Шеннон Мессенджер - Keeper of the Lost Cities

“Yes, yes, welcome back, Fitz and Sophie. Glad to see you’re feeling better,” Sir Caton said, looking a teensy bit annoyed by the interruption. He tried to call everyone back to order, but Dex, Marella, Biana, and Keefe broke rank and rushed over to them.

Biana got there first and threw her arms around Fitz, hugging him so tight he winced. It would have been a touching moment if Keefe hadn’t copied her and grabbed Fitz, pretending to cry. Fitz shoved them both away, blushing.

“Beat by a Level Two,” Keefe said, elbowing Fitz in the ribs.

“It was a tie,” Sophie protested.

Keefe snorted. “Please. You totally kicked his butt.”

“Totally,” Dex agreed. “He hit the wall way harder than you did. That was the greatest present you could have ever given me, by the way,” he whispered.

Sophie shook her head. He was hopeless.

“Even the Mentors declared you the winner,” Keefe added, wrapping an arm around her shoulders. “If you don’t think you’ll need your pardon, I’ll be happy to take it off your hands—”

“Keefe! Dex! Marella! Biana! Need I remind you that you are not excused from this lesson?” Sir Caton yelled.

“Think about it,” Keefe said, then ran to rejoin the class.

Fitz sat next to Sophie on the sidelines, watching everyone practice telekinesis with the remaining splotchers. She tried not to worry, but she couldn’t help glancing at him from the corner of her eye, wondering why he still hadn’t said anything to her.

“Why aren’t you and Biana friends?” he asked after a minute. “It seems like you guys would get along. You have a lot in common.”

She wasn’t sure she wanted to have things in common with someone who acted like such a brat. “I don’t think she has time for another friend. She’s always busy with Maruca.”

He frowned.

Before she could think of anything else to say, Lady Alexine delivered her prize, a small golden square with an intricate P etched on the top.

“Any Level Two who holds her own against Fitz is the clear winner,” she explained. “Congratulations, Sophie.”

“Thank you.” She peeked at Fitz to see if he looked bothered.

He grinned. “I couldn’t agree more.” But his smile faded after Lady Alexine left. “You really don’t know what happened during the match?”

“I . . . don’t know. I do remember pushing some energy from my mind,” she whispered, afraid to look at him. “But that couldn’t have been a brain push, could it?”

Fitz had no idea how much she needed him to tell her that it couldn’t. Instead he said, “I’ll have to ask my dad.”

She tried to smile, but she couldn’t help feeling like she’d somehow done something wrong. The worry in Fitz’s eyes seemed to confirm her fears.

So later that afternoon she worked up the courage to ask Grady about brain pushes while she helped him give Verdi a bath.

“Why?” he wanted to know.

Sophie focused on lathering Verdi’s feathers as she told him what had happened in PE. Grady and Edaline knew about her telepathy and her silent mind, but she hated reminding them how different she really was. Who’d want to adopt a freak as their daughter?

She’d tugged out three loose eyelashes before he finally spoke.

“That does sound like a brain push.” His voice was a whisper. “When you were around humans, did someone train you how to use your abilities?”

“No one knew about my abilities—not even my parents. Why?”

Verdi stirred, getting annoyed with her distracted bathers. Grady waited until the soggy dinosaur had settled before he answered. “The way you use your mind, Sophie—someone had to teach you. It’s not possible that you just instinctively know these skills.”

“But . . . no one taught me anything. I’d remember that.”

“Would you?”

How could she not? “Besides, how would a human even know how to teach me to use my abilities? It’s not like they can do what we can.”

Grady stared in the distance. “No, you’re right. Only an elf could teach you.”

“And the first elf I met was Fitz,” she added, reminding him as much as herself. She didn’t like the worry lines that creased his forehead.

She couldn’t have met an elf without knowing it, could she?

No. She’d never met anyone else with a silent mind. Except for that jogger that day. But she’d barely talked to him for five minutes. He couldn’t have done something to her, could he?

Wouldn’t she have felt something?

And why would he do that?

Plus, Fitz said they’d been looking for her for twelve years. Even the Council didn’t know where she was. There was no way she could’ve met any other elves.

But if humans didn’t teach her, and elves didn’t teach her . . . who did?

She searched her memories for the rest of the night, but when she went to bed she was no closer to the solution. So many things about her past raised more questions than they did answers—it was enough to drive her crazy.

She had to let this go. She had enough to worry about with her adoption and Bronte and gaining the Council’s permission to stay at Foxfire. Once she had her future settled, she could search her past. Until then, she’d try to put it out of her mind.

G OOD MORNING, PRODIGIES,” DAME ALINAcooed during orientation the next morning. “Everyone ready for another exciting day?”

“Hey, check it out,” Dex whispered to Sophie. He pointed to the meter on his plain blue nexus. “I finally passed the halfway point.”

“Really?” She tried to be excited for him, but she hadn’t even reached the one-third point.

“Yep. Not much further till I can have my own Pathfinder. Maybe I’ll even get my nexus off younger than Fitz—man, that’d be awesome! I’d love to see Wonderboy’s face if a Dizznee broke his precious record.”

She was about to defend Fitz when Dame Alina caught her attention.

“We are now four weeks away from midterms. For those of you worried you won’t be able to score the required seventy-five percent to pass, I recommend seeing Lady Nissa in the Tutoring Center.”

“Maybe you should sign up for alchemy tutoring,” Marella whispered. “Not sure you’ll pass without it.”

Marella’s tone was teasing, but her words hit a nerve. Sophie was barely scraping by in alchemy, and that was with Lady Galvin shouting instructions across the room. She couldn’t imagine how hard it would be on her own. And she had Bronte to consider. He was probably waiting for her to fail her midterms.

Everything in her shrank at the idea of needing a tutor. She wasn’t used to struggling with her grades. It felt so humiliating.

Not as humiliating as getting expelled. . . .

“That’s it for today. Everyone work hard,” Dame Alina finished, tossing her hair before her projection disappeared.

“UGH, WHAT IS THAT?” SOPHIEgagged and glared at the silver strip on her locker.

Dex looked a little green. “I think it’s reekrod. Elwin must’ve picked the flavor today.”

“Remind me to yell at him the next time I see him.”

“Planning another visit to the Healing Center?” Marella asked. “Going to make it a daily habit?”

“Very funny.”

Marella gave her locker the tiniest lick and shrugged. “He’s done worse.”

“Yeah, well, I’m taking all my books with me now,” Sophie said.

“Oooh—smart thinking,” Dex agreed, reaching for the rest of his books. He grabbed a small silver box and tore it open. “Here. Take a Prattle to get rid of the taste.”

For once Dex had good taste in candy. It was sweet and chewy—like caramel mixed with peanut butter and filled with cream.