I harness the power of four.
No Stormer is going to defeat me.
I turn toward the cliffs lining the beach, trying to guess which dark hole my attacker hides in.
It’s impossible to tell—but I know they’re watching me.
I call the nearest Westerly and coil it around my wrist.
Let them see how powerful I am.
Let them know that they don’t scare me.
“Show yourself!” I shout.
My words echo off the rocks before they’re swallowed by the waves.
I march toward the cliffs, but I’ve barely gone two steps before the winds vanish, turning the air quiet and still.
The calm before the storm.
CHAPTER 7
VANE
Y
ou’re leaving?” my mom asks as I drag myself down the hallway, following Os to the front door. “I made you a torpedo.” She points to the table, where one of her life-changingly good breakfast burritos is waiting for me. My dad’s there too, working on the crossword and trying to choke down a glass of questionable-looking grayish-green juice. The table is set for three. I can see the hope in my mom’s eyes.
I haven’t had time for a family meal in weeks.
Os clears his throat. “We need to get going, Vane.” My mom frowns, and my appetite vanishes. I know that protective you’re not taking my son anywhere without my permission look. She’s been using it a lot lately. And I’m not sure I have the energy for another fight.
“Where are they making you go now?” she asks me. “I—”
“That’s an official Gale Force matter,” Os interrupts. “You can call things official all you want,” my mom snaps back,
“but it doesn’t change the fact that Vane is my son and—” “Actually, he’s your adopted son—and the only reason we allowed
you to raise him was—”
“I’m sorry, did you just say that you allowed me to raise him?” “Oooooooooookay,” I say, stepping between them before my
mom goes into full-fledged Mominator mode. “We can fight
over who gets to control my life when I get back. I’m sorry about
breakfast, Mom. But right now I’m really tired, and apparently I
have a long journey ahead of me, so . . . I’m pretty much maxed
out in the things-that-I-can-handle-without-my-head-exploding category.”
I can tell by my mom’s glare that this is definitely not over. But
she stands aside to let us pass, and I promise my parents I’ll see them
tomorrow as Os follows me outside.
“Your mother is much more attached to you than I realized,” he
says after the front door slams shut.
“Yeah, that tends to happen with family.”
I’m so sick of the Gales acting like nothing about my human life
matters.
This is my real life—sylph or not. The sooner they get that
through their windblown heads, the better.
“Yes, well, I guess we’ll have to discuss this later,” Os tells me as
he wraps himself in Northerlies. “For now just try to keep up.” He blasts off into the sky and I’m tempted to run back inside
and lock him out of my room. But I really do need to sleep. I grab a pair of Easterlies and follow, spinning the winds fast
enough to obscure my form in the sky—not that anyone’s around to
see me. Os is leading me east, to the part of the desert where no one
actually wants to go. Cactus-and-tumbleweed land, with no sign of
life in any direction for miles and miles and miles.
The sun beats down, and I’m starting to feel like a Vane-Crisp
when thin, dark shapes appear on the horizon.They look like crooked
poles, but as we fly closer I realize they’re trees.
Dead trees.
Palms with nothing left but twisted trunks and crumbling bark.
There are dozens of them, arranged in random circles, like they were
once supposed to be something. But now they’ve been abandoned,
like some sort of palm-tree graveyard.
I move to Os’s side as he starts to descend. “Ugh, please tell me
we’re not going to Desert Center.”
It’s the kind of town you go to only if you have to, and the
deserted gas station by the freeway does not look promising. “We won’t be there long,” Os promises. “It’s just the starting
point I use to guide me from the sky.”
I’m not loving the whole starting-point thing. Especially since I
can see pretty far in every direction, and other than some old, crumbling buildings, there’s basically nothing, nothing, and more nothing no matter which way you go. But Os sweeps low, landing in the
center of the most isolated circle of trees. I have no choice but to
follow him.
It smells like something died here.
Actually, it smells like lots of things died, and given the graffiti
and the scary-looking shacks nearby, I wouldn’t be surprised. “So now what?” I ask as I move to one of the crooked shadows,
taking what little escape from the heat I can get. I’m still soaked in
sweat in about thirty seconds.
“Now, we walk,” Os says, turning toward the foothills. “Whoa, wait—you mean windwalk, right?”