Isaac sighed. “All I know is that they are alive. I see them in my dreams and meditations. Like I saw Sloane. But I don’t know where they are. They’re inhiding.”
When Isaac said no more, Logan turned on his heels and stalked off back to our little mud hutcampsite.
Oh crap, he waspissed.
‘Logan,’ Icalled after him, using thebond.
‘I want to be alone,’he snappedback.
Great. Leave me here to figure out how to stalk an elf.Men.
Danny waved a hand. “Straight men can be so dramaticsometimes.”
I chuckled. “Maybe we can keep training without a weapon, and then if we find the elf, great.” I wasn’t sure hunting the country for an elf was a great idea right now. Assuming he was even in thiscountry.
Isaac squinted and peered at me with those striking golden copper eyes. “Sloane, now that Ardan has seen your power and knows about you and Logan, he’ll stop at nothing to find you, kill you both, and locate theothers.”
Chills ran up my spine. “Do you think he knows what I am? I mean, that I’m an earthdruid?”
Isaac nodded. “Oh he knows. The second your purple magic unleashed, I could smell the earth druid withinyou.”
Shit. I mean, technically I had told Steven in the alley of Jeanine’s bar what I was, but he didn’t seem to care. He just wanted me dead, yet he didn’t know I was an earth druid—I hadn’t even known at that point. If this staff was the only weapon I could protect myself with, then I wanted it. Ardan and Steven could teleport, for Christ’s sake. I was going to need more than a knife that burned my hand to take themout.
“Okay, let’s do it,” I exclaimed. “Danny?” I turned to the sorcerer in hopes that he would know where tostart.
Danny raised one manicured eyebrow. “I’ll get right on that.” His voice was monotone, which told me he had no idea where to startlooking.
“Wonderful!” Isaac exclaimed, either not picking up on Danny’s sarcasm or pretending not to hearit.
My feet were still sunk into the earth; the vibrations were now a low background hum, barely detectable. I just felt … good. Like waking up after sleeping ten hours. I was refreshed and full ofenergy.
Isaac stepped closer to me and looked down at my feet. “Better than coffee, isn’tit?”
I barked out a laugh. “I wouldn’t go that far.” Nothing compared to coffee; it had its ownclass.
He smiled. Sophie must have gotten bored with us, because she was gone, trotted off back to camp I assumed. Now Danny was just standing there, assessing me with narrowedeyes.
“What?” I askedDanny.
Instead of answering me, he turned to Isaac. “Is that a normal amount of power for a newdruid?”
Nerves tightened in my gut as his question. I didn’t like the way he’d used the word “normal.”
“I mean, she just kicked all of us in the nuts two hundred yards away. That’s not normal.Right?”
Isaac rested a hand on his staff. “No. It’s not. I suspect her magic is conflicted inside of her. She’s constantly plugged into her power source, and her druid power will grow every day until we can find a way to properly anchor it into theearth.”
Fear saturated my entire being. I’d almost forgotten about his doom and gloom prophecy last night. That sounded dangerous, for me and everyone around me. “Anchor it? I … I thought you said I was already earth-initiated or whatever,” I stuttered, trying to find mywords.
The druid looked at me sadly. “The Earth has chosen you, yes. But until we can get a staff made for you, we can’t plug your magic into the Earth. It needs afilter.”
“Plug it in?” Was I a lampnow?
Isaac stuck the sharpened tip of his staff into the earth and the crystal ball glowed a deep orange. “You can pull power from her with your staff, or, in times of overwhelming energy bursts, she will take the excess so it doesn’t overtake you orothers.”
“So … the Earth will keep us from getting our nuts racked,” Danny concluded, and Isaacnodded.
“Precisely.”
