Page 16

RYDER

T he lake doesn’t sleep.

Not really.

It waits. Breathes. Watches.

And this morning, it feels like it’s watching me.

The sky’s overcast, water flat and gray like dull glass. There’s no wind, but the trees are restless. Everything’s too still in that way that makes your skin crawl like nature’s holding its breath.

I stand thigh-deep in the cove just before dawn, the water cold against my legs, the relic from last night still in my hand.

The coral’s gone darker. Almost black now. The silver braids pulsing faintly under the surface like veins.

It’s calling something.

And it’s not subtle anymore.

I close my eyes.

Let my fingers drift.

Feel the pulse of it. The rhythm.

The hum of the lake in my blood.

It answers like it always has quick and sharp. Like muscle memory. Like instinct.

And before I know it, the water moves.

Around me.

With me.

A soft swirl at first. Gentle.

Then sharper.

A current spiraling outward like a ripple pushed through time.

I don’t have to touch it. I am it.

And it should feel right.

It used to.

Before I broke it.

Julie finds me on the dock an hour later, dripping and stone-faced.

She doesn’t speak. Just folds her arms and waits.

“I summoned,” I say flatly.

Her eyes go wide. “On purpose?”

I nod.

“Ryder…”

“I needed to test the boundary. The artifact’s a trigger, it’s echoing through the old currents. Something’s responding.”

“You’re sure it’s not just you responding?”

I glance up sharply. “I’ve kept it buried since I was sixteen. I felt what it could do.”

Julie’s face softens. “You were a kid. And it was an accident.”

“An accident that shattered someone’s spine.”

“That was during training. A panic surge. No one blamed you but”

“I blame me,” I snap.

Because I do.

Because the second I realized what I could do, I stopped.

Dead stop.

No summoning. No control trials. No deeper dives into my tribe’s current craft.

Because it scared me.

Because I scared me.

But now?

I don’t get the luxury of fear anymore.

“Ryder,” Julie says gently, “you’re the only one here who can match what’s waking up under us. If you keep locking this down, we’re going to lose.”

I don’t respond.

Because she’s not wrong.

And that’s what terrifies me most.

After she leaves, I sit on the dock, feet dangling in the water, palms pressed flat against the planks. The lake laps softly against the posts, but underneath, the power coils like a live wire.

I could pull the tide.

Split it.

Turn it inside out.

I used to dream about what I’d become if I wasn’t afraid of it.

Then I hurt someone.

And I decided that was the end of the story.

But stories don’t end just because we quit telling them.

The lake still remembers me.

And now it wants me to remember it back.

The sun’s up now, but it doesn’t help.

The light feels thin. Weak. Like even it’s afraid of touching what’s waking up under this lake.

I walk the perimeter once more, half hoping for quiet, half expecting the ground to split open.

It doesn’t.

But something shifts.

In me.

I feel the power still humming under my skin. Still waiting.

And all I can think is, I didn’t struggle to access it.

I wanted to.

Some part of me wanted to move the water. To show the lake I still had it in me. To prove I could bend it to my will again.

That part scares the hell out of me.

Because if I stop being afraid of it, what else do I stop being afraid of?

What happens when the current doesn’t answer me?

What happens when it does , too much?

I remember the scream. The boy in my arms, blood in the water. My own hands trembling.

And worse, the moment of exhilaration before the fear set in.

I dig my fingers into the dock rail, gripping hard enough to splinter wood.

I’m not a monster.

But I’m not sure I can keep saying that out loud.

Not when the deep wants me back.

Not when I might want it, too.

Later, I pass the arts-and-crafts tent on my way back from the shoreline patrol.

The wind carries laughter, high-pitched, familiar.

I pause.

Callie’s there, sitting cross-legged on the wooden bench, surrounded by three other counselors.

They're painting rocks. Or maybe stabbing glitter into mason jars.

Honestly, I can't tell what it’s supposed to be, but she's got paint on her nose and a half-finished tie-dye towel draped over one shoulder.

She’s laughing.

But it’s different.

Too quick. A little sharp at the edges.

I know that laugh.

It’s the one she uses when she’s trying to cover the ache.

When she wants everyone to think she’s fine.

I watch as one of the girls jokingly flicks a paintbrush at her. She dodges it, shouts something teasing back, even flashes that infamous Callie smirk.

But her eyes don’t catch light the way they used to.

She’s still the brightest thing in the room.

But something in her is dimmed. That usual spark in her eyes has gone low, quiet. Her heart’s not in it.

She’s going through the motions of being her usual, spunky self.

And I know it’s because of me.

I should go to her.

Say something.

Tell her that night together meant everything to me. That she was the first person I felt I could open up to, be alone with. The first person whose voice I found more comforting than solitude.

Fix it.

But I don’t.

I turn and walk the other direction, toward my cabin. Toward the quiet.

Because what could I possibly say now that wouldn’t make it worse?

What could I possibly give her that wouldn’t break again in my hands?