Before losing Mom, I had only ever been in pain from training. Mom had empathy, but she wouldn’t show it when she was teaching us to defend ourselves. If she did, we surely would have used it against her when we were younger. She had been so strong. She had taught us to be strong.
I swallowed, letting his hand go. It was time to look for any clues—not that there would be any. The council had probablysearched the place, and it wasn’t like the dark mages would have left anything behind that indicated who they were. But I needed closure.
My entire life had been inside these walls and on this remote piece of land. Mom had rarely taken us away from the cottage, and usually, that had been to show us how to get to the cabin on the mainland. The island’s salty coconut air was all I had ever known.
An hour later, I hadn’t found anything. It had turned into searching Mom’s belongings among other things, reminiscing. The bedrooms were mostly untouched.
“I think I found something,” Ender called from the living room.
I clutched my mom’s favorite hoodie. It was white and had a small black outline of a ghost on it. Instead of dropping it, I brought it with me to put in my pack. Mom had loved celebrating Halloween.
“What is it?” I asked as I came down the hallway.
“Did your family have a phone?” He held an older-looking cell phone in the air. “It was under the TV stand.”
“No.” I grabbed the phone, dusting it off, and pressed the on button. The screen lit up, surprising me that it hadn’t been damaged in the pandemonium. “None of us had a phone.”
It took the phone a good solid minute to turn on, which felt more like fifteen. I clicked the inbox and a box popped up. My body stilled as confusion slapped me.
There was a message from an unknown number—the same message that had been sent on the phone hidden in John’s office.
They’re coming.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Ender
Theturquoisewaterthrummedagainst the hull of the ferry, and the sun beat down on my back, the hot railing leaving red marks on my arm where I leaned against it. Selene’s old home wasn’t the ideal spot to stay, considering its living conditions and because the dark mages had already been there once before. The plan was to travel to her family’s safe house and stay there for the night. The dark mages hadn’t known its location.
The text on the mystery phone had apparently come from a phone in the headmaster’s office, and Selene had questioned if staying at the safe house was the best option. She had gone tense at the topic. Headmaster John had been keeping secrets and clearly kept in contact with her mother. He had warned them that the dark mages were coming and it appeared that his intentions were good, so we decided to stay on course andcontinue updating him with our plan—though she had been less detailed and had delayed her updates.
The warning wasn’t the only secret the phone contained. We had found a single photo of an oldfor saleflyer of a house somewhere in Croatia. The home would be our next destination after a night at the safe house.
Wind wisped at the loose strands in Selene’s hair as she leaned over the railing and looked out toward the mainland. She seemed so careless and free, but I could sense her apprehension.
“That’s your thing, isn’t it?” She looked over at me, her eyes hidden beneath the sunglasses she had gotten at the small airport when we had first arrived in Dominica.
“Watching a beautiful woman stare off into the vast ocean?” I tilted my head, not hiding my smirk. “It most definitely is my thing.”
She scoffed, but her smile gave away the small amount of joy that overcame her annoyance.
“Your shirt.” She waved at my bare chest. “You have a tendency to be shirtless.”
“Ah.” I straightened and slung my shirt over my shoulder. “Just when it’s hot. Besides, there’s a lot of shirtless men on this ferry.”
“Well, it’s going to be even hotter on our trip to the cabin, but you’ll want a shirt on in the jungle.”
“Can’t we just use our magic and fly?” I joked, mostly.
“And risk being seen flying over treetops or the ocean, and drowning because we got too tired?” She raised her sunglasses so they rested on top of her head. “We’ll get a ride most of the way to the cabin. I’m not worried about the headmaster knowing we’re there. Apparently, he was Mom’s ally. The only question is why. She always told us to trust no one.”
“You said they were friends at the academy—could they have been more than friends?” I leaned over the railing next to her.
“More questions and no answers.” She sighed.
I slid over and reached my arm over hers, sliding her hand into mine. She tensed and I waited for a sign that she wanted me to move, but it never came. She relaxed and rested her head on my shoulder.
After a minute, something cool inside my veins stirred—my magic. Something pricked at my fingertips. Small water droplets rose from the ocean and stuck to my free hand. They clung to my fingertips and then popped, the water trickling back down into the ocean and the frosty prickling sensation disappearing with the droplets.
