Page 32 of Powerful

‘Deal,’ she breathes, fighting a smile.

Reaching into my pocket, I pull out a single shilling to offer her. She stares at it. ‘I was selling it for three.’

‘Yeah,’ I draw out the word, ‘and how was that working out for you?’

She crosses her arms. ‘Three.’

‘I didn’t realize you were in any position to negotiate.’

‘Two,’ she amends. ‘And a smile.’

I visibly weigh the offer, tilting my head back and forth. ‘That’s a bit steep, honey.’

She sighs. ‘Just the smile, then.’

‘That was the steep part I was referring to.’

Her words are gentle, as though she’s speaking to a spooked animal. And, in a way, that’s a fair comparison. ‘Will you tell me? About you? About why you won’t smile for me?’

‘It’s not personal, Dena.’ I shift to lean against the wall, draping my arms over bent knees. ‘It’s just something I stopped doing the day Hera and I ran away from home.’

She raises her eyebrows in silent encouragement tocontinue, to which I blow out a breath of annoyance. ‘Fine, but I’m getting that damn shirt for free, then.’ I take a pause, collecting my thoughts before continuing, ‘I grew up on the other side of the slums. My parents were – well, are – the very definition of poor Mundanes. They could barely feed themselves, let alone any children. Long story short and private details later, they unexpectedly had me.

‘It wasn’t much of a childhood, really.’ I say this with a shrug, as if it had little impact on who I turned into. ‘They didn’t want to have a kid and never intended on feeding another mouth. But there I was, begrudgingly forcing them into parenthood.’

She listens intently, head tilted, eyes wide, elbows on her knees and face in her palms. It’s endearing at least. Adorable at most.

‘Like all Elite toddlers, I couldn’t control my abilities, but seeing that my mother was a Sight and my father a Bluff, they figured I was simply another Mundane to litter the slums.’ I sigh. ‘Well, until I got old enough to draw on the more physical powers of those in my vicinity.

‘I almost lit our shack of a home on fire when I was five. This led my parents to believe that I was a latebloomer, but a Burner, nonetheless. That is, until I began crawling up the walls within the same hour.’

I glance over at her, finding a dramatic look of awe on her face. If it were anyone else, I might have thought they were mocking me. But it’s Adena, and this look is mild compared to the one she gives me at the sight of sticky buns.

‘What then?’ she urges, waving a hand encouragingly.

‘Then they started to figure out what I was.’ My voice is dull, masking the bitterness biting each word. ‘They didn’t know what to do with me. Kept me locked inside our little shack. Hera was the first person I remember seeing other than my parents. She showed up on our doorstep when I was seven, and we quickly became inseparable, seeing that we had no one else.’

I hadn’t noticed my thumb was trailing the length of that scar cutting my lips until I catch her gaze tracing the movement. ‘As I got older, I began to understand why it was that I wasn’t allowed out. I was still learning to control my abilities, and being a Wielder means certain death. I was – I am – a threat to the king because of a power I didn’t ask for. My parents knew this, and it was clear that I was unwanted. Especially by my father.’

I glance up at Adena, hoping for a reason to end this conversation, though I find nothing but concern in her hazel gaze. Nothing but gentleness guiding her hand towards my knee, seeping comfort from every splayed finger.

‘He thought I was useless – told me as much.’ Swallowing, I attempt not to stumble through each word in my haste to get them out of my mouth. ‘I couldn’t work at the shop with him, couldn’t leave the house without fear of being found out. I was an expense. A nuisance. A disappointment.’

‘You’re not,’ Adena breathes, shaking her head firmly.

‘Oh, I was.’ I nod, my eyes drifting up to the sky above us. ‘I just wasn’t fortunate enough to be loved despite it.’

When my eyes find hers, I regret having said anything at all. It’s as though every word has dulled the sparkle in her eyes, smothered her smile into a dreariness undeserving of her lips. I never imagined she could look so grim. And I hate that I’m the cause of it.

But knowing she won’t allow me to stop now, I continue with a deep breath. ‘I had Hera. My parents tolerated her more than they did me, seeing that she earned money by performing street magic as a Veil, but things only grew worse as we got older. Father starteddrinking more heavily, and Mother did nothing to stop it. And that is when I began learning how to defend myself.’

I run a hand through my hair, shaking my head at the flood of memories beginning to surface. ‘He would come home late from the shop, occasionally bringing back the weapons he’d made that day. He would yell; Mother would hide. I took the brunt of it, shielded both Hera and my mother when it came to it. It was me he was angry with. Me who was useless to him.’

A hand is now covering her mouth, hiding a half of her shocked face. ‘Is that why you ran away?’

‘Yes and no. I was fourteen when my shitty life officially fell apart.’ She scoots towards me, her hand still sympathetically squeezing my knee. ‘The night it happened was the same as usual. Father came home drunk, ready to pick a fight. He’d walked in on Hera and I laughing about something one of us had said. That’s when I saw the flash of a sword in his hand. I’d seen him with weapons before, but nothing so sharp, so lethal.

‘I tucked Hera behind me, as I usually did, and looked around for a mother who was never there. But it wasn’t the sword that scared me the most, but Father’s words.’ I swallow. ‘I’ll never forget what he said to methat night. He said I would be more use to him if they’d just handed me over to the king. If they had sold me out instead of putting up with me for so many years. And then…’ I blink, feeling emotion beginning to build there. Hating it, I push on, my voice stern. ‘And then he threatened to do just that. Said he’d sell me to the king for the shillings he deserved, and that he should have done it years ago.’

---