Carrier of the Mark (18 page)

After class Adam turned to me. “Was that as hard for you as it was for me?” he asked with a cheeky smile. “Lunch?”

Lunch.
Shoot
. Adam and Áine normally went home for lunch. I felt my mood plummeting, though I told myself I was being silly. After all, he’d be back in an hour, and I’d survived one class period without him already.

“Oh, right. I guess I’ll see you later,” I muttered, trying to hide my disappointment.

“Actually, I thought I might join you and your friends. If you don’t mind, that is.” He fumbled around in his bag and pulled out a lunch box. “Fionn made me a sandwich,” he added with a smile.

“You’re kidding.” I laughed. “Fionn? Sandwiches?”

“I swear,” he said, opening the lunch box. There was a limp-looking cheese sandwich in it with a big handprint stamped into it where Fionn had held it down to cut it in half.

“Wasn’t that sweet of him?” I grinned. “Come on, then,” I said, standing up. “Let’s do lunch.” I held out my hand to him, he took it, and I pulled him up. I wished, not for the first time, that kissing weren’t against the school rules.

After the bell rang at the end of the day, I headed out to meet Adam. Lunch had been wonderful, but I hadn’t seen him since then, and my mind was swirling with questions that I needed answered.

“Is everything okay?” he inquired as I approached him.

“I need to talk to you,” I said. “Alone.”

“Sure. Let me just ask Rían to pick up Áine.” He took out his phone and quickly called his brother, who I could tell from Adam’s end of the conversation wasn’t very happy with Adam’s request.

When Adam got off the phone he turned to me again and took my hand. “Thanks,” I said. “So, Rían doesn’t like me much, does he?”

“It’s not that,” he began thoughtfully. “Rían has a tough time accepting who we are and our purpose. He blames the elements for our parents’ death and he resents his particular power most of all.” He looked at me. “We had to move quite a bit before we settled here and Rían had to work very hard to learn how to control his power. When we were younger it ended in a lot of houses being torched. I think he’s just finding it hard to accept that you would opt in when you have the chance to walk away.”

“Wow. That explains a lot.” I wondered how Rían had learned to master his power, since it seemed like the hardest one to control. Maybe if he ever let his guard down I would ask him about it.

Adam and I walked in silence to his car and drove to my house. I didn’t want to bring anything up while he was driving—I wanted to have his full attention for all of my questions. Once we got inside, I made two cups of tea, grabbed a box of cookies, and led Adam up to my room. We sat down on my bed and he put his arms around me and hugged me, bending his head to mine for a lingering kiss.

“I can’t be distracted,” I said, breaking away, but then kissed him again. “Okay, I guess I can be distracted, but I don’t want to be.”

“You want to talk element stuff?”

“Yes. Seriously, I need to know everything.”

Adam looked thoughtful. “I don’t know everything, really, but Fionn does. I’ll tell you what I know, but we’ll have to talk to him again about it too, okay?”

“Of course. But I want to hear what you know first.” I handed him a mug and faced him, ready to drink in the stories behind my ability.

“You’re more Irish than you know,” he said, indicating the tea.

“Well, this tea-drinking habit is totally addictive.”

“I got quite fond of it myself when we first moved here.” Adam smiled, looking like he was lost for a moment in the memories.

“How old were you?”

“Fourteen.”

“So you’ve only lived here three years?”

“Nearly four.” He lay back on the bed. “So where do you want to start?”

“With the whole ‘my time running out’ thing,” I replied firmly.

“Thought you might.” He scratched his head. “Well, Rían, Áine, and I were born with our Marks. And, of course, we were born into a family that was groomed in the way of the Order. Our powers were apparent almost from birth, and they were fostered and cared for by people with extensive knowledge of the elements. We never had to evoke, in a manner of speaking, because we had done so without knowing, when we were children. We were bound to, really, since the elements grow stronger when they’re together. You, on the other hand, received your Mark when you were six, and while your power may have surfaced at times since then, you were too young to understand what was happening, and there was no way it could have been recognized by those around you.”

I racked my brain, trying to think of other weird windstorms or minitornadoes that I might have caused, but couldn’t come up with anything concrete. Adam paused as though he could sense that my focus had wandered, but as soon as my eyes met his once more, he picked up where he had left off.

“Anyway, your element has only really started growing since you came into contact with us. And from what I’ve seen so far, it’s growing fast, so you need to learn how to harness your power right away; otherwise you could do a lot of damage, and even possibly hurt yourself or other people. As for the possibility of the power passing you over, the element hits maturity just before we turn eighteen. If you don’t perform the evocation ritual before then, the element will pass you.”

“So if I don’t evoke the power before my birthday, it’ll be gone forever?”

“Well, technically it’s not your birthday; it’s the summer solstice in the year following your seventeenth birthday. But yes, that’s the general gist.”

“The summer solstice? When is that?”

“Next year it’s June twentieth,” Adam answered patiently. “You have a lot of time to make your choice.”

“What’s the evocation ritual like? Does it hurt?”

“It doesn’t hurt. It’s simply surrendering yourself to your element, so that you coexist. Your element is being suppressed at the moment and the ritual helps you free it. But your element needs to be strong first, in order to evoke. That’s why you’ll be training.”

“Training with Rían, you mean.”

“Yeah.” Adam shrugged, making it clear that while he still thought the arrangement was far from perfect, he didn’t think he could fight it. “Fionn has been working with the Dublin Order to work out a schedule for your work with Rían, and to try to estimate a date when you’ll be ready for evocation.”

“The Dublin Order. They’re the guys up at Trinity College, right?”

Adam nodded. “We call them Watchers, and there are three of them who are based in Dublin: Hugh McDonagh, William White, and M. J. O’Dwyer. They lecture in theology and philosophy at Trinity and they protect a crypt there where much of our history is stored.” He put down his empty cup and wrapped his arm around my shoulder.

“Any more questions?” he asked.

“Yeah, one more thing. I think I understand the whole Carrier of the Mark genetic line thing now, but Áine said something about not being the only ‘
freaky
Carrier of the Mark.’ What did she mean by ‘freaky’?” I watched as a pink tinge worked its way up his neck to his cheeks.

“So you understand that as a male Marked, I can’t pass on the Mark?”

“Yeah, I think so. You just pass on the royal blood, right?”

He nodded. “So the continuation of this line has always been dependent on Áine. I guess you share that responsibility now.”

Suddenly I understood what Áine meant when she said “Perhaps Adam would oblige.”

Flushing wildly, I pressed my face into his shirt, and only looked at him again once I was sure my face had returned to its normal color.

“So all the babies that a Carrier of the Mark has will be Marked?” I asked.

“Well, not necessarily. It all depends on timing. There can only be four elements at any given time. If there is an opening, a baby would get the Mark. If not, the baby is born a royal blood, but first in line for the Mark. It’s actually just like any royal structure, really. In the event where the direct line of royal blood comes to an end, like in the case of what happened to us, the Mark has nowhere to go, so that’s when the Sidhe steps in and makes his selection from the royal blood pool out there—someone just like you.”

“So let’s say for argument’s sake that Áine got pregnant now by a partner who carried the neutral gene. That baby wouldn’t be Marked?”

“No, because there are already four elements. But the child would be royal blood of direct decent and first in line for the Mark. One of us would have to die, or give up our element. But if neither of those things happens before the child’s seventeenth birthday, then that child gets passed over in favor of the next in line.”

“My head hurts,” I said, snuggling back into his arms.

“I know it’s a lot to take in. But it’s something we don’t have to worry about. There are four Marked ones. We are all alive and well. It’s not even an issue right now.”

“Yeah, I know. I just need to understand. What happens if a Carrier of the Mark falls in love with someone who isn’t from a gene-neutral line? What then?” I felt Adam tense.

“It doesn’t really work like that.”

“What do you mean?”

He pulled me closer. “The Order hand-selects gene-neutral males to … you know…” He cleared his throat uncomfortably. “They pick who the Carriers will marry. It’s basically like arranged marriages.”

I turned to face him. “What? That’s crazy!”

“I know. We don’t talk about it much—it freaks Áine out.”

“Will she have to do what they say?”

“She won’t be forced to, but there’s a deep-rooted sense of responsibility in her, just like in my mother.”

“I can’t even begin to understand that kind of pressure,” I said, and then I noticed the clock on the nightstand. “Uh-oh. My dad will be home soon. I’m not sure how happy he would be finding you lying on my bed.”

“You’re quite right, O wise one. Best not to fall out with the in-laws so early on in our relationship.” He laughed. “Anyway, I’m going to go.” He stood up. “Can you ask your dad if you can come over for dinner tomorrow?”

“I will.” I stood up and fell into his outstretched arms.

“Sleep tight,” he whispered in my ear.

“You too.”

“I’ll see you in the morning.”

After Adam left, I started putting dinner together. Spaghetti Bolognese. It was quick and easy. A few minutes later, my dad came in.

“Hi, Meg,” he called, as he hung up his coat.

“Hey! Are you hungry?”

“Starving.”

“Spaghetti’s almost ready.” I smiled at him as he came in the door.

“Did I see Adam DeRís coming down our road just now?”

“Yup. He dropped me off after school.”

“Hummmm,” my dad mumbled, as he peeked into the saucepan simmering on the stove. “So what’s the story with you two?”

“Dad.” I groaned, embarrassed.

“You really like him.”

“Yes, Dad, I really like him. Now, no more questions, please.”

“It’s just … I worry about you,” he continued in a softer tone. “I wish you had a mother to talk to about, you know, girl stuff.”

Oh, no
. I could hear it coming.

“You were never one for boyfriends, so I got away without needing to have the Talk with you, but that doesn’t mean I’m not concerned.”

“Dad!”

He held up his hand. “No, Megan, this is my job. We need to do this.” He took a deep breath. “Now, there is much more to sex than mere mechanics.”

I cringed into the boiling pot of spaghetti.

“There’s nothing wrong with sex, and I don’t necessarily believe in saving yourself for marriage, but sex is precious and should only be shared with a person you love. Just bear that in mind, please, for me? I don’t want to see you get hurt.”

I glanced up after a few seconds. He seemed to be finished. “Thanks, Dad, but honestly, you don’t have to worry about anything like that yet. It’s a long way off. Speaking of which, should I be giving you the same lecture?”

He flushed.

“Oh, I see. I’m too late,” I said, a bit shocked. His flush deepened. I was thankful the timer started going off, and I ran to drain the pasta. “Saved by the bell,” I exclaimed. I wasn’t sure whether to laugh or be horrified. My father? Sex?