increases. It seems like she can’t get any air into her lungs. “What’s wrong with her?” I ask Logan.

“I don’t know,” he replies honestly while placing a hand on her shoulder and closing his eyes. When his hand connects with her shoulder, she disappears. Logan stumbles forward when his hand is no longer resting on anything. Her chair scraps against the floor as Logan falls into it. “Where did she go?” I jump up from my seat at the same time as everyone else does. We’re all staring at the empty chair she was just in.