Shift

TWENTY.1

Kayden enjoyed the volunteer work at the farm more than she had first thought she would. At 9am on weekdays, she would board a yellow school bus with about forty volunteers and leave Los Angeles behind to a more rural area thirty minutes away. The first day, Kayden had been amused watching all of the potestas. Most of them, including Blaze, had never been on a school bus before, and they struggled to open the tiny windows and strap themselves into the flimsy crimson seatbelts. Kayden even had to help the bus driver operate the door. But today was the last day of fieldwork, and the bus arrived at the farm without incident.

They had harvested several types of herbs in the past few weeks, an assortment of plants needed for the potion component of the spell, but today they were picking jasmine. The delicate white flowers were a nice contrast to the fields of deep green, or so Kayden thought as she placed a few buds into a basket. She ran her hand through the soil, breathing in the scent of dirt and flowers.

She heard a distinctive laugh and turned her head. Blaze and Lexi were picking flowers about twenty feet away. Lexi's face was red from laughing, and she swatted at Blaze's arm playfully. Kayden felt a twinge of jealousy, but suppressed it.

It was good to see Lexi laughing again. After her stint in the hospital, Kayden had hardly seen her cousin smile, let alone laugh. Lexi would isolate herself, either reading in her bedroom or disappearing on long walks. And whenever she was around Kayden, she simply looked unnerved, a harried version of herself. The doctor had prescribed some anti-anxiety medication, but Kayden had a feeling she wasn't taking it.

Lexi behaved even worse when anyone mentioned Helio's name. Helio had not come to visit their suite once since he had officially started his internship; three weeks was a long time to get the cold shoulder.

"Did you know that jasmine is commonly used in love spells?"

The voice startled Kayden, and when she turned, she saw a guy with blond hair sitting next to her in the dirt. He held a jasmine plant in his hand. It hadn't fully bloomed yet; the white petals were only beginning to emerge from the green bud.

"Umm," Kayden said, unsure of how to respond. She glanced back to her right. Usually this was the time when Blaze would cut in with some story to mask the fact that Kayden knew next to nothing about magic, but he was too far away and hadn't noticed.

"Er, yeah," she finally mumbled, continuing to pluck the flowers off the bushes. "I guess it's weird it's in the spell to shift magic back."

"Too bad A Progressive Book of Magic doesn't have any updated love spells in it," the guy continued, twirling the flower between his thumb and forefinger. His smile was sly, his blue eyes trailing across her face. "I would definitely try to slip you one."

Kayden paused and looked at the guy, her eyes narrowing. Without a word, she got to her feet, picked up her basket, and promptly walked away.

Flirting is one thing, she thought, storming past other volunteers, but that filthy pig was implying that he wanted to drug me! That grimy—!

"Ah!" she yelped, bumping into a volunteer. "I'm sorr..." she started, but the apology died in her throat.

She had bumped into Helio.

He looked just as startled as she was. "Kayden?" he asked, his hazel eyes wide. "What are you doing here?"

"I'm volunteering," she said, her tone instantly defensive. "What are you doing here?" She hadn't seen him on the bus that morning; it was as if he had just appeared in the middle of the field. He was dressed in typical wizard fashion with black leather shoes and a button-down shirt much too hot for the weather. He stood out like a sore thumb. "Shouldn't you be interning for the Congregation?"

"I am," Helio said a bit indignantly. "Naven sent me here to help out, but I just arrived. I missed the bus so he had to write me a transport rune."

Kayden paused for a moment, unsure if she had heard him correctly. "Did you say Naven?" she asked.

"Yes?" Helio asked her with an edge to his voice, daring her to say more.

Kayden didn't let his intimidation tactic quiet her. "Why are you working for him?"

"I didn't ask for it," Helio said. She had expected him to snap at her, but he just sounded overwhelmingly tired. "Apparently the Congregation likes to divvy up their interns, and it just so happens that I was assigned to Naven."

"Oh." Kayden paused, unsure of what else to say. She was wondering if she should just turn away and continue picking, when she remembered her promise to Mr. Fairden. Next time we see him, we'll ask him for you. "So..." she started a bit awkwardly, "how do you like the internship?"

"It's okay," Helio said, glancing down at his thumb. "It's hard work. Naven has me running lots of errands, some of which are pretty... annoying."  He said the last sentence slowly with a slight face at each syllable.

"But you're adjusting well? Mr. Fairden wanted to know."

Helio's eyes brightened. "Mr. Fairden is here? In Los Angeles?"

Kayden nodded. "Yeah—well, no. Not anymore. He was here a few days ago, but I think he already flew back to New York." When Helio's face fell, Kayden asked, "Why? Did you want to talk to him?"

Helio shook his head. "No. It doesn't matter anyway. He's just a great guy. A really good guy." He looked at Kayden for a moment, shooting her a look that she couldn't quite read. She wasn't sure if he was trying to tell her something or if he was merely using her face as a canvas to throw his thoughts on.

"What?" she finally asked. "Is there something on my face?"

Helio shook his head. "Sorry," he apologized. "I'm just... tired. And stressed." He rubbed an ear with his palm. "Listen, I need to get going. Congregation stuff and all." He turned and started walking away.

"Wait!" Kayden called after him, reaching for his arm. She glanced over her shoulder to where Lexi was still chatting with Blaze. Her cousin hadn't noticed Helio. "Lexi is only a few rows away. Go pick jasmine with her. She misses you."

But Helio just pulled his arm out of her grasp. "I can't talk to her," he said. His voice was low.

"What do you mean?" Kayden said, grabbing onto him again. She was surprised by the anger that welled up in her chest. "She's been moping around for the past few weeks wanting to see you. She even had a panic attack and ended up in the hospital! She deserves a hello at least."

"I can't talk to her," he repeated sharply. His eyes narrowed, the hazel nearly swallowed by large black pupils.

But Kayden wasn't deterred. "Can't or won't?" Her grip on his arm tightened. "Lexi is my cousin. She doesn't deserve to be treated like this from anyone, let alone you. Don't string her along like she's some sort of object. Lexi doesn't deserve that."

Helio didn't dignify her with a response. Instead, his body shifted, his posture changing into something dangerous as he muttered something under his breath. It sounded like a curse, but then Kayden smelled the scent of magic in the air, smoky and slightly sulfurous. Before she could get her bearings together, a jolt of what felt like electricity ran through her hand, stinging her fingers and palm as if she had just touched an exposed piece of copper wire. She yanked her hand away with a yelp, glancing at her fingers to make sure she was unharmed.

"What the hell?" she demanded, but by the time she had glanced back up, Helio was already halfway across the field.

She felt a slight touch on her bare shoulder and she wheeled around, ready to snap at whoever was there. But when she saw it was Lexi, she shut her mouth.

Lexi stared at Helio's retreating figure with a look of confusion on her face. "Kay," she said, drawing her blue eyes away from him to look at her, "was that Helio?"

Kayden kept her face as still as possible. Lexi looked so concerned, so confused... so vulnerable. She had never seen her cousin look quite like that. It killed her.

Kayden swallowed and shook her head, her fingers still tingling painfully, her heart wrenching with every word. "No, Lex. It wasn't."