Page 63 of The Starlight Savior

“Now imagine the walls around you, how high are they?”

“There are none,” she murmured. She felt too raw, cut open for herself and Tobin to see. Maybe they’d build up once again, but now they had dissipated.

“Did you feel the heat in your body? Your light?”

“My chest.” It built inside of her, but there had been no heat or light visible to her as she hacked away at the fabric dummy.

“Good. Imagine it there. A small ball of light in your chest, burning and waiting to be released.”

She imagined it right between her breasts, where hard bone laid. It pulsed inside her, tendrils extending and releasing, waiting to flow through her.

“What would that light look like if it traveled up your chest, across your shoulders, and down your arm?”

The tendrils in her chest moved up her neck, splitting across her collar bone and into her shoulder blades. She imagined that very light brightening inside her veins and into her hands.

“Open your palms towards the sky.” Tobin’s voice was right behind her, but it sounded distant over the rush of blood inside her ear.

Heat pooled in her palms, familiar and taboo all at once.

“Open your eyes.”

She hesitated. But when she did, she didn’t expect to see that everything she had imagined, her body summoned. A white light blazed under her tunic. The veins in her arm burned bright. In both hands, balls of power floated in her palms.

“Now turn it off.”

“H-How?” She raised her palms closer to her face. The balls of light were hot against her cheek. What could she do with this power other than burn bright? She almost extended a hand, to throw this power out across the meadow, but she didn’t know what would happen.

She had never truly asked herself that question. All she had asked herself was how can I make this stop? She never leaned into it.

“The same way you were able to grasp your control. Now let it recede.”

Saige dropped her hands. When she put her palms on her knees once again, they burned almost hot enough to where she needed to retreat. But it didn’t burn through her pants. Taking deep breaths, she imagined the light flowing back into that spot in her chest, up her arms, down her shoulders, through her bones, blood, and muscles.

And to her surprise, when she opened her eyes, the light, heat, and any moment of anger was simply gone.

Chapter 27

Hoisted into her mother’s arm, Saige was frantically carried into her parents’ quarters. Her mother knelt on the wooden floor, pushing Saige under the bed. Yet she refused. She clung to her mother’s legs, begging for her to join. But her mother shook her head, sending fear pulsating down her body. Something terrible was ensuing.

Her father watched from the corridor as Saige reluctantly slid her shaking body under the bed.

“Wear this,” her mother whispered, undoing the silver clasp of her black cloak. “It’ll keep you safe.”

She obeyed, wrapping it tightly around her shoulders. The fabric swallowed her body, chest aching from whatever had burned her. Looking down, she expected to see her skin raised and itchy, white and pink, but there were no scars or blisters. Just the ghost of pain.

The cloak’s hood was tugged over her head. Her father knelt down, eyes meeting hers. Something flashed in his gaze, something she had never seen before.

Fear.

Suddenly, his calloused thumb moved across her face in a strange motion. No words came out of his mouth, despite his lips moving. She recoiled from his touch, unable to explain why. Finally, he spoke.

“Whatever happens, do not move. Do not utter a word. You stay silent and only come out when it’s safe.”

“Am I in trouble?” Saige whispered, her voice cracking over each word.

Her father brought his finger to his lips. “It’ll be okay.”

“It will not be okay,” a voice said to her. But she ignored it.