Witch in Hiding (#1 in the Witches Trilogy) (EDITING)

Fourteen: The Age of Puberty And Death Threats

Rae is late.

It's the first time she's not early since we started training, and when she does get here, she looks frazzled. "You okay?" I ask. "You seem out of it."

"I'm fine," she says, but she seems distracted. "What were we doing today?"

"Continuing weather, right?"

"Right." Rae sets her stuff down. "How're your winds coming?"

I conjure up a mini tornado. I've had a hard time keeping it in check—smashed a vase and scattered a pile of worksheets—but I've got it mostly down now, if I keep the wind small. "Airbending, check."

She laughs. "Okay. Then we move on to fire." She brings up the firestorm again. "The thing is, because I'm a weather elemental, I can only make the elements in their weather forms. You, however, can do anything with them. But the basics are the same."

"Fire is harder because it's more abstract. You can feel water. It's two hydrogen molecules, one oxygen molecule. Air is everywhere. So is earth. But fire... you can't really touch fire. In a sense. But really, it's a chemical reaction, too. Exothermic oxidation releases heat and light. It's hot because of negative enthalpy changes. Et cetera et cetera. Chem olympiad," she explains, flushing.

"Well, I've never gone for chem olympiad, so that's not going to work for me. But I can picture fire, right? That's how I've been learning most things."

"Yeah, but hold on a sec." She looks around critically. "Okay. Not too many flammable substances. Just try not to scorch anything."

"But you'll be here for damage control, right?"

"Right."

I start picturing fire. It's hot out, and that helps—I imagine the heat coalescing to form flames. I know what fire looks like. I know what it feels like. I know what it smells like. All I've got to do is combine them all into a reality. Honour! I shout at myself, in amusement. To my great surprise, my palm lights up.

I yell. It's hot. Hot. Rae quickly makes a jerking motion with her wrist and sends the flames into the air. I turn my palm over in horror. It's stinging with sharp pain. "Here!" Rae produces a bowl of water from nowhere and dunks my hand in. It's ice cold, and meets my blazing skin with cool relief.

"Holy shit." I breathe. My entire palm is red and blistering. "What was that?"

"My mistake." Rae is wide-eyed and apologetic. "I'm so sorry. I should have warned you—I should have guided you better. Fire is the most energetic—it tends to come right from you. If you don't control it properly, it'll form on your skin—and you're not fire resistant. I'm so, so sorry."

"It's fine," I tell her, even though my hand smarts like hell. If she hadn't stopped it when she had, I'd probably be well on the way to a third degree burn. "Do I need to see a doctor?"

She nods hesitantly. Rae is never hesitant, but she seems more horrified at the accident than me. "Yeah. For cream. Antibiotics. Or something. I know one, I can recommend..." she trails off, still highly unsettled. "Sorry. I'm not focused today. Let's just end it there."

Tense, I try to lighten the mood. "What, did someone threaten to kill you, or something?"

She frowns. "No. It's nothing. Just a bad day."

I hesitate. "Someone threatened to kill me."

She jolts. "What? When?"

I go and get the card, stowed away in my drawer. She turns it over thoughtfully. "That's definitely Essie's work, but they're easily bought. You don't know who sent it?"