Tempest Reborn (Jane True) - By Nicole Peeler Page 0,14

own mind, and yet I hoped that’s what he was. Because if he was just gone, if the White had managed to eradicate Anyan…

I couldn’t even consider that outcome.

I also realized that everyone was staring at me expectantly, waiting for me to begin. That was a huge change from our normal modus operandi, in which I was mostly listening to the other supes talk. It struck me that the tagger-along had become the leader.

So I’d better lead.

‘I’d like to start by thanking all of you for coming. I know that sounds lame, but I mean it. I now feel like we can actually do this.’

Everyone nodded, acknowledging my thanks but also, I think, affirming my words. My father, standing next to me, squeezed my shoulder in support.

‘I’ve been scared this whole time that our only option was to go after Anyan and destroy him, to get to the White. But Ryu had some really good reasons why working to save Anyan is actually a smart course. Ryu?’ I said, turning to my ex.

Ryu stepped forward, squaring his shoulders.

‘Jane told me that Iris already touched on the ideas that I had, but I’ll share them with you anyway. In my thinking, the Red and the White aren’t physical, which is why killing them never worked.’

Iris nodded manically, her eyes wide with excitement.

‘They’re not bodies!’ she hooted triumphantly.

‘They’re not bodies,’ Ryu repeated. ‘We’ve always been so focused on their physical selves – their bones – that we never stopped and asked how they could keep resurrecting themselves. But it’s because they’re souls, or spirits, or something else. As long as they could animate their own bodies, they chose to do so. But when that was no longer an option…’

‘They went incorporeal,’ Caleb said, his gaze turned inward as he thought through what Ryu was saying.

I cast a glance at my dad, Grizzie, and Tracy. Tracy and my dad looked a bit lost, if I was honest, but Grizzie just looked … blank.

Every once in a while, Grizzie’s Grizelda mask dropped, and we would catch a glimpse of the outrageously clever woman who lurked beneath. That woman loved being Grizelda, but she was something both of and apart from her persona. She’d also lived as many different personas, all with very different interests. So I was used to looking over and seeing Grizelda look like somebody other than Grizelda. But I’d never seen this. She looked … empty.

Creature? I asked. Is someone spying on us?

I felt a tingle in my head, an acknowledgment of my question telling me the creature had understood and would investigate.

I kept an eye on Grizzie as Ryu continued. ‘If it is true that they are able to exist noncorporeally, that explains why we can’t kill Anyan. All that would do would be just that: We’d kill Anyan, leaving the White still in existence and now free.’

‘It would just find another host?’ Daoud asked, obviously uncomfortable with this line of thought.

‘I’m sure. I think that a negative result of the Original using the labrys on the Red and the White was to help sever their last link with their bodies. Meaning that now the process of finding a new host might be even more straightforward than it was before, as they apparently don’t even have to worry about their bones or anything. They’re spiritual free agents, so to speak.’ Ryu looked around, his words weighing heavy in the air. I saw Iris shiver, and Caleb put a muscular bare arm around her. Grizzie didn’t react at all, but she also hadn’t done anything weird. Nor had I heard back from the creature. Maybe she was just tired?

‘So if we can’t kill the body…’ Daoud said, bringing my attention back to the problem at hand.

‘We have to kill the spirit,’ Ryu finished.

[Which means separating the soul from the body,] came the creature’s voice, rich and bright in our minds.

‘Can that be done?’ I asked, my voice breathless.

My supernatural friends all looked at each other expectantly.

Crickets.

‘Well, I’ve never heard of anything like that,’ Caleb began. He spoke lightly, as if he should have been relaying more positive information.

‘Souls,’ Iris mused, looking up at the ceiling.

Daoud looked down at his pants as if he were wondering what he could pull out of them to help. As a djinn, he could create anything he understood at the chemical level – and then pull it out of his pants. I’ll never understand the physics of that trick, but it made for some alarming hostess