Chapter 1

Elias said the unease in my spirit came from threads left untied.

He found me, a baby left in a woven basket at the edge of the forest, near their community.

He raised me with the old ways, taught me to see the currents in the world, the quiet hum of the earth.

Now, he said I had to go back, to the place the threads began.

So the Whitmores found me, or Elias allowed them to.

They were my biological parents.

They drove me to a house so large it felt like a small town.

Eleanor Whitmore, my mother, clutched a silk scarf. Her eyes darted.

"Elara," she said, voice thin, "Brenda is very sensitive. We don't want her upset."

Arthur Whitmore, my father, grunted. "You will not cause trouble. Brenda is our daughter."

I nodded. Their words meant little.

I saw a faint, flickering grayness around Eleanor, like old smoke. Arthur had a tight, angry red haze.

Three young men stood behind them. Brothers.

Derek, the eldest, looked me over like a piece of faulty equipment. Avarice clung to him, a greasy sheen.

Mark, athletic build, shifted his weight. Confusion and something duller, like muddy water, swirled in his energy.

Scott, the youngest, radiated a buzzing, aggressive heat. His eyes were cold.

They showed open dislike. It did not touch me.

This place, these people, they were a knot I had to examine, then loosen.

We walked into a hall bigger than our community's gathering lodge.

Everything gleamed, cold and hard.

"This is your room," Eleanor said, opening a door. "For now."

It was large, filled with soft, useless things.

Scott appeared in the doorway as Eleanor left. He held a baseball.

"So you're the replacement," he sneered.

"I am Elara."

"You look like them. It pisses Brenda off."

He suddenly threw the baseball, hard, aimed at my head.

I moved my hand, not fast, just enough. The ball changed its path, thudded into the wall beside me.

A small chip of plaster fell.

Scott stared, his jaw tight.

"You have a dark energy around you," I told him, my voice even. "It' s agitated. If you don' t calm it, you' ll have an accident."

"Are you threatening me?" he hissed.

"I am observing."

He scoffed, turned, and stomped away. The angry red haze around him pulsed.

This was the place of my spiritual imbalance. It was clear.