rainfall | ashton irwin au | completed

fourteen

When we arrived at the lake house the next morning, the sky was nothing more than a pink glow, which in turn tinged the lake with the same colour, making everything seem slightly more eerie than it should. I spent most of the day pretending to listen to what Anna was saying and trying to ignore the fact that Ashton was sat across from me, watching me, the entire time. The sun was setting when Luke finally found what he had been looking for all day.

"I think I've found my power!" He spoke urgently, his blue eyes falling across all of us as we sat expectantly on the brown wood floor, keeping ourselves warm against the fire in front of us. Michael had followed him in, looking slightly paler than usual.

Anna stood up quickly, her grass green eyes wide. "What is it?"

"It's like Matt's power, where he's able to cause pain," Michael spoke for him, his voice hitching slightly in his throat. "Only it's not physical. It's emotional."

I wasn't at all shocked by his power. Individual abilities reflected who you were as a person, and Luke was good at breaking girls' hearts. I didn't pay particular attention to his personal life in school, but nobody could ignore the tension of unfinished business between Luke and Anna, not to mention the constant slamming of a locker at least once a week when Luke had clearly hurt some poor innocent girl's feelings. The coven tended to remain indifferent about it, but every so often Anna would look at Luke the way one would look at the sun; with a painful kind of wonder.

"Wait, I don't get it," Grace said, looking at Luke from under her long lashes.

"He can make you remember things, or imagine things that would hurt you." Michael's eyes flashed to Leah quickly, and I wondered at what it was that Luke had made Michael imagine, probably the idea of Leah being hurt in some way. I wondered what image it would take to make me look the way Michael looked now, with his eyes wide with fear and his fingers trembling ever so slightly. "So much that you have to curl up in a ball and beg to make it stop."

Luke's face flashed with guilt as he scratched his neck awkwardly. "I guess it could help if we had to go against Matt and Josh."

"The only problem is that we don't know how powerful Josh is," Ashton replied hesitantly. "As far as I know, he's capable of anything. If we're going to try and stop him, we need to do it when he's not ready to defend himself."

"That's impossible." Leah was biting her lip nervously, her hands now safely in Michael's. "He knows that we'll be planning to stop them. If he's as powerful as you say, he's probably going to deflect any power we use on him."

Anna looked deep in thought until her eyes veered to me. "Not if we use Lilah," she said. "She could be just as powerful as Josh. She could be the weapon we need to stop them."

I scowled at her, feeling slightly hurt by her words. Was that the only reason that I was here? Because I was the only chance they had at killing a psychopathic witch, no matter how much danger it put me in?

"I'm not your weapon," I snarled, standing up.

"That's not what I meant," she replied, frowning.

"No. What you meant is that I should just risk my life to save yours in the hopes that I'll have more power than I thought."

I stormed away from a speechless Anna, feeling nauseous. I didn't expect for Anna to care about me after the way I had always acted towards her, but I did expect her to at least treat me like a human being rather than some secret weapon.

I slammed the front door behind me and ran to the lake, hugging my arms around myself to stay warm. Where it had been pink this morning, it was now a brilliant shade of orange, reminding me that another day of fear was over and another one ready to begin. I wondered how much longer I could do this.