Page 20 of Scion of Chaos

I swallow back tears again, though one escapes and slides down my cheek. Letting out a shaky sigh, I wipe it away and give Erroll a pleading look. “Is Clio going to be okay? I didn’t mean to hurt her. She got in my head.” I raise a hand to my head, grimacing as I recall the probing invasion, like fingers sinking into my brain.

His gaze goes distant, and a second later, he nods. “Razik says she’s just bruised and shaken up. He relayed her sincere apologies for what she did. I guess…” He pauses and frowns. “She evidently thought you wanted her to help unblock your lost memories? What lost memories?”

I reflexively wrap my hand around the flacon resting between my breasts. “I think I summoned a god a few nights ago, but I don’t remember any of it.” The bearded face flashes through my mind again, and I frown. “She said she would help, but I wasn’t ready for what she did. I didn’t know it would feel like that. I had no warning, then she was just clawing at my brain.”

I recall the weird expression she had when she saw my sketches and my heart leaps. “Where’s my sketchbook? And my bag?” I scramble to my feet up and rush to the balcony, staring out at nothing but water and the vague outline of a landmass miles across it. “I need my bag.”

Salem rests a hand on my shoulder, squeezing as if he thinks I might jump. I take a step back and brush him off, then turn to face the three of them.

“Listen, I might be desperate, but I’m not crazy. Something happened to me three nights ago that…activatedme, I guess. I don’t remember what, but I have something in my bag that I need to help me figure it all out. Along with this.” I lift the perfume bottle up. “If you guys really want to help me, I need my bag. And someplace safe to think about all this.”

Benedetta rises. “Nemea, St. George was created to help members of the Bloodline learn their powers. You wouldn’t be here if you weren’t meant to be. We’re all invested in helping. You can trust us. Thisisa safe space.”

“But I still don’t really know the answer! I think the power I have is… ischaos. But I don’t know what that means, or how to use it or control it.”

The two men share a worried look, but don’t show any other reaction, though I get the sense their silence means they’re madly relaying our conversation to their partner, Razik, who is no doubt at this moment telling their boss everything. I’m not sure if I have any choice but to trust them, though.

Benedetta takes a few steps closer and gestures to the small bottle I’m gripping white-knuckled against my chest. “May I see?”

I reluctantly release the bottle, but she doesn’t come closer. The heat radiating off her makes me realize why. She doesn’t want to burn me. I lift the chain over my head and hold it out. She gently grasps the small vessel between her fingers. An orange glow appears where her fingertips touch the object, growing brighter every second.

I’m still holding the chain, so I tug it from her grasp right as the silver filigree starts to melt. “You’ll ruin it! Jesus, what isupwith you people trying to break my shit? At least for me it’s involuntary.”

She presses her lips together. “The metal, yes. But touch the glass. That isn’t normal glass. Did you create that, or did you find it?”

“I made it.” I drape the chain back around my neck. It’s still hot from the heat conducted through the metal, but the bottle itself feels no warmer. “Well, I found the material, but molded it into this, then added the silver filigree.” I hesitate for a second, glancing between her and the two Shadow dragons standing guard. “It’s the third thing I made from the same strange glass I found on the beach. I have more of it in my bag, if you want to see.”

“Razik has retrieved your things. He’ll bring them,” Errol says.

“I’d like to try something. If I may?” Benedetta takes a step closer. I frown at her outstretched hand. “Will you take my hand? I just want to see how much heat you can withstand. If I’m right, then I might have a theory about your powers.”

I swallow and lift my hand, stretching it out to her. My heart pounds as her hand clasps around mine. She’s just pleasantly warm, though, so I let out a breath, gaze shifting between her face and our clasped hands. After a moment her hand begins to glow the way it did when she held my perfume bottle. The heat intensifies, and I brace myself for a burn, but it doesn’t come. Despite the glow eventually becoming a blinding white and sweat breaking out on my forehead and neck, trickling uncomfortably between my breasts, it never hurts.

She lifts an eyebrow at me and I smirk, excited by this discovery. “Gimme all you got,” I say, grinning.

“I don’t think that would be wise,” Salem says, stepping in and wrapping his big hand around both of ours, gently urging us apart. “If she burns out, we won’t see her for several months, and Errol gets really pissy when she’s gone.”

I frown, letting my hand drop to my side, experimentally flexing my fingers. They feel warm, and I also feel oddly energized. “That actually happens to you?”

Benedetta shrugs. “I am a phoenix; it goes with the territory—something I learned the hard way when I was teaching myself my limits. But since then, I’ve learned I can go a couple years at least, as long as I’m careful. But more to the point, you withstood heat that could melt metal without flinching. That suggests thereisdragon blood in you, at the very least. The fact that you’re adept at … Did you say you molded the glass you found? You didn’t melt it and cast it?”

“With these two hands,” I say, lifting them and waggling all my fingers.

She glances at Salem, who remains standing beside us. “Ursa,” he says.

“Glass is technically a liquid,” she says. “So I’m thinking Nymphaea.”

“Or both,” Errol offers, coming around to stand on our other side, staring at me with more interest than before. “She affected the wind currents while we were in the air too.”

Benedetta’s eyes light up. “Do you know what a chimera is?” she asks.

I blink at her. “The mythical beast that’s part lion, part goat, part snake?”

She waves a hand. “That’s an outdated interpretation based on a fleeting encounter. They are rare, and it’s said they can take the forms of animals. Deva Rainsong is the first chimera to have been born in millennia, though she was supposedly created in a lab. I’m curious about your origins, because you may be one too.”

“Deva… the goddess?” I ask, eyes going wide. She’s a legend on the island, and not just because of her origin story; many students report having learned of St. George after listening to the music Deva plays with her band, Fate’s Fools. It’s the favorite music played in pretty much every studio on the island. The other rumor is that she controls invisible creatures called fate hounds who lead us to our fated mates.

Benedetta nods and raises her eyebrows expectantly. I push air out past my lips and shake my head. “I’m nothing special. My maternal grandparents were Makah, but I didn’t grow up with them. I never really knew them.”

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