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"Because we need you."
I frowned.Yeah, you and everyone else, lady.Get in line."All right, so why not just ask if I want to learn? Why the bullshit? Why kidnap me?"
Helene swept the black scarf from her head. Her hair was almost the same shade as mine, but touched with grey. She must be at least twice my age, if not three times. "Because you might have said no. And you might have suspected the witches were behind this."
"Are they?"
Helene snorted. "Hardly. They prefer to pretend we don't exist."
"You seem to know a lot about me and where I come from," I observed.
"We've been watching you for some time. When you boarded the train, we got ready."
Yeah, that wasn't creepyat all."Ready for what?"
"To take you from wherever the Keeper sent you. You managed to prevent him from doing that yourself." Helene seemed almost impressed.
I shrugged. "Maybe if I'd known you were out there, I wouldn't have bothered." That was crap. I would have done everything I could, regardless. I wasn't sure if this wasn't some kind of slavery anyway.
"Letting you know we existed would have risked exposing us. We couldn't take that chance in the human world. We had to bide our time and wait. And…be sure you were what the whispers said you were."
"You talk a lot about 'we'," I pointed out. "Who else is there?"
"You'll discover that in due time," Helene said. Her tone assured me I would get no more than that from her.
I changed tack. "Are you working with Izzy?"
Helene looked surprised at the question. "The shifter on the train? No. To my knowledge she was working with Slade."
"So, you're not working with Slade?" This tangled web was getting more knotted by the moment.
"No," Helene said simply.
"Okay." I nodded.
"Do you have something to do with the dragon attacking the city, and us, an hour or so ago?"
"No," Helene said again. "We saw the dragon and kept it at bay with the power. It may have drawn the creature to you, but I did no more than that."
I inhaled sharply. "I'm not sure why I shouldn't push you off this hill."
Helene snorted. "Because you couldn't. You lack the skill for that. In a year, perhaps." She took in my disbelieving expression and stopped to spread her arms. "You can try."
To my surprise, I was able to pull in power from the subtle lavender scent Helene wore.
Without hesitation, I threw all of my power at Helene.
It hit what felt like a solid wall of stone and bounced back hard enough to knock me off my feet.
"Shit!" I tumbled down the hill, and only stopped when I slammed hard into a rock. My arm cracked audibly. Pain shot through my arm and into my shoulder.
Stinging tears poured down my cheeks, part agony, part humiliation.
I closed my eyes and didn't open them when the swish of grass told me Helene approached.
"There now, child, it's just a broken bone."
Warmth washed up my arm and pain receded, then disappeared altogether.
