The Grower's Gift (Progeny of Time #1) (3 page)

She held out her left arm. "Look what Giles made me."

They both leaned closer to admire the work, her father whistling appreciatively. "I haven't seen work this fine outside the Ring. You would do well there, Giles."

Giles waved his hand through the air dismissively, beaming. "The cities are no place for normal people."

Maya studied the bracelet and necklace side by side. "With both of these to channel my powers, I'm sure I can make a difference."

Her father coughed, and sprayed Maya with the wine he had tried to swallow.
 

"I thought you agreed you would stop saying things like that," he said when he regained control of his breathing. "Claiming you have a gift is a dangerous thing. People don't understand that kind of talk."

"They'd understand living a better life and that's what I want to give them," Maya protested. "Honestly, Dad, I've never heard of a bad thing happen to anyone with a gift."

Her father poured himself more wine. "You never knew anyone with a gift, so you have no idea what you are talking about."

"You know someone with a gift?" Maya asked. "Who?"
 

Her parents exchanged another strained look, and her mother shook her head. Maya's father looked down at the table and continued anyway. "I went to the copse on the north side of town once to gather some firewood and found a dying woman there. In front of my very eyes, grass shot up from all around her, burying her from my sight."

"She could grow things? Like me?" Maya interrupted. "Where is she now?"

This woman had the same gift as Maya, and she could use it at will. She could teach Maya so much.
 

"She died. Our doctor couldn't heal her. She kept pleading with us all not to reveal to anyone what she could do, that they would kill her if they knew."

"Who's 'they'?" Maya asked, her heart beating furiously in her chest now.

"She never said. We assumed she spoke of the people of whatever town she was from. So you see, it's not safe to go around telling people you have a gift."

Maya glared at her father. His story was too fitting, the woman had a gift too much like her own. "I'm not a little girl anymore. You can't just tell me lies to scare me."

Her mother laid a hand on Maya's. "It's the truth."

Maya looked at Giles for some support, but he was turned away from them staring fixedly out the window. He turned to face them, his face pale and his eyes wide. "I can't believe it. You did it."

"Did what?" Maya asked.
 

"Come see," Giles said and pointed out the window. Maya walked up to him.

Tall, ripe wheat hissed in the night breeze.
 

I did it! It worked.

She opened the window and jumped out, ignoring the others' surprised yells.
 

Frost would come this night. The wheat needed to be picked.
 

Once it was all safely inside she'd listen to her parents' admonitions and warnings. They wouldn't refuse ripe, healthy wheat, not once it was collected and stored inside the house.

~

"How is this possible?" her father demanded, pulling Maya back from collecting the wheat, his voice hoarse, almost threatening. "These were no more than shoots this morning."

Maya looked into his eyes defiantly. "I did this with my gift. I let the life giving warmth water them, and make them grow. I also made sure the shoots survived after the floods."

Maya cowered when her father grabbed her arms, his strong fingers digging into her flesh painfully. "You will stop this silly talk. You can't heal with your touch!"

Spittle hit her face, and his blue eyes bulged the way they did every time he got angry. Maya wasn't about to back down, not with the proof of her powers brushing against her legs in the breeze.
 

"How can you say that?" she yelled, pulling herself free from his grasp. "This wheat is ready for picking."

Giles and her mother had followed them outside. Her mother was staring from one to the other, opening and closing her mouth. Giles shook his head slightly behind her mother's shoulder.

What was he saying? That she should calm down?

He was right, probably. Yet she had to make them understand, had to make them believe.
 

Her father pushed her aside and started trampling the wheat viciously.

"No!" Maya yelled and threw herself at him. He pushed her back and continued to destroy the crop.
 

Giles wrapped his arm around her chest and pulled her back.
 

"Let me go!" Maya yelled, fighting against Giles' arm. "Dad! Stop it! What's wrong with you?"

"Be quiet! No one must see this." Her father started kicking soil over the destroyed crop.

"Why? Imagine all the food we could grow! Why can't I practice my magic?"

Her father moved to her side so quickly that Giles pulled her back out of his reach. "Magic? I see no magic, just a silly girl with crazy ideas who will get hurt because of them. I will not hear you speak of gifts again. And if you ever do such a thing as this again, we are leaving this town."

Maya could count on one hand the number of times her father had truly lost his temper. His anger tonight made all those times pale in comparison. Yet, he was being unreasonable.
 

"Why can't you accept that I have a special gift?" Maya rounded on her father, Giles' arm still tight around her chest.
 

"You do
not
have a gift!" her father hissed. "This is dangerous talk. You could be kicked out of town for saying it. And how would you survive then? Out in the Badlands all alone with no drinking water and no food, and who knows what prowling around?"

"I could make an oasis," Maya retorted.
 

"Let's go back inside," her mother pleaded softly. Maya ignored her.

She finally succeeded in prying away Giles' arm and took a step towards her father.
 

"I have the ability to feed this whole town and I plan to use it! I am of age now. You can no longer tell me what to do," she said, keeping her voice low.

The muscles in his face tensed into a grimace, and Maya was sure he would strike her. Her mother stood between them and took hold of his arm.
 

"She is of age."

She turned to Maya, such sadness in her eyes that had been so bright not half an hour ago. "I bought the grains from a strange merchant who came here for market day about a month ago. Who knows what kind of mutated gene strand they contained? Maya, please listen to your father. He only wants the best for you. Let's not argue anymore. Let's go inside."

She tried to pull Maya's father after her, but he stood his ground and looked around nervously. "At least no one else saw this."

Maya's face heated up. Those grains where not from market. Or were they?

The night swam around Maya, her father's fast breathing making a cloud of smoke in front of her face.
 

No, she had the healing touch, had always had it. Didn't flowers grow taller after she sent the warmth into them? Didn't the apple tree grow larger fruits? Didn't the sick she visited and touched with her warmth sometimes get better? Didn't her dog still draw breath even after it was mauled by that gleaming eyed puma from the city?

Coincidences all, her parents always claimed. Maya knew better, and she had always hoped her parents would believe her if she gave them proof.

 
Maya bunched her hands into fists. "Fine, destroy this wheat. I'll grow more. And you can't stop me!"

Tears streamed down her face as she ran from them, trying to stifle the hurt and anger. Not even her own parents were on her side.

CHAPTER THREE

Maya ran all the way to the town square before she finally had to stop. The icy air froze her lungs as she tried to draw deep breaths.
 

Giles stopped beside her, out of breath from trying to catch her. "Now what?"

She turned to face him so fast he took a step backwards. "You do believe me don't you? Or do you agree with my parents?"

He smiled and held out his hands pretending to ward her off. "Of course I believe you. Didn't I spend the last two nights in the freezing cold while you tried to bring the wheat back to life?"

He had. Some of the fire left her, replaced by the bitter cold of the night. "I'm not ready to go back and face my parents just yet."

Guilt started to creep over her anger, but anything she said to them now would still lead to another argument.
 

"Let's go to my house," Giles suggested.

Maya shook her head and pointed to the pub. "I want another glass of wine first." Maybe the pleasant fuzziness would take some of the edge off her anger.

Laughter and loud voices came through the open windows of the pub. The hovercraft was still parked outside, and by the sound of it everyone inside was having a blast.
 

"I'm not so sure it's a good idea with the Citizens in there," Giles said.

"They don't scare me," Maya said and hurried towards the pub. "This is the Badlands, it's our home, not theirs."

The heat escaping through the door as they entered the pub almost knocked her back. Marvin the pub keeper was talking quietly at the bar to Lavinia the town doctor. They were the only townspeople in the tavern.

Most of the merrymaking was coming from a group of about ten teenagers who occupied most of the front room. Guns, crossbows and even a spear lay on the floor and tables around them.

"Hunters, like we thought," Giles whispered to her as they took their seats by the bar.
 

Marvin asked them what they would like and to Maya's surprise, he didn't argue when she ordered mulled wine. "Turned of age today, didn't you? Your father was in here beaming about it earlier when he came to buy a bottle of wine."
 

A painful pang of guilt stabbed at Maya's heart at the mention of her parents.

Giles nodded in the direction of the rowdy kids. "Coming or going?"

Marvin's face turned dark, but he didn't look at the Citizens. "Not sure. They drank so much already, I doubt they'll hunt down anything tonight."

"I thought that hovercraft was large enough to transport at least a couple of large cats," Giles said quietly, bringing Maya right out of regretting how she spoke to her parents.

"Please let it not be big cats," Maya said. Of all the animals, she feared lions and tigers the most. They had no real ties to other living creatures, except as predators are tied to their prey.

Lavinia tapped her glass against the bar loudly. "Keep your voice down, Maya. We don't want any trouble."

"Trouble? One of their beasts tore the baker's leg right off…and mauled my dog!" Not that those two were equal. Maya had only been able to save her dog. "They shouldn't let anything loose if they can't hunt it down."

She turned and glared at the group, ignoring Giles' hand on her arm.
 

One of the girls saw her looking and fixed her snake-like green eyes on Maya's. Her pale red hair hung perfectly straight down her face, over her shoulders, and to her waist.
 

The girl hushed her friends. "Listen up, this piece of Badlands trash doesn't think much of our hunting abilities!"

The rest whipped around to stare at Maya, some chuckling, others glaring at Maya like she had mortally insulted them.

"Why did you have to provoke them?" Giles whispered and stood in front of Maya to shield and protect her.
 

Maya stood up and pushed past him. This was her fight and she could take care of herself.
 

"Barbaric is what your little hunting parties are. And no, I do not think you are very good. Not if you were the one who failed to catch that mutated puma a month ago!"
 

The red haired girl rose too. A knife was tucked into a sheath in the belt of her tight blue body suit. She was at least a few years older than Maya, but no taller. Maya's rage at the barbarity of their hunts was a furnace in her chest.
 

"The baker died from the puma attack. He left two toddlers behind!" Maya yelled. The futility of her efforts to save him, his little daughter sobbing into her mother's arm while Maya tried so hard to convince the man's blood to stop rushing from his torn leg crashed into her, eliminating all impulse to give life. "Was it you who failed to catch it?"

"I always catch what I set out to hunt," the girl said, advancing with a scary smile on her lips, a snake ready to strike. Several of the others stood up and joined her. "Even if it was me, what are you going to do about it?"

Maya sensed Giles beside her reach into his pocket for the small knife he used to carve the leather.
 

The redhead reached for her own knife.

Maya stood between her and Giles. The girl unsnapped her knife and pulled it halfway from its sheath. Behind her, a black haired kid rose from the table. "That's enough, Lana. We're their guests here."

The girl threw her head back and laughed. "Guests? Well, then I should teach her to show a little more hospitality."

The kid who spoke stood and grabbed her arm before she could withdraw her knife all the way. "I said, enough, Lana."

Maya broke eye contact with the snake girl to look at him. His black hair glimmered in the light, and his eyes were the blue of a deep ocean. His short sleeved body suit brought forth every ripple of his muscled arms, torso and stomach. A roaring tiger tattoo done in thin black lines covered the inside of his left forearm.
 

When his cold blue eyes met hers, an odd recognition flooded her chest. She felt like she had known him since forever, and was equally certain they'd never met before.
 

The red haired girl snatched her arm from his grasp and shrieked at him. "Are you in the mood for a girl from the Badlands now, Ty? And you don't have any authority to order me around. I'm not one of your Special Forces soldiers."

 
The kid kept his eyes fixed on Maya's, as though he couldn't help himself. Then he laughed and swept the red haired girl into his arms and kissed her, deep and long.