Free The Last Alignment: Cry of the Scorpions by Nathaniel Stewart Page B

disappointment. “Wait,” she said trying to settle her now racing
mind. “Grandma, if you, Charles, Kate and…I’m sorry, I don’t know
you…”
    “ I’m Emma, dear,” the
woman said kindly.
    “ Nice to meet you,” Awbrey
said. “If you guys aren’t ‘Wielders’ anymore and Sylvia is, and
she’s Zander’s mother, then does that mean that-”
    “ It means that currently,
Sylvia, O’Ryann, Tyler, and Pamela are the present Wielders.
Nicolas was as well,” Oren added somewhat bowing to
Androse.
    “ My Mom ,” Natalye spurted out.
    “ Yes, Pamela is a
Wielder,” said Sylvia. Awbrey looked at Natalye and saw that she
had tears in her eyes.
    “ Grandma, this whole
time-”
    “ Yes, Natalye,” Emma said
consolingly. Natalye bit the insides of her cheeks clearly in an
effort to keep quiet. “Most of you have had very unfortunate
circumstances growing up, I’m afraid. A lot of your parents…they
changed, for lack of a better word, but there are reasons why they
did.”
    Awbrey’s eyes hadn’t left
Natalye. There was something about the look on her face that she
identified with and then she noticed the absence of certain people
that should be there with them; her father, Hudson’s father, and
Natalye’s mother. They were all Wielders and would be passing their
powers down to them in a little over a month, yet they were nowhere
to be seen. Then Awbrey remembered her mother yelling over the
phone, “What do you mean you’re too busy,” “It’s your
responsibility to tell her, not Oren’s,”
and it sank in, filling Awbrey with a renewed disgust for her
father. He is such a fucking
asshole , she thought disbelievingly. She
didn’t think O’Ryann could be any worse of a dad and yet he always
seemed to manage.
    “ Your parents went through
a lot,” Emma continued. Yeah , well
my father has put us through quite a bit too , Awbrey thought. “Yes, they are Wielders, but at the same
time, they are human. There were things that they had to do that no
normal person would ever dream they had to. There were things that
they had to see that-”
    “ What reason could there
possibly be,” Awbrey questioned, unable to resist the compulsion.
“My parents used to be so happy together and then before I knew it,
they were divorced. There is no reason that can possibly justify
him changing up on us the way that he did.” Anger started to rise
in her when she thought about how all of those years that her
grandmother trained her to use her powers could have been time
spent with her father if they had indeed had a good and healthy
relationship. Awbrey loved Oren and despised O’Ryann, but there
were still parts of her that wanted that father-daughter bond.
Knowing now what she was and how much more directly connected she
and her father were only made Awbrey feel somewhat closer to
O’Ryann and she hated it. “Don’t sit there and tell me that being a
Wielder all of a sudden made my dad treat my mom like-”
    “ Awbrey ,” Hallie said tearfully. “Please listen. Do not disrespect
her.” Awbrey locked eyes with her mother and could see the
seriousness in Hallie’s face. Relaxing, she settled back into her
chair and Hudson put his arm around her and pulled her closer to
him.
    “ It’s okay, Hallie,” said
Emma. “No, Awbrey. That isn’t what I was saying at all. Though
being a Wielder is life changing in and of itself, it was the
duties that came with the territory that changed all of your
parents. You have to be so much stronger, braver, and wiser than
the average person. It altered us, and it will no doubt transform
the five of you as well. Unfortunately, though, I think Awbrey,
Hudson, and Natalye got the worst of it.”
    “ How can you say that? My
father is dead,” Androse spoke up. “I never even got to know him.
You don’t think that’s ‘the worst of it?’”
    “ Androse!” Charles and
Regina had both shouted.
    “ Androse, that is
certainly not what I meant,” Emma said going a