Reversal (Camren/Norminah)

Chapter 46: The Fire Keeper

XLVI.

A world where no one is the same. Where two minds clash in a flurry of blood and anger. That wasn't hell... was it?

"I escaped a while ago." Jason began when the two of us were seated around a poorly constructed wooden table. "I was really confused at first, and I didn't know where to go, so I found the first place I could with enough people."

"Enough people for what?"

"Enough people so that I could disappear." He shrugged. "I'm a pretty shy person, and I realized that I liked the prospect of kinda... hiding among the public was really appealing. So I hung around the city for a while, learning about people and sneaking into the library to read up on the history of that building, as well as the city itself. I didn't actually know about this place until I found you."

"Me?" I frowned. "But when we did that little fake tour, I didn't know about it either."

"I know." Jason smiled, showing teeth. "The answer is that pendant I gave you."

"This?" I looked down at the box in my hand. "I was actually a little surprised that I still had it in my backpack. I thought I had taken all the valuable things out before we left for the forest. I guess I just forgot about it."

"It's a good thing you forgot about it; that's actually what led me here." Jason explained further. "Take it out, it's probably not going to look the same way it did when I gave it to you."

I lifted the lid again, setting it down on the table and holding the box just under an arms length away. "Yeah, I kinda snuck a little peek a few seconds ago. Something happened to it."

"I know." Jason reached forward and removed the darkened pendant from it's little velvet pillow. "I don't really remember what happened to me when those bastards took me away, but I gained a pretty interesting ability. I can manipulate the iron content of any object, and amplify it to the point where it takes over the system."

"Iron?" I looked down at the coated pendant. "Is that what's all over the ornament?"

"Yeah." Jason turned it over and let his palm hover, and slowly the dark coating broke down into a sand like substance before sifting off the pendant and dropping to the ground. "I also marked it. It's not hard for me to tell when there's mutated blood in another person, friend or enemy. I was able to see right away that you were one of us, so I thought maybe I could get some information out of you as to what I was supposed to do next. But that night, you seemed pretty out of it, and I got the feeling you just wanted to take a relaxing tour and get out of there."

"Wow." I sat back and skimmed over his words a few times. "So you were playing me like a puppet that whole night? How did you mark the pendant?"

As a reply, Jason turned the ornament over, revealing the side with the mini version of the light and dark painting. He then twisted the face, and the front popped off with a small click. Underneath was a small hollow space, the surface of which was etched with a unique pattern. The boy handed it over, and I accepted the bottom face to peer down at it curiously.

The pattern consisted of an arrow, pointing upwards from the direction I was holding it. The head was longer than average, swept up in a sharp point and following down into a small square at the end of it's neck. Crossing perpendicular to the arrow's stem was another line, and on either side was a series of four black dots in a square formation.

"What does this symbol mean? Does it have something to do with your power?"

"I gravitate towards this pattern." Jason said with a shrug. "I've known for a long time that this symbol has meant something to me, so I made it my goal to figure out exactly what the meaning was. Most of the research I did at the Harrisburg public library was to figure out if it had any significance. Turns out it did."