Authors: Christopher Shields
NINE
BILLY
The sun
beamed
down on my face—it was bright wherever I was, but my body was cold and stiff. With no sense of time or place, I forced my eyes open
. O
nly then did the
pounding sensation in my head register. The sunlight hurt my tender eyes.
Instinctively, I reached for my temples
,
trying to carress the pain away—my voice was weak.
“I’ve got a
m
igraine. What happened?”
“No, not a migraine,” Billy said. “You fainted.”
Sara and Billy were both smiling when my vision came back. Exhausted and edgy, I felt completely dejected when I sat up.
“Why the long face?” Billy asked as he dropped silently to the ground beside Sara, some
twenty-five feet from above.
“Why?
Really? Maybe it’s because I can’t stop Cassandra from reaching me. She’ll either dissect me, or burst me like a bal
l
oon the moment I faint. This sucks.”
“No
,
she won’t,” Billy said.
“Oh, was I more effective when I passed out?” My tone was more defiant than I’d intended.
“You’ll learn to become more effective, Maggie.
Lesson one, you are drawing the power for the barrier from yourself—you drained your own energy. All we need to do is teach you to draw energy from other sources—that will give you the power to reinforce your shield. Your goal, of course, is
to
not los
e
consciousness.” He laughed
,
and that stung my pride.
“Oh, sure, why didn’t I think of that,” I said dismissively.
Billy crossed his muscular arms and smirked. “That lesson was necessary, I’m afraid. Better to learn your limits in the presence of friends, don’t you think? I doubt you’ll make the same mistake twice.”
Sara rolled her eyes at him. “You can learn to draw energy easy enough
,
I think, and it will be most effective.”
The excit
e
ment was stong in Sara’s bell-like voice. “Cassandra might not be able to penetrate that barrier.”
I shook my head.
“Trust me, Maggie.
If you can learn how to create a barrier, which no human has ever done, you can certainly learn to draw energy. Creating a barrier with the Fire element is unique—to my knowledge, no human
h
as ever conjured one.”
Billy nodded in agreement. His gray eyes flashed as he spoke. “Granted, you have a lot of work ahead of you to get to that point, and even then I doubt an energy barrier will
be
any more effective against a powerful Fire aligned Fae than your Air barrier is against Sara, but you should be able to block Water and Earth aligned Fae effectively enough.
”
He crossed his arms as he took in a deep breath.
“I believe you can use your Water inclination to block Fire aligned Fae. In time, I can teach you to redirect, dissipate
,
and absorb energy attacks. But for now, let’s work on teaching you to draw more energy.”
Billy had me focus on the various sources of energy around me. At the moment, the easiest source to draw from was the sun. He was patient, as always, and instructed me how to draw on it—the radiant heat and light would be like a wall socket I could plug into. The moment I made the connection
,
the lingering headache was replaced by a sensation of power and of being alive and alert. Every nerve and every fiber of muscle in my body tingled as my connection to
everything
around me awakened. It was wholly unlike anything I’d ever experienced. The energy in literally everything was at my fingertips, just waiting for me, ready to add to my state of euphoria.
“Oh
,
my god
, t
his is amazing! And I thought Redbull was great
.”
“What does this have to do with bovine?” Sara quizzed.
I laughed aloud. “I’ll explain later.”
Completely astounding
.
I realized I knew how to tap into other sources of energy. Drawing on sunlight, I created the barrier in front of me. Sara made one attack, just a few feet to my left and six inches above the ground, and it pierced the veil immediately. Once again I
puffed
air agai
ns
t my will. I focused on blocking the bre
a
ch and the attack stopped, but in doing so the rest of the barrier was weakened. Instinctively, I circled it around me like I did with my Air shield. Billy and Sara gasped. I expected Sara to try another assault, but she stood motionless, transfixed, next to Billy on the other side of the glowing blue veil. Then I began to hear them speak.
“Extraordinary
.
I
s it just me?”
Sara said, though her lips didn’t move.
“
Remarkable indeed
.
It’s not just you. Perhaps you should…”
“Yes, Billy, of course…”
I let my barrier melt away and their voices disappeared along with it.
“What? Did I do something wrong?” I asked.
They continued to stare at one another while having one of their silent Fae conversations. At that moment I realized when the barrier was up
,
I heard them. I caught myself just before I blurted out that fact. It was another secret I knew I should keep to myself, and it almost made up for the failure. I was no closer to blocking Sara than before.
“Hey, no fair. Full disclosure, remember?”
Sara smiled and blinked out, shooting past me.
“Okay, Billy, what did I do? Where is she going?”
“She doesn’t wish to play witness to anything else today, that’s all.”
“To hide it from Ozara?”
“Yes.”
“But you’ll see.”
“Some risk is unavoidable. But don’t fret, Ozara and I don’t run in the same circles these days. There’s no danger.”
No danger? Right.
Nonetheless, a surge of adre
na
lin raced through my body
,
heightening my senses even more
,
when I realized that I’d been tracking Sara’s movement from a mile a way. I recognized her uniqueness even when she passed among other Fae. I felt all of them and could detect their individuality, all of them, including the one at the Seoladán. Channeling the additional energy extended my range, but as soon as I cut myself off from it, my senses dulled and my range shrank back. It was but one more secret I had to keep.
“Billy, what happened when I formed the barrier?”
“I’m not sure, honestly—it’s never happened before. In simple terms, your barrier rendered you i
m
percept
i
ble to our senses.”
“I was invisible?”
“No,
our senses.
You were quite visible in physical terms—a blue girl standing inside a glowing blue orb, but we couldn’t sense your Naeshura.”
The significance was lost on me. “How is being a ball of glowing blue energy any better than being me? Wouldn’t it draw even more attention?”
“Yes and no
. T
hat’s why I sent Sara away when I did. As a glowing blue orb you threaten no one and as of yet you’re not powerful enough to block Sara—Ozara will pay no mind. What I didn’t tell Sara, and what I hope she ignored, is that I think you
are
capable of much, much more. Sara, and therefore, Ozara, will only know that you’ve learned how to channel an energy barrier of moderate strength, just like you can with Air.”
He was very excited, almost agitated, and acted like a child with a new toy though I still didn’t know why.
“Maggie, except visually, you just disappeared in front of us. When you channeled your own energy, you were easy to read. In fact, there was more of you to sense. I think that’s because you were projecting your own Naeshura. When you used sunlight however, you appeared to our senses as nothing more than a beam of sunlight, albeit a very intense one, like light through a magnifying glass. It completely masked your presen
c
e.
Can you do that again, but make the barrier weaker this time, no stronger than it needs to be to merely close it?”
“Sure.”
I did exactly as he said and like before, the blue veil closed, but I allowed it to weaken until it became almost completely invisible. He nodded and motioned with his hands for me to drop it.
“I could read the barrier when you formed it, but not after you weakened it. More importantly, I still couldn’t sense you. When you’re alone, you should practice forming it that way—very weak.”
“Billy, what if the sun is not out? Or it’s night
time?”
“Yes, that. It should work the same for any energy source. Focus on the small tree to your left, draw energy from it.”
Again, I followed his intructions and pulled the energy from the tree
as
I had with the sunlight. There wasn’t nearly as much, and it was more difficult to control, but with a little practice I managed to form a weak barrier with it. I struggled to make it stronger, and for a moment it worked. Then it was gone. I searched the tree with my mind,
but
there was nothing left. Billy nodded.
“What
? W
hat does that mean?”
“Touch it,” he said.
It was much colder than the air around it. I couldn’t sense any life in it.
“Is it dead
?
”
“Yes
. Y
ou drained it—remarkable. Just as I thought
—i
f you concentrate too much on a living object
,
you’ll deplete it, but until that happens, your essence is masked. The Naeshura of any physical object is finite and so is the life force
. T
here is still Naeshura in the tree, like there is with everything, but the energy that kept it alive is gone. The life energy in a living object is easier for you to sense and use, but you can pull heat and kinetic energy as well. Focus too much on any object and you’ll use up the energy
,
and your barrier will fail. That’s why you passed out, coincidentally. Fortunately, it happened soon enough that you couldn’t do any real damage to yourself.”
I didn’t like the idea of being able to pull the lifeforce out of anything. Even though it was a tree, a small white oak, I felt a tinge of guilt.
“So I can do this without killing things?”
“Yes
.
L
ike I said
,
there’s
N
aeshura in everything. The heat from the ground, the energy released by
the
waves in water, and even a light breeze
,
are
all
full of energy. I want you to practice with different sources, but only when you’re well away from my kind—all of us.”