Free Tethered 02 - Conjure by Jennifer Snyder

standing outside of a school. They both had dark hair and wide smiles. The one on the right looked like a younger version of Mrs. Yates, but it was the one on the left that made my breath catch in my throat.
    There was no doubt the girl was my mother; the similarities between us were uncanny. The list I’d compiled over the years as I’d stared at my reflection in the mirror ticked through my mind as I checked things off one by one. Same shade of hair. Same nose. Same eyes that were a mixture of both brown and green. It was as though I were looking at a picture of a teenage girl who could be my sister.
    “I’ve read this book before. It’s pretty cool,” Callie said as she flipped through it. “My mom uses it to do Tea Reading sometimes.”
    I pulled my eyes away from the picture to glance at Callie. “Tea Readings? What’s that?”
    “Oh, it’s when you use loose-leaf tea to tell someone’s fortune.”
    “Your mom can do that? How does it work?” I was mystified.
    She wiggled the book in her hand. “It’s all in here. And yeah, she can. It’s actually pretty fun. Do you wanna try it? I taught myself about a year or so ago.”
    “I’d love to!”
    “Cool, we’ll go to my house in a bit,” she said. She set the book on the table. “Do you want to look at the pictures I brought now or eat first?”
    “Both,” I said, reaching for the éclair I could still smell and taking a tiny bite. Bliss exploded on my tongue.
    Callie scooped up the stack of pictures from the counter and leaned toward me a little more.
    “This is my mom with yours. It was their junior year in high school, I think,” she said, holding the picture out to me. “That’s the school in the background.”
    “Your mom was so young looking,” I said.
    “I know.” She took a bite of her éclair. “Does your mom look like you imagined her?”
    I hesitated in answering. “Yeah, I guess she does.” The image I’d created in my head had already been replaced and I wasn’t sure what my made-up version was anymore. I didn’t know if I’d even been close.
    “You look just like her, you know. You guys have the same eyes and everything.”
    “I know.”
    “Is it weird seeing her for the first time?” Callie asked softly.
    I shrugged a shoulder and took another bite. “Kind of, yeah. It’s a strange feeling really. I don’t know how to explain it.”
    “Here’s another one,” Callie said, holding out another picture. “This is one of the entire group. There’s Kace’s dad. That’s Adam’s mom right there, and mine and your mom’s are beside her. Admer is the one standing off to the side a little.”
    I zeroed in on Admer in the picture. He was handsome back then. His face was baby smooth and his hair was a dark brown and cleanly cut. His looks weren’t what caught my attention, nor was where he was standing—off to the side like a loner—it was who he was staring at in the picture: my mother. Had there been something going on between them? Was Kace right? Was Admer my father?
    “Did my mom ever date anyone in the group?” I asked, going for nonchalant, but failing miserably.
    “Umm, no,” Callie said with a slight amount of disgust entering her tone. “There was only Kace’s dad and Admer. Your mom dated a non-Elemental, Talan. There’s a picture of the two of them in here somewhere….” she trailed off. She shuffled through the pictures until she found the one she was looking for. “Here he is. Wasn’t he a cutie? I mean, even though he was your dad and all.”
    My heart stopped for a moment. I braced myself as I leaned in to look at him. It was a picture of my mother sitting on top of a picnic table outside. She was gazing at an opened textbook in her lap. She bit the eraser end of her pencil while she read. The guy beside her held a textbook in his lap too. He was writing something on a piece of paper. I took in his light features—dirty blond hair, fair skin, and a slightly crooked nose. This was my