The elf stood and picked up the stick I had dropped. Isaac nodded. “Training a fire druid can be … difficult, but I am more than capable for thechallenge.”
Okay, confidence. I liked that. Feelinggood.
The elf gave Logan a small bow. “I will make her the finest white elm earth wand this world has everseen.”
Logan nodded, looking as if he didn’t much care how fine my wandwas.
Isaac gave the elf a small bow. “How well the wand is crafted, means how well her powers will work. I don’t need to remind you of that, doI?”
Oh. The plotthickens.
“You do not,” hegrowled.
Don’t piss him off. I tried to mentally beam the message to Isaac. The last thing I needed was for him to make me a jacked-up wand that exploded my head when I used it orsomething.
“We’ll be back in four days,” Isaac told the elf, and henodded.
“I’ll pay you half now and half when we pick up the wand,” I told Griddish, who bowed lightly tome.
“Thank you, young druid.” He went over to his desk and brought me back a small business card. On it was writtenTwo Elves Craftsmen LCCwith his company’s bank information. Two elves. But now only one. Again, I felt for him and the loss of his twinbrother.
I tucked it into my pocket and bade him farewell. As I was about to turn to leave, Dominic approached the elf, one gun in each hand relaxed at his side. “You remember the lady’s terms for paying you such a largesum?”
The elf didn’t show a hint of fear. If anything, he looked annoyed at Dominic’s little gun display. “I pledge on my honor to never make another skyborn-killing weapon in all my life,” hedeclared.
Keegan rolled his eyes, but I felt his promise was true. At least I hoped it was. I was living in the woods and out of a bus, what did I need the money for? I could always just sell another scale. But for him it would change his circumstances greatly, start him on a newpath.
We loaded up onto the bus and I took one last look at Griddish. He’d better not let medown.
As Griddish levitated our bus up and out onto the street, Isaac sat next to me. “Yalash made my wand free of charge. I still paid him a donation, but it was pennies compared to what you just offeredhim.”
I nodded. “I’ve been desperate before. People do crazy things when they’re in thatstate.”
My mind thought back to the Grand Canyon fall. I’d stolen clothes, food, and even money to get by. It wasn’t something I was proud of, but I’d been in survivalmode.
Isaac nodded. “If Yalash were still alive, he’d never have worked for the baddruids.”
I shrugged. “Sometimes grief makes you do things you never thought youwould.”
My chest pinched then as I thought of my mother. No teenager should ever have to bury their own parent. It felt beyond wrong. I’d gone to a dark place for a few years after that. Actually, I wasn’t sure how I hadn’t end up a drug addict or astripper.
“Hey,Isaac?”
The bus was landing on four wheels in front of thehouse.
“Yes?”
“If I’m a fire druid, then my mom was one,right?”
His eyebrows pinched in confusion. “Yes, but a fire druid is a pure earth druid. She wouldn’t have been one of Ardan’s. That means she was like me, but … I never knew of any others left. I could have helpedher.”
Emotions warred inside of me. My mother lied to me my entire life. She was my best friend and her betrayal cut me wideopen.
“But she died of breast cancer. I saw her waste away…” Tears lined my eyes as I thought back to how my radiant and boisterous mother had been, and then was reduced to a sleepingskeleton.
Isaac placed a hand on my knee. “I have a theory about that … but why hash out the past? It happened. Best to move on and feel good knowing your mother was one of us. One of the goodones.”
I wanted to move on, to take comfort in the fact that my mother wasn’t one of Ardan’s monsters, but I needed to know how this all happened. Andwhy.
