Treasure of the Fire Kingdom (The Elemental Phases Book 4) (41 page)

“You’re
supposed to be fucking watching her!”  Her neat and tidy Match bellowed at
Kahn.  “What if something happened and you were asleep, you moron?!  Is
watching over Mara
boring
you?  Is that it?”

“Chason.” 
Mara got herself up on her elbow and gaped at him.  In sixty-seven years, she’d
never heard her Match say “fuck.”  Or any oath, really.  He was always so
polite.  Her throat was raw from coughing and it hurt to talk, but pure
astonishment gave her the strength to scold.  “Don’t shout at Kahn.  He nodded
off for two seconds because he’s been awake for days.  You’ve both…”

“Don’t
you say a fucking word about how I look after my cousin!”  Kahn was on his feet
and advancing on Chason, cutting Mara off.  Kahn’s swearing was par for the
course.  Mara had been listening to him roar out four letter words since
birth.  “You’re been in here half-an-hour
total
since she got sick.  So
don’t play the devoted…”

“I’ve
been looking for a goddamn doctor, while you were taking a nap!”

“Bullshit. 
You’re avoiding the truth, because you can’t deal.  If there was a way to cure
this disease, don’t you think I would have found it when my baby sisters were
dying?!
 
You’re in so much fucking denial…”  Kahn stopped short, his eyes cutting over Mara
in horror.

Poor
Kahn.

Mara
almost laughed.  He was gigantic.  A Light House warrior with a sword strapped
to his body at anytime of the day or night.  But, he was a social idiot. 
Philologically incapable of saying the right thing.

“Shit.” 
He sounded appalled.  “Mari…”

“Don’t
be a dimwit, Kahny.”  She gave him a smile and tried to stifle another coughing
jag.  “I’ve already noticed that I’m dying.  I’m pretty clever about things
like that.”

“You’re
such an asshole.”  Chason hissed at her cousin.  “She’s
not
going to
die.  And it’s
your
fault she’s sick, in the first place.  She went to
the Light Kingdom to care for your sisters and she caught this fucking plague.”

“That’s
not true.  I wanted to go home.”  Mara put in.  “I wanted to be with my
family.”

To
Mara, the Light Kingdom would always be home.

Most
Phases were born into their mother’s House, so technically Mara
should
have
been a Light Phase.  Her powers
should
have revolved around Light and
the stripe in her hair that designated her House
should
have been black.

Instead,
she had a purple streak at her temple and all her energy came from Magnetism. 
Mara was part of the small percentage of people who followed their father’s
House.  She was a Magnet Phase, whether she liked it or not.

Mostly,
she
didn’t
like the Magnet powers.

But,
Mara made the best of things.

She
always
tried to make the best of things.

Mara
had been raised in the Light Kingdom, spending a few weeks a year in the Magnet
House, so she could get to know it.  When she came of age, Mara came to the
Magnet Kingdom to live permanently.  She was the Queen of the Magnetland, now. 
But, the wilds of the Light Kingdom always had her heart.

If
she could have, Mara would’ve asked Kahn to bury her next to his sisters in the
endless jungle of their homeland.  Mara would much rather spend her eternity in
the Light House, her body decaying and becoming part of the soil that fed the
rainforest.  The three hundred foot tall trees forever growing around her. 
There was a type of immortality in that.  A sense that she’d be remembered and
go on.

However,
Mara knew that even suggesting it would lead to conflict.  Kahn would try to
take her body home, but Chason would stop him.  Mara didn’t want a fight. 
Chason was a stickler for tradition and formality.  All the Magnet Phase Queens
were buried side by side in the cemetery, in a neat orderly row.  Even their
grey stone tombstones matched.

Jesus.

That
should be number thirty-eight on her list. 
Don’t
get entombed in that
dismal graveyard.  But, in order to fix that regret, she’d have to go back and
somehow
not
Phaze with Chason.  And, even if she somehow magically
could
,
Mara would never undo their Match.

She
loved Chason.

They
didn’t have the storybook romance that she’d once dreamed of.  She and Chason
only saw each other a few minutes a day and even those moments weren’t exactly
fairytale material.  Usually, she just felt like an imposition in his life. 
Someone foisted on him by Gaia, when he should have been Matched with a
legitimate princess.

Chason
was so perfect that Mara never quite trusted their bond.  Never trusted him to
want her just for herself.

She’d
always been afraid to try to demand more from him, because maybe he’d demand
more from her and not like everything he found.  Even their memory sharing had
been brief and unrevealing.  All Matches had an exchange of memories, where
they saw moments in each other lives.  Mara had always been very grateful that
she and Chason had such a short one.  She didn’t really want him to see
everything and find her lacking.

It
felt safer to hold back and quietly loved him enough for both of them.

Chason
slanted her a quick glance when she defended her choice to visit the Light
Kingdom.  He always shot her the same vaguely disapproving look when she spoke
of her homeland.

Mara
cared what Chason thought.  She did.

But,
there was a piece of Mara that Chason never reached.  A small place within her
that she kept apart from him.  Matches shouldn’t do that.  They shouldn’t have
any spots that the other person couldn’t touch.  But, Chason was so strong and
self-reliant that Mara
had
to hold back from him.  He didn’t need her. 
Giving him
everything
inside of her would be too intimate.  It would
leave her too vulnerable.  It was better to maintain the separation for both their
sakes.

Take
her birthday parties.

Every
year, the Light Kingdom threw her a party.  The Magnet House never celebrated
birthdays.  They were too busy being stoic and dreary.  Mara accepted that. 
So, every December fourth she went home and spent the day with her family.  She
never asked Chason to come.  She never insisted that he buy her gifts or blow
up party balloons.  She never pushed the idea that they should have birthday
cakes in the Magnet House.  No.  She did what she wanted and Chason did what he
wanted and they were both happy that way.

Or
so Mara had told herself.  What with dying and all, she was facing some pretty
harsh truths about just how
unhappy
she was with her life.

And
now, her life was over.

Chason
turned away.  He pushed the heels of his palms into his eye sockets as if he
was the one with the agonizing headache.  “If you’d just stayed in your room,
you could be safe right now, Mara.”

“Sure,
blame the victim.”  Mara barely recognized her own voice.  She didn’t have the
energy to argue, but she just couldn’t help herself.  Fighting came easy when
you saw you were about to die.  “The Fall is everywhere.  I would have gotten
it either way.”

“You
don’t know that!  If you’d stayed here…”

“I
would never abandon my family.”  Mara whispered.  “Not for anything.  Not even
my own life.”

Kahn
looked up at the ceiling for a long beat and then shook his head.  He pushed
past Chason and left the room at a near run.  He didn’t want Mara to see him
crying.

Poor
Kahn.

“Chason,
look after my cousin when I’m gone.  He’ll need your help to get through this. 
Kahn acts strong, but he has a gentle heart.”  Kahn and Chason never got along,
but they were all the family they had, now.  The two of them would be alone.

Chason’s
jaw tightened.  “You’re not going to die.”

“Yes. 
I am.”  She said simply, trying to get through to him.

But,
Chason was focused on his goal.  He was so stubborn and he wasn’t willing to
hear the truth.  Nothing could derail him once he was sighted on a target. 
“I’m going to find a way to fix this.  To make you better and then,” he made a
vague gesture with one hand, “then
we
can be better, Mara.  We can
listen to music and laugh and play checkers.”

Checkers? 
Chason hated games.  He wasn’t making any sense.  Mara began to get seriously
concerned about him.  “I wish we could do all of that, but it’s too late.  You
can go on without…”

“No,
it’s not too late!  It
can’t
be.  I’ll get a human doctor.  Maybe they
can cure the Fall.”

Poor
Chason.

Kahn
was right.  Her Match was in some kind of denial.  Mara kept her scratchy tone
calm and reasonable.  “Chason, humans don’t even get the Fall.  You know that. 
Stop and think, okay?  You need to just accept that I’m going to die and...”

“
NO!
” 
He screamed the word.  Chason had never raised his voice at her before.  Mara
was stunned by the depth of feeling in his eyes as he looked at her, again.  “I
will
never
fucking accept that.  I’m going to find another doctor and I
will fix this.”  He started for the door.  “I don’t care if I have to kidnap a
veterinarian from Mars,
someone
will cure you.”

Mara
felt a surge a panic.  She didn’t have much time, now.  If Chason left, she
wouldn’t be there when he got back.  She knew it.  “Don’t go.”

“I
won’t be long.”  He kept walking.

“Chason.”

He
turned and looked at her.

Nothing
was going to dissuade him from leaving.

Mara
swallowed and tried to think of some last words.  “I love you.  Forever and
then some.”  She’d told him that so many times over the years, especially at
the beginning.  She should have said it more.

Chason
stared at her, his eyes swirling with something like desperation.  “I won’t say
good-bye to you.”

Mara
kept going, wishing she’d written down a little speech.  Some really
inspirational heartfelt words that he’d remember fondly.  “I want you to be
happy when I’m gone.”  She paused.  “Well, not
too
happy.  You can cry,
obviously.  Maybe wear grey for a year or two.”  Grey was the Elementals’ color
of mourning.  Mara meant the comment as a joke.  She’d never seen Chason cry
before.  Not even when his father died.

He
didn’t look amused.

Chason
wasn’t a man who enjoyed bad jokes in tense situations.

Or
at any time, really.

Mara
was so tired.  She didn’t even have the energy to make a face at him for
ruining her attempts to lighten the mood.  “We should have danced more.  I know
that you have it in you to enjoy life so much more than you have.  I’m sorry
that I wasn’t a better Match.  I’m sorry that I didn’t do more to
make
you happy.  If we had more time, I’d do things differently.”

She’d
fight harder for their Match.

To
make them
more
.

Chason
was in no mood for romantic laments.  He’d always been more about duty than
poetry.  If you told Chason that you liked flowers, he’d have his gardener
plant you rosebushes.

All
the end result and none of the motivation: 
That
was Chason.

Important
stuff went right over his head and, at some point, Mara stopped expecting him
to get it.  Maybe that was the whole problem between them.  Chason didn’t
understand the little things and Mara couldn’t explain why she needed them. 
So, they both existed together, with pieces of themselves held apart.

Chason’s
eyes narrowed as if he was getting angry at her for simply accepting what he
wanted so desperately to change.  “You fight this disease, Mara, or I swear to
God, you’re not going to like what becomes of me.”  He warned.  “Without you,
I’ll have nothing.”

She
smiled at that, exhausted and in pain, but unwilling to stop the conversation. 
Knowing that she’d be dead soon inspired her to squeeze in all the talking she
could.  “You could never be anything but a good man and you know it.”  It
wasn’t like Chason to be so dramatic.  “You were born for greatness.  You’ll go
on without me and, in time, you’ll be fine.”

He
started at her as if she was speaking some alien dialect.  “Be
fine?
” 
His whole face twisted in a sort of agonized cringe.  “That’s not true.  If you
think that…”  He trailed off and stared at her for a long moment.  “You’re the
only light in my world.”

That
was the most beautiful thing he’d ever said to her.  “Chason.”  Mara was
stunned and moved.  “Please, don’t go.  Just sit here with me and…”

But,
he was already stalking off on his fruitless search for a cure.

Mara
briefly closed her eyes.

She
would never see her Match, again.

She
sighed and looked around her empty room.  Chills shook her body, even under a
pile a blankets.  She was so cold and tired.  Mara needed to sleep, but she
didn’t want to die alone.  Even if she’d go on breathing for a few hours more,
she knew that the coma was the real death.  Once that happened, she’d be gone.