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“All right.” Then he laughed. “I advise patience with my mother. She thinks she’s a matchmaker and will try to hook you up. If you want her to find you a match, just tell her your type, and she’ll try to find you a heart mate.”
Heli grinned. “Did she send you in here?”
“No. I volunteered.” He held up a pot. “Don’t worry. I wanted to ask you about Kade in private. However, my mother thinks otherwise, so when she starts singing my praises to you, just know that they’re all true.”
“Your modesty is staggering.”
He mock-bowed. “That’s me. Actually, I’m looking forward to hearing what she says. I haven’t done anything remarkable. Not like Opal and Mara.”
She wished to reassure him, but she didn’t know him well enough to do so. They finished putting away the pots and joined the others in the living area.
Zethan sprawled on the couch with a hand pressed to his stomach. He groaned. “That was the best meal ever. I’m stuffed to the gills and will never eat again.”
Vyncenza leaned forward. “There’s still a slice of cherry pie left.”
Zethan hopped to his feet. “Mine.”
* * *
After two days of eating, resting and more eating, Heli grew bored. Teegan had given them a tour of the glass factory. Helen’s little kiln at the coast looked like a toy compared to the massive machinery and quantity of equipment needed to run eight kilns. Not to mention the number of workers scurrying about. Intrigued by the scale of the operation, Heli followed Ahir and Jaymes into the building on the third morning, hoping she could lend a hand.
The hot air pressed against her like a physical force as the kilns roared in her ears. Without thinking, she used her magic and pulled the moisture from the heat. It condensed into tiny water droplets, which she blew out the door with a light wind. The temperature in the factory dropped twenty degrees.
All the workers paused and stared at her. Oops. “Sorry, I...”
“That was amazing,” Jaymes said. “Will it last?”
“Until the heat from the kilns builds up again.” Glass melted at twenty-one hundred degrees, so it wouldn’t take long.
“Too bad.”
“What are you doing during the hot season?” Ahir joked.
Jaymes showed Heli how to gather a slug of molten glass from the kiln, spinning it onto a metal rod called a pontil iron so she could help the glassmakers who sat at their gaffers’ benches crafting bowls, vases, goblets and decorative statues. It was hot, tiring work, but she enjoyed being useful. At the end of the day, Ahir taught her how to shape a ball of glass into a flower by using a pair of large metal tweezers.
He inspected her daisy. “Not bad for a first effort.”
“How do you get it off the iron?” she asked. Helen usually had all the glass orbs ready by the time Heli arrived.
“You put in a jack line, like so.” He spun the pontil iron on the bench as he pressed another metal tool into the soft glass, carving a groove. Ahir then carried the rod over to a box filled with sponges. Tapping the pontil with the end of the tool, the daisy cracked off right at the line and fell into the box. “Now we have to wait until it cools.”
“I can cool it.” The air was unstable and easy to push with her magic. A breeze sprang to life.
“No, don’t.” Ahir made a stopping motion. “If it cools too fast, it will crack. Instead, we’ll put it in an annealing oven to cool slowly.” He donned a pair of heat-resistant gloves and carried the daisy to a metal cabinet. A few other pieces were already inside. “It’ll be ready tomorrow.”
“Working with glass takes a lot of patience.”
“And skill. These glassmakers—” he gestured at the empty benches “—they make it look easy, but they’ve spent thousands of hours to get to that point.”
It was difficult to imagine working that hard. Her ability to connect with the weather and harvest storms had always been a natural extension of her. Sure, it took some practice to funnel the energy into the glass orbs, but no longer than a couple hours.
* * *
A brisk wind blew the next morning, and a sheet of dark clouds threatened rain. Jaymes muttered about the weather at breakfast.
“What’s wrong with the wind?” Zethan asked him, digging into his pile of bacon.
“It blows the sand around, making the glass gritty.”
“And it cools the kilns, so more coal is needed to keep them at temperature,” Ahir added.
“I can move the storm for you,” Zethan offered. “It won’t be hard.”
“That might attract the wrong kind of attention,” Zohav said.
Heli hated to agree with her. “I can keep a bubble of calm around your factory, Jaymes.”
“No need to exhaust yourself for us. It’s a minor inconvenience.”
“It doesn’t take that much energy. I do it all the time when I’m dancing in a storm.”
Ahir stroked his chin. “You know, having a Stormdancer around is handy. When everything is resolved with the Cartel, you should consider going into business.”
Surprised, she asked, “Doing what?”
“Weather stuff. Couples could hire you to ensure they have a sunny day for their wedding. Kade gave us beautiful weather for Leif and Mara’s day. Or farmers could engage your services to water their fields when it gets too dry.” Ahir sat up straighter. “You and Zee could work together when you’re not needed on the coast. You’d be rich in no time.”
“I never thought of it that way,” Heli said.
Vyncenza beamed. “That’s my smart boy. Always thinking.” She tapped her temple with a finger.
“Yeah, always thinking of ways to avoid work.” Jaymes stood. “Come on, Mop Top, the glass doesn’t gather itself.”
* * *
Their days fell into a routine. During the day, Heli helped in the factory while Zethan and Teegan practice
d their magic. Zohav preferred to stay with Vyncenza, learning how to bake pies, crochet and cook, which had surprised everyone, including Zohav. At night, Zethan sprawled on the couch, groaning about eating too much, Zohav read a book next to the lantern, and Heli, Ahir and Teegan played cards or dice.
Heli should have recognized it for what it was—the calm before a storm—but she was having too much fun. When Ahir woke her a few hours before dawn on the ninth morning, she shouldn’t have been startled.
“What’s wrong?” she asked, sitting up in bed.
“Dad says we have company. And it’s not our distant cousins coming for a visit.”
Alarmed, she scrambled to her feet. “Are they in the house?”
“No. He spotted them outside the gate. Looks like they’re waiting for something...or someone.”
Her first impulse was to run and hide in the plains.
Zohav pushed her covers back. “How many are there?”
“Dad says six or seven, maybe more.”
“What do they want?” Heli asked.
Ahir shrugged. “I don’t know. But Tee might. He’s downstairs.”
Heli almost smacked her forehead. Of course. They rushed to join Zethan, Teegan and Jaymes in the dark living area.
“Mom’s asleep. It’s better if we don’t wake her unless we absolutely have to,” Ahir whispered.
Teegan peered into the night.
“Robbers?” Heli hoped.
“No,” Teegan said. “The Cartel. They know we’re here.”
“All of us, or just me?” Heli asked. Bruns had learned that one of the Stormdancers had helped with Yelena and Valek’s escape, but he shouldn’t know about the twins or Teegan.
“All of us.”
Damn. Something must have happened at the Citadel. “Are we surrounded? Can we slip out the back?”
Zethan turned to her. “There are only seven—”
“Ten,” Teegan corrected him.
“—only ten of them. Between the four of us, we can easily blow them away.”
“Yes, we could, but they’ll just come back with reinforcements.” Heli mulled it over. “What are they planning?”
