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heat. The fire crackled and sizzled and spoke to her, ‘lightning man’. When the dream felt she was sufficiently warmed, the fire died down, but did not disappear.
    As her eyes adjusted to the dimming light, Shawn appeared across the fire. She sat completely still, a strange calm forcing its way inside her. Still, the tainted air kept her alert.
    ‘They call me mellow yellow…’ the words to the 1960’s song vibrated through her head.
    Shawn smiled, his expression friendly, but his eyes cold. As she shivered once again the fire flared up. It grew and grew, fueled by an intruding wind until everything was consumed.
     
    * * *
     
    I spent the majority of the next day evading Vayu’s attempts to examine me. I was bribed with more bouts of sunshine, food, and massages but didn’t care to have Vayu’s amateur hands probing me God knows where. I only got rid of him once I sold out Alex’s hiding place. As Vayu walked off excitedly, I sent a silent apology to Alex, knowing it wouldn’t be received. He didn’t have the same abilities as the rest of us.
    Searching for something to do, I found myself in Cato’s library. Scanning the walls of books for something to read, I was disappointed to find no fiction; just rows and rows of boring textbooks, some dating back to the 1800s.
    How accurate can those be? I wondered.
    Distracted by the books’ uselessness, I turned, knocking over one of the stacks of books. They scattered, mixing in with notepads and loose papers on the floor.
    “Crap,” I muttered at the room. I was going to have to get used to my changing body.
    “Is that you Kaitlyn?” Cato called from deeper within the library.
    “Yes, yes,” I responded, trying to put the pile back in some order. Not that it had had much of one before. “I’m coming.”
    Making my way to the sound of Cato’s voice was a trial. His office was ten times more packed than it was the last time I’d seen it, something that should not have even been possible. I worked my way around an especially large pile of junk and found Cato sitting at a desk under the giant tree growing in the middle of the room. The tree looked diseased. Its leaves drooped, some turning brown. The lack of sun was affecting more than just us humans.  
    Cato cleared his throat, averting my attention from the tree. Micah sat across the desk from Cato, settled on a torn, ratty couch.
    “This is the letter Micah brought home from your trip to the states.” Cato motioned to a letter. “We have been studying it for the last few hours. On the surface it doesn’t make much sense, but we believe it is coded. Do you want to look?”
    I stepped closer to the desk after a sideways glance at Micah and leaned over the letter.
     
    Prepare Your Fire And Rock my Worthiest opponent, in Mass quantities.
     
    The subject line sat written in clear print across the top.
     
    Cato continued, “The first line serves as a key to the rest of the letter. We are assuming any word not capitalized is not part of the key. There are several words and phrases we have pulled out; although it is likely more than one key exists to create different messages. Then we will just have to guess which message he is trying to send. Unless of course, anything here jumps out at you?”
    Cato pushed his notebook toward me and I scanned over the list of words.
     
    ruin kim
    warm
    wary
    eye norm
    pour a worm
    ray of arts
    aye dot
    princess
     
    I didn’t need to review the entire list; I knew it when I saw it. They should have guessed by the simple clarity of the word.
    “Princess - it’s what Shawn calls me,” I said it quietly, hesitantly, but there was no sense in hiding the fact. I looked at Micah but couldn’t read his expression. Cato took back the notebook and began to decipher the rest of the letter. Taking a seat on the dusty couch next to Micah, I could feel his eyes boring into me from the side. I turned to face him. “What?”
    He looked a second more, face stony. Finally, his