The Rebirth

“He’s what?” Daniel couldn’t even be angry, he was so in shock. The fingers thumbing the ring on his left hand, ring finger stilled. “You let him what?”
Percy glanced at Daniel in alarm. “He’s not in any danger. Sure, Sadie can be a bit arrogant, but he’s in good hands-”
“But-”
“Hey, I’m sorry. I thought you were letting him go on with this for just a little longer.”
“I… Well, yes, but there’s something bad in the air. Something bad’s happening to the summer air, and I don’t like it, and I didn’t know what it was when I woke up this morning, but now I know it’s because of Nico, and what he’s doing, and what he’s planning on doing-”
“Whoa. Hold on. You think-”
“I’m going after him.” Daniel got up, banging his knee on the table, cursing on his way out.
Percy got up to stop him, but Annabeth and Hazel tugged him back. This wasn’t their business.
They just hoped… That Daniel was wrong. That Nico was okay.

***

After the other beasts and magicians had disappeared, everyone had immediately banded together in the dining room area- all forty or fifty of them.
Elena’d waited until they all filed in and started whisper arguing before jumping down. The second the scorpion thing was gone her arm began screaming for pain medications, ice packs- anything. She let out a wince as she untangled herself from the strings and jumped, slamming her feet into the ground. Looking around, she was honestly so surprised that she hadn’t died. There were chunks of the ceiling that were not spared, now lying in heaps on the floor.
She inched her way to the dining hall area. She listened at the door at the while, and then tentatively peeked inside. Nobody was paying attention to her, choosing to whisper worriedly to each other or argue. She found a nestled spot in the back and observed, quietly.
Benji and Wyn were one of the helpers bringing snacks to everyone, setting up the table with waters and everything so people could feel comfortable. Outside, Elena caught the eye of something, and almost gave away her position by gasping. Was that a crocodile?! Swimming in a river that curved on the inside of the house?
“What was that thing? The scorpion thing?” somebody asked, summing up Elena’s thoughts at the time exactly.
The Horus girl provided the answer, her red hair flashing, like it was radiating her rage. “Scorpion antelope. Animals of Set. Setti has been channeling his favorite god.”
Set. The god of Chaos. Okay, maybe Elena will be able to keep up with this conversation.
“Okay,” one of the two people at the head of the table spoke up. People began to quiet down. Surprisingly, the person who spoke was the raven-haired girl that’d almost kicked Elena out earlier. Her eyes glinted and flashed gold, reminding Elena of somebody. “So. Setti finally is making his move. Well, we knew he would, right? Last year, when James and I defended the jewel, and he appeared, we were certain he’d come back.”
Clearly, she was the leader of the group. The way she talked, the air of confidence she had about her, and the way she held herself all showed signs that she’s taken command once before and she’s taken command again.
The boy next to her nodded. His hair was a light brown, sun-kissed on the tips, and his face was pleasant to look at, sweet and open. But the bone structure there was hard, and strong, and Elena knew if she wouldn’t want to make him mad. And when he folded his arms against his chest, he certainly didn’t disappoint with his biceps. “I didn’t take what he said lightly,” he recounted thoughtfully, and Elena realized this must be James. So many names. So many faces. So little knowledge of what was going on. “And we looked out for signs of warnings, but there was nothing coming up. It seemed like he disappeared off Earth.”
“Did we check in the Duat?” one of the younger ones piped up. The raven-haired girl’s face hardened. At this moment, Elena had officially lost all understanding of the topic at this point.
“The Duat's being… odd. It’s been harder to get away, and harder to navigate. I’ve lost sense of control there.” The girl relayed this information, and next to her, James nodded in agreement.
The oldest one, looking around nineteen years old, began to speak. “That’s bad. Really bad. Does the disorganization have anything to do with Setti?”
Here, the leader girl hesitated. “I hope not. Maybe he’s contributing to the Chaos, but if he’s the source of all the messes down there… We’re in serious trouble.”
Silence, and then Benji spoke up-
“So, we need to do something. But what? Let’s organize. Let’s rally. We need to get these things going. We have to think of ways to handle this.”
The girl snapped into action. “You’re right. You’re right. Let’s see, okay, we need to figure out what he’s up to-“
Everybody began to mutter, but once James started talking, the room silenced itself. “So we track his location. We need some Thoth and Ptah magic to prepare the navigators- ASAP. There’s going to be a few search parties going out to look for information and attempt to track Setti, find out his goals, and bring him down. We need studies on this new type of magic; I believe him when he says there’s something new brewing. Thoth will also need to get to that and work with those of Isis once the search parties are gone. The people left here’ll need to start preparing for the next attack, because there will be another attack if the quests don’t go out and stop him. Everyone else will have their training upped, and we’re going to have to take some field trips. The elder teachers already assigned will be in charge, and we’ll have around eight kids stepping up to take places of the people who go out. Nobody should have massive panic attacks unless there’s good reason to,” he added, to ease everyone’s nerves, “But it doesn’t hurt to be a little worried and cautious. Also, just in case, Isis and Hathor should work together to produce more healing potions. We might need some of those.”
The raven-haired girl waited, her eyebrows raised, for James to end his speech. She smiled, as though to herself. “You done?”
He looked down, coughing. “Oh. Yeah. Um, anything else to add?”
“No, it’s all good. You covered it,” she reassured him. She turned to everyone else, her eyes going back to their glinting gold identities again. “Everything clear? Help clean up, and then you can all rest. It’s been a long few hours. Let’s move.”
“Who’s going to go on the quests?”
“We’ll assign that later. James and I need to talk, figure out the rest of our plans before announcing it at dinner. Go. Clean. Rest. We’ll talk later.”
Elena’d realized just a second before everyone else did that they were about to be dismissed. She slipped out of the rooms and quietly tried to remember how to get back to the hospital bed that she was in before.

***

“Hey,” Wyn bounded in, as though she hadn’t just fainted, as though she hadn’t just decapitated a serpent, as though it’d just been a regular ol’ day. And maybe it had. Maybe she did this stuff all the time. Her face was softly beaming, her eyes dreamy like it’d been before. Her braid hadn’t even been fixed, wisps of auburn hair floating around her face. “Sorry. We just got hung up. But here’s Tiggerius, like I said!”
Elena didn’t know what she expected when Wyn’d said before, “I’m bringing up a penguin”…
But penguin it was.
“Wow,” she said, stunned, as she watched the thing waddle around, checking out her room. “Wow. Doesn’t it get too hot?”
Wyn brushed off the question with a wave of her hand. “It’s a he. But, no, Isis magic fixes that. We normally don’t keep them as pets, but for Iceberg Friday, we summoned a couple and Tiggerius told us he really liked it here and he wanted to stay for a while. And he has ever since.”
“Isis magic…” Elena put her hands to her temples. She didn’t bother asking how this penguin managed to communicate with Wyn. She was reminded of the conversation in the room, the warning that this “Setti” lay down for them. She was… she was kind of worried. Nervous. Twitchy. Nauseous. She never got that scared in London, but this was a different terrain, different feelings. Everything here felt foreign to her. “Can you kind of explain to me what’s going on?”
Wyn’s face flitted with a butterfly touch of concern, and exhaustion. “Oh. That battle that went on downstairs? Don’t be worried about it. We handled it. There shouldn’t be any more threats to the Twenty-First Nome during your stay. By the way, if you want to call your parents, here’s my cell phone. I unlocked the passcode, I trust you not to go through anything (not like I have much on it anyways)-” and she pressed a thin metal circle into Elena’s hands, the cellie cold against her flesh.
“No,” Elena tried again, looking down at the circular phone in her hands. It was silver. The screen was white. “I mean… Yes. I’d like that. Thank you. But with the attackers. Who attacked you?”
Wyn hesitated, before sitting down on her bed with a plop. Her expression was etched with skepticism. “I mean… I’m not sure… Agh. Okay. I guess it wouldn’t hurt for you to know. There’s this guy, Setti? He’s this huge follower of this Egyptian god we have, Set-“
“The evil Egyptian god?”
“Yeah. Kind of. Agh, it’s complicated. If we had Brandon come in here- he’s our one guy that’s on the path of Set… He could tell you- Set’s not all that bad. He guarded Ra- he still does, actually- the king of the gods. He did try to take over once Osiris, the death diety, came along, and again when Horus took the throne, and he’s an all around kind of terrible guy, but at some points he becomes okay. In the last Great War, about sixteen or fourteen years ago, he sided with the rest of the gods against this big serpent. Without his help, we wouldn’t have won. And he also used to, at the very beginning of time, help some of his followers and certain towns in Egypt with wind, bringing in gifts from the sky. He’s a very odd character,” Wyn thought about cheerfully. “Very complex. I’d love to sit down and have a nice, long talk with him. There must be so many layers to his story.”
Elena had to keep her on track. “So. Setti…”
Wyn made a face. “One of the people at First Nome that always comes by to check up on us, Carter, told us he had trouble with this other nasty guy, Setne, a while back. Setti’s used to be kind of a follower, admirer of Setne, before Setne finally got defeated after his thousand year streak. I guess that kind of broke Setti’s heart, and he turned to Set instead.”
Set. Setne. Setti. So many names with Set in them. “God help us.”
“Gods, but yes.”
“Oh,” Elena felt uncomfortable. “Yeah. But I’m Christian.”
“Really?” Wyn’s eyes widened and sparkled gleams of opal, the clouds drifting away from her eyes. She excitedly scooted forwards. “How? Tell me why! Tell me your beliefs! How can you See us if you’re Christian? How can you see this? How can you see anything?”
Elena changed the subject. “I’ll explain as much as I can later, even though I don’t really know the answers to most of your questions. But, Setti. What did he mean, the doors have been opened?”
“He means,” Benji leaned against the door, closing his golden hazel eyes. Cat eyes. Elena couldn’t shake the claws, the grace he had, his battle moves out of her head. He’d gotten better- so much better- than he’d been four years ago. “That tying ourselves with the Greeks and Romans will bring bad, bad things.”
Wyn’s dark amber eyes hazed with gentle calm. “Benji,” she said mildly, “We can’t keep ourselves separate from the rest of the world. We all agreed with that, along with First Nome, months ago.”
“Not all of us.” He sighed, quietly. He shook it off, and smiled at Elena. Something funny tripped in her chest. “Well. Now that’s over. Your dinner’s going to come up in a few. If you want, someone guard you through the night, just in case another attack happens…?”
For a terrifying second, Elena was actually tempted. She wanted someone to help her get through the night- a strange night in a strange place that just got attacked. She didn’t know magic. But then, remembering the way she handled herself and didn’t die in battle, Elena smiled and shook her head. “I’m good.”
Benji gave her a long, slow grin before turning to Wyn. “You okay?”
Wyn gave him a look, goofily. “Yes, ding dong.”
“Okay enough to go on a quest?”
“Of course. You and me? And James and Bree are going together?”
Benji rolled his eyes and nodded. “Duh. They’re debating sending Brandon with us, just in case we need help suppressing the Set magic, but they’re afraid he’d just make it worse instead of, like, settling it down. And then I think Michael, Sunny, and Jacqueline are also going, maybe together, maybe in pairs, depending if Brandon comes with us or not.”
They talked about more names, more people, more parts of the quest that Elena couldn’t keep up with. And then finally, when it looked like they were wrapped up, and Benji turned to go, Elena asked Wyn softly, “So what does that mean? The tying with the Greeks and the Romans?”
Wyn bit her lip. “It’s a tad complicated.”
“My brain’s a tad complicated. It will be able to handle, I swear.”
“There are other gods. Greek, Roman gods.”
Elena waited. “Yes.”
Wyn furrowed her brow. “Yes?”
“Yes.”
“How do you know? How much do you know about Egyptian gods? That never even occurred to me. You know so much about us. How?”
“I can See.”
The gears in Wyn’s brain slowly began to turn. “See… how?”
“A lot of things. Gods. Monsters. Everything. I thought I was going crazy for a while.”
The haze in front of Wyn’s eyes was thick. It was like she was retreating back into her own brain, scrambling around with this information.
“London is a weird place,” Elena said pathetically, to tie it up.
Wyn blinked back the weirdness. It looked like she was about to ask something, her auburn freckles suddenly enhanced like copper constellations.
Someone came in, saying very grumpily, “No visitors.” Elena looked down in surprise to find a small eight year old girl in a limp brown ponytail holding a blood pressure measurer and ice.
Elena raised her eyebrows, just slightly. She expected Wyn to wave this order off, or maybe plead for a couple more minutes.
But instead, she nodded seriously. “Of course. Hey- Elena. I’ll be up later. Maybe I’ll bring you your dinner. Do you want Tiggerius to stay with you?”
Elena opened her mouth, to say what she wasn’t really sure, when the eight year old girl barked, “No penguins, either.”
In a couple of minutes, the penguin and the teenager with the auburn freckles had disappeared from the room, leaving Elena with an ice pack and a very grouchy eight year old.
“Inflammation,” she muttered. “It was doing much better this morning. What have you been doing?”
“Oh.” Should Elena tell the girl she’d just been in battle, dangling off the ceiling for a good ten minutes using the weight of her shoulders? “Um…”
Luckily, the eight year old didn’t seem to want to know. “Stay in bed. Keep this on. And don’t ir-ri-tate it.”
All professional-like, too, with a sigh and a tucking of hair behind her ear, like this little girl had so many other patients to attend to. And with that, she took a clipboard and strolled off, leaving Elena behind, still clutching the phone Wyn had given her.
She don’t know how long she was scaring at the black screen. Ten seconds? Twenty minutes? Her mind blanked automatically, like it’s been starting to do when she got nervous, clearing her of all thoughts. Bringing herself thought by thought back to reality, Elena forced herself to raise her thumb. With shaking fingers, she pressed the power button. Facing her parents and what they would say and how worried they must be… it was just as scary as diving headfirst into battle.
The phone number dialed, and she could hear the ringing. Her breathing quickened. She hated lying. Elena hated, hated, hated lying, especially BIG lies, and everyone else could tell when she was lying, and it was just a terrible situation. But what was she going to say? “Hullo, mama, papa! Don’t you worry- I know you must be going bloody insane, but it’s okay! I was just meditating by the river for a couple of hours, before catching sight of a lion bird baby and deciding to fight it with my bare hands! Regular day, yes? But get this- I absolutely blasted my shoulder into tiny bone bits, so I was half-kidnapped by a young boy I met four years ago and the rest of his magician mates so that they could fix me right up, regrow my bones, and send me on home! Sorry I couldn’t call earlier; there was an attack at our sanctuary! But it’s all good now- turns out these lovely magician friends seem to have this mortal enemy named Setti, so they’ll be figuring out how to prevent him from killing them before they send me on my jolly way. Lots of love to grandmom and grandpops!”
Between getting sent to an insane asylum and lying, Elena would have to choose lying.
Getting so engrossed in these thoughts, she hadn’t even realized that the phone beeped. Voicemail. Her hand stilled, faltering. That can’t be right. They always answered the home phone whenever they were home. Always.
She dialed again, frantically. Voicemail. Voicemail, voicemail, voicemail. Were they at work? No- it was 6:30, and their night shifts start at 8 and 8:25. Were they in trouble?
Elena left a frenzied voicemail- “Mama. Papa! Tell me you’re okay. As soon as you get this message. I’m just dandy- in the process of healing before my friends send me home- I got into some trouble, and I hope to God that you’re not in any, either; call me right away, alright? Please. Please, please, please please pick up-”
The dial tone cut her off, and she was out of bed, racing down the stairs to talk to Wyn. Maybe the connection was awful here?
She was stopped short by an argument, realizing she wasn’t supposed to be out of bed.
Nobody seemed to notice her.
“Bree,” someone was yelling. “Stop trying to find a way around this! There’s no other options!”
“There’s always other options,” the raven-haired leader girl snapped back. It took a second for Elena to make the connection- this must be Bree.
“Yeah, and they suck!”
“We can’t be afraid. We can’t let some magician scare us into making decisions we don’t want to make. We’re so much stronger than he is, you realize that? We are modern Egyptian mythology, and now we have the Greeks and Romans holding our backs.”
“This isn’t just any magician, Bree. You’ve met him. You know what he’s like. You know what vile, twisted, disgusting-“
“Which is why we, the much less vile, twisted and disgusting, can take him down.”
“You don’t understand,” someone different spoke up, quietly, from the back. It was Benji, looking down uncomfortably. His curls splayed out across his forehead. His long, lean arms were shoved awkwardly into his pockets. “This is… really, really, really bad. If he goes through with this, it will definitely change the course of the world.”
“He’s just a magician,” Bree asked, but it was almost like a question. “What can he possibly do against the whole community of magicians and hundreds of gods?”
“If he gets through with this, he won’t be just a magician. He’d be a god. Not just any god- a god with a power of a thousand. He will be his own culture, fueling himself, rising into the being of Creation. Do you know how Egpytian mythology was born? Roman, Greek mythology? First, there was Chaos. And then, a sliver rose out of it and expanded, sending light throughout the seas of darkness. This is Creation. Combining these two- three?- cultures will combine both of its powers into a Chaos. And from this will rise Setti.”
It was silent. Benji’s eyes were sad, and he blushed, even harder, like it was hard for him to be the bearer of bad news. It was the first time Elena’d seen him without laughter or a smile dancing on his face.
“How?” James asked, curiously, his body leaning forward. His eyebrows were furrowed. Elena did a double take. If she concentrated enough, brought the image in focus enough- James was radiating a blazing golden glow. It seemed almost… angry, and it was smothering itself, like it was trying to be suppressed. All this, but his face gave away nothing. “How do you know this?”
“Dreams. The Ma’at is closer, now than it’s ever been since the Great Egypt War eighteen years ago. Is that enough proof for you?”
“You’re right,” Bree stood up. Her sculpted jaw was set, voice even, head held steady. “This is serious. Really serious. And we’re going to stop him. Isis, Thoth- you have work to do tonight. Research. Capture magic in amulets, talismans… anything that can help track Set. With Set comes Setti. Maybe we’ll be able to force him into giving information.”
“We?” James asked, mildly, cinnamon skin warm and sweet, smiling a little at Bree. Her lips twitched.
“No. We’re going to be going into Duat. Searching for some gods. They must be in there somewhere.”
James nodded, but looked sick. A lot of other people gasped, around the room. Some older kids protested, “Do you know how dangerous-“
“Yes,” Bree snapped. “We were just there. But we survived. I know we can survive. We’ll be able to get out of it, somehow. We just need quick transportation, and we need a council with the gods. Immediately. Jacqueline and Sunny, Brandon and Michael. Alert the Nomes. All of them. Start with First first, obviously, and work your way down from there. Maybe they’ll send representatives to help you. Oh, you know what- also contact Camp Jupiter and Camp Half-Blood once you’re done. You should actually get that started tonight… Camp Half-Blood’s actually right here in the area… I have the address somewhere.”
For the first time that day, Elena actually thought, “Wait. Where am I?” She was slammed again and again with sickening questions of reality. Despite the fact that these people were healing her, and that she was sure they were on the “good side”, she still managed to not see the absolutely most obvious questions. First “what are my parents doing”, and now this? Where was she? Where was she?
“Benji and Greywyn. First thing tomorrow, you use the amulets to track Set. We need to do this fast, okay? We need to see what we’re up against.”
Benji nodded, defeated. He still wasn’t crazy about opening the cultures to one another, Elena noted. Which was understandable. It was very understandable. What if they all accidentally create an immortal dictator in the process? “Hate to bring this up, but Grey and I are lacking the knowledge of what Setti looks like.”
Bree groaned, softly, closing her eyes. A pause, and James took over from there, digging out a very flat milky stone, etched with a rune. Light, caramel-chocolate feather hair brushed into his face as he concentrated.
The stone glowed yellow, and an orb of faces, memories illuminated. A slow-motion face of a surprisingly young man lit up the sphere- chin covered with blonde stubble, a perfectly styled dirty blonde hair, brown eyes filled with a calm insanity.
Bree looked up and gave the orb a look of total loathing. James just looked grim. Benji had to look away.
Elena staggered backwards, inhaling sharply, choosing the very worst moment to make noise. Nobody else had been talking.
Eyes slowly turned to her as she slammed in the wall behind her. It took a shocked moment for Bree to recognize her face. “Oh. You’re Elena, right? The one we’re healing? I was wondering if you managed to make it out of battle.”
“Out of battle?” a little girl’s voice cried in outrage. “Are you stupid? I knew you weren’t telling me something!”
Elena couldn’t care less. Her eyes were on the magical orb. “I know him.”
“She must be… delusional,” the little girl said the last word very carefully, importantly. “I’ll get her upstairs.”
“I do,” Elena looked up and around the table. “Is that Setti? Because I know him. And, trust me, if there’s anyone that’s absolutely barmy, it’s that one. Holy- How could I be so stupid?”
“De-lu-sion-al,” the little girl repeated again, just as carefully, glancing at Bree and James. They were looking at Elena intensely.
“How?” James asked, his brows knitting together. “How’s that possible?”
“He’s in London,” Elena said quietly. She coughed and repeated it louder. “He’s in London. Blast. Blast, blast, blast-“ She said some words that she’d have to confess in confession later on Sunday, if she got back in time for church- “!!! Of course the lunatic is in my city!”
“How do you know?” Wyn eyes were so wide, so huge, so convinced.
“I saw him. I’ve been seeing him for a while now- five months? Six months? The attacks have been increasing, and only from the Egyptian side, and almost always with him hanging around…”
“He’s in London?”
“Yes. Yes. I’m sure. I’m positive,” Elena’s brain kicked into high gear. She frowned, remembering something unpleasant. “Always in these very fancy, pressed beige slacks. I could tell he was one of those people, you know? God, how did I not make the connection… could have saved a million attacks…”
Ever since Elena commented about the slacks, Bree and James have been looking at each other, in wide alarm. Bree muttered, “So he’s in London.”
Benji stood up. “What does this mean?”
“It means change of plans. No getting Set. First thing tomorrow, you’re transporting yourselves to London. And we’re going with you.”
Everyone started shouting, the excitement rising and filling the room. Elena watched all of this in alarm. There was something filling, but it wasn’t good. This wasn’t good.
“Bree,” Wyn said, softly. “Bree.”
The cheering continued, shouts about how “Setti will pay for messing with their home” circulating.
“Bree!” Wyn shouted, her eyes wide as ever. “Bree! We can’t all go to London!”
Bree turned. “What?”
James and Wyn locked eyes and nodded. While the level suspended itself, quieting down as James starting talking low to Bree. Her eyes grew darker and darker, and she allowed her hair to fall over one cheek like a dark silk raven curtain. “I want Setti taken down, and I want him to pay.”
“Be reasonable,” James argued gently. “We all do. Don’t you know that I want him ripped apart? But we still need the gods. Do you really think we can all take him down? We don’t know his power. We’ll be on his ground. We don’t even know for sure if he’s in London yet. Our quest is in Duat.”
“James. We know his location.”
“We know where he could be. And we can’t bring everybody along. Do you know how unreasonable that is? Do you know what we’re going into? No. Nobody does.”
“Which is why we need to find out.”
“Which is why they need to find out.”
“Everyone else except us?”
“Benji and Grey. Just Benji and Grey.”
“I want Setti to pay,” Bree repeated, but it was calmer, smaller. She seemed to realize how she sounded. And James knew it, choosing not to respond, staring at her in such the oddest way- a mixture of messages, emotions, agreements seemed to pass between them. And yet, as Elena took a slight dip into her Sight, there was no magical colorful glow passing between them, no magical necklaces or anything. But they seemed to know what the other was thinking.
Maybe that was a different kind of magic altogether, one that wasn’t “really” magic at all. The thought kind of made Elena’s heart ache and swell at the same time. She wanted to have that someday.
“Okay,” Bree said. She turned to the rest of them. “Okay. Benji and Greywyn will go on the quest to London. They’ll figure out where he is. And they’ll take him down.”
There were some groans, but it was mostly quiet. They seemed to know that what Bree said was right.
There was something ticking under Elena’s skin, something she needed to say, something that needed to burst out from under her chest. There was something swirling in the air- this type of shimmery translucent shift in the fabric of space- and she noticed it… this was now or never…
“And I will also go.”
The awkwardest, tensest, and heaviest of all silences shoved down everybody’s throats as they looked at her face, determined and ready and shy all at the same time. Next to her, nobody saw the remains of a silver string around her feet.
Bree cleared her throat. James looked at her with an unreadable expression. Elena couldn’t even look at Benji.
But Wyn… her face was surprised, yes… But encouraging. The most encouraging one out of all the disbelieving faces in the crowd. It was clear, admiring, accepting. Her mouth twisted up in a small twitch of a smile. Her freckles sparkled, like deep, red copper stars.
“You’re injured,” Bree said cautiously, her eyes meeting Elena’s with intense focus. Elena found herself rising up to the gaze.
“Everyone gets injured. Everyone keeps fighting. This is my city. And this crazed chap thinks he can waltz and get to terrorize my city? I don’t think so.”
“I hate to tell you this. But we don’t know you. I’m sure you agree, can understand… We’ve officially known each other for a day, three if you count the time you’ve spent unconscious. And now you think you’re ready to go on a quest?”
“I know I’m mortal,” Elena emphasized, with a sad smile. “I know my limits. I haven’t gone bonkers; I know what I’m signing up for. And I know where I can help. I can guide these ones to Setti. Can’t you see? My Sight is the only thing I have, whether curse or blessing. It’s time for me to use it, yes?”
“But we don’t know you. We’re not completely sure we can trust you.”
“Trust me, I was thinking the same thing when I woke up in this place,” Elena paused, remembering something she needed to cover. “Where is this, exactly?”
“Brooklyn, New York. America,” Wyn supplied helpfully. Elena gave her a wide smile.
“Wow. First time in America. Lovely place, I guess. Anyways. Trust me when I say that you can safely assume my loyalty is with you. Trust me when I say that I do not want a mad man running around my area. And trust me when I say that you probably need me for this mission.”
Benji cut in. “I agree. She should go. She knows London. We don’t. We need to get to Setti fast, right? And Elena’s seen him. She’s fought the monsters that he’s probably released! It’s… It’s a good choice.”
“I also agree.” Greywyn gave Elena a wide smile. Her kindness hurt Elena’s chest- Grey’s only known her for, what, a day? And she’s already got her back.
“This isn’t some child’s mission,” Bree said, tiredly, agitatedly. “We can’t just send whoever raises their hand to go.”
“I am not a child,” Elena immediately responded. She pushed any anger, hurt, or insecurity that she could’ve possibly felt about Bree’s comment to the side, separating herself from those feelings. She doesn’t need those right now. What she needs is to stand her ground. Calmly.
Thick silence.
Benji said, “I’ve seen her fight. First time ever fighting, 12 years old. Saved my life.”
Elena’s cheeks lit up on fire. And they weren’t cooling down. Out of all the feelings she had in the world, all the ones she trained herself to push away, she somehow couldn’t separate herself from this emotion, this thing that was rising to her skin, blushing it a golden pink.
She stood her ground, though, as she felt her ears burn.
James finally said, “Elena? You can go. You should guide. You say you know your limits? Prove it. Just keep yourself safe. Pack your bags tonight. You’ll be on the transport tomorrow.”
And something had released. A feeling of certainty, righteousness, oozed out into the air. Whether this decision was good or bad, it was the right one. Elena was certain of it.
A cry rose up. James nodded at the small girl who’d made the noise. “Oh, yes. Lily. Please- try to amp up her progress? Don’t drug her so that she can’t wake up tomorrow, however. You might have to grit her teeth and pain her way through a painful night,” he apologized to Elena, kindly. His face was so sweet.
Lily- finally, a name- huffed again, indignantly. “ ‘Amp up her progress’? What does that even mean? You can’t… I can’t… it’s inflammation,” she explained, frustrated.
“Lily…”
“Bone regrowth!”
“Please? For me?”
With a huff of apparent acceptance, she spun around to storm off to Elena’s room.
“Alright.” He smiled tiredly at everyone. “Everyone know what we’re doing? Huge day for all of us tomorrow. Rest for you all that need it. The ones leaving tonight get packed. Let’s go, people!” A boyish look flitted over his face.
Everyone left to go, hurriedly. Elena soon found out why. Within seconds, an army of baboons shrieked out to meet the table of plates, dishes, silverware, trash, taking it in their arms and whisking off to the kitchen.
Tripping her way out of the chaos, Elena managed to find herself face-to-face with Bree.
She faltered. “Hullo. Bree.”
Bree studied her for a moment. “Hi.”
Quiet rested comfortably in between them.
“I’m… sorry,” Elena said, apologetically. “This is just the right thing to do. I know it is. I can see it.”
“See it, or ‘SEE’ it?” Bree asked, curiously. Her face gave nothing away.
Elena hesitated, concentrating on the air around her. The shimmer was fading, but it was there- like the mirage heat waves rising from black asphalt on a sweltering dry day.
“Both.”
Here, Bree hesitated. “I wanted to tell you about something.”
Elena waited. After a good twenty seconds of Bree not saying anything, Elena gently prompted, “I’m listening.”
“It’s just that… Well, we don’t know each other. At all, really. Well, I know you more than you know me, I guess, but…”
She wasn’t making any sense. “Pardon?”
Bree continued to stare. It was uncomfortable, really, but Elena forced herself to observe Bree quietly back, from her dark eyes to her silky sheet of black ebony- hair that would have been mine if it wasn’t for these wild, curly strands, Elena chided her hair- to her delicately sculpted face slashed and battered with patches of rough skin. It looked like Bree was created to be a doll, grew up to become a fighter.
Elena hoped she could like that someday. A fighter.
“You know what?” Bree decided. Her eyes stopped flitting and became hardened, set in stone. “Come back alive. And then remind me to have this talk.”
The Elena with feelings would’ve protested. Maybe she’d have groaned, or gave out a little sigh. She definitely, at the very least, would’ve deflated, like a disappointed life-sized Latina balloon.
But feelings weren’t of use in this situation. So she forced her disappointment to the back of the mind, gave a small nod, and said, “Well, of course.”
**

Notes

I'VE FINISHED WRITING THE REBIRTH. JUST WROTE THE LAST WORDS TODAY, AT 4 AM. NOW IS ONLY THE MATTER OF UPLOADING- I'LL BE UPLOADING AROUND TWO CHAPTERS A DAY FROM NOW ON- ONE IN THE MORNING, ONE AT NIGHT. IN THE MEANTIME, I'LL BE WRITING MY NOVEL. LOVE YOU ALL!