cascade | kotlc

38. Tragic Endings Follow the Sun

 For a moment, everyone was breathless, watching the adorably flirting couple stand there.

Keefe had ice blue eyes. They'd always looked cold, like real ice after everfleeting winter. There was always a sheet of white rimming his eyes like snow after a midnight snowstorm, sometimes transluscent, sometimes opaque. His eyes were always reflective, shimmering like the surface of a still lake, leaves dancing over the water. But now, his eyes were warm. Warm like a fireplace, warm like a fire, and maybe the ice in his eyes, the ice in his soul was finally starting to thaw.

"Of course I will."

Sophie smiled. It was a hard smile, a sad smile, a smile that screamed 'I told you so.' But it was a smile nonetheless, and Keefe seemed to love it. He loved her.

He reached out, taking her hand and stepping to her side. She rested her head on his shoulder and he put his arm around her neck. They stood there, enjoying each other's company, and Linh decided to leave them there. She gestured at Tam and he nodded. Biana and June understood too, walking with them, stepping over ruined pillars and toward the sea.

-

Mr. Forkle was dead.

Linh didn't know how to feel about that. She didn't cry, but she didn't do anything either, just standing there, her eyes empty as she leaned against the wall, her hands fidgeting around her waist.

He shouldn't have died. If they'd just stopped a bit sooner. If they hadn't slept there under the starry canvas, if they hadn't watched Biana's tree grow, if they hadn't failed in their mission and let the Neverseen escape.

They'd wasted too much time, and now it was their turn to pay.

She gently traced her palm, feeling the white line where she'd blocked his sword. Elwin said it would scar, and she didn't particularly care, curling her fingers and digging her nails into the faint line.

Surprisingly, Tam's arm didn't scar. Perhaps it was because Gethen didn't strike as deep, or maybe Biana just used more energy. Linh didn't blame her, honestly. She wanted the best for her brother too.

The Councillors were studying Calla's ring and exploring its power with assistance from the gnomes. They coined a new term, viridescence, and there was debate over whether or not it should be counted as an element. The gnomes kept her informed, and she often visited Everglen with June, helping Biana research how the life energy interacted with other elements. They'd considered bringing in a pyrokinetic, but that was probably too dangerous.

After a while, they were sitting on the bench facing Everglen's lake. Linh still felt that familiar tug of water, but it seemed even more free. She had a sneaking suspicion it was because she finally cried.

She was supposed to be a good girl when she hadn't manifested yet. Good girls don't cry. Good girls can't cry. So she hid herself away in her bedroom, holding back her tears and her anger, relying on Tam and leaning onto his shoulder, but never crying. She screamed into her pillow, even screamed at Tam sometimes, and he would sit there, nodding his head, listening to her fury. Quan and Mai could never know.

Then disaster struck. She had manifested into a Hydrokinetic, and the water was always calling, everywhere, without and within. The constant pressure pushed at her, and she couldn't hide in her room anymore, not with the water everywhere, roaring like waves and bashing her skull, making her brain rattle. And there was so much pressure, and she always had to contain it. She had to keep cool, because she was a teenager now, and teenagers don't cry.

Her parents had constantly told her, tears are dangerous. "Never let them know what you think, because it doesn't matter anyway. They don't care, so hide your emotions away and deal with it yourself."