Empire Island, Exile the First

Chapter 12

"Who are they?" I asked. "Tell me everything you know about them."

"Everything I know could fit inside this spoon," Day said, holding up her teaspoon after she'd poured her sugar in her tea. She liked hers sweet, I preferred the herbs to mix with water and offer up their intended flavors.

"I followed one of the leaders there a couple days ago," I said. "She was getting Empire tea from Eva. I've been hanging around, my instinct led me to her. She thinks my name is Lizzie, some hipster Instagram kid with big ideas about spirituality or something."

"You?" Day snorted. "Posing as one of those white girls with goddess Gaia tattoos, feather headdresses and expensive designer dresses made to look like thrift store finds? That would be something to see."

"I think they bought it. Maybe my shabby looked chic to them," I grinned.

"Anybody with two eyes in their heads could see you're a rebellious ass, definitely not white, and not all about peace and love," she laughed.

"I think they just need labor," I replied. "And I'm strong, even if I look like I've aged ten years in the past two months. Besides, I am all about peace, love, and a hard cock...just like Tori Amos says."

"She does say that," Day giggled. She and I often found the same music agreeable. Not like Mom, she'd loved old school rock with a little country mixed in.

"How did they get permission to build up there?" I asked. "They're selling off pieces of it, too."

"Not selling, leasing," Day said with an annoyed huff, like she couldn't believe they were laying any claim to the land at all. "And it wasn't my idea, but there's just me and your dad, Phoenix and Calla."

I felt a dark shadow pass over my heart at the mention of my mom's sister, Calla. She'd been the one who had called us to perform the dangerous spell that had cost my mom her life. She'd been the one who had stood there that night, watching my mom's life force explode in fiery bolts from her body, and hadn't tried to save her.

I had. I'd done everything I could, but it hadn't been enough. I'd been a teenager, new on the path of guardian magic. Day had tried to help, too. She had almost no power, though, and hadn't been able to be of any help at all.

I'd always suspected Calla and my father hooked up on the sly, but that night I saw the evidence clear in front of my eyes. He'd run to the explosion site and had taken Calla into his arms to comfort her. All the while, looking for my mom's body and when he didn't find it, it was like he was happy to see her gone.

Like he'd planned it that way.

And that's when my suspicions had altered direction, and I could never be certain if it had been an accident or if he had conspired with Calla to let it get out of control.

They'd denied everything, of course, and she'd moved out of our house after I left. Apparently the stress of my anger was too great for their relationship to bear. But I thought it was more along the lines of them being addicted to the excitement of sneaking around, and when they were free to be together, they realized they didn't even like each other.

If they weren't my relatives and if their hookups hadn't led somehow to the death of my mom, I would've watched them on some trashy television show and loved the sordid details. But the thought of Calla, that snake, going after her sister's husband filled me with this sour, vengeance tinged bile that threatened to leave me swearing like a trucker and punching walls like a teenage boy losing at Call of Duty.

"And me," I said, raising a brow. "You forgot that I'm on the titles to the land as well."

"We found a way to get around that when you didn't return anybody's calls," she said. "We heard you were doing some bad shit in Vancouver and didn't even know if you were alive or were dead down some back alley off Hastings Street somewhere."