I can concentrate on blocking it out.
All I want to feel is my heart pounding and the current— ancient and strong—sizzling its way all over my body. It’s what I imagine the third rail in the subway would feel like if I touched it, minus the electrocution part. I shut my eyes and imagine lightning crashing across the horizon the day of the first storm. I remember the strength of the wave clamping down on me with the full force of the sea. The crackle of thunder. The whip of the wind.
It’s all inside me.
Kurt’s scream follows a sharp blast. Above us is a single black cloud. It cracks open with a spurt of lightning, crashing directly into the cluster of satellite dishes on the roof. The cloud vanishes like smoke against the sunset sky.
“That was killer, man.” My hands are buzzing.
“Just don’t kill me,” Kurt says.
“You have to get yourself one of these.”
“I can’t. It’s one of a kind.”
Unlike the other times, the light of the quartz is still blazing. I feel a thrill go through me, and it must be linked to the scepter because it sputters another burst of lightning. This time the ledge where the satellites are hooked up catches fire, right where Gwen sits.
“How do you turn this off?”
“You control it!” She yells, dusting herself off the ground.
Kurt is running around the roof looking for a source of water. “Stop getting excited.”
“Yeah, I have that problem.” I give my scepter a shake, but it’s not a remote control with nearly dead batteries. I close my eyes. The crackle of flame whips in the wind. I breathe and imagine, like Arion had me do when coasting into the cove. I can feel the current retreating, containing itself.
Gwen shouts my name.
The flames are six feet tall and getting taller with every gust of wind. Kurt is entranced by it. He crouches down, pressing his hands against his temples.
“You okay, man?” But of course he’s not okay.
I set the scepter on the ground before I set anything else on fire and run back inside the building where the fire extinguisher is. I take my shirt off and wrap it around my knuckles to break the glass. I run back upstairs to where the flames are twice as tall as Kurt.
“Stupid child lock!” I cut myself on the plastic but it doesn’t matter. I’ve set my building on fire. I point the nozzle at the flames and the cold pressure blows all over the place.
I kneel beside Kurt. “It’s okay. It’s out.”
Even Gwen rubs his back and shoulders.
“I hate fire.” He’s breathless and shook and rambling, so all I can make out is: “My parents” and “dragons” and “fire.”
“Come, let’s go back inside,” I say once I make sure the fire is completely out. “Even if no one’s called the fire department, I’m pretty sure they called their satellite providers.”
•••
First, Gwen and I take a shaking Kurt under our arms and leave him on the couch.
He repeats the same words, “fire, mother, father, dragons,” like a mantra.
Then we race back to the rooftop for the fire extinguisher. I set it on the Command Central floor and my scepter on the table.
“I don’t know what to do,” I whisper to Gwen.
She stretches her arm around my back and rests her chin on my shoulder. “He’s in shock. It’ll pass in a bit.”
“I know he said something about hating fire.” I run a hand through my hair. “I had no idea it was like that.”
“Many of our warriors were like this. When they came home from battle.” She presses her forehead against my cheek. Her breath is warm on my neck. “Those who made it home.”
I stand, tugging gently away from her grip. “We call it PTSD. Post-traumatic stress disorder. My friend Jerry, his brother’s a Marine. It’s our version of warriors. When he made it home, he shut down completely.”
“He wasn’t fighting dragons or fey, was he?” She asks so innocently that I can’t laugh at her.
“No,” I say.
Gwen nods, studying the pins on the Command Central maps. “Seems silly, doesn’t it?”
“What does?”
She traces the length of the map. North to south. West to east. One big invisible cross. “We’re all fighting for a bit of home, and even if we get it, we’re not satisfied because it isn’t really home, is it? It’s still just an ocean. A bit of land.” She turns back to me, and I can feel the shift in her body.
“Where is your home, Gwen?”
Startled