“Our powers are a gift, and we are tasked with protecting humanity from other creatures like the one you saw.”
I looked at Amara, then at Mum.
“Mum, do you see this, too?”
Mum stared at the plant, but she didn’t seem startled or surprised at all. She looked blank.
“Your mother sees it, and besides, she knows what I just did there because she also has a gift.”
Completely confused, I tried to catch Mum’s gaze, but she just looked at the plant.
Whatever this was, I wanted to wake up.
I squinted my eyes and bit my tongue. Then I blinked.
“You’re not dreaming.”
Amanda still sounded calm, like it was normal to grow flowers. Out of nowhere. Just like that.
I looked at her, focused and slightly scared.
Couldn’t I please just wake up in our apartment in Sacramento and find Mum in the kitchen with pancakes and her relaxed smile? I’d even settle for the bed here if this was all just a bad dream. But it felt so real.
“Have unexplainable things ever happened to you?”
I blinked at Amara, confused.
Hadn’t that been enough inexplicable things today?
“Something like floating objects or wounds healing quickly?”
I immediately thought of my injuries, which had always healed unnaturally slowly. Mum had almost stopped letting me go to the playground when I was eight because I had come home with wounds all the time. It had always been like that, except that I had become more careful. Objects had fallen out of my hand many times, but they had also hit the ground.
I shook my head, still speechless.
Amara turned around to Mum. “Had she really not experienced any incidents yet?”
That word reminded me of my panic attacks and the pain that followed, on my arms. But it had nothing to do with this. I didn’t want to have anything to do with this. And I was not a wolf, nor did I have any supernatural connection to plants.
Again, I looked at the vase.
“No, there’s nothing there. She didn’t inherit any gifts,” Mum said tonelessly.
What did she mean by that? No gifts inherited?
“It’s extremely rare, and you can’t assume that...” Amara looked thoughtful. “Who destroyed the glass earlier?”
The glass that had just...shattered.
“That was me,” Mum said quickly, and I looked up in surprise.
She hadn’t even touched the glass.
Again, I tried to catch her gaze, to somehow reach out to her, but I couldn’t. Mum refused to look at me.
“You should wear your necklace, Diana,” Amara just sighed.
“I don’t understand what’s going on here at all. Could someone please explain it to me?”
Mum continued to be silent.
“Quatura control the elements, so do I, my daughter Grace, who you've already met, as well as the rest of my family and other families in town.”
Grace? Her daughter? They looked nothing alike...but Blair did. It made sense.
“Many other Quatura from Canada have settled here in Blairville to become part of our ancient Circle and use their skills to contribute to a safer society.”
Quatura? That sounded like a pest controller for plants.
It was getting more and more chaotic in my head.
“I don’t quite understand... What do you mean by elements...and what do I have to do with all of that?”
“You control an element because you were born a daughter of a Quatura.” She said now, sounding more certain than before.
My confusion grew like the plant back there.
I was supposed to control an element? I was supposed to be the daughter of a...
I looked up at Mum. This time, she looked at me.
“What does it all mean?” I asked in a shock of realization. “Mum, what does she mean?”
She looked at me pityingly, her mouth closed, tears in her eyes. And in that moment, all I knew was that she was scared and that I needed to end that fear.
I had enough and rose up. Everything was spinning.
“Listen. Whatever that pocket spell was there...”
“What you saw is real, Bayla.”
All right, if she insisted. I was too disturbed to be able to assess what was real and what wasn’t, so I left it at that.
“Anyway, my mum and I have nothing to do with it!”
“Your mum wouldn’t have come back if that was the case.”
“Mum came back because she’s ill, and her doctor lives here.”
