Page 3 of By the Moonbeam and the Mist
The lake sat directly behind the Element Wielder sector, several jutting columns of rock rising from the water like fingers. Miniature waterfalls plunged down between the crevices in an endless cycle, spawned by elemental spells. Thankfully, the Element Wielders weren’t picky about who liked to hang out on their turf, so there was almost always a group of Esholians lounging on its shore or island.
My friends were already there. I could hear their voices echoing from one of those crevices, but before I emerged from the tangle of jungle surrounding the lake, I sent a hum out to the trees.
Vines unraveled over my head and gently wrapped around the handle of the knife that I offered with outstretched hands. I watched them tug the weapon up into the thickness of the canopies, where I knew the jungle would keep it safe for me until I could stuff it back into the drawer of my bedside table in my new room.
“Thanks,” I whispered to the trees, and touched the nearest trunk.
I could have sworn the limbs of the tree bowed in response.
Then I made my way toward the bridge of permanent ice that never melted, even with the current streaks of sunlightstreaming down onto its path to the rocky island in the center of the lake.
They must not have heard my clacking footsteps over their own voices, because Wren and Rodhi’s argument didn’t falter as I drew near.
“Iknowthat octopus exists, darling. I was at the Mind Manipulator house last night, and Penny Ickers said it groped her when she—”
“Penny Ickers,” Wren interrupted with what sounded like a scowl, “likes to blow stories out of her asshole. She was probably just pissed no one else wants to grope her and made it all up to feel better about herself.” I rounded the column of rock, and Wren’s gaze jerked toward me. “Oh, hey, Rayna! Where’ve you been?”
“Meditating,” I answered as truthfully as I could. During this three-month break at the peak of the dry season, it wasn’t uncommon for a Wild Whisperer to go out into the jungle on their own and practice. And Ihadbeen meditating—until Jagaros had so rudely interrupted me.
I felt that wall of ice forming around me again, though, that familiar pain beating a dull melody at the base of my skull now that I’d left the grove of black bamboo. But my smiling mask was airtight as I turned to Emelle, Gileon, and Lander, and said, “Please tell me they haven’t been bickering the whole time. I think my ears are already bleeding.”
Oh yes, my mask wasgood.
Emelle rolled her eyes, a smile crinkling the edges of her face. “Trust me, I can’t wait to get this over with once and for all.” She turned to Lander, tucking a strand of loose brown hair behind one of her ears. “You ready, babe? Or do you need more time?”
Lander was flexing his fingers and bouncing on the balls of his feet nervously. When I cocked an eyebrow at him, heexplained, “I think I can change all your clothes to wetsuits for as long as we’re in the lake, if I can just concentrate hard enough.”
“Really?”
As a Shape Shifter, Lander would eventually learn how to morph other people’s forms for longer periods of time, but right now he wasn’t too confident about changing any other corporeal thing besides himself. I was surprised he was willing to try Shifting all our clothes at once.
“Yeah,” Lander said, giving a shy smile. “I’ve been practicing on my own. Turns out the trick to Shifting multiple objects at the same time is to imagine juggling them. So.” He clapped his hands. “You all in?”
Actually, I couldn’t think of anything I’d rather dolessthan, as Jagaros had so kindly put it, act like a half-brained monkey who’d just discovered a puddle. But old Rayna would have been all in just for the hell of it—for the sake of belonging—and besides, I wasn’t a bad swimmer. Back in my home village, my once-best friend Quinn and I had splashed through enough ponds and lakes around Alderwick for me to know the basics.
The thought of Quinn made something deep inside my chest wring itself into a tighter coil. She’d been the only other one besides me to face interrogation in the Testing Center after the pirate breach. From what I’d heard, they’d found her deep in the jungle, surrounded by walls of her own magic-made ice, after she’d lost her memory as thoroughly as I had.
Yet the few times I’d tried to knock on the Element Wielder house door to ask for her, the girls who answered always told me Quinn wasn’t available to talk. And that thing in my chest would just wring tighter.
Because despite our falling out, Quinn and I were both surrounded by our own ice, it seemed. Even though I doubted we’d ever be able to melt each other’s walls…
Well, it would have been nice to be walled in together.
“I’m in,” I said before I could overthink it.
Everyone else echoed the sentiment except for Gileon, who rubbed his arms and said, “I think I’ll sit this one out. I don’t like water.” He pressed a mournful look onto the surface of the lake. “It’s really wet.”
Rodhi choked on nothing but air, while Wren reached up to pat Gileon’s shoulder. “Okay, Gil. You stay here and guard us against any wandering Element Wielders who might want to come stir up the lake. I’m sure we won’t be long, considering there’s nothing to find.”
Rodhi recovered from his almost-burst of laughter and blew Wren a sloppy kiss. “Hope you like tentacles, darling.”
Lander rolled up his sleeves and fixed a look of utmost concentration onto his face. Like he was constipated.
Emelle giggled at me between her fingers.
A moment later, our clothes tightened in some places and melted away in others. The remaining fabric molted into a stretchy, waterproof material that reminded me of one of my silk dresses hanging in my new second-year closet back at the Wild Whisperer mansion.
I looked down and found a suit clinging to my body, its two-inch straps haltered around my neck and its bottom cutting off around my thighs.
