Lumière's Arc

Chapter 4 of 5

Lumière walked with his plain face and his one pink streak. Beneath his collar, the pendant pulled. It grew warm when he faced the hills and cold when he turned away. He learned to trust it. The key wanted him to find others like himself. He followed its tug up a winding slope, past iron gates, toward a great house on the ridge. He stopped behind a low wall. The pendant burned now, hot against his chest. Someone gifted was close. Then he saw why. On the wide lawn stood a boy his own age, arms raised to the gray sky. The clouds churned above him. A thread of lightning bent down and touched his open palms. It did not burn him. It curled around his fingers like a tame snake. The boy shaped it, split it, let it fade. He wore a dark blue coat stitched with silver thread. A rich boy, kept behind gates. Yet here he stood, catching the storm. Lumière's heart raced. This was proof. He was not the only one. He climbed the wall and dropped onto the grass. The boy spun. The lightning snapped out. His eyes went wide, and he backed away. "Wait," Lumière said. He raised both hands to show they were empty. "I saw what you did. I'm like you. I have a gift too." "You shouldn't be here," the boy said. His voice shook. "No one is supposed to see." "What's your name?" Lumière asked. He stepped closer, slow. "I want to help. There are others. We could stand together instead of hiding." The boy shook his head hard. "You don't understand. My family hides me for a reason. If they knew—if the hunters knew—" He glanced at the house, then at the gate. Fear filled his face. "They won't find you through me," Lumière said. "I'm hunted too. That's why I'm searching. To build a place where we don't have to hide." The boy hesitated. For one breath he looked like he might listen. Then a door opened somewhere in the great house. A voice called out across the lawn. The boy flinched as if struck. "I can't," he said. "Please go." He turned and ran toward the house. His coat flapped. Something small dropped from his pocket and fell to the grass, but he did not stop. The door swallowed him, and he was gone. Lumière crossed the lawn and knelt. A white handkerchief lay in the grass. Fine cloth, folded once. In the corner, stitched in blue thread, was a single word: Harlow. He closed his fist around it. He had found one of his own at last, and lost him in the same breath. But now he had a name. He would come back for the boy who caught lightning. He would find a way past those gates.