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“Who you are is somebody who is fit to wield such divine and miraculous power.” He gestured at me on my knees struggling.

“You’re not this. You’re not at the mercy of those who wish to mold you to their liking.

No matter where things currently stand, the situation is fluid, and it won’t remain as such.

I won’t allow it, but more importantly than that—neither will you.

Because you don’t have to, sweetheart. There are ways through it.

And we’ll all find them together. You’re stronger and more in control than you’ve ever given yourself credit for.

Don’t allow the power to control you. Own it.

Be one with it. Accept it, but wield it—not the other way around. ”

“Kai… I… I don’t know.”

“That’s the fear talking. And it’s not yours.

” Realization sparked in his eyes with a whole lot of heavy sadness and regret.

“It never was, was it? It was always theirs. Your family’s.

The supernatural world as a whole. The True Celestials.

It bled into you, and over time you internalized it.

But it’s not yours, sweet Ari. Do you hear me?

You know you’re capable of managing this, of owning your power and everything that you are.

This is your chance to prove that, to be that.

Take back who you are. Fuck everyone else.

This is you. Your moment, your power, your fucking life! ”

As I latched onto his words, letting them land, register, and infuse me, an eruption of blue light caught my attention, and then Nyx teleported right beside Kai with Vorzyr grasping his shoulder, along for the teleportation spell.

“Kai was right,” Vorzyr told me with a rumbling power to his words.

“You don’t need me to make your power submit, to help you do anything like that.

This is who you are, who you’ve always been.

Who they all tried to stop you from being, what they tried to take from you.

With Cassius in the picture, there will be more of that.

So do this now, make an empowering choice that will mean no one can ever take or twist who you really are again. ”

Nyx smiled at me in his usual gentle and understanding way. “You’re feeling it. You’re ready. Let the rest of that fear they all infected you with go.” His eyes sparkled at me. “There’s so much freedom in that. And it’s what you’ve always wanted. I know, Halo.”

Kai drew a little closer and crouched down. “Do you remember the anchor exercises we were taught at the Maven Coven?”

“Yes, but they… they couldn’t hold my power… remember?” I choked out, and I had to lift my hands from the grass as my power threatened to rip right through the ground and toward him, Vorzyr, and Nyx.

I held them up unsteadily either side of me, my palms turned up toward the sky as my silver power shot up in a rush, streaking into the clouds overhead.

Natural lightning was forced into being as my magic called a fucking storm, thunder rumbling and cracking overhead within moments, which then brought torrential rain down upon us, beating down on us and our surroundings.

That natural lightning was joined by my silver magic doing the same and firing off dangerously all around it.

Shit!

“It will work,” Kai spoke calmly, despite what was happening, and the three of them being drenched because of me.

“They never knew how to adapt it to your power level. I do.” He smiled.

“Not because I know your power, but because I know you. That aspect was always left out by Coven teachings, because of the emotional constipation involved in all their instructions and approaches.” He then sat down into the now muddied ground and moved into a cross-legged position.

He rested his palms on either knee and turned them up.

“First, focus on your breathing. It’s not about calming down, it’s about being present, acknowledging your current state and what your power is doing and how it’s reacting. ”

As I tried to take his words in, panic surged when I looked at the magic shooting out of control from my palms and impacting the natural world and our environment. Hurting it. Causing damage.

“It’s not about containing it right now,” Kai reminded me. “Focus only on the Anchor of Air.”

“Breath,” I rasped.

“Exactly. Your breath. Forget about everything else. Close your eyes if that helps.”

I took his advice and squeezed my eyes shut.

No longer able to see the damage I was doing, and the shocking impact of my uncontrolled power, all I could do was feel.

The instability.

The rage, really, with the way my magic was releasing.

It was angry that it had been basically caged for so long.

No. More than that. I was angry. About that, about all of this. My whole life being the way it had, what it had done to me, how it had stripped me of who I really was at my core and at my heart.

No more.

They were right—this was my chance now.

To undo what had been created in me.

To reconnect with the core of my true identity, not the one I’d taken on out of the fear I’d been infected with.

No more repression.

I managed to draw in an unencumbered breath.

I kept going, over and over. Slowly but surely deepening my breathing, regulating it.

And through it, I felt not just the fury of my power tearing through me, and out of me, but the essence of it as well. I could feel how it was connected to me, fused to me. No longer just viewing it as a separate and wild entity, but as an inherent part of me.

As one with me.

It wasn’t an outside force, nor an enemy to be controlled or beaten back.

It was me.

“Very good,” I heard Kai saying. “Now to root yourself, ground yourself further with the Anchor of Earth .”

I remembered those teachings, and he was right about why they hadn’t worked for me before, the massive aspect that had been missing for somebody with my power level.

I focused on my knees in the grass, moving to encompass the rest of my body, my positioning, zoning in on the moment and my body independent of just the surge itself.

“ Anchor of Fire ,” I spoke this time, before Kai had to say it.

This one involved accessing a memory where I felt strong or even cherished.

For me, it had to be where I was cherished for who I was, with none of that fear that I’d internalized being present.

And I knew in this moment it was key.

I closed my eyes and searched, pushing inward despite the burning of my power through my very being, the chaos of it unleashed in this manner.

And there it was.

The hot springs pool last night.

All four of us coming together.

My magic surrounding us.

Me letting go without any of them feeling the need to contain me in any shape or form.

Being wanted for who I was, not what I was.

Them accepting the weight of the Celestial Plane nonsense, being there with me in spite of all the heaviness that it brought along with it.

They weren’t afraid.

Of it.

Nor of me.

They accepted me.

They cherished me.

And with them, in that moment, I’d never felt so free.

So much like my true self.

So hopeful, despite the threat bearing down on me, of living that truth further.

I’d realized in that moment just how far I’d come.

As I held onto that memory and it rolled through me, I felt the storm within start to calm.

“Amazing,” Kai said. “Now, the Anchor of Water . This is about will . The final one. You focus now on choice and intent.”

They were all things that I hadn’t been able to own properly before.

Because of that, I could feel the strain there.

Unlike the other anchors that I’d been able to employ and master, there was a lot of resistance to being able to do the same with this one.

I was slamming up against a mammoth obstacle, and I couldn’t figure out how to conquer it.

Did I even go around it, or try to smash right through it?

“Doubt,” I heard Nyx tell the others in warning. “It’s reigniting.”

“It hasn’t been dealt with properly then,” Vorzyr rightly deduced.

I opened my eyes to find Kai still sitting cross-legged in front of me, completely drenched just like Vorzyr and Nyx looking on as they stood tensely a few feet back.

I looked to see my power still streaming up toward the sky.

Although the stream was more controlled than it had been earlier when it had erupted out of me.

The final thing to do was to employ my will without stifling myself in the way I’d been used to doing.

No more hating it or condemning it for its might and destructiveness.

Because it didn’t have to be destructive when it unleashed.

That was just the fear that everybody else had put on me.

There’d been very little focus on the positives that could come from it, on what I could do with it.

But my panic that I couldn’t easily figure out how to put the final anchor in place had that doubt I was trying to get rid of flaring up.

And then my own silver lightning was attacking the natural lighting through the dark clouds above.

It raged out of control and the natural lightning and my magically-generated lightning struck the trees around us, one after another, ripping into them, branches breaking, a couple even tearing from their roots, falling just feet from Vorzyr and Nyx.

Nyx conjured a shimmering blue dome to guard against any others that could actually hit them within range.

Fire erupted, taking the trees and it spread like literal wildfire, flames taking the entire forest within moments.

And then more burst out of me, tearing through the grass, flames erupting into being and forming a circle of fire all around us.

But it didn’t stop there.

It started to fill the circle itself, rushing toward the center near the three of them, the grass blazing.

I saw Kai hesitate.

He wanted to react to stop the flames, but he also didn’t want to leave me while he was trying to help me complete the anchors. If we stopped now, we’d have to start all over again. And it could be too late with the damage my power was already doing as it was.

The fact he was even sitting so close to me while I was unstable and in this state hit me like it hadn’t before because I’d been focused on the implosion of it all.

Him doing that, it was a major act of faith.

He was showing me how much he believed in me.

His trust was absolute in me.

And despite the danger all around, he didn’t move. He didn’t even attempt to shield himself.

But with the insanity happening right now, the urge to just shove it all down and not continue to fight to get a real handle on it took me.

They were all in danger. And, in spite of Kai’s trust, and Vorzyr and Nyx urging me on to do this, all of them believing in me… the danger to them threatened to numb all of that and take over everything.

“This is about your will!” Nyx called over through the madness. “Not theirs. Yours. This doubt isn’t your own! It’s theirs!”

Before I could even process that, a blast of gold magic tinged with sparks of blue swept through the area.

I watched, stunned, as it doused the fires erupting all around, drawing it from the trees, and even the circle of flames raging near us.

And then, with a burst of gold smoke, my mom appeared just to my left, a few feet from Kai and me.

“Mom, what are you…” I grimaced as my magic surged all the more at the unsettling sight of her presence.

“No,” she spoke quickly. “I’m not here to attempt to contain you.

” She gestured around. “I just healed the damage in the meantime. Nyx is correct, the doubt and fear is ours. Mine, mostly. And I’m sorry.

I’m so sorry, my darling.” She drew closer and crouched down at my side, so close.

And for once she didn’t even flinch at being so close to my power while I was suffering from an implosion, or what my family used to call an episode or a tantrum.

“You’re not… scared? Not scared of me?” I choked.

“I’m so sorry I ever made you think that.

I was terrified for you, what your great power meant for you, especially in the big picture of the supernatural world, and the Celestial Plane.

” She reached out and actually touched me in the midst of it.

“Continue with your final anchor. But take my words inward this time as you do: the fear and doubt isn’t yours.

It doesn’t belong to you. You were born with this power.

It’s yours to wield, my darling. It’s a part of you.

As such, you have the means to wield it. ” She smiled sadly. “You always did.”

My gaze flicked to the guys and I saw them smiling back at me, nodding along.

“Take what was always meant to be yours,” Kai told me.

“ Goddess,” Vorzyr breathed in reverence.

Nyx winked at me, obviously feeling the relief in me, the change, that obstacle shattering to bits now that the missing aspect—my mom conveying what I hadn’t realized I’d needed to hear and believe from her so badly—had been put into place.

I sucked in a breath and concentrated on my power from the standpoint of it being one with me, not as an out of control element that needed to be caged and condemned.

I guided it through me, using it to infuse me with a whole lot of strength, rather than allowing the implosion to drain me and weaken me.

And then I was finally able to rise to my feet.

My stance was strong as I stood tall, and looked up at the streaming silver magic still surging into the sky and fueling the dangerous storm above.

But it wasn’t dangerous.

Not to me.

Because I could take control.

And that was exactly what I did.

The violent streaming morphed to little sparks of light, much like fireflies, bit by bit.

My hands shook as it transformed, becoming what I intended, what I willed it be—a beautiful expression of magic. Something non-threatening.

Something not destructive, but healing.

Once I had control, sparks spreading all over where I wished them to be, I thrust my palms forward and they flowed up into the sky, and pulled back the storm.

Light broke through nice and easy, the darkness, thunder, rain, and lightning replaced by the bright break of day.

I swept my palms toward the trees and down to the charred ground before healing all of it. The burned, charred mess of the trees dissipating and being replaced by growth and mending. The grass regrowing and healing also.

“Holy fuck,” I heard Vorzyr utter in reverence, as he gazed all around in awe.

Nyx chuckled excitedly, disintegrating his shield and taking it all in as well.

Kai rose to his feet and gazed at me with a whole lot of pride and wonder.

I turned to my mom who was getting to her feet as well.

“We need to talk. About a lot of things.”

She smiled sadly. “I know. I know we do.”