Burning for You (Blackwater) Read Online Free PDF Page A

catalyst?” I ask.  “I want to know what that means.”
    “You’re always so impatient,”
Isabel says, picking up a piece of cheese and tearing it apart with her long
nails.  “I was going to explain.  Your dad is your mother’s catalyst.  A
catalyst is the person who makes you realize your full potential.  Your mother
has powers that she can no longer use when your dad isn’t around.”
    “Powers?” I say.  “Like
witchcraft?”
    “Like witchcraft,” Isabel agrees. 
“Or crafting.  You already knew that you come from a long line of crafters.”  I
nod.  That’s never been a secret.  On both my father’s and my mother’s side of
the family, there have been crafters the whole way back, as far as we can
trace.  It’s something you grow up knowing about in Blackwater, but you aren’t
allowed to talk about as a child.  My parents were never open about crafting
and their own abilities.  I’d suspected as much, from the women who came to see
my mother to ask about the gender of their unborn children, or whether their
daughters would ever be married, or their sons would wind up dead before the
next male in the line would be born.  Lineage is important to people in
Blackwater.  If you can count your family back at least six generations, you’re
solid.  Anything less would be considered a newcomer.  “Since your dad left,”
Isabel continued, “Your mother is empty.  He is her catalyst.  He is what fuels
her craft and gives it life.  Without him, she isn’t able to do what she has
been born to do.”
    “And what exactly is it she can
do?” I ask.  “She’s never bothered to share with me anything about her craft. 
She’s shut me out my entire life.”
    Isabel smiles and takes another
bite of her eggs.  The steaming forkful pops into her mouth and comes out
clean.  “Do I need to teach you the elementals?” she asks.
    I shake my head.  “No, I know what
it means.  Elementals are what element in nature controls your craft, like
earth, air, fire and water.”
    She nods.  “Good.  So you know
something.”
    “Everyone in Blackwater knows
that.”
    She shrugs.  “I suppose.  You’d be
surprised.  Your mother is a water elemental.  Water elementals have the
ability to know things.  They can see things others can’t see.”
    “You mean like you?” I ask.  Isabel
nods.  “But wait, you said that without my dad as my mother’s catalyst, she
can’t craft.  How can you craft?  Was your husband your catalyst?”
    “Hell no,” Isabel says.  “The only
thing that man was good for was getting me out of my mother’s house.”  She
pauses and her hand flutters to her chest with a flash of sparkle from her
nails.  “Did I ever tell you about Nerita?”
    “You mean your twin sister that
died?” I ask her.  Isabel’s eyes lower and she nods.  I remember hearing the
story about her twin sister that fell out of a window and broke her neck when
she was only six.  “Was she your catalyst?”
    “She still is,” Isabel says,
pulling her necklace out from under her shirt.  It’s a locket that’s the most
modest piece of jewelry that she owns, but she’s always wearing it.  She opens
it up and I see a small tuft of something that looks like hair inside, the
exact color as Isabel’s.  “As long as I have this piece of her on me, I will
have my craft.  It will never be as strong as when she was alive, but I still
have it.”
    “I see,” I say, mystified.  “So
when you said I met my catalyst, how did you know?”
    “Because you’re ignited,” she
says.  “I can feel it all over you.  You’re radiating heat and energy.”
    “Ugh, now you’re reading my aura?”
I say with a smirk. Something about what she is saying is ringing true with me,
though.  I’m feeling different this morning than I did yesterday morning.  Of
course, yesterday I woke up knowing I’d be leaving Michael.  Today I woke up
knowing I’d left Michael and that chapter of my