Branded (The Branded Series)

I turned and
stared out my window. The dream itself was horrifying enough, I didn’t need to
recount it and deal with my mother’s ambivalence to the same.

“Dreams can be
scary, sweetheart, I get that, but you can’t stay home just because you think
the sky is going to start falling down around you.”

“It’s not the sky,”
I mumbled.

The overpass
was up ahead, in plain view now. My knees were drawn to my chest and I was
breathing heavily into them. Mom reached out and gripped my knee. “Are you okay?”
she said, her concern now apparent. Tears streamed down my cheeks as I tried to
catch my breath.

“Geez, honey,”
Mom said as she slowed the car down and pulled in behind a slow moving car. “Just
breathe, honey. It’s okay.”

I knew what
the loud thud was without having to look. I knew it was a chunk of concrete
from the above overpass. I knew it had just fallen and split apart into several
smaller pieces. Cars began swerving around the broken concrete. I knew the
colors of the cars without looking. I knew which ones would make it and which
ones wouldn’t.

“Pull over!” I
shouted between sobs.

Mom was
clutching the steering wheel now as we neared the overpass. Her speed was
reduced, and she was met with annoyed drivers behind her, honking and hollering
at her to get out of the way. And then, right there in front of our eyes, and above
a half dozen vehicles, and below a dozen more, the overpass heaved, groaned and
crumbled as it collapsed. Just as I had seen it a few hours before while I
slept.

While others
were screaming, panicking and racing from their vehicles, Mom was smiling. “You’re
gifted with Prophecy!”

Yes, it would
seem that this tragic incident confirmed that her sixteen-year-old daughter had
finally
found her gift. And although it wasn’t what she had hoped or
imagined, there was never a mother more thrilled to have a prophet for a
daughter.

Now that I
was a Gifted
One, I had no choice but to break up with Ryan. I knew he would be heartbroken,
but it was the only way. Gifted Ones weren’t supposed to get romantically
involved with the ungifted. It was too dangerous as there would be no way for
him to protect himself from the Defiers.

As expected,
it didn’t go over well. As controlling as he was, the mere fact that he had no
control over this situation sent him into a tailspin. He showed up at my door
every morning and every night—sometimes with a dozen roses, sometimes with my
favourite take-out food, and once with a ring as he begged me to marry him. Whenever
I turned him away, he would tear out of the driveway, peeling rubber as he
went. He was angry. I knew that, but there wasn’t anything I could say or do.
The more time I spent away from him, the more I realized how smothering he had
become over the last couple of months. I began feeling guilty that I was
enjoying my time apart from him.

One evening as
we sat on my doorstep—him begging for an explanation for why I wouldn’t take
him back, and me dying inside a little bit more each time he asked—I finally
caved. I told him about my gift. Mom would not be happy; I broke the number one
rule of secrecy.

“Mom?” I called
into the
kitchen one morning as I came down for breakfast. “I had another dream.”

Mom sat up
straight and pulled a chair out next to her. “What is it?”

“There are
Gifted Ones on the East Coast that haven’t been discovered yet. One of them
holds a power so strong that could change the world.”

“What are
their gifts?” she asked.

“One is a
healer with great potential. The other is fuzzy. I don’t know. I just know that
the two are close friends. We will find them together.”

Mom drilled me
for all the details and when I had finished, she said, “Pack your things. We’re
moving to the East Coast.”

“What? But
what about my friends? Can’t we finish this school year first? Why do we have
to
move
there? Can’t we just go visit first?”

“You’ve done
too much damage telling Ryan about your gift,” she said pointedly, still
harbouring a tone of resentment.

“We can’t just
up and move across the continent just because of that, Mom.” I was standing
now, making my point loud and clear. “He won’t tell anyone,” I promised.

“My sources
tell me that he’s been doing a lot of research on Gifted Ones. You should not
have told him.”

“I know, Mom.
I wasn’t thinking. I just wanted him to stop asking why.”

She ignored my
reasoning and stared at me with such intensity that I knew what she was doing.
She was manipulating my thoughts.

“Mom, don’t!”
I warned as my reasons became clouded and my memories fogged.
Don’t what?
I asked myself.
She
’s
right.
We have to go. For the good of
mankind. To find these Gifted Ones before the Defiers do
.

“We’ll need to
move at night, and leave no trace behind,” she said.

“Of course.” I
nodded. Because she was right.

Chapter 1

“What’s the deal?
Is her flight
on time?” Noah called out as I studied the large arrivals screen overhead.

“Supposed to
have landed a few minutes ago.” I checked my watch and stuck my hands back in
my pockets, watching the people as they began hovering around the arrival
doors.

“Did you miss
her?” Noah teased, giving me an annoying shove to the side.

“Whatever,” I
laughed. “She’s like a sister to me, man.” I thought back to Christmas Day when
Anna had told me she would be leaving to spend the next few months with her parents
in Africa. A wave of emotions was triggered by her announcement. At first I was
excited for her because I knew how much she had missed her parents since they
left last summer to build a community in Africa, but then I felt a shot of
disappointment as I knew I would miss her. She always knew how to make fun out
of nothing, and only living three doors down, I could count on her to keep me
company on short notice to watch a late night flick or go for a canoe ride
across the lake to our secret island. So maybe I missed her a little. That
didn’t mean I was crushing on her. That would just be plain weird.

“What are you
smiling about?” Noah’s voice penetrated my thoughts.

I shrugged it
off and pretended to check my phone for new e-mails. Texts. Missed calls.
Something
.

“Jake, I’m
your best friend, remember? I can see right through you.”

“So what’s the
deal with you and Lexie these days?” I said, squinting toward the arrival doors
and hoping for a conversation change.

Noah scrunched
his eyebrows and sucked in a breath, puffing out his chest—a sign that he had
no idea how to answer the impending question.

“What are you
waiting for, man? She’s hot. She likes you. What’s the problem?”