Софи Джордан - Firelight

“A pool!” Tamra exclaims.

“It’s not for your use,” Mrs. Hennessey injects.

Tamra’s frown is only momentary. Nothing can dent her optimism. A new town, new world. A new life within her grasp.

I fall behind Mom and Tamra. Each lift of my foot requires enormous energy.

Mrs. Hennessey stops at the pool’s curled lip. She motions behind us toward the fence.

“You can come and go through the back gate.”

Mom nods, bouncing against her leg the rolled-up newspaper where she’d found the ad for this rental.

The keys jingle in Mrs. Hennessey’s hand. She unlocks the door to the pool house and hands the keys to Mom. “Next month’s rent is due on the first.” Her rheumy gaze skitters over me and Tamra. “I like it quiet,” she says.

I leave Mom to give assurances and enter the house. Tamra follows. I stare at the dismal living room that smells faintly of mold and chlorine. If possible my heart sinks even lower.

“Not bad,” Tamra announces.

I give her a look. “You’d say that no matter what.”

“Well, it’s only temporary.” She shrugs. “We’ll have our own house soon.”

In her dreams. Shaking my head, I check out the other rooms, wondering how she thinks that’s going to happen. Mom counted change to pay for dinner last night.

The front door shuts. I dig my hands into my pockets, rubbing the lint in the corners between my fingers as I move back into the living room. Mom props her hands on her hips and surveys the house—us—with what seems like genuine satisfaction. Only I can’t believe that. How can she be so happy when I’m so…not?

“Well, girls. Welcome home.”

Home. The word echoes hollowly through me.

It’s evening. I sit at the edge of the pool, dipping my feet in. Even the water is warm. I tilt my face, hoping for wind, missing the mist, the mountains, cool, wet air.

The door behind me opens and shuts. Mom lowers down beside me and stares ahead. I follow her stare. The only thing to see is the backside of Mrs. Hennessey’s house.

“Maybe we can get her to change her mind about the pool after we’ve been here awhile,” Mom says. “It would be nice to swim this summer.”

I guess this is her way of trying to cheer me up, but the only words I hear are after we’ve been here awhile.

“Why?” I snap, swishing my legs faster. “You could have chosen a thousand other locations. Why this place?”

She could have picked anywhere to live. A small town nestled in cool misty hills or mountains. But no, she chose Chaparral, a sprawling city smack in the middle of a desert, ninety miles outside Vegas. No cooling condensation to nourish my body. No mists or fogs for cover. No easily accessible hills or mountains. No arable earth. No escape. It’s just cruel.

She inhales. “I thought it might make it easier for you—” I snort. “Nothing is easy about this.”

“Well, it will make the choice for you.” She reaches out and brushes the hair off my shoulder. “Nothing like a barren environment to kill off a draki quickly. I should know.”

I cut her a glance. “What do you mean?”

She sucks in a deep breath. “I lived here during my tour.”

I pull back and stare at her. Lots of draki take a tour to gain exposure to the outside world. For a short time anyway. A year, maybe two. But never to someplace hot and dry.

Never in a desert. A draki needs to know how to fake being human for survival.

Occasionally, rarely, a draki chooses to remain in the human world.

“I thought you went to Oregon. You and Jabel took your tours together and shared an apartment there.”

Mom nods. “I started my tour with Jabel, but after a few months I decided…” Here she pauses for breath. “I decided I didn’t want to go back to the pride.”

I straighten. “How come I never knew this?”

Her lips twist. “Clearly, I came back. I didn’t need everyone to know that it took a bit of arm-twisting.”

Then I get it. I understand who did the arm-twisting. “Dad,” I say.

Her smile softens. “He never toured, you know. There wasn’t any point. He never wanted to be anything but draki.” Her lips wobble and she touches my cheek. “You’re a lot like him.” Sighing, she drops her hand. “Anyway, he visited me once a month in Oregon…and every time he tried to persuade me to come home with him.” Her smile grows bleak. “He made it very difficult.”

She looks me squarely in the face. “I wanted to get away from the pride, Jacinda. Even then. It was never for me, but your dad didn’t make it easy. So I ran. I came here.”

“Here?”

“I figured your dad wouldn’t find me here.”

I rub one of my arms. My skin already feels dry and chalky. “I should think not.”

“Almost at once my draki began to wither. Even when I broke down and risked flight a few times, it wasn’t easy to manifest. It was working. I was on my way to becoming human.”

“But you went back.”

“I finally faced reality. I wanted to give up the pride, but I missed your father. He couldn’t live without being a draki, and I couldn’t live without him.”

I stare out at the water’s surface, still and dead without the faintest ripple of wind, and try to imagine loving someone that much. So much that you would give up all you ever wanted for yourself. Mom did that.

Couldn’t I make a sacrifice for those I loved? For Mom and Tamra? I’d already lost Dad.

Did I really want to lose them, too?

The hunter, Will, flashes in my mind just then. I don’t know why. Maybe it was because he let me go. He didn’t even know me, but he let me go…even though he was trained to do the opposite. He fought what doubtlessly came naturally to him. Hunting and destroying my kind. If he could break from his world, then I could break from mine. I could be that strong.

Mom’s voice rolls over me. “I know it’s hard to accept right now. That’s why I chose this town. The desert will take care of things for you. Eventually.”

Eventually. I only have to wait until my draki is dead. Will I be glad then? Will I thank Mom one day like she seems to think?

She squeezes my knee. “Come inside. I want to go over some things with you and your sister before we enroll you in school.”

My chest clenches at this, but I stand, thinking about all Mom has given up for me, all she’s lost. And Tamra. She’s never had anything of her own. Maybe it’s finally time.

Time for both of them.

“Jacinda Jones, come up here to the front and introduce yourself.”

My stomach twists at these words. It’s third period, which means it’s the third time I’ve had to do this.

I slide out from my desk, stepping over backpacks as I move to the front of the room to stand beside Mrs. Schulz. Thirty pairs of eyes fasten on me.

Mom enrolled us last Friday. She insisted it was time. That attending high school is the first step to assimilating. The first step to normal. Tamra is thrilled, unafraid, ready for this.

All last night, awake in my bed, sick to my stomach, I thought about today. I thought about the pride and all I was giving up. So what if daylight flight was forbidden? At least I could fly. The rules I chafed against with the pride suddenly pale beside this new reality. I’m not even sure why I resisted Cassian so much anymore. Was it only for Tamra? Or was there something within me other than loyalty to my sister that opposed being with him?

Teenagers surround me. Human teenagers. Hundreds of them. Their voices ring out, loud and nonstop. The air is full of false, cloying scents. A draki’s worst hell.

It’s not that I never expected to live in the outside world. Among humans. I would probably have taken a tour. But no one tours during adolescence. Only as an adult, as a draki strong and fully developed, and never in a desert like this. All for good reason.