Dare {Book 2}

Chapter twenty-two

Isabella
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The sound of crackling against the air wakes me gently, like lightning. I take a deep breath, opening my eyes to see the black roof from above my bed. The curtains around my bed are shut, but through them I can see Ace sitting on my desk chair, fiddling with his sword. He looks so cute when he's not trying to impress me.

I sit up slowly, a headache taking on in the front of my head. Ace looks up from his sword, setting it down and coming to the side of the bed. He doesn't touch the curtain, and he doesn't reach for me.

"Did it work?" My voice is high-pitched as if I swallowed helium. My eyebrows knit together in confusion.

Ace lets out a laugh. "It did, now I'm going to have to ask you to put down your forcefields"

"My what?" I peel the blankets off.

"Your forcefields? The things that are keeping me from kissing you?" I look harder around my bed, and faintly see a silver glow in the air.

"Oh" I murmur, focusing on putting it down. After a few passing moments, it dissipates as if it were melting. Ace smiles, climbing onto the bed and pushing me into my back. I smile, gripping his shoulders. He brings his lips down and my eyes flutter shut. But his lips don't meet mine. I open my eyes and notice that I'm lying on the floor in father's office. I roll onto my stomach and stand up, seeing father chuckling behind his desk.

"Morning" he says brightly.

"Um, what just happened?"

"Teleportation, I'm guessing" he leans back in his chair and sets his feet on his desk. His eyes fog over for a moment in mind-link. I wait for him to finish chatting with whoever it is. "Try to locate Ace"

"How?" I ask, sitting in a chair across from him.

"Close your eyes and think of Ace, his scent, his blood flavor, his laugh, whatever you feel like, and wait"

I close my eyes and think of how Ace's lips felt on mine, the way he smiles genuinely around me and how he seems to light up my day even when I'm I the worst of moods. I gasp when I start getting something that seems like a vision. My mind goes black, and then people start soaring past in different rooms. It's like I'm running through the house, passing everyone at super speed. It stops when I spot Ace in the hallway outside of my room.

"Woah" I whisper, opening my eyes. I feel slightly dizzy and assume I'll feel like that for a little while until I'm used to locating mentally. "He's in the hall outside of my room"

"Very good" father smiles. His eyes fog over in mind-link again. "Go get dressed sweetheart, we'll go introduce yourself to all of your new abilities"
****
Flight was first. Turns out that the air element and flight are good matches. I can change the air to suit my flight, for example, if it's super windy, I can calm it down in my path as I fly, or if it's not windy enough, I can create wind to help.

It wasn't that easy on the first try.

To get my flight ability working, father made me use my leaping ability to get as high as possible. From there, I had no other choice but to fly, and if I didn't, chances are my other abilities would be too shocked from me falling to work.

It was do or die.

I jumped as high as I possibly could, almost above the trees. Father and Ace were mere specks on the ground.

And then I started to fall.

I screamed, praying to the Moon Goddess that I wouldn't die. Ace had a look of shock and ran to catch me, but father held him back. I vowed that I would slap father if I lived through this.