Sleight of Hand

Chapter 20

The first half of the week went by with little trouble, save for a close call with some wandering humans that were searching for a good fishing spot. After Kurtis man­aged to steer them away, everything went back to being peaceful again. But Trebor couldn't shake the uneasy feeling he'd had since that day when the purple lightning had appeared. It felt like a bad omen.

He'd gotten better at Shadowing since that first practice. He could now slip into shadows with utmost ease, even playing pranks on a few of the others by hiding in the shadows and then jumping out at them when they didn't expect it. When Trebor wasn't training, he was practicing. Sharp­ening his senses so they were once more weapons as deadly as the blades he could conjure. Not to mention, practicing kept his mind off of things he didn't want to think about; namely the memories of kill­ing people that haunted him unless he occupied himself with other things. When he wasn't careful, images of lifeless bodies appeared in his mind. The reek of blood somehow found its way into his nose, though he was never near it. It made him dizzy and nauseous, and it took all his willpower not to race to the bathroom every time it happened to throw up everything in his stomach. There had been nights where he'd woken up from nightmares, so convinced that his hands or his body were covered with the blood of the peo­ple he'd killed, that he'd spent hours in the bathroom, scrubbing at his skin until he was raw.

Trebor also spent his free time trying to convince himself he wasn't a danger to everyone. He knew he was dangerous. It was a handy thing to be sometimes. But when it came to the other Super­humans around him... Trebor felt like being himself would just become a liability.

By his next training, Trebor was Shadowing in small incre­ments, entering the shadows on one end of the room and appearing on the other side. There were times when he ended up where he didn't aim to be, but like everyone else, he was still trying to fine-tune his abilities now that he'd successfully found control over them again. He never did as well as the time he'd Shadowed himself and Aivilo back to the warehouse on the day they discovered the Mage still had a Superhuman in his possession. Using his power seemed to happen naturally when he wasn't thinking about it, but it wasn't often that Trebor thought about anything else. From what he'd heard and seen from the other Super­humans, they had reached the same point in their training, too.

All except Aivilo.

She'd used power, Trebor knew. Had seen her use it. But it was so... pitiful compared to what he knew she was capable of. It irked him that she wouldn't go further into her power, and it irked him even more that he didn't know why. He tried to press her for answers, but her responses got vaguer every time he asked.

Kurtis let Trebor use his power more during training. When he did target practice, he also practiced Shadowing, pretending the targets were moving and not him. And he used it in close combat, feinting attack and disappearing before Aivilo could touch him, then reappearing to over­take her. That irked him too... that it was so easy to beat her at what she was good at.

Now, a day later, Trebor was pulled from his thoughts when Kurtis said, "Trebor, do you know where Aivilo is?"

Trebor was sitting at the counter that jutted out from the wall and allowed three barstools to be pulled up to it. Kurtis stared at him expectantly as he got out dishes for dinner. Trebor shook his head and scanned the room.

Kurtis had already taken Tom and Sierra home for the day, so it was just Kurtis and the Superhumans. Bacon and Hanna were chatting animatedly in the living room, having finished helping Kurtis in the kitchen with dinner. Ammee, Alyakim, Lassos, and Mac were sitting outside in the dying light, mar­veling at the sunset that touched the sparkling sea in the distance. Rae and Enaj were painting their nails at the kitchen table. Aivilo was nowhere to be seen.