Source Fire: A Young Adult Fantasy (Arcturus Academy Book 5) Read online

  She checked her watch. “Perfect, I’ll get Joanie on the line to make provisions. It’s only three in Yellowknife, so she’ll be available.”

  “What should we do?” Tomio asked as we got to our feet.

  Ms. Shepherd left the room, already speaking to someone, presumably Joanie. Mehmet tapped away furiously on his laptop.

  Basil turned to us, mobile glued to his ear. “Check on Ryan, see if he’s lucid enough to understand that we have to leave in a hurry.”

  “And if he’s not?” I asked.

  My mind went in several directions at once. Should I let my family know what was happening? What did one take to the Arctic? And once we were there, what exactly were we planning to do about stopping this super-powered madman?

  “How about you pack?” He waved his fingers in a shooing motion. “With any luck, we’ll be on a plane by this time tomorrow.”

  5

  Tomio’s Request

  “What supplies does one pack for this kind of expedition?” I stood at the end of my bed in front of an empty duffle bag, wondering aloud as I sorted through my things and made a mental list. It was past midnight, but I was too excited to sleep. My desk was covered in toiletries, everything I owned in terms of clothing and shoes, fireproof and not, was either laying across furniture where I could see it, or sitting in piles on the floor.

  “Soap and layers?” Tomio looked like a sleep deprived hedgehog, his hair standing up in spikes and his eyes glazed, but he insisted that he was also too over-stimulated to sleep. He hadn’t stopped pacing around the piles of my stuff since we’d spoken to Ryan, who had been awake when we entered his bedroom—and annoyingly perky. Tomio was silent as I’d caught Ryan up, and now seemed uncharacteristically mopey. I only now clocked how little he had looked me in the eye since he’d come into my room.

  I threw the bunch of socks I’d been holding into the duffle bag. “Is something bothering you?”

  He stopped pacing and looked up, eyes wide, thumbnail between his teeth. “No. Why do you ask?”

  “No reason. Only, you’re chewing your thumb down to a bloody stub.”

  He dropped his hand. “Nothing’s wrong… exactly.”

  I crossed the room to stand in front of him, my gut twanging. I thought I knew what might be on Tomio’s mind. “Is it Ryan? It really annoys me, the way he discounts you sometimes.”

  Tomio blew out a big breath and his shoulders dropped. He took my face in his hands. “No, it’s not Ryan, you beautiful idiot. It’s you. I keep hoping you’ll realize on your own, but you haven’t yet, and now we’re leaving tomorrow. So, you’ve given me no choice but to do something I promised myself I’d never do.”

  “What?” My stomach gave a new and unpleasant twist. The only other time Tomio had been upset with me was after I’d gone after Dante in Naples without telling him where I was going, and that had upset him so much it had made him throw up.

  His hold was gentle on the sides of my face. His thumb brushed across my bottom lip, his voice almost a whisper. “Ask you to take me through a Burning.”

  I backed out of his reach, horrified, shaking my head and hoping I’d misheard him. I repeated in a different tone, a harder one: “What?”

  He sighed again, letting his hands drop. “I was afraid you’d react like this.”

  “How else am I supposed to react when my boyfriend asks me to watch him die?”

  Gruesome visions of Tomio’s insides turning to ash, the heart in his chest stilling forever, and those beautiful dark eyes going dull and cloudy made my mouth go dry and my throat close up. I grabbed the glass of water sitting on the corner of my desk and downed it.

  Tomio rubbed his face and sent me his classic look of long-suffering; the look that said, I’m going to be patient, but you’re not making it easy. “That’s not going to happen, don’t catastrophize.”

  “Have you forgotten that I nearly died from Burning? Nicodemo did die, and Ryan would have died if I hadn’t found him in time? No, Tomio. The answer is: no freaking way.”

  “That was then. This is now. Please, just hear me out without losing your mind or getting all emotional?”

  I set the glass down harder than I’d intended and glared, heat flickering along the stems of my eyes. “How exactly am I supposed to not be emotional about this insane request?”

  He put out a palm. “Okay, that was a bad way to start. But please, just hear me out.”

  I pinched my lips together and shook my head, but Tomio forged on, talking fast, like he was afraid I’d go deaf in about fifteen seconds and he had to get it all out before then.

  “I won’t die. Not only did the formula that Ryan got from Nero work, you said that by using evanescent vision you could see at what point his insides had been volcanized, but his heart hadn’t yet stopped. You’ll know exactly when to give me water. I am sorry that you almost died, and I am very sorry that Nicodemo did die, but that was then. This is now. We know what we’re doing, and if you don’t do this for me, then you’re letting me walk into a gunfight armed with only a knife.. A gunfight I might not come back from.”

  I gasped. “That’s a low blow. Shame on you.”

  “It’s not a low blow, Saxony.” Tomio’s eyes turned pleading. “Can’t you see? You and Ryan and Basil have all these amazing abilities. If you see me through a Burning… just imagine. Please. Imagine my skills backed up by the kind of power and ability you yourself now possess.”

  I hated that Tomio’s request was making sense. I opened my mouth to protest further, but only a choked sound made it out. “But—”

  Tomio sensed the break in my resolve and went for the jugular. “You know I’m right.”

  Fear slipped its freezing, skeletal fingers around my throat. I shook my head, my vision blurred. “Don’t ask me…”

  But even as my determination to prevent Tomio from taking such a risk increased in response to my fear, my heart whispered that he was right. I had seen Ryan through his Burning, I had known what to do and when to give water. Things were different now, even if the process wasn’t any less appealing. Letting Tomio go into this fight as an Unburned mage was probably more of a risk than a Burning was.

  I felt like I couldn’t breathe, and stepped back until I felt my bed. Sitting on a lump of clothes, I put a hand over my racing heart. Images of Tomio’s agonized eyes battered me, the agony I would have to watch him endure surged into sharp, painful details in my mind. My breath hitched on a sob.

  Tomio unleashed a curse and was at my side in a moment, his arms around me. “I’m sorry this is so upsetting. I was hoping you’d think of it on your own.”

  I squeezed my eyes shut and let my head fall on his shoulder.

  “You finally asked her, I see.”

  Ryan’s voice at my door made my eyes fly open. I gaped from him to Tomio. “Ryan knew you were thinking about this? When did you have time to discuss it? He only just woke up!”

  Tomio looked guilty, but Ryan scoffed.

  “I’m the one who told him, days ago, that you’d never think of it on your own. You’d rather send Tomio into this fight unprepared than watch him Burn because you’re too sensitive. Do you forget how hard I had to work to get you to help me?”

  “That’s uncalled for,” Tomio said to Ryan, his voice calm.

  Ryan leaned against the doorjamb, relaxed, holding a glass of water. He looked almost bored. It annoyed me how fast he’d bounced back from his traveling experience. Why did he appear to be so much more resilient that I was?

  “It’s your fatal flaw, Cagney. You’re the second-most powerful mage I know, but you let your emotions control you. Your fear. Everyone knows it. Just ask Basil.”

  I grit my teeth. “At least I don’t manipulate and lie to get what I want.”

  Ryan’s eyes flared. “If you were a little less fragile, then you wouldn’t have to be manipulated or lied to.”

  My jaw dropped as I gave a squeak of indignation.

  “I’m not manipulating her,” Tomio pr
otested, his arm tightening around me. “I’m asking her outright.”

  I brushed Tomio’s arm off and stood, moving away from the bed so I could see both men easily. Cocking my hands on my hips, I seethed, “I. Am not. Fragile.”

  “I know,” said Tomio.

  “Yes, you are,” said Ryan at the same time, clearly enjoying himself.

  “Prick,” I spat.

  “Invertebrate,” he spat back.

  “Asshat!” I half-screeched, enraged but also knowing Ryan was inflaming my temper on purpose, and I was letting him. Truth be told, I needed the outlet, so I gave myself a length of leash I rarely allowed.

  I sucked in a breath. “You walk around this place like you own it, you always have, ever since the first day when we lined up for the fair. You stand around with your arms crossed, judging everyone, looking at everyone like they’re beneath you—” I mimicked Ryan’s snottiest snarl, the one where he cocked both the side of his lip and the eyebrow above it at the same time, and exaggerated it as much as I could.

  Ryan didn’t miss a beat. “That’s because they are.”

  “Don’t you even care that no one likes you?”

  “Not really, no.”

  “Don’t you care that Gage got all the likeable characteristics of your mother, while you got stuck with all the genetic refuse and tragic flaws of your father?”

  “My father has his faults,” Ryan said, patiently, “but my mother, lovable as she is, is also flawed. She has zero talent for teaching simple skills like how to properly load a dishwasher. There’s bound to be screaming.”

  “The screaming is fully justified, I’m sure. The poor woman can’t bear how obtuse you are. I’d like to get through one day, a single bloody day, without having to look at your replicant face. It’s like you stole it off someone nice and then corroded it over time, with the poison of your soul.”

  Ryan gave a loud and obnoxious laugh but with genuine mirth, I noticed with satisfaction.

  Tomio looked mystified. “How did we get here? I’m so confused. You two are usually so civilized. Well, Saxony is. To be frank my expectations of Ryan are pretty low. But still…”

  It was like he hadn’t spoken at all.

  “At least I don’t suck up to the headmaster,” said Ryan, throwing his weight into one hip in an effeminate gesture that I assumed was supposed to mimic me. “In plain view of everyone. I mean, come on, it’s so obvious. Have a little self-respect.”

  I squeezed my eyes shut and wrinkled up my nose like I was facing into a strong wind. Waving a hand in front of my nose, I blinked at Tomio. “What was that? Weird. A huge blast of hot air just hit me in the face, and man, did it reek. I mean, it was rancid.”

  Tomio ran a hand down his face and groaned. “Will you two quit it! What are you? Twelve? This is serious and we are running out of time.”

  That shut us up for a few long seconds. The fear was back, lacing itself into my muscle fibers like an invasive species.

  Ryan’s look turned smug, and oh how I hated that look. It was the look that said they were right and I was wrong. They had me backed into a corner. As he opened his mouth to make some final damning statement or hurl some last insult. I resisted the urge to clamp both hands down on my ears and scream, like a kid having a tantrum. Whatever he was about to say, I wouldn’t like it.

  And it was even worse than I expected.

  His lip lifted in a snarl of contempt. “Even if you don’t agree to it, Cagney, he’s only asking you as a courtesy. We don’t need you. I’ve got evanescent vision now, too. So, if you won’t do it, then I will. Be there, or not. The choice is yours.”

  With those final stinging words, Ryan disappeared from my doorway, leaving me gaping at Tomio.

  Tomio looked like he hoped a hole would open in the floor beneath his feet. “I wish he hadn’t said that.”

  My heart ached with the pain of betrayal. “But it’s true? You already agreed to do this without me? You and Ryan? You colluded behind my back?”

  He stood, then shuffled awkwardly, appearing sheepish but speaking without repentance. “I can’t face what’s out there as I am, Saxony. Why go into battle on a burro when I can go on a warhorse? I’m sorry it’s happening like this, but it is going to happen. Tonight. Starting now.” His features softened. “And, I really want you to be there.”

  It took another half hour of pouting and dithering before I tracked the men down in the fire-gym. They were near the rear wall, bent over a table with pen and paper discussing something. When I strode over, glowering, they looked up. Tomio’s gaze skimmed my face and body language. I was in such a tangle of emotions that I didn’t know what he was seeing, but whatever it was, it made them stop talking to watch me approach. Their faces mirrored a hopeful caution.

  I stopped in front of them and forced my fidgety hands to my sides. “I hate the way this all came about, but I am sorry that I didn’t think of it myself. I honestly didn’t, because putting my loved ones in danger doesn’t come naturally to me. Not like it clearly does to you, Ryan.” I glared at him. “But, since it’s going to happen with or without me, I’d rather be here.”

  Tomio swept me into a hug, whispering thank you into my neck.

  I pulled back and took his cheeks in my hands. “If you die from this, I’ll kill you.”

  His eyes crinkled. “I’m not going to die, but duly noted.”

  “Touching. Can we focus please?” Ryan gestured to the paper. A calculator sat beside the page and a couple of formulas had been scrawled down in long-form. The number 17.75 was written in a large size and circled vigorously.

  I moved closer to look at the formulas. “What’s seventeen point seven five?”

  “The number of hours Tomio has to Burn for,” Ryan explained. “The formula in the diary wasn’t complete, but what was there was authentic. Nero gave me the rest. It’s a basic calculation taking Tomio’s blood volume in liters, divided by the golden ratio without a decimal, that spits out a target temperature in Fahrenheit. This gives us our first metric. Tomio’s fever has to hit three-hundred-thirty-five. This number is then multiplied by the golden ratio with a decimal placed two points in, which gives us the next metric, which is time. Tomio’s personal Burning time is seventeen hours and forty-five minutes.”

  My head spun. “I didn’t get all that, but I’ll have to trust you did the math right.” I’d rely on my vision to tell me whether Tomio was in danger or not, not math.

  “We’ve done the calculation five times, it always comes out the same,” added Tomio.

  “Seems like a long time, though. Doesn’t it?” I peered at the mess of calculations on the page, feeling uneasy. “Nicodemo died after nine hours, I think it was.”

  “Yeah, but we don’t know if that was nine hours from the last drink he had, or nine hours from when Dante locked him in the cell. There’re too many unknowns to bother considering Nicodemo’s case. It has to be from the point of Tomio’s last drink.” Ryan circled the number once more for good measure. “This is when Tomio will need water, either three-hundred-thirty-five degrees fever, or seventeen and three-quarters of an hour, whichever comes first. In a perfect Burning, they happen at the same time.”

  “Starting from when?”

  Tomio fished his phone out of his pocket and showed me the timer he had running. “I had tea with the sushi, so less than eleven hours to go.” He set his cell on the counter. “I won’t have any fever for another two and half or three hours, going from past experience. Long enough to watch one of the Lord of the Rings movies.”

  I noticed the hafnium cuffs sitting on the table. “I’m not going to ask if Basil gave you permission to take those.”

  “That’s probably best,” replied Ryan with a saccharine smile.

  I wondered if Basil would in fact stop us if he knew what we were up to. Given what was at stake and the fact that Tomio had two Burned magi monitoring him, there was a chance he might not protest, even though he’d been adamantly against students attempting Burnings
when I started my first year. Still, in this case it was better to ask forgiveness than permission. Tomio only had one shot at it before we got on a plane for the Arctic. That thought led me to another, which made me feel slightly better about the situation: if Tomio and Ryan had genuinely thought I would rat them out to the headmaster, they would never have told me anything until it was all over. Which meant that they knew me pretty well, or at least Tomio did. Ryan had made it clear he didn’t care one way or the other if I was involved. I didn’t doubt for a second that Ryan had pressed Tomio not to let me in on their plan.

  “I don’t think we’ll need them, though.” Tomio gestured to the cuffs. “The two of you are more than enough to keep me away from water, plus I’ve got a high pain threshold. All those years of getting my ass kicked were good for something.”

  Tomio had had his ass kicked far less than he’d kicked asses himself, but I didn’t doubt his tolerance for pain. I’d thrown him across a dojo several times, only to watch him bounce back like he was made of rubber.

  “Don’t underestimate the agony coming your way,” Ryan told Tomio as he went to a storage unit in the wall that contained gymnastic mats.

  “Yeah, it’s too bad there isn’t an anesthetic you can take.” I matched my tone to their casual ones, but the thought of watching Tomio writhe in agony made my stomach do slow, nauseating summersaults. This was going to suck.

  As the boys set out some mats for us to lounge on, I fetched my laptop from my room and queued up the movie to pass the initial stages.

  Tomio and I lay sprawled on a gymnastics mat on our stomachs, my right thigh pressed against his left. I wanted to feel his body temperature as it rose. Ryan had stolen a pillow from a nearby lounge and lay on his back with it under his head. I couldn’t focus on the film to save my life. Tomio’s body temperature began to climb toward the end, and I knew the pain was setting in when he put his face down into his forearms. I put a hand on his back, feeling his fever coming through his t-shirt. I wouldn’t ask him if he was okay. There was nothing I could do about it if he wasn’t, and I already knew he wasn’t.