“I’m glad to see you, too, but I need to breathe,” he said.

I relaxed, although I didn’t let him go.

“What happened? Did you…?”

“No. It’s just the family…” I shuddered when I thought of the Bloodroses. “I’ll tell you about it later. Will you promise me something?”

“Anything.”

I smiled. “You should ask what it is first.”

He shrugged. “The last one netted me a day on the beach with a beautiful woman. How bad could it be?”

“Not bad at all. Just promise me the next time I’m complaining about my family and their embarrassing stories, you’ll remind me of the Bloodrose family.”

“Bloodrose. Got it.”

I pulled away to give Heli the sea glass I’d found. I explained about Quinn. She deflated, but agreed about my guess to the purpose of the markings.

“It was fun. I love puzzles. They’re pretty,” she said. “Do you think Quinn wants them back?”

Remembering the strange tension about the sea glass, I said, “No.”

“Then I’ll add them to my collection.”

“Can we go now? I don’t want to miss dinner,” Leif said.

We walked the rest of the way to the stables. I rubbed Quartz down and groomed her. Moonlight banged his stall door. “As soon as Kade opened it, the horse circled us, then leaned against Quartz.

Skippy worked on Beryl, but he seemed distracted. His attention focused on the sky instead of his horse.

Kade also contemplated the gray clouds over the sea. “I believe our first heating-season storm is headed this way.”

“How bad?” Skippy asked.

“It’s sullen and annoyed. It could blow for a while,” Kade said.

“What do you mean?”

“This time of year, it’s mostly thunderstorms. A few will pop up and sweep over us with nary a rumble, others grow into large chains with pouring rain, wind and lots of noise, and a couple will build into huge systems, sucking in moisture. Those monsters produce hail and tornadoes.” Kade’s eyes lit up at the prospect of monster storms.

Skippy swallowed. “Where is this one on your scale? A popper or a monster?”

“A popper or a monster?” Kade repeated. “I like that!”

“Thanks, I guess. But you didn’t answer the question.”

“This one is in between the two. Large, but not huge, with wind gusts and plenty of lightning.”

“When?” Skippy combed the same spot on Beryl. She flicked her tail at him.

Kade studied the sky. The sun dipped behind the distant cloud bank. “Tomorrow afternoon. Maybe early evening.”

“Do we need to bring the horses up to the storm cave?” I asked.

“No. It doesn’t have enough force to push the water that far onto the beach.” Kade smiled. “Besides, I’ll be out there, taming that sullen storm into a nice shower.”

Raiden and the others seemed glad to see us. Dinner bubbled on the fire and chairs ringed the flickering flames. The glassmakers asked if they could make the rest of the orbs for the season.

“Wait until after this storm. We need to make sure the orbs will hold the storm’s energy,” I said. Anxiety swirled. Kade insisted he dance the storm alone tomorrow just in case the orbs shattered. If that happened, the force of the flying glass would kill him.

Skippy claimed he had no appetite and went to bed early. Leif, Kade and I joined the group around the fire. We took turns filling them in about the hunt for the wild magician.

“I like it when a story ends well,” Raiden said.

“How can you call that a happy ending?” Prin demanded. “The boy is being forced to stay.”

“No one died and no one got hurt,” Raiden said. “Besides, I said it ended well. Not happy.”

Conversation drifted to the approaching storm. The Stormdancers analyzed and compared their thoughts and theories. With small frowns and little pouty huffs, Tebbs showed her disappointment about not dancing. Wick conserved his strength by falling asleep in his chair.

When my eyelids wouldn’t stay open, I said good-night and dragged my tired body up to Kade’s cave. He followed soon after, joining me on the narrow cot.

I melted against him.

He wrapped his arms around me. “You’re worried about tomorrow.” It wasn’t a question.

“A little. I wish I could be out there with you.”

“Too dangerous.”

“I know.” Memories of the last storm season played in my mind, when Kade was faced with a similar situation to test new orbs. His strength had failed before he could harvest enough energy to calm the killer storm. “I helped you before.”

“And I’ll never forget it. You saved my life.”

We had connected through Kaya’s orb. “I would love to do it again.”

“What? Save my life? You’re up to two times now to my one.”

“No. You’ve saved me twice. You forgot about blowing Devlen away.”

“He didn’t want to kill you.”

“It still counts.” Besides, if he had taken me, it would have been worse than dying. “What I want is to link with you again. I felt so powerful and in control.” Two things I lacked. The Council told me how many messengers to make and when. I could use my powers, but only if the Council approved or assigned me the task.

“We could try linking through an empty orb,” Kade said.