Page 67 of For the Ghastly and Beautiful

She turns to face me, pursing her lips at my expression. Water pools into my palm, and she studies it. Then the round shape contorts, flattening out as thin ropes twist around my fingers and wrist before she pulls them back into the ball.

“Can you feel the difference?” I muse aloud.

“I felt the pull from my body, like heat pressing against my skin.” She frowns as she thinks through her explanation. “But yours wasn’t a physical feeling. It was more mental. I could see the water rising from your palm without really seeing it. Does that make sense?”

“Yes, and no,” I answer truthfully. “No two Mongrels have the same description. Our element is a part of us from birth, even if we can’t summon it until we’re older. Your situation isn’t the same, so you’re adapting as you learn.”

“None of this was possible before I came to Spiran. Now, it’s reality. I don’t know your rules, but I know they don’t apply to me. I have no preconceived notions of what I can and can’t do. Even though I have my own set of rules, I can’t follow them if I don’t know them.”

I nod as her logic begins to solidify. “How do you know they don’t apply to you?”

“I don’t know how I know,” she replies, staring down at her hands. “Call it intuition or a wild assumption.”

“Tal?” Connak’s voice rumbles through the forest.

“On the beach,” I call out, pulling Ada to her feet as we meet the hunter.

He pops out along the treeline, moving so quickly sand slings up behind him.

“Ecaeris needs you.”

“Did he say why?” I ask, watching his frown turn into a grimace.

“There was an attack inside the wall. He wants you to search the area with him, since it’s the closest one we’ve had.” Connak tips his head toward the village. “He’s waiting for you at the palace.”

Ada furrows her brows, too perceptive. “Is there something wrong with the area?”

“No,” he tells her. “But nothing is quite right, either.”

“Go. We’ll finish this lesson another day,” she says to me. “Connak can take me back.”

“What were you doing out here?” he inquires. “I thought you were training today?”

“We were.” I drop a kiss to her cheek, then chuckle as I head to the forest. “Since we’re done, and I’m leaving, you can take her swimming with the krakens.”

A low string of curses greets my ears, followed by Ada’s laughter and the sound of something distinctly hunter-size being thrown into the ocean.

Connak and Jade have always disagreed about the line between spontaneous and hazardous.