Quan ordered Cassie to pull over when they'd cleared the busier part of town.
"Turn in there." He pointed to a dark street marked with a subdivision sign yet no residential lights behind it.
They wound through the curving streets past the few occupied homes, stopping when they reached the end where several yet unpurchased homes backed up to another street still mid construction. Victims of the housing market glut, these partially built skeletons stood forgotten, already weathering in the extreme Florida climate, their fates uncertain.
"Show me what happened with Pritchard." Quan opened his door and stepped out of the vehicle, his body breaking the beams and casting a long shadow on the frame of the home beyond. The timing of his exit removed any hope of disagreement. Not that the odd man would humor one anyway.
Cassie put her hands on the wheel, the adrenaline rushing through her making it hard to hear outside her own head. "Be right there." She mumbled, the thread of confidence that had begun to weave itself into her consciousness after tonight's incident had passed leaving her usual doubt in its place.
The dome light stayed on, illuminating the remaining occupants. Julia paused with her hand on the door, eyes following Quan as he moved past the scope of the headlights and into the darkness beyond. "There are two fronts for us to cover now, Pritchard and the Carters. Quan loves a challenge you know he'll want Pritchard. That leaves you with Drew to wait here for Brandon's return. He's scared but he trusts you." She waved off her partner's dubious frown. "I see it in him and so do you. Don't be afraid, Cassie." The experienced woman attempted to encourage her. "This could be the breakthrough Anna's been waiting for, that we've all been waiting for. We need to know if you can handle it."
Julia's reminder that her career rested on her functionality didn't help the lead balloon in her chest. It wasn't enough that she'd made a connection with her magick, now she had to show she could command it. The incident in the club might be a fluke and Cassie feared she wouldn't be able to reproduce it at will.
Again she called up the image of her father's pride on the day she was accepted into the Academy. It had been a given granted her lineage but it had given her father a rush nonetheless. It was the need to see that pride in his eyes again that drove her, the need to make good and to show her grandmother that her mother's blood had not made her weak.
It was vital that she prove her merit by honoring both of her parents' contributions to her powers and be able to provide for her family. To be able to quash the rumors at Veritas and on the reservation as well as in her own father's house that her mixed blood made her weak and confused the spirits so that they could not hear her prayers. With a juvenile stubbornness, Cassie wanted to show them all she was one of the good ones while it was the flip side of that very coin, the one that was far easier to believe, giving her the crippling doubt in herself that she never would.
Sighing, she turned off the car and opened her door to join Julia now waiting by the front of the car to help her trudge over the uncertain terrain. "Please don't let me screw this up." She muttered to whatever spirits or gods might be listening. Quite frankly she would be loyal to any of them right now if they would claim her and help her to keep her job.
"Over here," Quan called out, moving to make himself visible in the partial moonlight.
They closed the distance, stopping a few strides away. Julia made certain Cassie was stable and stepped out of the line of fire.
"How far apart were you in the club?" He wasted no time in getting started.
Eyeing the distance, Cassie teetered two hop steps forward. "This is about right."
"Tell me exactly what happened."
This time making certain to hit on all the details, Cassie relived the potentially life changing moment. "I stumbled and when my hand came off of Drew's arm, that's when my circle broke." Letting her thoughts be spoken aloud, "I lost my confidence but then when he caught me again I could tell the ring was transferring some of its influence over to me. I felt like I could do anything."
"Is that why you chose to attack instead of cast another circle?"
Cassie took Quan's remark to be accusatory. "There wasn't enough time and I could feel the energy building in my hand. It had never felt like that before, it felt right." Cassie realized she was giving them more insight into the depth of her problem than she'd intended. Quickly adding, "Then, I pushed." She wished she could see his expression. Julia was nibbling on her lip, she was nervous.
"Show me," Quan ordered.
Cassie was going to argue then she saw his stance shift and his hands go up, palms facing one another yet not quite touching like he was praying. Quan was pulling power. The bright blue light flared in the space between his palms and hung there, waiting to do his will. Cassie began muttering an incantation, the instinct to cast a circle ingrained from her earliest years.
The shock when he hit her was relatively minor considering she'd seen him knock three rogue witches down with one blast. This one blew her back about four feet landing her squarely on her backside. Julia hurried in to help her struggle to her feet. Meanwhile, the ankle was screaming at her, fresh blood leaked from the reopened cheek laceration and she was fairly certain she was going to have a huge bruise on her butt from a rock that had surely torn her skirt.
"I'm not really dressed for this exercise." She muttered crossly, brushing herself off with Julia's help to stabilize.
Her older partner snorted in amusement.
There was no sympathy from Quan either. "What did you do differently?" She could hear that smart tone and picture the raised eyebrow. He knew full well what she'd done.
Feeling vastly less glamorous than she had at the start of the evening, Cassie groaned. "I couldn't help it, it's a habit to cast a circle first. Protection's good you know."
"And were you in a protective circle at Carter's?"
"No, I..." Cassie hadn't earned the right to argue, not with her track record. Biting her tongue she swallowed her sarcastic comments.
Quan moved into the light. "Then you should not be in one now."
"I know, but it's a habit..." Cassie repeated, wincing at the whine she heard in her tone.
"Your habits do not work." The clouds shifted and the moonlight framed his face in half shadow, casting his features in a ghoulish mien. "It is time for new ones."
A response was neither necessary nor expected. Quan waited barely long enough for Julia to get out of the way before his palms came together again. This time, Cassie was ready and made a conscious effort not to cast a protective spell.
What struck her was the intentional lack of preparedness she had to maintain. In her training with her mother and then at the Academy she had been taught to first cast a circle to protect herself before opening herself up to any external power sources such as she did to cast a spell. Grandmother didn't agree with Veronica's different spells, yet hers was a magick built upon ceremony as well and both women had drawn their power from the elements.
Though they were different elements, Water and Earth, they used a similar caste system which was why Cassie had attempted to merge them. It was also that blur between the different elements she was inviting into her body's energy balance that made it hard to differentiate enough to know what was stuck. With that clog unstuck, her mind and energy balance were easily able to restore themselves and automatically seemed to draw the energy she needed from either of the elements available.
Cassie's new style diverged from both of her parents' ritualistic types, favoring a free form she was having trouble reconciling after such a long time practicing and drilling complex and simple spells.
Taking a deep breath, Cassie held her hands palms out toward the ground and relaxed. The water was not far below the ground here, she could feel it coursing beneath her feet, at the same time feeling the roots of trees and plants long dead and decomposing in the ground. She could feel it flood her body. The skin from her feet all the way up her sides tingled and raised goose flesh as the energy raced up and down, igniting her nerves until her entire body seemed to hum.
Directing it to her hand, she gathered and wound it into a writhing, swirling ball of blues and browns eager for release. When it had grown to the size of a softball, and Cassie felt the colorful mass fighting to flow back into her or unravel and fling out in a chaotic wave, she saw Quan's hands spreading apart from their prayer position. As they spread, beginning to fan, the bright blue ball of power sparked from within ready for its own unleashing. He was a breath away from launching his attack as Cassie let hers fly to strike first.
A bright burst of light marked where her attack hit Quan squarely in the chest followed by a surprised cry as he was thrown backward, arms wheeling to land in a heap against a pile of construction debris behind him.
"Crap. Quan, are you okay?" Cassie stumbled and hopped her way over to him. Julia left her to manage on her own to check that she hadn't in fact incinerated their male counterpart.
By the time they reached him, he was already sitting up and patting the smoldering fabric on his shirt. As experienced as he was, Quan wouldn't have let her hit him on purpose. Would he? Cassie could see that he had blocked most of the force but some had definitely gotten through his defenses.
She'd actually scored on him! She couldn't believe it. Forcing herself to breathe through her nose while holding her lips firmly in her teeth Cassie was able to keep herself from grinning and laughing like an idiot.
The smell of burnt cotton and residual goose flesh were evidence of victory. Something had changed in her magick. That fact was now indisputable. Twice, not just the one fluke, but twice she had successfully used this less organized method of manipulating her elements. Elements, not element she noted with an "aha."
Two had to be balanced and maintained within her for her magick to work. Mixed blood didn't mean choosing one, it meant making them work side by side and avoiding either one from building up to outweigh the other. Cassie struggled to maintain her composure. She couldn't tell if she wanted to cry for how stupid she'd been or if she wanted to pump her fists in the air and dance. It was so simple! How had she not seen it before now? Jim Salter was going to get the best ceramic kitty money could buy.
"What was that? It looks and feels completely different from what she's been doing." It could have been her imagination but Cassie thought she heard something akin to fear in Julia's voice.
Head canted to the side curiously, Quan studied his young partner. "I believe you have found the key to your power Cassie."
She took a few breaths to slow her racing heart. "Really?" What it meant was sinking in. Cassie's emotions threatened to overwhelm her.
He allowed himself to be helped up, brushing dust off his pants while he answered. "Your channels were blocked and your magick could not find its balance within you. You've learned to open yourself up and let your powers flow through you in harmony. They will no longer be at war inside you."
Eyes pricking with happiness turned incredulous as Cassie blinked rapidly. "You knew what the problem was? You knew this whole time I just had to 'clear my channels'?" Sarcasm dripped from her words. Salter's mention had been the first she'd even heard of such a thing. "Why didn't anybody say anything?"
"Magick is individual, as unique to the witch as her thoughts. The teachings can only go so far. When the student has her knowledge, she must apply what she knows to what she feels in her powers. No one can do it for her." Quan shook his head mildly. "Being mixed merely complicates things. If you would have tried to force your power to copy another's, it would have driven you mad."
Embarrassed that she'd been such a heavy burden to so many who had watched her, waiting for her to go nuts or blow herself up, angry that it had taken this long for her to figure things out Cassie snapped her mouth shut and covered her face. Yelling at her partners wouldn't do anybody any good. Instead she let the hot wave roll over her and felt it pass, taking with it the last of her strength leaving her exhausted and drained.
Speaking in her low voice lilting hauntingly in the darkness, Julia put a hand on Cassie's shoulder. "Now that we have you figured we can finally teach you some things."
The three ran through a few more exercises before headlights twisting through the streets told them it was time to move on. Cassie leaned heavily on Julia's arm on the way back to the car, sweating and completely spent.
"You've done well Cassie." The older woman patted her arm. "Anna will be pleased."
Exhausted and simultaneously elated, Cassie sniffed. "I hope she hasn't already made up her mind that I'm beyond hope."
"We haven't." Julia's teeth flashed in the moonlight. "We aren't your partners if we aren't willing to help you Cassie."
All three were quiet on the ride back to the hotel. Quan assisted Cassie into the building while Julia hung back to have an employee help her with the bags. The last three rooms on the top floor were theirs. Julia and Cassie were on the same side with an adjoining door, Quan's room lay across the hall.
Julia knocked on the door adjoining their rooms with Cassie's bag. They'd left it open and she came through to leave the bag on the side chair. Cassie sat on the edge of the bed, her eyes beginning to droop.
"Quan's called Anna to update her." She eyed the dirty, once tan wrap and the overall disheveled appearance. Cassie looked like she'd been in a bar fight and hadn't necessarily done all that well. "We'll have a healer here by breakfast for that ankle." She frowned and leaned in to examine Cassie's cheek. "They ought to be able to keep the scarring down to a minimum. I'm going to wash up and then if you'd like to join me I was going to get myself some food downstairs." Her deep brown eyes sparkled, "I heard they have a real Creole chef here. What I would give for good etouffee."
Her voice trailed off.
Her stomach fluttered at the thought that Quan had already reported the good news to Anna. Excitement won out over the nerves that came with knowing if she was a full fledged Investigator a lot more would be expected of her. It was still a very real possibility that she could get her partners in trouble or let everyone down. "Thanks Julia but I'm probably just going to get some room service after a really, really long, hot shower. I'm beat."
"All right, I'll be downstairs if you change your mind." With a wave, Julia walked back through their shared door closing it with a click after her.
Cassie turned the lock for privacy and hopped to the bathroom, her head reeling from the day's events. A hot shower, a light dinner and maybe some ice on the side for her ankle were about all she could imagine wanting tonight. She was almost right. She barely ate her dinner and got her foot resting under a bag of ice before she fell asleep. Cassie didn't move until the alarm went off at eight.