“If you could be a cat or a dog, which would you be?” he asked.
The ridiculous nature of the question had me in shock. “Answer!” he yelled.
“Dog!” I shouted.
‘I’m telling Mittens,’ Logan taunted, and I ignored him, trying not to laugh.
“Chocolate or caramel?” Griddish quizzed.
Pssh, as if that was a competition. “Chocolate.”
“What color is your magic?” He rubbed his chin as the wheels spun in his mind.
“Purple.” I was pretty sure he already suspected I was a hybrid, and I didn’t want to combust by lying.
He raised an eyebrow at that and moved on.
“Do you believe in love at first sight?”
I looked at Logan, faltering for a second, embarrassed. “Yes.”
Logan grinned. Ego boost.
“Final question. If you could have one gift, would it be to fly or to read minds.”
I paused, my mind getting stuck. I wanted to say fly, but technically I could already fly. Reading minds might be cool, but would I want to be stuck in everyone’s drama?
He looked nervous. “Answer!”
Shit! I’d lost what my instinct had been. “Fly?” I replied and he swallowed hard.
“She’s either a white elm or a balsam fir.” He rubbed his chin and popped open the wooden chest.
Inside were a bunch of small sticks. They weren’t normal sticks. They were capped each side in gold and carved with different symbols. Because of my curious nature, I couldn’t not ask what they were.
He fiddled through them before pulling two out and weighing them in his hand.
“They are magicked power wands, meant to magnify the effects of a staff one hundred-fold, to help me chose the right one for you. What if I spent four days carving a staff that didn’t even work?”
“Right,” I mumbled. Oh God, I was going to have to touch one of these. I knew it. I had a horrible history with touching stuff.
He weighed each one in his hand. “Elm or fir? Elm or fir…?” he mumbled.
I swallowed hard, suddenly nervous to do this at all. Maybe I could learn to harness my power without this…? My eyes met Isaac and he simply shook his head. He must have known where my thoughts were going. What had he said by the waterfall, that without a wand my powers would overwhelm me? Great.
The elf seemed to have decided on one, and extended his knobby hand to me. I took a deep breath and reached for the stick, then something in his face flickered and he snatched his hand back.
“You pass a homeless man on the street. He looks like a drug addict but he also looks hungry. You have a dollar in your pocket. Do you give him the dollar?” the elf asked.
I answered without hesitation. “No.” I never gave money, always food or packages of socks or something else. Maybe that was wrong. Not to trust them with money. But it’s just who I was. I would have bought him a burger with the dollar but not given the money.
The elf smiled, looking more confident, and this time handed me the stick that was opposite from the one he’d just been about to hand me. Great. Guesswork.
Behind him, Logan, Keegan, Isaac and Danny all covered their man parts with their hands.
Sloane the ball buster. Beware.
Taking a deep breath, I reached for the stick and wrapped my fingers around it. Here goes nothing.
Instead of the uncontrolled and chaotic sonic boom of energy that normally happened when I tried to make my power show itself, a low rumble shook the ground and purple light vibrated out of the wand in wavy lines across the yard. Seeing that the purple magic was too widespread, I only had to think of condensing it before it became a thin beam. I stared at the purple beam in awe as it lit up the base of the tree trunk.
The boys all took their hands off their junk and relaxed, but Griddish and Isaac both had their jaws slack as they stared at the beam.
A peculiar scent filtered through my nose and I identified it at the same time Danny yelled, “Smoke!”
My purple beam was branding the base of the tree. I yelped and dropped the stick, as Danny threw some yellow magic at the tree to keep it from catching fire.
Griddish had fallen to his knees, staring at me with an awed reverence. “A fire druid,” he breathed. “I haven’t seen one in a hundred years.”
Isaac was grinning ear to ear. “We must train immediately.”
I stared at the stick on the ground where I had dropped it. My palm itched to pick it up again. It had somehow soothed the agitated energy I’d had since finding out I was skyborn. Fire druid … I could guess at what that was but I’d rather be told. I had a wild imagination and didn’t want to insert things that weren’t reality.
“Fire druid?” Logan asked, stepping closer to me, his muscles tightening, going into his protective mode I had come to love.
Isaac placed a reassuring hand on Logan’s shoulder. “In the beginning, when all druids were earth druids and did not take power from the Skyborn, there existed only four kinds: Earth, water, wind, and fire—the latter being the rarest. Earth druids, like me, harness energy from the earth, and my magic is linked to the earth. Water druids draw from the water, and often swim for hours each day to recharge. Wind druids, like Ardan and Steven, are some of the most powerful. They pull energy from the most plentiful resource on Earth. Air. But they’ve tainted their bodies with the siphoning of skyborn magic, and it’s distorted their ability, which is why Ardan is so formidable.”
He paused for effect. “Fire druids are rumored to be the mightiest. Their magic is born of the core of Mother Earth. With proper training, a fire druid could eviscerate Ardan.” His eyes were gleaming. Long gone was the happy druid who hugged trees. In his place, was a sadistic murderer who was hell bent on seeing Ardan burn alive.
No pressure. And yuck.
“So …” Danny was the one to break the silence. “With this wand, her magic won’t be able to nut punch us anymore?” He seemed to be overly concerned with his junk.
The elf’s brow furrowed in confusion, but Isaac simply nodded. “Among other things.”
Logan hadn’t said a word, but apprehension was written all over his face. “Is it dangerous? Can she get hurt?”
The elf stood and picked up the stick I had dropped. Isaac nodded. “Training a fire druid can be … difficult, but I am more than capable for the challenge.”
Okay, confidence. I liked that. Feeling good.
The elf gave Logan a small bow. “I will make her the finest white elm earth wand this world has ever seen.”
Logan nodded, looking as if he didn’t much care how fine my wand was.
Isaac gave the elf a small bow. “How well the wand is crafted, means how well her powers will work. I don’t need to remind you of that, do I?”
Oh. The plot thickens.
“You do not,” he growled.
Don’t piss him off. I tried to mentally beam the message to Isaac. The last thing I needed was for him to make me a jacked-up wand that exploded my head when I used it or something.
“We’ll be back in four days,” Isaac told the elf, and he nodded.