Hereditary by Jane Washington Page A

Nareon had given me. As I pulled it from my bag, a shadow disentangled itself from the edge of the trees as if on cue, moving toward me. Seconds from upending the contents of the pouch onto my palm, I closed it in my fist and froze, waiting for the outline to solidify before I acted. This was clearly a woman, but I didn’t relax until she came close enough for me to see her face. She was elven.
    “I thought I was the only one who used this path,” she said, laughter in her voice.
    I realised why, when she slipped a dagger back into her belt. I hadn’t even seen her draw it.
    “Me too.” I started to move around her, wanting more than anything to run back to the cottage and bury myself beneath a pile of blankets after the unnecessary fright.  
    She must have realised how much she had scared me then, for she flicked me a sympathetic smile, and continued past me. I waited until she had disappeared into the darkness, and then I opened my fist again, tipping the pouch upside down. A smooth wooden carving fell into my hand, and I lifted it to my face, examining the unfamiliar coat-of-arms. The shield was separated down the centre by a thorny vine, and from each side of the vine sprouted an unfurling wing. They could have belonged to an eagle, or a hawk. What was strange was that the left wing seemed to be disintegrating, while the right had been carved with obvious strength, even beauty. Shrugging, I dropped the carving back into my bag and then jogged the rest of the way home without incident.
    Four days passed, two more lessons with Cale and Hazen, and no word from my father. My moods were growing darker, but I was also getting better at keeping it all contained. I knew it wasn’t healthy for me, because there was only so much that I could shove to the back of my mind before there was no room left and my mind imploded , as Cale had put it.
    Nareon had said that he would help me, but he was nowhere to be found, and when I thought about our last moment together, I wasn’t sure how to feel about his sudden disappearance. Not that I had much time to deliberate over it, with my eighteenth birthday now only nine hours away.
    What would happen when that clock struck midnight and I came into this power that Nareon had spoken about? Would I kill myself from the overload, as that other boy had, or simply go insane, not knowing how to deal with the tripling darkness that hovered on the edges of my vision?
    I had a volatile plan, which I had deliberated over since yesterday’s session with Cale and Hazen, in which my darkness had gotten to be a little too much for me to handle, and Hazen had once again stepped in to help. I didn’t know whether it was a good plan or not, but it was all I could think of, and I was very quickly running out of time.
    I was once again in Specialised Elven Elementals , and Hazen was actually sitting right beside me. He was the only one to ever sit so close to me, especially since Cale seemed to always be skipping class. I pulled out a fresh sheath of paper and wrote carefully.
    Are we friends?
    I slid the paper over to his desk and he stiffened immediately, probably because even though he had started sitting next to me, we never actually spoke. I watched out of the corner of my eye as he scribbled something down below my question and nudged the paper back to me.
    Yes .
    Despite the fact that this was all supposed to be a part of some bigger plan to prevent a probable disaster tonight, the three letters sparked something warm in my chest, and it took me a few moments to remember what to write next.
    It’s my birthday tonight, my father is away, I was hoping you and Cale would want to come and celebrate. I’d invite more people, but they wouldn’t come.
    It was sketchy at best, I wasn’t a very good liar even on paper, it seemed, but I pushed it back to him all the same, and waited for him to write his response.
    I can throw a party; nobody has to know that it’s for you. Then lots of people will