Overshadowed (The Divine Affinity #2)

Prologue

Skye

“Give it back!”

“Give it back!” My older brother said, mimicking me with a high-pitched, girly tone. He’d been doing that a lot, lately. He’d taken one of my dolls and was threatening to shave its hair. He’d been doing that a lot, lately, too.

I stomped my foot.

Zephyr laughed.

I could feel my hair begin to float.

Zephyr’s laugh cut off, his eyes widening. “Skye, you’re–”

“Give. It. Back.”

Zephyr’s eyes widened even further a second before he cried out in pain, then dropped the doll.

I gasped as he stumbled, and I ran to him, the doll forgotten on the floor.

“I’m sorry!” I cried, looking for an injury and finding that he clutched one of his hands.

Stupid. I was so stupid.

Mom and Ben had just sat me down and explained how careful I needed to be with my newest affinity.

The conversation was somewhat pointless. My new affinity did what it wanted, it didn’t listen to me.

My parents didn’t listen to me either. Mom had just sighed deeply when I tried to explain.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” I cried as tears began to stream down my cheeks. Zephyr held his hand, sniffling. It looked okay, but I’d already learned the hard way that I could hurt people on the inside, not just the outside.

“It’s okay,” Zephyr gasped, trying to hide that he was crying, too. “I think it’s just my fingers.”

I sobbed.

Zephyr handed me my doll, then wrapped his good arm around me. While holding me in a hug, he used his other hand to heal himself. He hissed through his teeth, and I sniffled.

A minute later, he flexed his fingers.

“See? All better.”

“Really?” I asked in a small voice.

Zephyr gave me his hand, letting me look it over. I bent his fingers back and forth for several seconds before I was satisfied.

“Sorry,” I said again, then turned to hug him.

“It’s okay,” Zephyr said, hugging me back. “It was an accident. And I was being stupid again.”

“What was an accident?”

Zephyr and I froze.

We turned at the same time before ducking our heads.

Levi was here.

He stood at the top of the stairs, his big arms crossed over his chest. I always thought Levi looked like a bodybuilder, he was so strong.

“Zephyr? What did she do?”

Levi was scary when he got angry…which was a lot. Ben was never angry, and Mom would only get annoyed with us sometimes. Levi, though…

Zephyr cringed. “I took her doll, and she chased me, so–”

“So she broke your fingers?”

Zephyr stayed quiet.

While I knew I was safe with Zephyr, I felt really small.

Levi tended to do that. He usually talked about me like I wasn’t there. He didn’t even bother asking me what’d happened, because a lot of the time, he didn’t believe me. I knew better than to try explaining myself, though. He’d asked Zephyr, so Zephyr had to explain.

“You broke his fingers?” Levi asked, his tone getting a little more mad.

“It was an accident,” I said weakly.

The next moment, Levi ripped me out of Zephyr’s arms and pulled me toward the stairs. I stumbled after him, and Zephyr scrambled to follow us, his eyes wide as he held my doll.

“It was an accident,” Zephyr repeated. “I took her doll.”

I shuddered as Levi pulled me through the wall. I could hear Zephyr’s protests from the other room, and a few seconds later he came through the doorway.

“Iris,” Levi snapped.

My mom was sprawled out on the couch with an ice pack on her chest. She’d been having her bad days again. When she got like this, she just stayed on the couch with her ice pack. Sometimes she’d read a book or watch TV, but most of the time she seemed like she was sleeping.

She sighed before opening her red eyes to stare at the ceiling.

“What,” she said, her tone flat. Levi stopped his advance for a second, chewing his lip before he spoke.

“Your daughter just broke Zephyr’s fingers.”

My mom jolted, sitting up so quickly her ice pack slid to the floor. She scrambled to pick it back up, then held it against her chest as she looked back and forth between us.

“His fingers, Skye?”

I started to cry again.

“It was an accident,” I said.

“Don’t whine,” Levi said sharply. I only sobbed again. I didn’t think I was whining. I didn’t know how to not whine while crying.

“Lay off, Levi.” My mom said, sounding mad. Levi’s face twisted, but he didn’t talk back.

“I took her doll,” Zephyr said, panting from charging up the stairs. “I was being a jerk.”

My mom sighed, then nodded. “Let me see your hand.”

“I fixed it,” Zephyr said, showing her his healed fingers. “Just two fractures. She didn’t even fully break them.”

Mom’s eyebrows were high on her forehead as she looked at Zephyr’s hand.

“You fixed it,” she said, then smiled. “Good job, baby.” She squeezed Zephyr’s cheek before looking to where Levi and I stood.

I was still shaking, tears streaming down my face. I didn’t like when Levi acted like this. Sometimes Mom listened to me, and sometimes she listened to Levi. Usually when Zephyr got hurt, she’d listen to Levi.

“Let her go,” Mom said in her Mom Voice. “It was an accident.”

“Iris–”

“Now.”

Levi again seemed like he wanted to argue, but as he looked at how tired Mom was, exhausted with her ice pack, he let me go.

I ran into my mom’s arms, glad to be away from Levi, and she hugged me. I didn’t even flinch from the cold ice pack squished between us.

“It’s okay, baby. We just have to work on those breathing exercises, right? What did Ben just teach you?” Mom asked.

“That I need to remove myself from the situation,” I blubbered.

“But she didn’t do anything wrong, I took her doll.” Zephyr looked bewildered, which matched how I felt.

Any time something happened, I got in trouble. Even if Zephyr had done something bad, somehow I was the one who got in trouble. One of my friends at school said it was the same in her house, because her parents favored their boys. That didn’t seem right to me. My parents weren’t like that.

I was just the one always making a mess of things in my family.

But today…Zephyr took my doll. Levi was acting like I just attacked him for no reason.

“That doesn’t mean she should break your fingers,” Levi snapped. “She needs more practice, Iris, not breathing exercises. What is she going to do when we’re all gone and can’t pull her to heel? Breathe through it? Run away?”

“She’s only ten years old. You will not be pulling her to heel,” Mom said, her tone a little angry again.

“Iris,” he started, but she cut him off.

“Go away, Levi.” Mom said, her voice gentle now. “I’ll deal with my daughter now, and you later.”

Levi scoffed, and as his angry presence disappeared a moment later, the air felt lighter.

“I’m sorry, Skye.” Zephyr said. “I was being dumb.”

“I’m sorry, too.” I said, sniffling. “I didn’t mean to.”

“I know,” Zephyr said with a sigh. He handed me my doll, then climbed onto the couch next to Mom.

“See? Everything is okay, baby.” Mom kissed my forehead before leaning back on the couch.

The three of us all sat in the quiet for a long time. Mom hugged me while she stared blankly at the wall, Zephyr finger-combed the knots out of my doll’s hair, and I tried not to shiver from the ice pack against my shoulder.

We were supposed to be leaving Mom alone today. When she had her bad days, she needed to be alone, in the quiet. The living room curtains were pulled closed, and the room was dark. That’s why Zephyr and I had been downstairs.

But Levi never paid attention to Mom’s rules. He was a grown-up, so he didn’t have to follow all the rules like we did, but it didn’t make sense why he wouldn’t follow them anyway. Mom didn’t feel good, so he should have left her alone.

Why did he want me in trouble more than he wanted Mom to feel better?

“Levi hates me,” I declared, speaking the words I’d felt inside me for a while now.

Mom sighed.

Zephyr frowned.

But neither of them told me I was wrong.