Fire and Fantasy: a Limited Edition Collection of Epic and Urban Fantasy Page 45

  “Yeah,” Liana signed. “No one’s going to see you anymore.”

  We all rose, settling into our seats and glancing around out the windows. Liana slowed the vehicle next to a line of trees. The trees weren’t very tall, but they were enough to conceal the small shack hidden in there somewhere. We all emerged from the car into the warm air and around to the trunk. Noah and I slipped our backpacks over our shoulders and took as much as we could carry. Tristan followed behind us, grabbing the bag of food we’d packed, leaving Liana with only the broom we’d brought along to sweep the shack. She shut the trunk and hurried in front of us.

  “Let’s see if I remember how to find it,” she mused.

  Noah raised a questioning eyebrow. “You don’t even know where we’re going?”

  “You don’t understand, Noah,” I said. “It’s a magical cabin. Like the Room of Requirements. It only shows up when you need it.”

  “Room of Requirements?” Tristan asked with a furrowed brow.

  “Harry Potter?” I said. Right. He didn’t have books or TV where he came from. I wondered what that would be like. Would it get boring, or would it be peaceful?

  “What’s that?” Tristan asked, drawing his eyes toward me and almost tripping over a rock.

  Noah stifled a laugh, and I had the sudden urge to hit him. It wasn’t nice to make fun of Tristan, especially about his grace. He didn’t exactly have much experience in the art of walking.

  “It’s just a book…you know? Fiction,” I explained.

  “I know what a book is.” He almost sounded offended.

  Liana let out a breath that told me she was rolling her eyes even though I couldn’t see them. “It’s not a magical cabin. It’s just that all the trees look the same around here. It’s hard to find your bearings and remember where the cabin is.”

  Since I suggested it, I almost wondered if the cabin was magical. I mean, if Tristan’s people could enchant our entire town, surely they could enchant a single building. I shook off the idea. It was dumb. It’s not like they had a reason to enchant it anyway. Sure, I was paranoid, but this idea was crossing the lines into conspiracy theory. Only, weren’t there conspiracies happening all around me? While that was true, I didn’t think the cabin had anything to do with it.

  We walked slowly through the trees for another ten minutes or so. I half expected to emerge from them back at the car, but just as I was about to give up hope, Liana drew in an excited breath.

  “I see it!” she exclaimed.

  We all quickened our pace to reach the cabin. It looked exactly as I remembered it with its worn wooden siding and slanted roof. The crack in the front window was still there from where I’d thrown a pebble after Liana locked me out as a prank when we were younger. Memories came flooding back as I approached. I remembered trying to climb the tree closest to the cabin but sliding down the trunk instead and spraining my wrist when I landed. I’d never told my parents; I just let it heal on its own. And then there was the time I hid behind the small building for nearly an hour during hide and seek before I realized Liana had abandoned me. I’d found her at her grandparents’ table chowing on macaroni and cheese.

  Liana opened the door gently. It creaked on its hinges. I was nearly afraid it was going to fall off. An odd scent hit my nose when I walked in. It smelled like no one had stepped in there for ages.

  The room was smaller than I remembered, probably because I was taller than the last time I’d been there. The whole thing was probably smaller than my bedroom back home. Two old chairs and a tiny round table were the only contents of the space apart from a small cabinet behind the door. One of the chairs had been tipped over, and the table was missing one of its four legs, leaving it leaning on its edge. The fourth leg lay across the room. I hadn’t remembered us breaking it, but maybe that was from one of the times Liana had returned here without me. Or maybe a wild animal had gotten in here. If I had to bet, I’d put my money on it being the outcome of an angry outburst after Liana found out her boyfriend was cheating on her a couple years ago. She probably came out here to calm down and ended up kicking it off. I didn’t ask about it.

  I noticed both Tristan and Noah turn up their noses when they stepped inside. Neither of them said anything, but if they had, I imagined it’d be something along the lines of, “This is where we’re staying?”

  “Oh, it’s not that bad,” I said aloud, rolling my eyes at them. They both quickly reverted their expressions to normal. “Sure, it’s a little dusty, but we’ll get it cleaned up.”

  At my suggestion, we all got to work. Liana began sweeping the dust away. I took a wash cloth she’d packed for cleaning up and wiped the dust off the chairs, setting the one upright. Noah began trying to fit the leg back on the table. Tristan kind of just stood there observing. I wasn’t sure he knew what to do. What kind of cleaning did they have to do in the ocean?

  “If I remember right, there are some nails and an old hammer in that cabinet over there,” Liana said, pointing.

  Noah’s eyes followed, and he nodded a thanks. “Old hammer” was an understatement. When Noah pulled it out of the cabinet, I immediately noticed how rusty it looked. I was almost afraid the head was going to fall off on the first pound. But it didn’t. Noah managed to hammer a few old nails into the table to secure the leg back on. Tristan watched in intrigue like he’d never seen a hammer before. He probably hadn’t. But didn’t they have tools like that where he came from?

  “Here,” I said, shoving one of the wash cloths in his direction. “You can wipe down the windows.”

  He nodded my way and then dropped the bags he was carrying. I turned to begin dusting down the small cabinet on the wall. I didn’t expect to find much in there, but when I opened the cabinet, I drew in a sharp breath.

  “What is it?” Liana asked.

  I reached my hand out to grasp my new-found treasure—or rather, old treasure. I turned to Liana, my arm stretched out with the small mermaid doll in my hand. She fit in my palm, but she’d grown dusty and worn throughout the years. “Remember this?”

  She nodded. “You can keep it if you want.”

  She was Liana’s doll, but I remember being the one to play with her the most. I’d called her Cynthia. I slid her into my pocket—she was the perfect size for it—and turned back to the cabinet. All I found left inside was an old screwdriver—but no screws—and a package of bandages whose wrappers had started to peel open. I personally wouldn’t use them on a wound. They’d probably only infect it. It’s not like any of us would need them if we got hurt, though. Liana had loaned us the first aid kit from under the sink in her bathroom. I honestly didn’t think her family would notice. The only thing they might notice would be the missing toilet paper. I was not looking forward to using nature as my toilet.

  I wiped down what I could and shook off the dust from my rag outside when it got too full. Eventually, things started looking pretty good. Well, as good as you could get in a beat up little shack in the middle of nowhere. At the very least, it would provide us shelter for the time being.

  The time being. I didn’t like that thought. That meant something had to happen in the future, and whether it was gut or logic, I knew it wasn’t going to be good.

  Noah pursed his lips and fell into one of the chairs at the newly fixed table. “I think it’s time to discuss our next move.”

  I groaned. Tristan had already claimed the second chair, so I slunk to the floor next to our pile of bags and leaned up against my backpack, my head resting against the wall of the shack.

  “I know,” Noah said. “None of us like this, but we can’t stay here forever.”

  “And now we can’t leave,” I snarled, more to myself because I blamed me for choosing to restore my magic, making myself prisoner to this place. Except, I blamed everyone else, too. Nobody had thought of that fact last night. I guess we were all overcome with so many emotions that none of us were thinking clearly.

  “I know,” Noah said.

  “Well, what e
lse are we supposed to do? Turn ourselves in?” I asked. Honestly, it seemed like our options were pretty limited to that or staying here.

  “Your people made the spell,” Liana said to Tristan. She was seated on the floor on the opposite wall from me. “Maybe you could break it.”

  Tristan pressed his lips together. “I cannot. It would take an agreement from your people and several of the strongest of my kind to tear down the walls of the spell. That’s how it was built; and that’s how it can be broken.”

  “So basically we’re screwed,” I said.

  Tristan twisted his face at me like he didn’t understand. I felt like I should be the one doing that to him. I still didn’t understand the whole purpose of this spell. He said it was for our protection. Was it really a way for his people to keep us prisoner or something? Why would they help us? I made a note to ask him more about that later, but I didn’t think now was the time.

  The conversation continued without making progress. Moments of silence passed between the four of us until someone would suggest something stupid and another would pipe up about how it didn’t make any sense. I didn’t think anyone else was more stressed about this situation than I was until Noah rose from his chair and stalked out of the cabin without a single word.

  Thirty-One

  The remaining three of us exchanged a glance.

  “I’ll go talk to him,” I offered.

  He probably wanted to be alone, but it didn’t seem right not to at least try to talk to him. After all, I was the one to get him into this mess. He at least deserved an effort from me.

  I found him next to a tree, one hand leaning on it while he inhaled long breaths. He noticed my approach and jerked his gaze toward me.

  “I’m sorry,” he said, shaking his head as if to rid it of whatever thoughts were rolling around in there.

  “Noah.” I approached slowly, cautiously.

  He didn’t move until I was right next to him, so close that I could reach out and touch the tree he was supporting himself against. He straightened up before turning his back on the tree and sliding down it.

  I took a seat beside him, so close that our knees almost touched. “Noah, I’m so sorry about all this.” I glanced down at my hands knotted in my lap. “I—I wish I never got you involved. I was being selfish and impulsive and—”

  “You don’t have to apologize,” he said softly without looking at me.

  “Yes, I do.”

  “No,” he insisted, finally looking up at me. I couldn’t help but notice a shine to his eyes that told me he was on the brink of tears, but he held it in and remained strong. His eyes didn’t even turn red like I knew mine would have if I were in his place. His gaze turned down to the forest floor beneath us. “I’m glad you brought me back. This past year, I’ve felt so…off. Not myself. I always thought it was because of my parents’ death and then the whole new experience of living in the city. I thought it was something I’d get over eventually, you know? And, I mean, there’s always going to be a piece of me missing with my parents gone and all. I just never realized that wasn’t the only piece missing. I didn’t realize how much our magic made us who we were. Now, I feel…different…better. More like I was before. And the thought of having to give that up again, whether we have to so we can leave or the council takes it as punishment for what we did…it’s just something I…I can’t even think about it.”

  My jaw dropped while he spoke. In his momentary pause, I realized it and snapped it back shut. Noah had seemed so much more reserved before. I wouldn’t have expected him to open up to me so much like this. Maybe it was part of him getting his magic back. Maybe it made him more emotional.

  “I keep wondering what would happen if we went back to the council,” he continued. “You seem to think they’ll toss us in a jail cell or something. I mean, come on, Bree. Does Sea Haven even have any jail cells?”

  I raised a brow at that one. “They still have those rooms where they were keeping Tristan. He was a prisoner down there. They’d do the same thing to us to keep their secrets safe.”

  Noah retorted almost before I’d finished the sentence. “But we can’t even tell anyone about it. We know now that they took our magic because that was their only choice. Maybe if we just talked it out with them, they’d be forgiving and everything would go back to normal.”

  This time when my jaw dropped, I made sure he noticed. “You can’t be defending them! Noah, they held me down and stole my magic. If they’re capable of that and locking Tristan up, then who’s to say they won’t do worse?”

  “That’s another thing. Why would they lock him up? If we’re allies with his people, why not just let him go back to them? Maybe he’s the bad guy. Maybe his people aren’t helping us the way he says. We didn’t exactly try that hard to find the car. Maybe you and I could try again. Maybe he was wrong and we can get out of here with our magic.”

  I almost had the urge to storm away, but Noah needed to be reasoned with. “Look who’s the paranoid one now.”

  “I’m not being paranoid,” he stated sternly. “I’m just trying to come up with alternative theories. It’s clear that we don’t have the whole story yet. And I don’t think we can decide on our next move until we do know.”

  “Then let’s go ask Tristan,” I suggested. “If there’s more to the story, he’ll know.”

  “Yeah, maybe. But not right now. That little shack isn’t exactly pleasant. I thought you called it a cabin.”

  I rolled my eyes. Now he was only poking fun of me. “Cabin. Shack. Same difference.”

  “And here I was expecting a five-star resort.”

  “Nah,” I nudged his shoulder. “You stayed in one of those last night. Too many nights in one and you’ll start to get a big head.”

  “You mean like yours?” he asked with raised eyebrows.

  How could we go so quickly from being serious to being playful? That almost didn’t seem right. We both seemed to realize this quickly, and our laughter died down. A light breeze rustled through nature around us, and I could hear the faint sound of Liana and Tristan’s voices back in the cabin. The quietness wasn’t exactly welcoming.

  “Noah, why’d you agree to come with me in the first place?”

  The corners of his lips turned down like he was hoping I’d never ask that question. Hadn’t I asked him something similar before? With his magic back, would he open up to me more this time?

  He sighed heavily but spoke softly. “You reminded me of home.”

  My heart fluttered at his words, so full of emotion. I didn’t know exactly what he meant by that—was it because I was from Sea Haven, or did it have to do with the crush he admitted to having on me years ago?—but I was touched nonetheless.

  I expected Noah to leave it at that, to not elaborate, but he continued. “It’s different out there. The people aren’t quite the same as they are here. I had a hard time fitting in.”

  And I had a hard time believing that. I always thought Noah would be the type of guy who could fit in anywhere.

  “When I saw you on my doorstep, it was…familiar. I mean, I know we were still practically strangers and hadn’t talked much before, but I knew that of all the people in that city, you’d understand me best.”

  My thoughts locked on only one of his statements. “You mean we’re not still strangers?”

  His gaze flickered toward mine for only a second. “I wouldn’t say we’re strangers anymore, no.”

  Then why was it that I still didn’t feel like I knew that much about him? Did he know more about me than I knew about him? Was I that much of an open book? I didn’t press the topic because I wanted to hear what else he had to say.

  He continued. “It helped that you seemed so helpless and alone.”

  “I thought you said you could see through that act.”

  He shrugged. “Oh, sure. Most of it. But there was a genuine side. I could just tell you were milking it.”

  So I was an open book, then.

  “Noah,”
I said suddenly, changing the subject. I wasn’t sure where my question sprang from, but I felt the need to ask it. “What do you want to happen?”

  He finally tore his gaze from the ground and looked at me in question. “What do you mean?”

  “When all this is over? Hypothetically, where would you like to end up if you could? Would you want to leave Sea Haven with your magic, or would you want to stay here?”

  “If I had my way, I’d stay here. I kind of wish I never left. If only none of this ever happened.”

  I swallowed hard. It’s not like I wouldn’t have found Tristan washed ashore if Noah had never left. And if he hadn’t, I wouldn’t have had anyone to help me get back. Maybe it was a blessing that he’d left.

  “What about you?” he asked.

  “Me? I guess I wish the same thing, that things never got screwed up. But I mean, at the same time, I’m glad I found Tristan and that he told us the stuff he did. It’s nice to know.”

  Noah kicked at the dirt in front of him. “Yeah, I guess. But maybe these things are secret for a reason.”

  “Maybe they shouldn’t be,” I stated flatly.

  “But people seem so much happier not knowing. Isn’t it better to let them live in peace?”

  I didn’t have an answer, so instead, I opened my mouth to change the subject. Only, nothing came out. I turned my eyes back to the ground with a frown. Noah surprised me by taking my hand in his and squeezing it.

  “Hey,” he said, tugging on my hand to get me to look at him.

  When I did, his blue eyes turned so serious that I had no choice but to look into them. They were filled with a sense of caring that I’d never read in anyone but my parents. But it wasn’t that kind of caring, either. It was something different, almost like it mattered more. I nearly forgot to breathe, I was so overwhelmed by his stare.

  “It’s all going to be all right. You know that, don’t you?” His expression became more serious as he spoke.

  When I didn’t respond, Noah released my hand but placed his arm around my body, pulling me to his shoulder. I gave into the gesture and rested my head there. I listened to his breathing, felt the rise and fall of his chest. I could sense his heartbeat, and it made me want to cry. I didn’t understand why, and it made me curse myself internally for not even understanding my own emotions. I didn’t have enough energy left to wonder what this was, if it was an act of one friend comforting another or if it was an attempt at romance. It felt like the first, but I couldn’t be sure with Noah. Where I was an open book, I wasn’t sure I had a full read on Noah yet to understand what his actions meant.