Fire Stones - By Kailin Gow Page 0,37

dating boys. But instead I was embroiled in a war in which there was no side I could trust, nobody I could truly count on. Fire or Water – Mars or Poseidon – Abzu, Hephaestus…danger lurked around every corner. And the one person who should have warned me, the one person who should have protected me, had lied to me my entire life, and left me to fend for myself.

How could I ever get over that?

“Mac, please!” Chance insisted. “What’s going on – what’s wrong? You left so suddenly, without even eating anything. Are you feeling okay?”

“No,” I cried. “No, Chance, I’m not! I just found out that my Mom’s an Embodiment, that she’s working with my enemies, that she lied to me my whole life…”

“Hold up!” Chance put out a hand to steady me. “What are you talking about?”

I took a deep breath and started again, more slowly this time. “My mother,” I cried. “She’s an Embodiment too. That’s what all this is about. She’s the goddess of Rivers, Yami.”

“Rivers? You mean…”

“She’s a Water goddess,” I said. “Apparently she’s closer to Fire than most of the Water deities – but still! She’s not Yami – she’s Rose Evers! My mom!”

“Oh, Mac….” Chance pulled me close, leaning my head against his chest. “Mac – I know this is a lot for you to deal with; I know it’s been hard…”

“Hard? Only my entire life uprooted in a matter of months! You knew about your destiny from the beginning – you and Varun both! You had Antonio to guide you. But me, I’ve had to figure this all out from scratch.”

“You had me…” Chance kissed the top of my head. He hesitated. “…and Varun. Both of us. To show you the ropes. To rely on.”

“But my destiny! If I’m supposed to have all these Fire powers…but my mother’s allied with the Waters.”

Chance’s face fell. His eyes darkened with sympathy. He stroked my hair, his touch gentle and yet possessive. “You must listen to your own heart, Mac. You must go with what feels right. Listen to what your strength tells you. You found the stones, didn’t you? And each stone will bring you closer to your nature as Vesta – and the choice that she had to make.”

He pulled me in for a kiss – a kiss that was so strong that it made me see stars. My head started spinning. The heat between us began to flame up; my skin was scorched and yet I felt no pain, only the ecstasy of his touch, his kiss. He had never kissed me like this before. This wasn’t the kiss of Chance Cutter, high school student. This was the kiss of Mars – the fire deity – in all his power. I had experienced this kiss before in my dreams and my visions, but this was reality.

I gasped as he pulled away, my heart severed in two by the pain of parting from him. I looked around in surprise. All around us, flames had sprung up from the earth, blazing wildly in a circle around us. Vesta’s flames.

“Did you feel that?” Chance looked at me. “That pain – as we sprang apart just now. It was so physical – so visceral. It hurt to let go.”

I was trembling. “It hurt me too,” I whispered. “I know – my one, my love, my only.”

Chance stopped in surprise. “What did you just say?”

I blushed. I hadn’t meant to let myself get so emotional.

“My one, my love, my only – that’s what Vesta and I always used to say to each other. Our special phrase for one another.”

I clapped a hand over my mouth. So Vesta was taking over now. I remembered the words from my dreams, but this time they seemed to spring from a hidden place within my soul – rushing from my lips with a new power. Vesta’s words in my mouth. Vesta’s spirit in my body. She was taking over – kissing Chance with my body, calling him my one, my love, my only.

We parted as lovers, and I somehow managed to get through the next day without blowing up at my mom. She’d been ill, I knew, and had been through a lot, and right now wasn’t the time to get angry at her or blame her for her lack of honesty with me. I had to swallow my bubbling confusion – save my questions for later. Yet the next night, when I met Chance out in the open fields,